The Haunting of Number 12, Grimmauld Place

Harry cut him off as he started up the stairs. "Well, then you'll be happy to know that you can tell the neighbors that I've gone back early to St. Brutus to get some extra beatings, okay?" The St. Brutus Secure Center for Incurably Criminal Boys was the place the Dursleys told their neighbors and relatives that Harry went to school, instead of explaining about Hogwarts. "I'm going to spend the rest of this pathetic holiday with my friends!" He waved the letter in the general direction of Uncle Vernon's tomato-like face, and disappeared upstairs into his room, letting the bedroom door slam shut behind him.

Harry dragged his trunk out from his closet and threw his schoolbooks and other necessary items inside. He carefully coaxed Errol into the owl cage with Hedwig (who didn't seem terribly keen on having to share the already limited space with another owl), then dragged the bulky luggage downstairs and out the front door to the sidewalk, ignoring the protests of his aunt and uncle as he passed. After a few blocks of walking, he stuck out his wand hand and didn't even blink when a violently purple triple-decker bus suddenly screeched into sight and opened its door to let him on.

"Harry! There you are!" called out a familiar voice as Harry handed the requisite thirteen sickles to Stan Shunpike and collected his cup of hot chocolate. Harry looked up to see the familiar red-haired and freckly features of his friend Ron as the gangly young man made his way up the aisle between the brass bedsteads inside the bus. Ron turned towards Stan the conductor and said, "He'll be back here with me, we're both continuing on to London."

Once Harry's trunk was safely stowed and Errol had been removed from Hedwig's cage and put back into an empty one that Ron brought with him, the two boys sat on Ron's assigned bed while Ron brought Harry up to date. "Right, it's Dad's latest mad project, trying to examine a house that doesn't have any actual ghosts or what have you, just one that's sort of mental all by itself. And he wants other people besides just himself watching, so he can compare notes." Ron glanced around cautiously, but the only other passenger on the first level of the bus was a loudly-snoring witch with bluish-grey hair three bedsteads away. "So, er...Snuffles said he had a house that would probably do for that."

Harry nearly dropped the cup of hot chocolate that he was carefully sipping at while the bus lurched along. The steaming beverage didn't quite spill, but it sloshed threateningly. "Snuffles?!" he said in a whispered exclamation. That was the code name for Harry's godfather Sirius Black, since one never knew who might be listening and interested in collecting the reward being offered for finding and turning in the infamous escapee from Azkaban prison. "You mean we're going to the Shrieking Shack?"

Ron shook his head. "Nope - it's another place, in London. And it's where you're going, not me." Ron got a glum expression on his face, and his shoulders sagged a bit. "I'm staying behind. Mum and Ginny and the Twins are helping Percy move out of The Burrow and into a flat in London, and I said I'd help them."

Harry peered at Ron in confusion. "But your Dad's letter said it would be you, me and Hermione helping him out. Why are you skiving off? I thought it sounded fantastic, the three of us exploring a haunted house?"

Ron's cheeks turned a distinct shade of pink underneath his freckles. "Well, um, Hermione and I had something of a spat, and...look, I just think it might be best for me to give her a bit of distance, you know? You know how she is when she's upset. Maybe I'll join you guys next week if you say she's calmed down a bit." And after this, Ron was deliberately closed-mouthed on the subject of Hermione for the rest of the trip.

Eventually, Knight Bus pulled up short on a slummy London street, and Ron perked his ears up as Shunpike announced that they'd reached Grimmauld Place in London. Ron helped Harry unload his trunk and birdcage from the bus, then handed over an envelope with Harry's name upon it. "Happy Birthday then, Harry," Ron said with a lopsided smile.

"But Ron," Harry replied. "I don't know where I'm going when I get off of this bus. I don't see your Dad or anyone out here. Which house am I supposed to go to?"

Ron pointed to the envelope. "Just open that up and read it, once we're away. You'll find it soon enough after that." And then he turned back to Stan and the bus-driver, Ernie Prang. "Right then, back to The Burrow in Ottery St. Catchpole for me."

"Taking the Grand Tour, ain'tcha?" asked Stan. "That'll be another eleven sickles, then. Unless you'd like 'ot chocolate. Then it's firteen."

Harry watched as Ron handed over eleven sickles to the conductor, then waved as Ernie Prang pulled the door closed and revved the engine of the triple-decker bus. The enormous vehicle lurched off down the street, toppling over a row of garbage bins set out on the sidewalk for the trash collector, before it disappeared around a corner. He glanced nervously at the decrepit state of the tenements and shops, while the wail of a police siren echoed through the night air not far away. Harry opened up the envelope that Ron had given him, finding a folded piece of parchment and a book of matches within. He unfolded the parchment to read:

Harry walked to a rubbish bin and used the matches to set the parchment aflame, then prodded the charred remains with the tip of his wand so that they crumbled into unreadable ash. Then he walked down the street, reading the numbers on the buildings carefully until he came to a place where Number 11 was right next to Number 13. Maybe the even numbered houses were on the other side of the street? Harry turned about and shaded his eyes, peering at the structures opposite him. But their numbers didn't fit with this theory, and besides, there was Number 14 on the other side of the building to Harry's right when he turned back to the houses nearest him. But the note that Ron gave me said that Black's house was Number 12 Grimmauld Place in London, Harry thought to himself. And immediately as he thought, something began to happen. It was really as if an extra house had inflated, shoving Number 11 and Number 13 off to each side as Number 12 pushed its way into existence between them. Harry gaped at the newly-revealed structure, with its tarnished door knocker, its dirty walls and grimy windows. The house was vile. Harry shivered and thought to himself, the words coming freely into his mind - The House of Black is vile, it is diseased; get away from here at once.

No human eye can isolate the unhappy coincidence of line and place which suggests evil in the face of a house, and yet somehow a maniac juxtaposition, a badly-turned angle, some chance meeting of roof and sky, turned Number 12 Grimmauld Place into a place of despair - more frightening because the face of Number 12 seemed awake, with a watchfulness from the blank windows and a touch of dour disapproval in the eyebrow of a cornice. It was a house without kindness, not a fit place for people or for love or for hope. Exorcism cannot alter the countenance of a house; Number 12 would stay as it was until it was destroyed.

For an instant Harry was taken off guard, even momentarily afraid, listening to the sick voice inside him which whispered, Get away from here, get away! But this is what I came so far to find, Harry told himself in response. I can't go back. Besides, this is Sirius' house - and after going into the Shrieking Shack, he would laugh at me if I turned away from some house in town.

And so Harry dragged his trunk up the step and set Hedwig's cage down upon the cement stoop in front of the shabby, paint-scratched door. He brought his hand up to the silver knocker that had the form of a twisted serpent to draw it back and strike the door -- when the door opened without warning, and Harry looked down to see an aged house elf clad only in a filthy loincloth-like rag around its middle. Its skin seemed to be several times too big for it, and though it was bald like all house-elves, there was a quantity of white hair growing out of its large, batlike ears. Its eyes were rather bloodshot and watery grey, and its fleshy nose was large and rather snoutlike.

Harry stared for a moment and started to speak, but the elf made a distinct, gravelly shhhhhing noise, taking Harry's trunk in one hand. Harry quickly picked up Hedwig's cage himself and stepped in through the door, pausing in the long foyer while the elf secured various locks and chains upon the door. Breaking the silence, Harry said uncertainly, "I'm Harry Potter. I'm expected."

The house elf grunted a bit, and there was a soft hissing noise as old-fashioned gas lamps sputtered into life all along the walls, casting a flickering insubstantial light over the peeling wallpaper and threadbare carpet of a long, gloomy hallway. A cobwebby chandelier glimmered overhead, and age-blackened portraits hung crookedly on the walls. A heavy staircase arched upwards to the upper floor of the house at the far end of the hallway.

When Harry tried to speak again, it was as if his voice was drowned in the dim stillness, with only the serpentine hiss of the lamps to fill it. "Can you take me to my room? I, uh...gather I'm the first one here? Or is Mr. Weasley, or Sirius Black already here?"

The elf seemed only to mutter to itself as it took Harry's trunk up the stairs and along a dark hallway, before throwing open one of the doors to reveal a dank, dark bedroom papered in an uncomfortable blue latticework pattern. The room contained a curtained bed, wardrobe, dresser and dusty chair, and the only decoration upon the walls was one blank painting in an ornate frame...although when Harry passed by the picture, he was sure that he could hear a faint snickering from someone just out of view.

"This is the Blue Room, Young Master," said the elf, adding on under his breath, "Is it true? Kreacher can see the scar, it must be true, that's the boy who stopped the Dark Lord, Kreacher wonders how he did it..."

Harry cleared his throat uncomfortably as he set Hedwig's cage down upon the bureau and opened up the door to let the owl fly out and stretch her wings. "It's nice," he said unconvincingly, looking around. "Where are the..."

"Kreacher sets dinner on the dining-room sideboard at six sharp," the grotesque servant interrupted. "I have breakfast ready for Young Master and others at nine. That's the way Kreacher has been told to do. Oh, my poor Mistress, if she knew, if she knew the scum they've let in her house, what would she say to old Kreacher..."

The sound of a door slamming downstairs caused Harry to jump, and he said cautiously, "Say, the houses on either side of us...they can't see this house here, can they? Can they ever hear what goes on...?"

Kreacher's orb-like eyes widened. "Filthy muggle houses cannot see or hear anything in Number 12!" the house elf said in a hoarse, deep voice like a bullfrog's. "Especially not after dark. No, not after it begins to get dark..."

"Yes," Harry said, shifting back a step uncomfortably.

"So they wouldn't be around, the vermin, if Young Master needed help!" continued Kreacher, his muttering running over any reply Harry opened his mouth to give. "They couldn't even hear you, the smutty creatures, in the night."

"Right," Harry said uncertainly. "I don't suppose..."

"No one could," Kreacher croaked in a dire, solemn manner. "The charms are far too strong. No one will come near, except those who know of the house, and so few, so few know it even exists! No one shall come."

"Uh, I know..." said Harry, now backed into a chair and sitting down involuntarily.

"In the night," the house elf intoned, almost like a spell incantation, before its thin lips peeled back in what might have been a smile, or at the very least a baring of teeth. "In the dark." And with that, the withered servant turned about, and disappeared with a snap of its fingers - leaving Harry alone in the room with his owl.

The entire episode with the aged house elf had so confused and disconcerted Harry that for a few minutes, he just sat and looked around at the room. Light came from a modest chandelier hung from the center of the ceiling, and besides the doorway leading out into the hall, Harry noticed a second door in the side of the room. Perhaps a closet, or a communication door with the next guest room down? Just as he was rising to go try the knob, the side door was flung open, and a loud, excited shriek of "Harry!" assaulted his ears as his vision was completely obscured by a large quantity of very bushy hair. Hermione had come rushing through the communication door and thrown her arms around him so suddenly that it nearly knocked Harry to the floor. "Harry, thank heavens you're here! This awful house, I haven't been two minutes in it and already I feel like I've got ice water in my veins..."

Harry straightened up and looked through the doorway. "So you're in there? I've only just gotten here myself. But I think they've made a mistake; they've clearly put me in the embalming room, not a proper guestroom at all."

Hermione looked around Harry's room with a critical eye. "Your room and mine look just alike, although mine's all in green instead of blue. I suppose it might have been worse," Hermione remarked, as she tried to shove the window open a crack in order to relieve the stuffiness in the room. "Although I never imagined the house would just expand like it did when I first saw it. I keep expecting the buildings around to fall in on us."

"They don't fall on you," Harry replied, his gaze falling on the antagonizingly empty picture frame on the wall. "They just slide down, silently and secretly, rolling over you while you try to run away."

