Book of Memories

Chapter 11: FINDING PEACE

There was no telling how long he was out. When Harry awoke, his hand was in a bandage and he was in a bed in a hospital wing. Someone had conveniently placed his other hand on top of the Order of Merlin plaque. Someone else was sitting on a chair beside him and there was no mistaking the owner of the long, silver beard and crooked nose. He must have been sitting there a long time, waiting for Harry to wake up.

"Good evening, Harry," said Dumbledore cheerfully but there was a somber look on his face and Harry couldn't make out the expression behind the half-moon spectacles.

He looked to his left and was staring at Sirius who was still pale, still white-faced, still looking dead.

"He's dead, isn't he..." said Harry gloomily.

He kept his hand on the plaque but his mood still didn't brighten. Dumbledore didn't reply. Harry turned to look at him, waiting for an answer. His hand was very sore. There was silence for about a minute where Dumbledore continued to stare into space and Harry guessed he was waiting for another question.

"Why'd you lie?" asked Harry.

"No, he is not dead," said Dumbledore finally, calmly.

Okay, he is not dead but the news still did not brighten Harry's mood, either. There was a possibility he could be worse than dead -- completely soulless -- and would eventually get up an act like a real zombie.

"What's wrong with him?"

Dumbledore took a deep breath, rose from his seat and began pacing.

"He did indeed go to St. Mungo's," said Dumbledore nervously, very much unlike his usual self. "The dementor was killed and what was thought to be the rest of his soul did escape. It took an awfully powerful Clades Ultimus from ten wizards to do the job. The half soul was spotted near St. Mungo's but it's intention was nothing as we thought. It had attempted to rip out the rest of itself so it could be completely free."

"Why would it do that?" asked Harry, confused. "When I was a floating soul, I didn't hurt anyone!"

"Very few of us have the will power to behave in a savaged state... and that is saying something," he said, smiling but then he went back to his somber tone. "You were yourself that summer, you were able to control yourself completely. Sirius cannot. There were so few cases where the soul could be reattached to it's body because only so few people could exhibit such extreme self control. If you will, remember back to our impostor Professor Moody. You were able to show signs of fighting off the Imperius Curse on the first try," he added, grinning faintly, then went back to his previous tone, again. "Sirius' soul managed to remove a further portion and without enough to call his own, slipped into a much worse state. Here, you see the result," he said, pointing towards Sirius. Harry didn't want to look.

He wanted to ask why no one told him, but dreaded how it might come out. Would it sound like he was too delicate? Would it come out as a shout? But Dumbledore, as he so often did, seemed to read Harry's mind (or did the look on his face give the question away).

"So often we are blinded by our attempts to please that we do not see the wrongness of our ways until it is too late. When the nurse witches at the hospital came to me with the situation, my immediate reaction was to notify you -"

"- and why didn't you -"

"but I did not," Dumbledore continued ignoring Harry. "Upon talking with Professors McGonagall and Snape -"

"SNAPE?" shouted Harry. "Why should he - ever - be involved with anything about me?"

"- and Arthur Weasley, we came to the conclusion of bringing Sirius back to Hogwarts where the rogue soul could not enter the grounds. Here now is the result of what we tried to avoid. You gave Madam Pomfrey quite a fright and not until Professor Flitwick managed slip a Draught of Living Death potion into your mouth were we able to detain you. It did not last very long, either."

Harry raised an eyebrow. Snape had once said there was an excessively powerful sleeping potion called the Draught of Living Death.

"Indeed. Just as what happened at the Fire Quidditch game, we don't know how you were able to stand rooted to the ground like a stone statue. You also managed to cut your hand very badly." At that, Harry remembered another question he had, now that he had a few minutes to brood on Sirius. He let go of the plaque and without saying anything yet, Dumbledore got the idea right away.

"Professor, whenever I hold this thing..."

"The most powerful magic of all is that of self-confidence and other feelings that start up here" -- he pointed to the top of his head -- "and other beliefs in yourself that start in your mind. Receiving an Order of Merlin came as such a shock that things you deemed as acts just for friends and desperacy started to feel more like what they really were: acts by a young wizard with a bit more heart than he could see. I bet whenever you look at it you still don't think it's really yours," he added, beaming.

Dumbledore was right. Harry picked up and looked at it again. No matter how many times he blinked, in white gold were the words Harry James Potter written upon it. He sometimes thought he was used to it but all he needed to do to shoot that down was to look at it again.

"The necklace is not magical nor is it bewitched. You feel something whenever you hold it because that necklace is the result of everything you've ever done, every life you've ever saved, every hardship you've ever endured and every life you've ever touched." Dumbledore stopped pacing and walked to the foot of Harry's bed, smiling broadly. "Yet you have a tendency towards downplaying it all because there's only one thing that you have wanted to accomplish for five years.

"Holding that plaque reminds you nothing you have done is a waste and it is that feeling of self-confidence that you have been hanging over since you moved into Privet Drive. When you hold it and feel nothing, it is then that I feel you'll understand all the things you've ever wondered and couldn't find the answers to."

"But when I was holding earlier I didn't feel anything and I'm not closer to answering anything," said Harry slowly, more to himself than to Dumbledore.

"I am afraid you will have to find the distinction between feelings battling each other and knowing when you are content with yourself on your own. Remember this, Harry: I believe I once said, 'remember if the time should come when you have to make a choice between what is right and what is easy.' Clearly, you have more hardships ahead of you and there will be many forks in the road. Do not, Harry, take the one with bad consequences as you have not so far."