Hermione turned from where she was inspecting the dingy state of the bed-curtains. "Goodness, Harry! If I didn't know better, I'd say that Mr. Weasley put you up to making this place seem even spookier than it is. Let's go see if we can find him and Sirius. Somehow, I don't have the desire to stay cooped up in here any more than I have to."

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Harry and Hermione came down the wide staircase and passed through the foyer, a drawing room, a ladies' parlor, a study and a rear hallway, before finding themselves in the kitchen...where Arthur and Sirius stood talking amidst the homey scent of fine cooking. All of Harry's reservations and vague worries were forgotten at the sight of his Godfather, and the four researchers moved into the dining room to have a truly excellent dinner. It was after this, when Harry & Hermione were enjoying a creamy dish of trifle and Arthur & Sirius were drinking after-dinner coffee, that Arthur Weasley lifted his cup and offered a toast: "Our success here at Grimmauld Place!"

"Hear, hear!" said Harry and Hermione in unison.

Sirius crossed his arms at this however, looking at Arthur skeptically. "And how would one reckon success, exactly, in an affair like this?"

"Well, ideally," Arthur clarified, "I hope that all of us will have an exciting time here, and my book will shake up the Journal of Afterlife Studies and the Spirit Division back at Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures!" He took another sip of his coffee, then turned to Harry and Hermione in particular. "I cannot call your visit a holiday jaunt, although it might seem as such. But really, I'm hopeful of your working. Specifically, taking notes." And at this, he handed the two teens a pair of school notebooks, before bestowing a third upon Sirius himself.

"Notes?" Sirius turned a rather incredulous eye upon Arthur as he looked at the clean pages of the notebook.

"Notes," repeated Arthur with a firm tone in his voice. "About anything out of the ordinary that you see occurring, odd dreams or nightmares as you sleep, strange thoughts or worries you have in different places while we're here. And make sure to be descriptive -- this is for science, you know!"

Hermione spoke up, at this point. "But why are we here, specifically?" She had that precise, earnest tone in her voice, as when asking about a fact in class. "I mean, I know that it's partly because of Sirius, and the house being available to us, but...what is wrong with Number 12? How do we know that anything will happen here that's worthy of taking notes about? What really goes on here?" She looked over at Sirius now, before turning back towards Mr. Weasley.

Sirius opened his mouth to respond, but Arthur hastily jumped in ahead of him. "It's really a bit too late at this point, to get into that tonight. But tomorrow is soon enough to talk about it, I think. In daylight..."

Harry shook his head. "Why not now? We might as well know at the start. Hermione and I are curious, and you two already know, I'm guessing?"

"We're not afraid," Hermione said firmly, and continued in such a matter-of-fact tone that it forced Harry to turn his head away and conceal a grin, on account of it being so utterly Hermione-ish. "I really think, Mr. Weasley, that it's best to approach these things from an informed standpoint."

Sirius looked over at Arthur expectantly, and the redheaded wizard sighed. "If I had thought that I could do so," Arthur said ruefully, "I would have preferred not to say a thing at all, about this house and its history - before you've had a chance to experience it for yourselves, without anything influencing your minds. Ideally, of course, you ought not to know anything about Number 12. You should be ignorant, and receptive."

"And taking notes," Harry murmured to himself.

"Notes - yes indeed," Arthur said, drawing out a pipe from an interior pocket of his robes and starting to fill it with tobacco from a small pouch. "Notes. However, since one of our company is already quite familiar with our location..."

Sirius shrugged and muttered at this, saying, "Although like I told you, Arthur, it's changed..."

Arthur continued forward before Sirius could say more, once again. "...I realize that it is most impractical to leave you entirely without background information, largely because you are not people accustomed to meeting a situation without preparation." This time, Arthur smiled warmly at Hermione as he said this, and she blushed at the implied compliment.

At this point Mr. Weasley nodded to Sirius, who commenced with a rather cynical overview of The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, leading the group into the drawing room to point out various names upon an immensely old tapestry that took up an entire wall of the room in its large size. A history of haughty, slavish adherence to the pureblooded wizard ideal followed, forbearers who attempted to have muggle-hunting legalized, relatives who joined the ranks of death eaters and died or were imprisoned as a result...a family tradition of beheading house elves when they became too old to serve, then mounting their heads upon the wall as an example to the elves who came after. Possibly more interesting, however, was the equally important tradition of casting out those who did not support the family values and Toujours Pur motto - here and there upon the tapestry where names should have been were instead burn marks. Sirius' name had been removed when he rejected the family and ran away as a teenager; gone too was the name of the uncle who showed support for him. The name of one of Sirius' cousins who had married a muggleborn wizard was wiped out, and her progeny never listed upon the great record. Arthur happened to chime in about how technically, the Weasley family had connections by marriage to the Blacks, although they wouldn't be found acknowledged upon the official heritage tapestry on account of their 'Blood Traitor' open-minded ways. In short, it was a family that had an age-old legacy of zealous loyalty for an unforgiving code of hate towards anyone who was not like them.

"And of course," Arthur remarked in an enthusiastic tone, "The Blacks had rather a catalogue of colorful events occur over the years. Several wizard duels ending in fatalities, some poisonings...even a hanging, up in the cupola tower. "

Sirius gave a rather bitter smile as he nodded. "All in a day's work for my big, happy family." He snorted in a derisive manner. "And before you ask," he remarked with a cynical tone in his voice, "the hanging was my great-grandmother. They say she did it herself, but...well, the news had just come out that she was carrying a child gotten by a muggle lover, and my great-grandfather surely would've been enraged. Let's just say the timing of her sad demise was...convenient."

Hermione was clearly aghast at this last bit of news. "How horrible! You mean he murdered her?! Where did this happen? Is her ghost about?"

Harry turned to his godfather, puzzled. "But...you never mentioned that you'd grown up in a haunted house. Even the Shrieking Shack wasn't really haunted, though people assumed it was because of Professor Lupin's being there once a month."

"The entrance to the cupola staircase up is over there..." Mr. Weasley pointed to a slightly smaller-looking door off to one side. "...But it's quite firmly locked. No reports of any individual ghosts, though, and that's rather unusual for such an old house. And built upon the foundations of an even older Black manor that had burned down, I believe."

Sirius nodded, glancing around. "That's right, Harry. I didn't mention it. And that's because back then, it wasn't like it is now. Oh, it was an awful place to grow up, all right. And I was grateful to your grandparents for taking me in and making me feel welcome after I ran away from here." He stepped away from the tapestry, looking around distantly, as if seeing his surroundings differently in some way. "But I never returned to Number 12 after I left when I was sixteen, until a few months ago. My brother died, my father somewhat later. And my mother not long after that. And then this house just...sat. By itself, unless you count Kreacher. Kreacher, and the paintings, and nothing else for all those years. And in that time..." He looked back towards Arthur. "Well. Let's just say it's developed kind of a personality of its own."

Arthur took a thoughtful puff from his pipe, and settled upon one of the aged divans in the room before speaking again. "And in addition to that, I think it might not be too fanciful to say that some houses are just 'born bad' - Number 12 was constructed on land that was home to people with rigid, superior beliefs for generations and generations, and in the last decade the house has been unfit for human habitation entirely. Whether it was molded by the people who lived here, or the things they did, or whether it was just purely evil from the start are all questions that neither Sirius nor I can answer. Although naturally I hope that we will know a good deal more about Number 12 before we leave." For a moment he seemed to slip into a reverie, but then he came back to himself. "In any case, we shall watch, listen, and observe. And write down what we observe. I'd also like to note that if at all possible, unless it is utterly and completely necessary...refrain from using your wands while you are here. Even Sirius and I will try to do the same. In addition to being our object of study, this house is Sirius' hiding place from the Ministry, and we don't want to do anything that would attract attention or compromise that."

Sirius rolled his eyes. "My new prison, you mean," he said bitingly.

Arthur cast a worried glance at Sirius before turning back to Harry and Hermione. "So - now you know all there is to tell. Do you want to back out? I assure you, although I feel your assistance in this would be invaluable, I won't be upset if you feel you'd rather not stay in such a dour place as this. You could spend the remainder of the summer at The Burrow, if you'd rather not go back home before it's time to leave for school." This last comment seemed particularly directed towards Harry.

Hermione shook her head firmly. "I think it would be fascinating to help you with this, Mr. Weasley." She gave a broad smile, and looked to Harry for his thoughts on the matter.

"Oh, no, I certainly couldn't let you down, Mr. Weasley," Harry said quickly. "Besides," he added as an afterthought, "I don't think we could leave now, even if we wanted to."

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It was the wee hours of the morning after the group's arrival at Number 12, and Harry was tossing and turning in his bed in the Blue Room. "Coming, Father - Dad, don't go!" He'd twisted up the sheets of his bed around him as he thrashed restlessly in the midst of his dream. In his mind's eye, James Potter was reaching out a hand towards him, even as some mysterious force drew him away through an arching gate. "Father, don't go!"

"Harry?" It was Hermione's voice that intruded into his consciousness, and with a crashing shock Harry was awake. The room was icy cold, and he shivered as he realized that he was at Grimmauld Place and not his regular bedroom in Number 4, Privet Drive.

Hermione stood at the connecting door between her room and Harry's, wearing a plaid flannel nightdress and pale blue dressing gown. "Harry, you're having a nightmare, wake up! Did you hear that noise out in the hallway?"

Harry groped for his glasses on the nightstand and clambered out of bed once they were set on his face. "Noise?" he asked, before the house itself seemed to answer his question - a dull thump that seemed far down the hall, close to the room at the end of the wing that Sirius had pointed out as being the old nursery room he and his brother had played in when they were very young.

Hermione nodded as another thump echoed from down the hall, this one a little closer. She padded back into her room with Harry following in his pajamas. "What is it?" Harry asked drowsily.

The next noise was louder, harder - although still some distance away. "Something's knocking on the doors," Hermione said in a tone of pure rationality. "Do you think that Sirius and Mr. Weasley can hear it?"

Harry sat down on the edge of Hermione's bed, running a hand through his disheveled black hair. "I don't know," he said after a moment. "They said they'd be staying in the hall on the other side of the staircase from where we are, and this - " Harry broke off as a sudden bang came from a door on the other side of the hallway. "It's getting closer."

"It's just a noise," Hermione said tensely, sitting down on the edge of the bed next to Harry. "It has an echo," she observed.

It sounded, Harry thought to himself, like a hollow banging noise - as though someone were hitting the doors with an iron bar or armored glove. It pounded regularly for a moment, then suddenly more softly...and then again in a quick flurry of raps as it seemed to methodically move from door to door at the end of the hall. "It's still some ways away," Harry whispered cautiously. "We could sneak out and investig..." Crash! Harry's words were cut off by the noise of iron smashing against what must have been a door very close by.

Hermione scrambled further onto the bed, clutching at Harry's shoulder. "Maybe it will go on down the other side of the hall," she ventured, before wincing hard at the deafening sound of a second crash of metal against wood.

Harry impulsively went to the hall door and ran his hand over it, calling out angrily as another smashing noise rang through the wing - "Go away! Just go away!" Then there was a sudden, complete silence after Harry's exclamation, the only noise coming from Harry and Hermione's breathing. The pair looked nervously at each other, and back at the door. Now I've done it, Harry thought to himself.

Hermione listened to the pregnant silence, holding her breath. "It's looking for a room with someone inside."

Harry exhaled nervously, and was surprised that he could see his breath as he did. "It's getting colder," he said with a shiver, returning to where Hermione sat on the bed. Hermione's teeth had started to chatter, and she tugged the coverlet up to wrap around herself and Harry like a cloak. Harry ventured, "In a minute, I'll go out in the hall and call down to where the others are. Mr. Weasley will want to see thi--"

Harry's words were cut off by the sudden recommencing of noise - a barrage of blows against the high, upper edge of the Green Room's hallway door. Hermione gave a shriek of surprise and gripped Harry's shoulder tightly, while Harry found himself wrapping an arm around Hermione as if to shield her from the hammering assault of sound. "I've got my invisibility cloak in my trunk," Harry said, having to raise his voice almost to a yell in order to be heard over the battering din. "I could run into my room and go get - "

"No!" Hermione said in a shrill reply, just as the sound stopped as suddenly as it started. She cautiously raised her head, looking around as if expecting an attack from another quarter of the room. "No, I think it would be a bad idea to...do you hear that?"

There was a quiet, pattering sound coming from the hallway door now, as if something were seeking for a weakness, feeling about for an untried method that might give entry. "Is it locked?" Harry hissed to Hermione from where they clutched at each other under the coverlet.

Hermione nodded hastily before looking over at the connecting door. "What about yours?" she whispered, as the hall doorknob was fondled, twisted by something outside.

"Mine too," Harry assured. He turned his eyes back towards the door.

The knob was rattled more firmly now, and Harry and Hermione could see the wood of the door tremble and shake upon its hinges. "You can't get in!" Hermione yelled out suddenly, clear defiance in her eyes.

Perhaps the unseen intruder picked up the forcefulness in Hermione's voice, because the shaking of the door ceased, and after a moment there was a high, thin giggle from out in the hall beyond...developing into a cynical, gloating laugh as it disappeared back down the hall. The room seemed to grow warmer again, and Hermione slumped in against Harry's shoulder. "It's gone away - it's over."

Harry was about to agree, when his head turned at a different noise outside: the sound of clattering feet, and familiar voices. "Harry! Hermione!" came the sound of Arthur Weasley outside the door. "Are you all right? We heard shouting!"

Before the men outside could think of knocking, Harry hopped out of bed and went to turn back the bolt in the door, opening it to reveal the windblown figures of Arthur and Sirius. The two entered, looking around as if expecting something to leap out from behind a curtain.

As Hermione drew back the coverlet and stood up, Sirius remarked with a cheeky grin, "Why so pale? You look as if you've seen a ghost."

"Very funny," Hermione replied. "Did you hear the banging down near your rooms too?"

Arthur Weasley's attention jerked away from looking at Harry to stare intensely at Hermione, upon hearing this comment. "Banging? What do you mean? Did you hear a noise inside?"

"Nothing in particular," Harry remarked in a sarcastic voice. "Something knocked on the walls with a cannonball and then tried to get in through the door and eat us, but nothing really out of the way."

Hermione had padded over in her bedroom slippers to examine the hallway-facing side of the door. "I thought it was going to pound the door into splinters," she said wonderingly, "But there isn't even a scratch on the wood...or on any of the other doors either," she added, looking down the row of room entrances.

Something about the clinical attitude that Mr. Weasley and Hermione were taking irritated Harry, and he snapped, "How nice that it didn't mar the woodwork - I'm sure I couldn't bear it if this dear old house got hurt."

Hermione glanced back at Harry with an odd look on her features, before turning to Sirius and Arthur again. "But I still don't understand - the noise was so loud, I was sure the whole street was ringing with it. You didn't hear a thing?" Her expression was fairly incredulous.

Sirius shook his head. "Not a tap. But then again, we weren't inside. We've been out for the past two hours in the bloody cold and rain looking for a dog."

Arthur nodded, and upon closer look it was clear that his robes and Sirius' were extremely damp. "Or something like a dog...it ran past my door and we followed it down the stairs and out into the garden. But even with Sirius in his animagus form, we couldn't catch it."

Harry's features darkened. "How could a dog get inside? Were any of the doors open?"

Sirius shook his head. "Checked 'em all, and they're locked. But after hearing about what happened to you, that doesn't surprise me that much." He gave Arthur a meaningful look.

The Weasley patriarch nodded in agreement, stroking his chin. "You see," Arthur said slowly, "We've been wandering around for quite a while outdoors, and never dreamed that you two might be awake until just as we came back inside and heard Hermione yelling. It was perfectly silent, to us. But the strangest thing is..." Arthur turned towards Sirius to apparently confirm his words. "While we were outside, it didn't seem like that long until we touched the back threshold again. It only seemed like a few minutes we were chasing around, until I saw how much time had passed on the kitchen clock."

This seemed to utterly puzzle Hermione, and she asked, "I don't understand what you're getting at. What's the point of all this? It sounds completely nonsensical."

Arthur glanced around, and carefully shut the bedroom door behind him. In a low but clear voice he said, "I'm starting to realize that there are things going on here that I never took into account, originally. We must take precautions from here on out - "

Sirius' features looked as confused as Harry and Hermione's. "What kind of precautions?"

"Let me put it this way," Arthur said softly. "Sirius and I were lured outside, while Hermione and Harry were trapped inside and attacked. That's what it's doing -- divide and conquer."

"That's it," Harry echoed. "The house's plan is to separate us from each other."

The first morning of the grand experiment dawned, and with it came an odd excitement in nearly all the observers sojourning at the House of Black: in spite of the ominous theories about the structure's intentions, Arthur, Harry and Hermione all seemed ebullient about the fact that they truly were occupying a place that fought back - the thrill of having a worthy adversary. Only Sirius seemed oddly reserved on the subject, but clearly pleased to be in company of Harry and his friends.

"I remember the cold," Hermione said to Arthur, as he jotted down details with a striped quill in black ink. "And I can remember knowing that I was frightened, but I can't actually remember being frightened. I think it's because it seemed so unreal; I mean, it just didn't make any sense."

Harry nodded in agreement. "I found myself this morning telling myself what had happened last night. Like the reverse of a bad dream, where you're telling yourself that it didn't really happen."

"It was diverting enough, I'll give you that," Sirius remarked.

Arthur took down all these details, but frowned to himself as he read over them. "This excitement troubles me; it's intoxicating, certainly, but might it not also be dangerous? An effect of the house's atmosphere, a sign that we're falling under its spell?" Arthur pondered. "I wonder if it's possible for a location to produce a mesmeric effect of some kind..."

Sirius poured the last bit of the tea into his cup, adding some cream to it. "And yet, while I'll agree that we need to watch out for ourselves, I wonder about the level of risk in all this. It's definitely unpleasant to have a banging din going off at all hours, and perhaps a run out in the rain might produce the need for some pepper-up potion, but it doesn't seem that we were ever in any true physical danger. Even Harry's remark that whatever was outside the Green Room door was coming to eat him and Hermione didn't really sound like..."

Harry turned to Arthur seriously. "But that was what it felt like," he said emphatically. "It was like the house wanted to consume us, to take us into it and make us a part of it..." He trailed off as he looked over at Hermione's quizzical expression in his direction. "Well, that's what I felt, anyway."

Arthur dutifully recorded this testimony, and looked up at his compatriots. "I'm certain that no physical danger exists. No ghost in all the long histories of ghosts has ever been able to hurt someone physically - the only damage ever done is by the victim to himself, or by another living person to the victim. It's the mind that's most at risk - and therefore it is Number 12's mental influence that we shall have to be most on our guard against. By all means...if any of us ever feel the house 'catching' at us, tell the others. Even the slightest suspicion that you may be letting it take hold is important." Arthur reached over for the teapot, but found it empty when attempting to pour. "Here now, this won't do! Organizing notes with no tea?"

Harry looked around. "Shouldn't Kreacher be about to get stuff like that?" He turned towards Hermione. "Say, you didn't try to give him clothes or anything, did you?"

"And what if I did?" Hermione retorted. "We sit around and talk about the negative affect of the house on us when we've only been here for one night - he's lived here his entire life, and a member of his family has always been a slave for this family..."

"Good riddance to bad rubbish, if you did set him free, although that leaves us without a cook," Sirius remarked in a flippant tone.

Arthur rubbed a hand over his brow worriedly. "Hermione, you didn't really free Kreacher, did you? I know how strongly you feel about house elves, but..."

The bushy-haired member of the party looked close to fuming. "I tried talking to him, okay? But he's clearly not in his right mind. He says all kinds of things that he can't possibly mean..."

"I wouldn't be so sure about that," Harry interjected.

"...But no, he wouldn't let me give him clothes. So wherever he is, it's not on account of anything to do with me." Hermione prodded at her breakfast boiled egg fretfully.

Sirius lurched up from his seat, and picked up the teapot. "Probably off reminiscing about the halcyon days, when Mother would flog him constantly for his own good. I'll rout him out." He strolled off in the direction of the kitchen.

Harry finished his toast, and turned to Arthur. "So anyway, what is out in the back garden, where you were last night? Hermione and I haven't been there, we might want to take a look today."

Arthur glanced up from his tabulations. "Oh, a large beech tree, some rosebushes... looks like some family graves, as well. Oh!" He started from his seat, looking towards the archway where Sirius had departed. "Look at this! I've broken my own rule! I let him go off alone, when we know we need to stick together. Sirius!" Arthur called, hurrying to the arch. "Sirius, come back! Don't go off alone!"

"I'm all right." Sirius' voice called back to the group from a few rooms away. "But I think you might want to come take a look at this, all of you. I'm in the drawing room."

Harry, Hermione and Mr. Weasley headed out quickly to join Sirius, who stood holding the empty teapot and looking at the large family tree tapestry that had been pointed out the evening before. As they came into the drawing room, Hermione gave a swift intake of breath. "What's happened? What is that all over it?"

"It's chalk," Arthur said after a moment's investigation. And indeed, it appeared that wide strokes of powdery white scrawled large and scraggly letters upon the ancient work of intricate embroidery. Up close, the lines just appeared to be haphazard gibberish, but from a distance they read...

"Help Harry - Come Home." Harry's cheeks burned as he puzzled it out, and saw the other three turn to stare at him, and then back at the tapestry. "Wipe it off." Harry's voice was hard, and he glanced from face to face as the other three just stood there. "Come on then! Don't just stand there! It's crazy -- wipe it off!"

"What's that circled up there, over on the left?" Hermione asked, pointing to an oval area apart from the childish lettering. Arthur had brought out his tablet, and was quickly sketching the graffiti-marred wall hanging.

Sirius leaned in closely to examine the area Hermione mentioned, a portion of the tapestry that had long ago gone unreadable because of a thick coating of mildew and ash that obscured the gold embroidery. "It looks like it's trying to indicate a particular part of the family tree..." He brushed away part of the chalky circle, then drew out a handkerchief and rubbed hard to remove some of the blackened buildup. Then he stared. "Bloody hell."

The group crowded around, with Harry standing at the back. As Sirius dusted the rest of the chalk away, it became clear that the rough circle was intended to highlight a section of the tapestry where one 'Fenella Black' had a double line of gold embroidery linking her name to that of 'Acrisius Potter'. A single vertical gold line led down from the pair to a burn mark that obliterated the name of the child that the union had produced.

"I'd never seen that before," Sirius said disbelievingly as he stepped back. "I think that portion of the tree has been sooted over like that since before I was born. 'Course, it doesn't surprise me that there was a Potter connection to the Blacks, because the pureblood families are all interrelated, some many times over. But still... I'd guess that Acrisius here would be a great-great-great grandfather of yours, Harry. Or maybe a four-times great uncle, based on where he falls in the tree."

Hermione looked between where Harry stood wordlessly flushed, and where Sirius stood next to the Black family tapestry. "But...isn't this good? It means that Harry and Sirius are related, distantly. Do you think Kreacher did this as kind of a weird way to welcome Harry?"

Sirius shook his head with a fierce jerk. "Kreacher would never do anything like this to the tapestry - he had a fit when I was trying to find a way to undo the permanent sticking charm that keeps the moldy old thing hung on the wall. You thought the banging on your door was loud last night, it'll be nothing compared to the wail you'll hear when he gets a glimpse of this." Sirius gestured offhandedly to the chalky letters that defaced the wall-sized hanging.

"Tell me that you did it, Sirius." The words tumbled out of Harry's mouth, jumbling against each other. "It's okay - you noticed this last night when we were looking at the tapestry, and you decided to have some fun, right? This is all your joke, isn't it? To have some fun with me, and yank Kreacher's chain?"

"Not that the eternal mutterer doesn't need some chain yanking, but..." Sirius looked uncomfortable with Harry's accusation. "But I didn't do this. I hadn't seen that connection between you and me before just now."

"NO!" Harry yelled furiously, the sudden loudness causing Hermione to flinch. "No, you're lying! Or...or maybe you did it, Hermione? Which one of you?"

Arthur put his hand onto Harry's shoulder, but Harry pushed it off. "Harry - listen to me. Just because your name - "

"Well that's it then, isn't it?" Harry snapped back. "It knows my name. This house knows my name. Why didn't it write 'Sirius welcome back'? He belongs here more than I do - why not your name, Mr. Weasley? Why not Hermione's? She's a brand new guest here!"

"Harry, calm down!" Hermione's voice was tense and strident.

"It's always me, isn't it?" Harry went on. "Harry Potter, our new celebrity! Rita Skeeter making up soap opera-y stories for the Prophet about me crying in the closet about my mum and dad! People's heads nearly twisting off as they try to get a glimpse of my forehead when I walk down Diagon Alley! And when I think I might be in the company of people I can trust, I still wake up to find my name smeared all over everything! I'm surprised that none of you have accused me of writing it here myself!"

"Will you just stop?" Hermione had stepped forward and grasped Harry by the shoulders, turning him forcibly to face her. "You're overreacting, and you know that none of us did this. Don't you see? You're letting it get to you! It's just what Mr. Weasley was saying last night - you're letting the house divide you from us!"

For a moment it seemed like Harry had a mind to pull away again, as Sirius and Arthur stared at him and Hermione. But then he let out a breath, and self-consciously put his arms around Hermione in a hug. "You're right," he said. "You're right...I overreacted. I don't know why. I guess it was all just too much for a moment there. I'm sorry."

Arthur Weasley stepped forward and put his hand on Harry's back, pushing him very gently towards the door leading out of the room. "Come on, then. I think we've seen enough here."

"And we don't want to be around when the Kreacher sirens go off," Sirius remarked, taking a final look at the family tree before sauntering out of the room. "'Cause that's not going to be pretty."

Harry followed the group out, still burning inwardly although he seemed to have calmed to outward appearances. They think I've come back to the fold, he heard his thoughts say. They don't understand that I've always been divided away, from the very start.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The afternoon of the first full day at Number 12 started slowly, following the morning's unnerving surprise. Sirius gave the group a tour of the house's remaining rooms, which looked eerily ghostlike given the sheets slipcovering the unused furniture within. Harry's owl Hedwig returned - she had been let out the night before to get some exercise after being caged up for all of July at the Dursleys' insistence, and was now returning. In her claws was a letter from The Burrow, and Harry, Hermione and Sirius gathered around to hear Arthur read the news.

"Percy's move into his new flat is going well, since Fred & George were persuaded to stop making all the boxes of Percy's things shrink whenever he touched them," Arthur reported. "Mrs. Weasley feels that she will be able to join here us for a few days, as Ginny has been invited to visit a friend for a week and the Twins have promised not to blow anything up inside the house while she's away." Arthur looked up from the epistle and added, "I daresay, the boys are certainly old enough to handle themselves at home alone for a bit. I had been hoping that Molly might stop in off and on, while we're staying here this month."

As Arthur and Sirius departed for the library to set up a game of wizard chess, Harry and Hermione headed out the house's back door to explore the garden under an overcast sky. It seemed to Harry, however, that viewing the cankered, overgrown rosebushes and the spreading limbs of the beech tree - which was clearly rotting away from some blight within - was only a way to wearily pass the day. It was a lull, he thought distractedly, a biding of time until nightfall, when the house would come into its complete power and fully awaken.

Hermione seemed unaware of these brooding thoughts, and genuinely interested at pondering the verses inscribed on some of the family headstones set amongst the grass and thistles. But as the afternoon wore on, a chill breeze sprang up and she found herself rubbing at her arms for warmth in spite of being dressed in a Fair Isle jumper and wool skirt. "I think it's going to rain again tonight," she said, watching the movement of the clouds. "I'm getting chilly, Harry. Do you mind if we go back to my room so I can get my jacket?"

Harry turned back around from the snarl of thorns he was contemplating. "Sure -- I was thinking I might want to get my Firebolt, just to do some flying around the garden area." They came back inside, waved to Sirius and Arthur as they passed through the library, wandered through the various rooms into the foyer, and then ascended the stairs.

"Be careful about flying too high," Hermione commented. "I expect if you stay at level with the top of the house or below that, and within the garden walls you'll be unnoticed. But much higher, and someone's sure to see you. I almost wish that I could write some postcards to fill up the time," she remarked with a lazy tone. "Except that I wouldn't really be able to say much to my parents, and we can't reveal where we are or that Sirius is with us to any of our school friends."

"You could write to Ron, you know," Harry suggested carefully. "'Having a splendid time, but miss you terribly'?"

Hermione made a face, as they reached the entrances to the Blue and Green rooms. "Didn't Ron tell you we'd quarreled? I was sure he'd mention it."

Harry opened up the door to the Blue Room and stepped in, crossing to the window. "Yes, but he didn't say what about," Harry called this back over his shoulder, as he worked on unsticking the latch and pushing up the sash. "Come on, Hermione - it can't have been too awful, whatever he said. He's just being Ron." Harry frowned to himself, and gave the window a good shove upwards. "You know, I was sure I left this window open this morning since it's so stuffy in these rooms."

Harry's comments were answered by an ear-splitting scream from the direction of Hermione's room, and he rushed across the room to throw open the side door and see what was wrong. "Hermione! Hermione, are you all ri..." His question trailed off into momentary speechlessness as he stared at the view of the connecting room. "What is all that?" he asked in astonishment.

"What does it look like?" Hermione screeched in a shrill voice. "What does it look like it is, Harry?!" She was still standing upon the threshold of the entrance out into the hallway, eyes wide in shock and her features starting to go a sickly green.

The sound of shouts and running footsteps could be heard in the distance, as Arthur and Sirius started up the stairs in haste. "It looks like...paint," Harry said in bewilderment, his gaze scanning the room from the bed...over the bureau and chairs, the open wardrobe and clothes strewn across the floor... "Red paint. Except...the smell is awful."

"It's blood!" Hermione yelled hysterically. "It's blood, it's got to be blood - it's everywhere! All over the sheets, all my clothes, on the...walls..." She took an unsteady step back with a dizzy motion, teetering into Sirius' arms as he came running up.

"What's going on up here? Are you all right? Hermione!" Arthur's breath was racing as he came dashing down the hall behind Sirius.

Sirius let out an oath that would have been shocking at any other time, while his arms wrapped around Hermione protectively as she buried her face against his chest.

Arthur gazed slack-jawed at the grotesque sight within the Green Room, fumbling for his notebook to take down details with a shaky hand. "And there's more words," he said in a faint voice. "More writing. Do you see it?"

Harry felt cold as he looked at the far wall of the Green Room, staring at the dripping, shaky red letters that spelled out 'Help Harry Come Home Harry' against the lurid green latticework wallpaper now spattered with red drops. Like Christmas colors, he thought wildly. Behind him, Harry could hear Sirius and Arthur arguing over whether Kreacher might have done this as a slur against Hermione's 'mudblood' background. But Harry knew it hadn't been the work of Kreacher. Isn't it obvious? Harry thought. Of course it's the house. And it wants me to answer it, to tell it that I'll come. The others really don't have anything to do with this at all. Harry stiffened, shaking his head with a shudder at the thought.

"Of course Hermione can't stay in this room anymore," Arthur said in a brisk, worried voice. "We'll have to ask Kreacher to open up the next room down."

"No!" Hermione looked up, shaking her head. "I'm not going to stay in a room isolated by myself - there isn't any other connecting door to Harry's room, and the two of you have the rooms that share a door too, and I'm not going to split you up. And Mrs. Weasley doesn't come until tomorrow at earliest."

"Molly!" Arthur exclaimed in sudden recollection. "That's right - I'll write to have Molly bring some of Ginny's clothes for Hermione when she comes." He turned towards Sirius and Hermione, babbling nervously. "Or maybe some of Molly's older outfits - she wasn't much larger than you back when we were first married...and you could write your parents and ask them to send some more." Arthur's mind returned to the issue of bedrooms. "But as for a place to sleep, we'll have Kreacher open up two new rooms. Both Harry and Hermione will move, into another connecting set."

Sirius shook his head. "Except that there isn't another set. There are other bedrooms to be sure, but they don't have the connecting door that these do. That's why I chose the rooms I did, for us. Perhaps we should put one of the day beds from the nursery into Harry's room, and Hermione could sleep on that."

Arthur started to protest this idea, but Harry turned around and spoke. "No, it's all right - we were having to share a bathroom anyway, and she can change in there. There's plenty of room for another bed, and I hadn't put anything from my trunk into the wardrobe anyway." He reached to pull the connecting door between the Green and Blue rooms shut, drawing the bolt into the locked position.

Arthur looked uncertain about this. "Under any other circumstances I would say definitely not - but after all this, I'm thinking that keeping everyone together and safe is a higher priority than guarding against imagined improprieties... Hermione, what would you like to do?" His eyes trained worriedly upon where she stood, still being supported by Sirius.

Hermione swallowed hard as she thought for a moment, looking between the three who watched her with concern. "I rather think it would be easiest to stay in Harry's room," she said. "Since we've always been in the same dorm together, and all."

Arthur shook his head, his expression tired and drawn. "I never imagined this would be an issue. Otherwise, I would've insisted that Ginny come along as a roommate for you." He let out a weary sigh. "Well then. I think it might be best if we let Harry take Hermione to rest in the Blue Room, and Sirius and I go find an appropriate day bed down in the nursery."

The quartet stepped away from the Green Room entrance, as Hermione disengaged herself from Sirius to let him lock the door. Then they separated two and two, leaving the bloody chamber sealed behind them.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

That night, the rain that Hermione had predicted would come arrived with a vengeance, pouring down in a heavy summer storm interspersed with flashes of lightning and thunderous rumbles that could be felt throughout the whole of Number 12. It was one of these loud booms from outside that woke Harry from fitful dreaming, and he peered around in the darkness. There was a flicker of light from behind the heavy curtains that shrouded the window, but otherwise the room seemed as black as a tomb. And it was cold again, too - cold enough that Harry burrowed further down under the covers of his bed and tugged the bed-curtains closed in hopes of retaining some warmth. He listened silently for a long moment, and found it strangely comforting to hear the soft, regular breathing of Hermione asleep on the daybed on the far side of the room where Arthur and Sirius had arranged the new piece of furniture for her earlier that evening.

It was just as Harry was drifting off to sleep again that he heard a new sound, this one coming from behind the connecting door that led into Hermione's former guest room - the steady, low sound of a voice babbling, too low for words to be understood. Harry blinked, peeking his head out from under the covers and listening to it; not with any feeling of fear, but with a muzzy confusion, half wondering if he was imagining the noise, and half trying to puzzle out what was being said.

As he lay listening, there was the soft rustle of the velvet bed-curtains being partly drawn back, and a familiar bushy-haired figure lifted the covers and slid into bed next to Harry. On one hand, Harry was surprised at this turn of events, especially considering Mr. Weasley's earlier worries about the appropriateness of having Hermione stay in the same bedroom as Harry. But on the other hand, at that particular moment in the midnight darkness, in the cold, and with the mumbled, alien noises coming from the other room penetrating the bedroom and growing in emphasis, Harry could understand exactly why there was a need to be with someone. Someone alive, warm and safe.

"I didn't know you were awake, Hermione..." Harry started, breathing in the familiar scent of his friend's hair. He shifted over to give her room next to him, while at the same time sliding a protective arm around her waist. He could feel the crisp cotton pajamas that he'd loaned her to sleep in, since Hermione's own nightgown was one of the blood-drenched casualties of the disturbing afternoon episode.

Harry's words were cut off by a soft shhhhing noise close to his ear, and he nodded, falling silent. As the voices from behind the door grew louder, Hermione twisted closer against Harry, limbs wrapping around him and her head pillowed against his chest. Harry's hand stroked comfortingly against her hair as if he were petting a cat, while ideas whirled in confusion within his mind. The noise from the other room was ominous - and the shuddering of the house under the wrath of the storm outside had given him cause for worry earlier as well. But the closeness of having another person with him -- silent and secret except for the soft noise of breathing -- thrilled Harry as never before. She was soft and close and warm, and as he started to fall into a half-asleep lull from the rhythm of stroking, Harry felt Hermione lift her head and move, and press her lips to his.

Harry's arms wrapped tightly about the figure in the darkness close against him, and he kissed back fervently, insistently. Outside the sanctum of the curtained bed, the strange voices continued until a high, gurgling laugh broke through the babbling - the sound rose as it laughed, up and up the scale until it broke off suddenly in a little painful gasp. Harry could feel Hermione twist in his arms, her head lifting and a worried intake of breath as she held still and listened. He could hear her heartbeat grow faster, and Harry was sure that Hermione must be able to feel his heart about to throb right through his chest, it seemed so loud and fast to his ears. He stroked his hand over Hermione's back, trying to draw her down against him once more. "It's just a noise," he whispered. "The house just wants to scare us..."

The voice from the next room continued, a little liquid gloating sound - and then more babbled words, and Harry thought for a moment that he could possibly make out what was being said, if he listened carefully and lay perfectly still. The little gurgling laugh came again, and the rising mad sound of it drowned out the voice, and then suddenly there was absolute silence.

Harry felt Hermione twist against him, and he let out the breath that he'd been holding in as his head sank back against the pillows in relief. He reached his hand up to stroke against the soft cheek that was so close to him, drawing Hermione's face closer while his lips parted slightly in anticipation of another kiss.

It was then that Harry heard a little soft cry that broke his heart - a little, infinitely sad cry, a sweet little moan of wild sadness. There's a child in there, Harry thought to himself in disbelief. And then, upon that thought, came a wild shrieking voice that he had never heard before...and yet knew that he had heard it always in his nightmares. "Go away!" it screamed, "Go away, go away, don't hurt me!" Harry's arms tightened hard around the feminine form that lay on top of him, and he could hear the cadence of Hermione's breathing race with a mixture of fear and concern. "Please, please don't hurt me!" came the terrible pleading cry from the next room, breaking down into sobs before moaning once more, "Please don't hurt me - please let me go home!"

"STOP IT!" Harry yelled with all his might, twisting out of bed and rushing across the cold bedroom floor to the locked connecting door. "STOP IT NOW!" He groped upon the bureau for where he'd placed his wand, his other hand reaching for the knob to bring up the gaslight in the chandelier to illuminate the room.

As Harry shouted and turned on the lights, the noise from the Green Room ceased immediately. Hermione sat up with a start from where she was sleeping on the daybed, jerking her head up and looking around, her hair messy and disheveled. "Harry?" she called in confusion. "Harry, what's the matter? What's wrong? Stop what?"

"Oh God!" Harry flung himself back against the wall, as far from the connecting door and his bed as he could get. He trembled convulsively, his hands reaching up to cover his mouth as sickening realization flooded through him. "Oh God, Hermione - who was that with me...who was I holding in my arms?"

The second full day of the observation at Number 12 was a brighter one than the day before, with the clouds parting and allowing the sun to beam down upon the garden of Grimmauld Place in a cheery manner that seemed utterly at odds with the dour structure. Sirius wandered with Hermione amongst the headstones and recalled various anecdotes about the family members laid to rest, while Arthur coaxed a reluctant narrative of the previous night's incident from Harry.

"Does Hermione know, er...that you thought she was with you at the time?" Arthur inquired tentatively.

Harry shook his head. "And I'd rather that Ron didn't hear about that either. I know you're taking all this down for a book, but...could you not be specific about that point? Maybe...maybe just say I felt disoriented, and the figure seemed familiar, but I couldn't specifically say who." Harry's cheeks felt like they were aflame.

Arthur looked at Harry with sympathetic eyes. "It isn't your fault, Harry. It was a natural reaction, given...well, given the circumstances. The house was playing upon that natural tendency, I'm sure. Although...you say you really felt her against you, are you sure it wasn't just a very vivid dream? It's not so unusual, you know, for a young man of your age to..."

"It wasn't a dream!" Harry said hotly. "It was real. She was there."

Arthur nodded quickly, finishing his note-taking. "I believe you, then. Although I worry..." He glanced over to where Hermione and Sirius were coming back over to join them at the table where Arthur had set himself up to transcribe his notes more fully. "I worry," he remarked to the other three members of the party, "that I may have brought the three of you here before I truly knew what it was we were getting into - Sirius, you had been hiding elsewhere in a reasonably secure location, Harry and Hermione had been safe at their homes...it's true that in spite of what we have seen and experienced, no physical harm has come to any of us. But it's clear that the emotional effect the house is able to produce is very intense."

Hermione had a pondering look on her face. "It's almost like...it can see into our heads. And know what will upset us - Harry getting upset that the attention in the writing is still on him even though we're away from everyone, me getting a nasty shock with the blood in my room..." She shuddered in spite of the sunny garden atmosphere around her.

"It's been targeting Harry and Hermione far more than us, Arthur. Have you noticed that?" Sirius leaned against the edge of the table. "Like it knows it can get more of a response from them."

"I've noticed that, yes," Arthur said heavily. "And so I feel at crossed intentions. There can be no doubt that there is a force at work here, a concentrated, powerful force indeed. Some great good might well come out of studying it and producing a work of research, since Number 12 can't be the only house like this out there. But...even in a little over a day, an emotional toll has been taken. I'm wondering if, in good conscience, I should continue to put you three through this, even in the name of investigation and knowledge."

"You're thinking of giving the study up? After only one day?" Hermione's voice sounded dismayed, and she looked from Harry to Sirius before coming back to Arthur once more. "But we're Gryffindors! We shouldn't give up just because of some bumps in the night and silly writing. Really, Mr. Weasley, we can do this!"

Sirius shrugged his shoulders. "Like I said, it's been harder on the others than on me. But I think we should keep our eyes open a bit more, and watch about how we let this get to us if we're going to stay. I wouldn't have lasted over a decade in Azkaban if I'd let that place get to me. It wasn't the same sort of stuff as this, but..."

Arthur looked over at Hermione with concern. "You seemed decidedly more overcome yesterday when we saw what happened to the Green Room, than you are now. Who knows what further surprises the house has in store?"

Harry had been quiet while the others talked, but now he spoke up. "Sirius is right. We've been letting the house get to us too easily. Me, in particular." He looked over at Arthur, and reluctantly voiced a question that had been on his mind. "Mr. Weasley, I wasn't sure if I'd wanted to ask this, but...are we sure all this is being caused by the house? I mean, when I think about all this, I'm sure that the house is doing it, but...what if it isn't really? What if it's Voldemort..."

Arthur flinched as Harry spoke the name, and Hermione glanced at him worriedly. Harry pressed on, though. "What if it's You-Know-Who just using the house as an excuse to get at us? You remember how I told you that once I'd had a dream about You-Know-Who and Peter Pettigrew, in an old house like this one. And I saw Vol...You-Know-Who use a killing curse on an older muggle man? At the time I knew it wasn't just a dream, and my scar really hurt. Somehow, I knew that what I was seeing was real, and it was projected into my mind."

Mr. Weasley was silent, apparently weighing this theory for a time. "You haven't had any similar dreams though, since you've arrived? Since you said that you were certain you weren't dreaming last night. Has your scar hurt you at any time since you've been in this house?"

Harry shook his head, and Arthur continued on. "I don't believe that all of this could be caused by You-Know-Who, although I appreciate your raising the idea as a matter of concern. But the reason I doubt is...didn't you say that when you saw him last June, he'd only just gotten a true body?" Arthur turned now to the heir of the family Black. "And didn't you tell me, Sirius, that your parents had every charm, every concealing spell known to wizardkind placed onto this house so that it couldn't be found? I don't think that He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named could find us here, much less influence us so intensely. No, I am convinced that the source is here with us. But I ask you three again - should we stick it out, or should we depart? I don't want any of you to feel that I am forcing you to stay here and go through this, if you wish to leave."

Sirius shook his head. "I'm staying. It takes more than I've seen to make me move from as good a hiding place as this is. For the moment, anyway."

Hermione's nod of agreement was firm. "I was just caught off guard, yesterday. I promise it won't happen next time. I think we should stay."

The three looked over at Harry, who shifted uncertainly. Should I tell them about what the house wants from me? He thought to himself. They've seen the writings, but...they don't seem to understand what's happening. Am I the only one who does? Harry looked up and saw Arthur, Sirius and Hermione still gazing at him expectantly. "I'm in," he said. "I think we should stay too. After all, now we've got a taste of what we can expect."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Molly Weasley arrived at Number 12 Grimmauld Place that evening, bringing with her a large valise of loaned clothes and necessities from The Burrow. The majority of her things were for Hermione to make use of, until contact could be made with the Granger parents to secure replacements for the ones ruined in the Green Room's mysterious bloodletting.

Arthur greeted his wife with a rather desperate hug and firm kiss, which prompted a merry laugh from the Weasley mother. "Goodness, Arthur! It's only been a few days since you left - maybe I should pack you off to haunted houses more often!"

Over dinner, however, Molly's attitude grew pensive as her husband, Sirius, Harry and Hermione filled her in on the unusual events experienced since their arrival. Once the catalogue of occurrences had concluded, she let out a deep breath. "Well, well. Since you're resolved to stay...may I offer a suggestion, Arthur? Because it seems to me that it's one you haven't considered yet, based on what you've told me."

"Believe me, Molly, any suggestions that can be made at this point would be highly welcomed." Arthur's brow had been lined with worry for most of the day, and he fidgeted with his utensils as he spoke.

Molly looked around for a few seconds before speaking. "It's all well and good that you came here with the idea of just observing the house, but from you've told me, the house has other ideas - it's clearly trying to communicate with you. Have you attempted to answer it back yet?" She looked around the table at the other four people with her, eyes coming to rest with a questioning gaze upon Harry.

Sirius snorted loudly. "Communicate? Is that what you call it? And here I'd been thinking it just wanted to scare the crap out of us so we'd leave."

Harry opened his mouth to speak, but Arthur broke in before Harry could start. "Answer it back, Molly? I think that given the kinds of experiences we've had so far - given the fact that Harry specifically said he felt like the house was trying to devour him that first night - it would be highly ill-advised for us to encourage the house along these lines! Who knows what response that might inspire?"

Molly looked around the table, a challenging look in her eyes. "Of course I'd call it communication! The house is clearly trying to reach out and make a connection - how else do you explain the messages you've been getting? Asking for help? Asking for someone to come home? That doesn't sound to me like the house is trying to drive you away. It's a plea for assistance! And quite possibly the reason why the most attention has been focused on the two young ones is because it feels that they will be the most receptive, the most likely to give it the aid that it needs." Here an idea clearly struck Mrs. Weasley's mind, and she leaned forward, speaking with excitement in her voice. "Look at yourselves! Nervous, cynical, defensive...trying to hold back from responding to what's happening around you. But what if this is the only way that the house knows, after all these years, to try and reach people? Instead of distancing yourself, maybe what you need to do is to open yourself to the house - to take an attitude of pure love, understanding, helpfulness? I think it's very possible that this residence wants to purge itself of the wickedness that it's been filled with for all this time. And now that you've come, you clearly represent another way to live and think. Arthur, it needs us to help it!"

Arthur looked pained. "Molly...this isn't a stray cat that we're taking in and putting out bowls of milk for! We're not going to cure its ills merely by 'thinking lovely thoughts'! This house..."

Hermione leaned over and whispered into Harry's ear. "Reminds you of something out of Peter Pan, doesn't it?" Harry nodded quickly, continuing to listen to the arguing adults.

"This house is in pain, Arthur! And your policy of restraint, of staying aloof from it may actually be causing whatever is here to suffer all the more. In fact..." Molly's features took on a shrewd expression, of one who has the winning point in a debate. "Your aversion to reaching out to the house is likely causing its more and more frequent violent responses! But if you only opened up your heart to help it heal, think what great good you could do, after all these years! A house is like a mother, Arthur! It nurtures the people who grow and live within it..."

Sirius crossed his arms diffidently over his chest. "With all due respect, Mrs. Weasley, you wouldn't be using the word 'nurture' if you knew what my mother was like. And I have a feeling that this house is just like her, to a tee. You could throw all the 'pure love' you want at it, and it's not going to do an ounce of good."

Molly threw a sharp, significant look at Sirius. "I can see that you're convinced it won't. This only goes to show that in certain areas, witches simply have more of an instinctive understanding of things than wizards."

Arthur put up his hands in a gesture of surrender. "All right, all right! So just for argument's sake...what would you have us do, Molly?"

Harry glanced over at Sirius worriedly, in time to see him roll his eyes and settle back in his chair with an 'I'm staying out of this' attitude.

Molly seemed to gather her thoughts and then spoke in a purposeful voice. "Well, given that I am the newest arrival and freshest in terms of my relationship with the house, I propose that I see if I can establish a positive link to the entity causing these events." She glanced around. "It were best done in a symbolically appropriate area...the kitchen? No, in these kinds of places, that was usually the domain of the servants..."

Hermione spoke up, at this point. "What about the nursery, Mrs. Weasley? Mr. Weasley and Sirius found a day bed for me in that room yesterday, and Sirius said that he and his brother played in there when they were young."

Molly gave Hermione a smile of approval. "That sounds like just the place! The 'heart of the home', so to speak. Well then, I shall attempt to reach out in thought to the house from the Nursery tonight and make contact, see if it might respond back."

Arthur looked about at the others apprehensively. "Are you sure, dear? I suppose the others will be all right if I join you..."

But Molly shook her head. "I will be certain to make scrupulous records of all that I witness, but darling, I fear that you would just distract things with your nervousness. How can I make you understand that there is no danger when there is nothing but perfect love and sympathetic understanding? When I've come here to try and help..."

Arthur winced at his wife. "As you will, but leave the door open - and if anything should happen, just call out and we'll come to you immediately."

Molly let out a laugh, and rose from the table. "Well then! I shall go locate the house elf, and get everything situated. But Arthur...it seems to me that you and these others are in far greater need of protection than I am." And with that, she headed out of the dining room, calling out for Kreacher as she went.

As soon as Molly had departed and was well out of earshot, Sirius pushed away from the table roughly. "Arthur, you know I've nothing against your wife, but I have to say...I swear she's going to blow this house wide open with that 'perfect love' business. Because if I ever saw a place that has no use for perfect love, it's Number 12 Grimmauld Place." He walked firmly out of the dining room, throwing down his napkin on the floor as he headed for the library.

Arthur, Harry and Hermione followed quickly after, with Hermione glancing nervously behind. "Do you hear that? It sounds like the wind's building for a storm."

As the group stepped into the book-filled room, Harry listened in response to Hermione's comment. "That's not the wind," he said carefully.

Arthur paused as well, turning his ear towards the door as a low, rushing sound began to rise out in the hall. "It sounds more like..." He hesitated, as if trying to find the right word. And in that moment, the door swung wide seemingly of its own volition, and crashed shut.

Sirius turned and hurried to the door, pulling at it and trying to turn the knob fruitlessly. With a roar of frustration, he started to feel around in his robes to find his wand.

"Sirius!" Arthur shouted. "No magic! And get away from the walls!"

Hermione started to shiver as the room's temperature dipped unnaturally cold, and she looked about suspiciously at the high shelves that filled the room as an ominous, dull thumping noise rattled the volumes. "It's that pounding again - "

"It's a wonder you were ever able to sleep at all when you were growing up, Sirius," Harry called towards his godfather, before retrieving a knitted afghan from one of the chairs in the room and draping it over Hermione's shoulders. The battering noise grew louder, joined by more thumps and crashes as knickknacks and books started to tumble from their precarious heights. "But haven't we gone through this before?" Harry asked over the noise. "We've had this pounding act before! Is it going to start everything all over again?"

A terrible thought seemed to strike Arthur, and he turned towards the unyielding exit. "Molly's out there!" he called. "She might be frightened! Who knows if it's..."

"I don't think this is anywhere near where Molly is, Arthur," Sirius yelled back. "This sounds to me like it's intended for us, not her!"

Hermione draped one half of the knitted blanket back over Harry's shoulders in response, and clutched in close against him. "Mr. Weasley, she'll be all right!" she called out to the increasingly frantic researcher. "It never hurt us, it won't hurt her!"

Though reticent at first, Harry pulled the afghan close around him and Hermione as the temperature dropped further, and he could see his breath in a frosty cloud with every exhalation. There was a loud bark, and a shaggy black dog came to join the pair - clearly Sirius had shifted into his warmer animagus form.

Arthur's teeth chattered loudly as he pulled out his notebook and turned about, trying to track where the banging and pounding came from - how the noise moved around the perimeter of the room, attacking each side in turn. Books showered from the walls and fell into dangerous heaps, and the chandelier at the center of the ceiling rocked ominously above the group.

And then there came, suddenly, quiet - there was a secret, creeping silence throughout the room, as all held their breath and looked about for where the next attack might come. It was Arthur who broke the silence, saying, "I think...a small drink might not be a bad thing, at this moment." He crossed the room to a wooden cabinet, where the casements had kept the glass decanters' contents as yet unspilled. Arthur poured a glass of brandy and brought it over to Harry and Hermione, giving them each a small sip in hopes of warming them with the liquid before having a gulp himself.

As Harry rubbed his hands against Hermione's back in an effort to generate heat, he thought to himself, This is the eye of the storm; we're just passing through this, it's going to start again, any time now...

The shaking of the door began with no warning - indeed, the rattling was so sudden and contrasting with the palpable silence in the room that it startled Arthur and caused him to drop his glass upon the floor. The remaining brandy spilled onto the oriental carpet, a dark stain spreading out against the ornate pattern while the forces outside attacked the door.

Sirius leaped out and grabbed the edge of Arthur Weasley's robes in his canine mouth, pulling him backward from the one entrance to the room. As Mr. Weasley was jerked away, the door hinges squealed from the strain of something trying to pull the door apart from the metal fastenings that held it in the frame.

"It can't get in," Hermione was whispering over and over, her eyes on the door. "It can't get in, don't let it get in, can't get in..."

The shaking stopped, the door was quiet, and a little caressing touch began on the doorknob, feeling intimately and softly before moving...now it patted the doorframe, fondled it, as though wheedling to be let in.

Harry glared at the noise from the door, snapping out at it, "Of course you know we're in here - you trapped us here! Just go away and stop all of this now!"

As if in retaliation, the crashing and banging started up with a vengeance once more, and it seemed as if the doorway out into the hall bowed and twisted in its frame with the unnatural effort put upon it. Eerie fingernails scratched and scraped against the surface of a mirror set above a fireplace mantelpiece, and the lights of the chandelier flickered and flared before going out in a blinding flash.

Hermione instinctively pulled Harry down with her to crouch against the floor in an attempt to protect against the increasingly wild tumble of books and curios, but for Harry, the storm came not from without but from within. How can the others hear the noise when it's coming from inside my head? he wondered desperately, shuddering against the cold. Why are they frightened? It doesn't want them - it doesn't care if they're here or not!

"Molly!" Arthur called out again in a desperate cry, as the sound of wood and glass shattering filled the blackened room. "Molly, if you can hear me, stay where you are! Don't try to come in!"

Sirius' voice called through the room, and Harry guessed that he must have shifted back into his human form in the midst of the fray. "Pure love - remember, that's what this house needs!" Sirius gave a mad cackle in spite of the tempest that rocked the room. "Purest love!"

Distantly, Harry heard Hermione give a startled scream and twist away from him when a heavy wooden bookcase toppled over close by where he and she crouched. If this is all because of me, Harry thought, what if I say yes? Will my friends be safe? Will they be able to leave, while I stay with my family? Harry's breath seemed to catch in his chest, as a sense of knowing filled his mind. But if I resist...if I resist, the house will still have me. And the others as well. But if I accept... Isn't this what I've always wanted, to be reunited with my true family? Isn't this what the Mirror of Erised showed me as my deepest desire? Why can't I say yes? Don't I want my friends to be safe? Don't I want to go home? Somewhere in the midst of the turmoil, the answer came to him clearly. Yes. My answer is yes.

And then there was peace.

Harry blinked his eyes, coming back to consciousness. He looked around in confusion - no longer was he in the library, where he last remembered himself being. Instead he recognized the dark bed-curtains and wallpaper of the Blue Room around him. He sat up, ruffling his hair with his hand. But as he came to full consciousness, he was staggered for a moment -- his awareness seemed to stream out far past his own self and the place where he was laying. Instead, he could feel the walls of his room...the hallway beyond...the upper floor...the forbidden cupola above, ground floor below and the dank basements underneath the house. He knew every limb and leaf of the beech tree that stretched over the veranda outside of the kitchen door, and the names of the people who rested under the soil and the garden grass. He took a deep, shaky breath, as the magnitude of this understanding settled upon him.

"Harry - you're up finally!" Hermione sat in the chair across from the bed, writing in the school notebook that Mr. Weasley had given her on the first night of the visit to Number 12. "How do you feel? We've been very worried about you, you know."

Harry groped for his glasses on the bedside table and slid them on, before climbing out of bed. "I didn't know. Tired. What happened?" He looked down at himself, and found that he was still dressed in the clothes he had on the night before.

"I thought the entire house was coming down around us last night," Hermione said with a wry twist of her lips. "And then you passed out in the middle of it, and we didn't know what to do! But apparently it was just the library that went insane...and you look fine now." She shook her head fretfully. "If we hurry, we'll be in time for breakfast. Do you need...anything?"

Harry shook his head and rummaged around in his trunk, grabbing the first items of semi-clean clothes he could set his hands on before making his way to the bathroom to change. Not much later, he and Hermione headed down the stairs and through the various rooms and hallways to the dining room, where Arthur and Sirius were already waiting.

"Where's Mrs. Weasley?" Harry asked, wanting to divert some of the attention off of himself and onto the person he recognized as not being present.

"I looked in on her in the nursery earlier this morning," Arthur replied, as Sirius set plates of fried eggs, stewed tomatoes, sausage and toast before the two teens. "She was sleeping like a baby, so I didn't want to wake her after such a night."

Harry twisted around in his seat and looked back towards the room entrance. "She's coming now - I can hear her on the stairs." I can hear everything now, all over the house, Harry thought to himself. But he didn't mention this to the others. Instead, he took a sip of tea from the cup that Hermione passed over to him.

"You can?" Arthur's brow furrowed as he too turned and listened. "Better ears than I have, I don't hear a..."

"...Properly aired." Molly Weasley's voice preceded her, and she bustled into the dining room a moment later before her husband could finish his sentence.

Kreacher followed Molly, muttering under his breath and generally looking in a foul manner at the others in the room. He picked up some of the empty food platters before skulking off into the kitchen to refill them.

Arthur rose in his seat to give his wife a kiss. "The eggs are quite good," he remarked brightly to Molly. "Shall I serve you some?"

"By all means, Arthur," Molly replied as she settled into one of the chairs. "But I'm rather disappointed that you didn't call me for breakfast? I expect everything's half-cold by now. Is the tea bearable?"

"Seems hot enough," Sirius remarked as he poured out a cup for Molly and passed it over. "So did you have a profitable night in the nursery? Heal the woes of the house and set all to rights?"

Molly glanced over at Sirius with a slightly suspicious look in her eyes. "Sirius Black, if you're mocking me, I daresay I should warn you that I have little patience for that today. Not a single response to any of my outreaches, there was a branch tapping against my window all night, and even with the windows open, the nursery was horribly stuffy. Is your room properly aired out, Arthur? I expect I shall want to sleep in there with you if it's any better."

The breakfast conversation continued over this topic and that - Sirius making snide comments about the 'motherly' quality of the house, and Arthur going over details of the destruction to the library during the episode of the night before. But Harry was distant, lost in his own thoughts even when Hermione asked him how he was feeling once again. It was something of a surprise to the group, when he interjected a non sequitur statement into the midst of the discussion: "It was my fault that my parents died."

Arthur looked over at Harry worriedly. "It was what? Good heavens, you were only a baby - it wasn't your fault at all. What makes you say that?"

Sirius scowled and set his utensils down with a clatter. "It was that scheming bastard Pettigrew's fault, you mean! His fault and You-Know-Who's. You should've let me and Remus kill him, when we had the chance."

Harry set his teacup down and shook his head. "No, it was my fault. I remember how I could hear them, when the Dementors were around back in my third year at Hogwarts. I could hear my Dad saying, 'Lily, take Harry and go - I'll hold him off'. And my Mum, begging Voldemort to kill her instead of me." Harry hardly noticed as the others flinched at the Dark Lord's name. "It sounded like he would've let her live if she hadn't stepped in front of me, to guard me. If they hadn't had me to worry about, my Mum & Dad could've gotten away. Maybe they wouldn't have even been targeted!"

Mrs. Weasley listened worriedly, stretching out a hand to touch Harry's wrist. "Harry, don't rue your own existence! You've done nothing wrong, and as a mother I know that nothing in the world would keep me from risking my life to save any of my children, nothing."

Hermione nodded in agreement. "There's nothing good that can come of dwelling on that, Harry. It can't be changed, and think of everything you've done since then!"

Sirius frowned and stood up. "And it's a disservice to your parents, to wish you'd not been around to need protection. If you could have known how happy they were to have you..." He raked his fingers through his hair. "But that time is past, Harry. There's a lot that I wish had gone differently, but in the end those wishes don't mean anything. That sort of thing can't be changed, and that's that." He turned to Arthur, as he paused at the entrance to the dining room. "So, shall we go see what more mess is still in the library? We'll probably have to start our chess game again."

Molly turned and spoke to Hermione, as her husband rose to join Sirius. "Maybe you and Harry can help me move my things into Arthur's bedroom? And I'll want to have you try on some of the clothes I've brought, to see if they fit or they'll need some alteration before I go..." She finished her eggs and rose from the table, heading out with Hermione in tow.

Harry followed behind Molly and Hermione gamely for a bit, but eventually let them get ahead of him and leave him behind on the staircase. In the back of his head he could hear the others talking, moving about the house and focusing on various activities of interest. But as for himself, he was lost in the shuffle, forgotten and alone. Alone, just like this house is alone, Harry thought to himself. Alone, and only this house can understand.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

That night, Harry pulled the bed-curtains shut and drifted into a semi-dreamlike state, but he wasn't truly asleep. Thoughts drifted through his head, although he was never quite sure what the thoughts fully were. It seemed to Harry that he was walking through the different rooms of Number 12 in his mind, looking in at the sleeping figures of Arthur and Sirius, even Kreacher curled up in his hidey-hole in an unused cupboard. It was as if he were wearing his invisibility cloak, but even better - no footsteps on creaking floorboards to call attention to himself, no sound of his breathing to disturb the peace. He was a part of the house, and whatever the house saw, Harry could see.

And then he heard the voice - intimately familiar, and yet a voice he'd only heard a few times in his life directly. His father's voice, calling to him. Calling to him and waiting for him to respond.

Harry slipped out of bed and crept across the room, careful not to make a sound and wake Hermione. Soundlessly he opened the door, stepped out with care not to make the floorboards creak, and closed the bedroom door behind him with the most careful of movements. That accomplished, Harry crept down the hallway, pausing at the top of the staircase. "Father?" he said aloud, listening carefully for guidance.

When he gave a playful kick at the door of the Weasleys' room, Harry could hear the sleepy voice of Molly Weasley call in response, "Who is it? I'm a friend, I mean you no harm..." And then Arthur's voice afterwards, asking his wife who on earth she was talking to.

Harry had just started down the stairs, taking the steps two at a time and sliding the last portion of the way down the banister, when he heard Hermione's shrill voice call out, "Harry? Harry!...Mr. and Mrs. Weasley, Sirius! Harry's not here!"

Harry sprinted through the first floor rooms, weaving in and out of the different chambers. It was funny, how lost he'd been when he first arrived at Number 12, always taking the wrong turn and having to blindly grope through the house like a person trapped in a maze - the order of the rooms seemed to make perfect sense to him, now. He could hear the distant sounds of movement on the floor above him, as the others started calling and looking for him. And then...another voice, closer. One that knew where Harry was, and called for him to follow. Harry passed through the library and paused at the entrance to the drawing room. "Father? Father, are you there?"

Behind him, Harry could hear the others talking upstairs in the hall - Funny, he thought. I can see everything; Mrs. Weasley fussing and wringing her hands, Sirius frowning and sniffing the air like a dog, Hermione trying to remain calm but growing more nervous by the second. And now Mr. Weasley, clearly - "We've got to find him; everyone, please hurry!"

Harry paused for a moment, listening to the thumping of heavy feet as some of the group started down the stairs - others were still trying the doors of the upper hallway, to see if he might be still hidden above. Harry stepped into the drawing room, approaching the Black Family Tree tapestry to look at the revealed section that showed his ancestor Acrisius Potter, his wife Fenella Black and the burned-out hole that marked the place of their outcast child. If that name hadn't been burned away, would the tree have continued, and would my name be listed there? In his mind's eye, Harry could almost see the carefully embroidered names linked with single and double lines of gold, coming down the surface of the heavy fabric to display Harry's own name. And as he thought, his father's voice called again, and Harry looked over in the direction of the cupola stair door, which was always closed and locked...except for tonight. Tonight the door was open, and Harry could see the base of a twisting metal spiral stair, leading upward to the very top of the house.

Without considering any other course of action, Harry started to climb. Up and up, around and around he went in quick, eager steps, following his father's coaxing words. Higher and higher he went, towards a wooden trap door that would open and allow him up into the very highest point of the house. Of the whole world, Harry thought excitedly to himself, reaching a hand up to open the latch.

"Harry!"

For a minute, Harry could not remember who the people gathered at the base of the stairway were (Had they been guests of the Dursleys at some point in the past? Acquaintances at Hogwarts? Maybe someone he'd been introduced to at the Leaky Cauldron, or who had traveled with him before on the Knight Bus?), and so he hesitated, holding onto the railing of the twisting metal stair. They were so small down there, so ineffectual. They stood far below on the stone floor and pointed at him; they called to him, and their voices were urgent and far away.

"Harry!" Arthur Weasley yelled up towards the figure high up on the tiny metal platform, nearly two stories above where the group was gathered at the base of the spiral stair. "Harry, turn around very carefully and come down the steps. Move very, very slowly, Harry - hold onto the railing all the time. Now, turn around and come down."

Harry remembered them, slowly, whispering their names to himself as he stared downwards. Why did they want him to come down? Wasn't he supposed to be up here? Why did they look so afraid?

"What is he trying to do, Arthur?" Molly asked with a tense, worried tone in her voice. "What's up there?"

"Nothing good," Sirius growled, and he started up the staircase after Harry.

"For Merlin's sake, be careful!" Arthur said as Sirius moved steadily upwards. "The railing's rotted away from the wall, and I don't trust this center column at all. Make sure to test each step before putting your full weight upon it!"

"Can't you just mobilicorpus him down, Mr. Weasley?" Hermione asked stridently. "Or we could do a summoning spell, and bring Harry's broom here!"

Mrs. Weasley answered Hermione in firm but hushed tones. "Arthur and I have our wands here, Hermione. If anything happens, we'll use them, but if we can get them down without..."

The metal column running up the center of the stairs gave a strained, angry crack of a noise, and the upper section where Sirius was approaching Harry wobbled dangerously. "Harry," Sirius said carefully, "can you turn around and start down slowly? Give me your hand."

Above Harry was a little trapdoor leading up into the cupola of the house; he stood on the little narrow platform at the top and pressed against the trap door, but it would not move. Futilely, he hammered against it with his fist, wishing wildly that he knew how to apparate, or that he could somehow pass through the door like a ghost and get away before the approaching figure of Sirius caught him. Glancing over his shoulder, Harry could see the figure of his godfather moving closer, climbing stealthily around and around the dizzying spiral.

"Harry! Do as Sirius says, please!" It was Hermione's voice, calling up to him from the distant floor below.

"Hermione?" Harry yelled back with a growing feeling of hysteria. "I can't get out! The door's been nailed shut, and it won't open!"

"Damn right it's been nailed shut," Sirius growled. "And lucky for you, too!" Climbing, coming very slowly, he had almost reached the narrow platform where Harry stood. "Stay perfectly still..." he whispered.

"Don't make any sudden moves, Harry!" called Arthur, his wand drawn in one hand, and hugging his free arm around his wife Molly.

"Harry!" Molly echoed the words of her husband. "Please do what they say! We're watching to make sure you'll be all right!"

"But why?" Harry asked, and then he looked down. With the combined weight of Harry and Sirius upon the very top of the stair, the metal column swayed, grinding against the stone floor as the bolts that held it in place strained and twisted because of the lack of upper-level support. There was a metallic groan and a loud crack, before the entire staircase shuddered.

"Right," said Sirius fiercely. "Harry, I want you to start down ahead of me - you're going first. I'll be right behind you. Arthur and Molly will break our falls if anything happens, but we need to start moving down. So let's go." He took Harry by the wrist, leading the reluctant young man in front of him, until Harry was taking his first few descending movements.

Precariously, the iron stairway shaking and moaning with every step, Harry felt his way down. He looked at his hand on the railing, white because he was holding the bar so tightly. His bare feet went down the stairs one at a time, step by step, moving with extreme care. Harry took pains not to look directly down again, and he could feel the metal levels bending and buckling under the weight of his body with each placement of his feet.

"Steady," Sirius whispered behind Harry. "Take it easy...we're almost there..."

Automatically, the Weasley parents moved to track Harry and Sirius' progress, extending out their wand arm and free arm as if to literally catch the pair if they happened to fall. "It's only a little farther," Arthur said in a hoarse whisper.

Lower and lower Harry and Sirius crept down at a maddeningly slow pace, testing each stair one by one for stability. But as the floor grew close and Harry's hands felt strained and damp with perspiration, he moved faster watching the Weasleys and Hermione more than his own feet. It was at this point that a jagged twist of metal from one of the steps happened to catch at the back of Harry's pajama bottoms, holding his leg back when he intended it to move forward, and causing Harry to fall forward with a yell of surprise.

Hermione gasped and hurried to the base of the stairs, grasping the handrail to hold it steady while Sirius reached out and grabbed Harry's shoulder - holding him firm until Harry could get his legs underneath him again.

Over and over, Hermione mumbled as if it were a prayer mantra, "It's all right...it's all right, all right..."

Creeping more slowly now, Harry slid his feet down, one step after another until at last he stepped off onto the stone floor. Behind him, the stairway rocked and clanged as his weight left the metal structure, and Sirius leaped down the last few steps in his dog-form, bounding across the drawing room floor to curl up on one of the couches. The large, black canine form whined and shivered, panting as if it could hardly catch its breath.

As Harry turned to look upwards in the direction he'd come from, Mrs. Weasley and Hermione grasped their arms about him in a fierce, joint bear hug. Harry could see the infinitely high little spot where he had been standing, far up at the top of the warped and crooked iron stair that still swayed from the momentum of Sirius' final jump. "I ran up," Harry whispered. "I ran up all the way..."

Arthur prodded his wife and Hermione to move Harry out through the doorway back into the main part of the drawing room, and he closed the door to the cupola stair behind him. "I think," he said heavily, "that this has been quite enough activity for tonight. Sirius, will you take Harry with you back to your room and let him sleep the rest of the night with you? I think we all could use a rest, after this."

Harry looked about in confusion at the others, as if seeing them truly for the first time that night. Both Molly and Hermione were in flannel granny-style nightgowns, Arthur in a pair of red-striped pajamas, and Sirius - now changed back into human form once more -- in a scarlet dressing gown thrown on over a long nightshirt. Harry stared in particular at Sirius, whose face was whiter than he'd ever seen it before. "Sirius...you were scared," he said in wonder.

"You bet I was scared," the dark-haired man snapped back at him. "So scared I almost didn't get myself down from there. Harry, I love you. But that was the most imbecilic stunt..."

"I would tend to agree," Molly Weasley chimed in, giving Harry a universal look of maternal disappointment.

Harry glanced away towards Hermione, whose face was also drawn in worry and confusion. She reached out towards Harry's arm with a hand, saying, "I suppose you had to do it, Harry?"

"I'm all right," Harry said, turning away from the others. "I'm all right, okay? I just couldn't sleep. And I came down to get a book from the library, but I got lost. I'm all right."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The next morning - the dawning of the fourth day at Number 12 Grimmauld Place - was humiliating, disastrous. Sirius seemed loathe to let Harry out of his sight to even take a shower before coming down to breakfast. The morning meal itself was taken in complete silence, except for murmured whispers to pass the cream or marmalade, mixing with Kreacher's glum mutters as he brought out the plates of food.

After the breakfast coffee was nearly finished though, Arthur Weasley took a deep breath and began to speak. "Harry, last night after you'd fallen asleep, the rest of us had a talk. And we've come to an important decision."

Harry knew immediately what it must be, and he slid his chair back an inch before Sirius' foot reached out and stopped the movement against the floor. With a guarded look in his eyes, Harry said, "What do you mean? What decision?" He glanced between the others accusingly, and Hermione turned her face away.

"You have to go home, Harry," Arthur continued. "It's not safe for you to stay here any longer. What happened last night...well, it's really my fault, for putting you and Sirius in such danger. If I'd read the signs better - your name in the messages, what you told me about the figure in your bed, the detached look you've been having lately - I would have sent you home far sooner than this."

"Go home?" Harry stared in confusion. "You mean...back to Privet Drive?" He saw Arthur start to nod, and burst out in response, "That's not my home! That's never been my home! If anywhere is my home, this house is! It's the home of my godfather! I've got some of the Black blood in me, from my great-great-great grandfather and grandmother! This house is mine!"

Hermione interjected carefully, "We don't really know that Acrisius and Fenella Potter are your great-great-great grandparents, Harry. The name similarity might be just a coincidence, or..."

Harry shook his head violently, drowning out Hermione's words. "Would you shut up? I know I belong here! I've known it ever since the first day! And besides..." He took a gasping breath of air, like a swimmer trying to stay afloat although the undertow threatens to pull him under. "Besides, back in my third year - Sirius asked me to come stay with him! He said that I could come live with him, and we'd be a real family! You can't send me back to the Dursleys! I won't go! I won't..."

Sirius hung his head. "You know I wish you could live with me, Harry. It's been too long, and I've got too much time to make up for. But this house is dangerous for you. I'm not going to keep promises that I know are going to hurt you."

"THAT'S A LIE!" Harry lashed back, and Sirius winced. "You promised! You can't go back on your promise! Unless you never meant to make good on it to begin with?"

Molly Weasley's frown deepened. "Harry, that's a low blow, and completely uncalled for. Sirius hasn't been in a position..."

"He's in a position now, isn't he?" Harry fired back. "He's got a house! And no one from the Ministry can find it, can they? It's perfect! But no, Harry can't stay here! You want to send me back to my bloody muggle aunt and uncle and keep it all to yourselves! It's all a mystery to you, and you can't stand the fact that I might actually understand it more than you! That I might belong here more than any of you!"

Hermione seemed to be knocked back in her seat when Harry made the cutting reference to his muggle relatives, and she stared down at her empty plate with a look of despair. As Harry continued to yell, she gathered her resolve and finally spoke in reply. "You want to know the real reason why Sirius is breaking his promise, and Mr. Weasley is sending you back? Do you really want to know, Harry? It's because something's going to happen to you if you stay here any longer. Something's going to happen, it's going to be bad, and you're too thick-headed to see it coming! We're doing this because we love you, Harry!"

Arthur used this opening to add in quickly, "I shouldn't have chosen you as a subject to begin with, Harry. Not after the experience you'd had with the Triwizard Tourney and Cedric Diggory. Even you suggested that you might be under the suggestion of You-Know-Who, and I ignored it."

"But you said you didn't think that Voldemort had anything to do with this!" Harry yelled; emphasizing, twisting the name of the Dark Lord on his lips like a weapon to make the others squirm with discomfort.

"And I still don't." Arthur's words were firm, but he had not yet reached a shouting level in spite of Harry's anger. "But it forces me to face the fact that you are more sensitive to certain influences, Harry. There are things in this world that affect you that don't affect the rest of us. So I'm sending you back to where you're safe."

"NO!" Harry cried, starting to rise from the table. Sirius' hand reached out and grasped Harry's shoulder like a vise, keeping him in his place.

"...Molly will escort you back to your aunt and uncle's home in Surrey once you've gathered your things. We'll come and help you get to King's Cross on the first of September when it's time for you to return to school with Hermione, Ron, the Twins and Ginny," Arthur continued. It seemed that the weight of what he was saying drained him, but he was resolved to continue on.

"Can't I just go back to The Burrow?" Harry asked pleadingly. "At least there I can still be among friends! I don't belong at my aunt and uncle's! You said at the start of the week that if we were too frightened, we could go back and stay at your place!"

Sirius and Arthur exchanged glances, but Arthur shook his head. "It would be too easy for you to return here, I think, if you merely went back to The Burrow. Besides, I have a theory that once you're away from a magic-rich environment, the house's hold upon you will lessen..."

"You can't stop me from coming back!" Harry growled at the quartet. "I'll just run away if you send me back to Little Whinging! I know how to get here now! I'll be able to..."

Sirius sighed. "There are ways of making sure even you can't find the house again, Harry. Don't do this to us. We're only doing this for your own good."

Harry sank back in his seat, staring at the others. "They probably won't take me back, you know," he said sullenly. "They hate me about as much as I hate them. I told them I'd be away for the whole rest of the summer."

"I've already spoken to your Aunt Petunia this morning, via a public fellytone," Molly said briskly. It was at this point Harry noticed that everyone in the group appeared to be wearing 'muggle-ish' clothes.

Beside Mrs. Weasley, Hermione whispered, "Telephone."

Molly gave a distracted nod of acknowledgement and continued. "...With Hermione's assistance. And I must say, I was highly disappointed at her reticent manner, but she said that your room would be ready for you, and that they'd be in today for when you return. At any rate, you are expected, and it would be best to get things taken care of right away. So let's go make sure you're all packed."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Accompanied by his escort, Harry went up to the Blue Room, and his things were gathered into his trunk. Hedwig was called and put back into her cage, and the group bustled Harry and his possessions back down the stairs and out through the front door. It appeared that the entire quartet intended to walk with him to the pub where Molly planned to get a cab with Harry back to Little Whinging.

They were only a few yards down the sidewalk when Harry burst out, "My broom! I've forgotten my broom!" He shook off Arthur's hold upon his shoulder and turned around, dashing back towards where Number 11 and Number 13 seemed to stand side by side. The House of Black is located at Number 12 Grimmauld Place in London, Harry thought to himself. He hardly noticed more than just the appearance of the door with the ancient twisted-serpent knocker this time, and as he bolted up the step, he drew his wand out from his back pocket. "Alohomora!" Harry yelled, and burst through the front door a moment later.

Harry was certain that the others were close behind, but that didn't worry him as he rushed past Kreacher and dashed up the staircase to the upper floor. He flung open the door to the Blue Room and slammed it shut behind him as he entered, hastily turning the bolt in the lock. He knew that precaution wouldn't take long to get past, but every moment might help. Now he was flattened on the floor, reaching underneath the curtained bed to where he'd stashed his broom and invisibility cloak a few nights before. As he shoved the window open, he could hear the sound of footsteps outside in the hall, the rattle of the door knob, and Hermione's shrill cry of "Alohomora!" causing the lock to fall back into an open position.

They were very close, to be sure. Harry had only a moment to swing the invisibility cloak on over his shoulders and jump out the window with his Firebolt, which he quickly accelerated to its top speed in order to take him out of wand range for any of his friends to pull him back. He was fairly sure that the cloak would conceal him well enough, but there was a chance that a part of the broom might be sighted, and the target fixed using that.

Up, up, up he flew, as high as he could bear, until the garden of Number 12 seemed to be just a postage stamp below him in the midst of the vast London sprawl. He caught his breath for a moment, and then turned his broom downwards, accelerating once again as if he were in the most desperate of Wronski Feints, chasing after a winged golden snitch that his opponents would do anything to keep him from catching. I'm really doing it, Harry thought to himself. Down, down he raced, gripping the shaft of the Firebolt with all his strength as he aimed for the foot of the great beech tree next to the garden terrace. I am really doing it, now, at last; this is me, and this is all that I have ever, ever, ever wanted.

In the unending, crashing second before the broom hurtled into the foot of the tree, Harry thought clearly, Why am I doing this? Why am I doing this? Why don't they stop me?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Harry sat up in his bed suddenly, awakened by the sound of George's loud voice filling the room.

"Mum says get up, your breakfast is in the kitchen and then she needs you in the drawing room, there are loads more doxies than she thought and she's found a nest of dead puffskeins under the sofa."

Ron moaned loudly from where he lay on the other bed in the room, turning over to look in Harry's direction. He blinked his eyes sleepily, squinting as he peered in his friend's direction. "Blimey, Harry - you look like someone just walked over your grave. What's the matter?"

Harry shook his head to clear it, and slipped his glasses onto his face. "It was nothing," he said a bit shakily. "Just a bad dream. Come on, or we'll be late for breakfast."

In the midst of the hurried events of the day Harry forgot about the troubling vision he had the night before, and later, when questioned by Ron, he even had difficulty recalling that he'd had a dream at all. Harry, Ron, Hermione, the Weasley Twins and Ginny returned to school on the scarlet Hogwarts Express; the members of the Order of the Phoenix scattered in order to handle their various assignments; Kreacher brooded over the remaining items he had hoarded to help him remember his beloved previous masters and mistresses; and Sirius gloomily consigned himself to his new residence and inactivity in the dank structure known as Number 12 Grimmauld Place. Number 12, not sane, hid away in its shadows unnoticed by the world around, holding darkness within; it had stood so for well over a century, and might stand for a century more. Within, portrait-laden walls stood high, ceiling beams met neatly, and curtains were sensibly shut; silence lay steadily against the wood and stone of Number 12, and whatever lurked there...

...lurked alone.