This left Harry far more confused than he started out. Dumbledore was finished with his speech and simply left. As long a speech as it was, almost all of the words would stick in Harry's mind.

Madam Pomfrey came in moments after Dumbledore left with a very disturbing look on her face. Was she going to give Harry his comeuppance for nearly breaking her arm and sending her flying across the room?

"I'm sorry," he said before she could open her mouth. She stopped her stride of death towards Harry's bed and just smiled. It was very strange.

"Understandable," she said. "Well, I'm happy to see you awake. We thought you would be out for a week. Did the Headmaster manage to put you in better spirits," she said. It wasn't even a question and it sounded very businesslike as she continued walking, but turned to Harry's bedside table on which lay a small goblet of frothing, smelly, swirly black and brown potion. It looked rather like it tasted very bad and would sting horribly if put on skin.

"Sort of," he said quietly. It was true... sort of. "How long do I have to wear this thing on my hand?"

"You have to take it off now so I can rub this on it," she said, picking up the potion and waving it in his face. "Amazingly deep cuts you managed to make on yourself," she said exasperatedly. Madam Pomfrey's ability to change moods in the blink of an eye was unmatched.

Harry took the bandage off and looked at his hand. There were scar lines where the cuts had been, stretching from his middle to ring finger and across the base of his thumb. The inside of the bandage was stained red.

Madam Pomfrey held his hand pointing up and poured out the entire goblet onto his hand. It didn't sting or hurt like so many potions did and to Harry's amazement, the scars disappeared before his eyes. Madam Pomfrey tossed the empty bottle into a trash bin and disappeared once more to return a minute later with a golden plate from the Great Hall. He had missed dinner and looking outside, it must be past midnight.

"You may leave once you've eaten, Potter." She placed it on the table next to him and immediately a tuna sandwich appeared on it. Not very appetizing, but Harry was quite hungry.

Back in the Gryffindor common room, Ron and Hermione were playing a game of chess, alone. It looked like Ron was going to lose, until Hermione's King pointed out to Ron that he could win with his Knights.

"That's totally unfair!" she screeched.

"Blame your King," Ron sniggered as his own King decapitated a Bishop.

One of Hermione's pawns moved for her, apparently disgusted at her style of play ("Hey!").

"Checkmate!" Ron said as his Knight stood in victory, wagging it's tail merrily.

Harry, unseen so far, stepped closer and said, "What did you expect, Hermione, it's his chess set," giggling.

"It was all luck!" shouted Hermione's traitorous King. "And she didn't even see how to put the other King in Check!" All the broken pieces became one again and Ron put them all in a bag as they went lifeless.

"Harry!" Hermione screeched again, bright eyed and smiling, but then she became somber as she remembered what happened.

"No," said Harry, half gloomily, "it's... it's okay. Dumbledore told me everything." He explained what Dumbledore had told him.

"They just didn't want to see you go to pieces," said Hermione, standing by Dumbledore's decision, "like you did."

"He still lied to me," said Harry.

"It's not like you haven't lied to him before," snapped Hermione. Harry felt guilty. This was true; he should have seen it coming. "There's nothing you can do, Harry," she then said quickly, reading his mind.

But what could he do? The potion failed. The rest of his soul didn't want to come back and the potion backfired: the other half used it come back and steal the rest of itself. This all began to sound really weird and Harry thought it best to put it out of his mind, or did he? So far, no one's died under his watch unless he could help it. Cedric Diggory died, but he listened to a shadow of Cedric's request to bring his body back to his parents... parents... Harry shouldn't have thought of that word. Nope, Sirius was a hopeless case and the most Harry could do was stare at the face that simply stared back.

Whatever effect Dumbledore's words had were completely lost. Gripping the Order of Merlin plaque continued to have no effect as he climbed the spiral stairs to his dormitory. There was always something he could do, even if it was just minor, and it usually ended up being the thing to save the day. Now, however, it looked like he had hit a dead end. Hermione, useful as she was, as apparent over the next week, was sticking to Dumbledore's belief that Harry needed to put the thought of Sirius to rest and let St. Mungo's deal with it. But as Dumbledore kindly (or unkindly, depending on how you look at it) reminded Harry on a visit the next Saturday morning after breakfast, if Sirius was returned to St. Mungo's, the soul could very well finish it's work.

They left the decision up to Harry as to what to do and he decided to keep Sirius at Hogwarts. Nobody was capable of anything. Harry sat and ran over the thought in his head constantly that he should have let Sirius stay at Azkaban. Better to be downtrodden and depressed than go without a soul. But, no, again, he remembered that he wanted to pull Sirius from his wrongful confines. It got him front page on the Daily Prophet and a feeling of guilt he would probably carry all his life.

What did Dumbledore's words matter anymore? "Holding that plaque reminds you nothing you have done is a waste," he had said but it wasn't true. It was a waste of time pulling Sirius from Azkaban. Gone from Harry's mind were all the things Sirius had done over the summer. None of that mattered anymore. "Clearly, you have more hardships ahead of you and there will be many forks in the road. Do not, Harry, take the one with bad consequences as you have not so far."

Yes, now Harry understood. Dumbledore tried his very best to cheer him up but Harry saw right through that lie as well that Saturday evening after dinner. He stared into the photo album Hagrid gave him while lying in bed. Instead of staring at Sirius, Harry was staring at a photo of his mom and dad, arm in arm, on their wedding day. Maybe Dumbledore was right. It was a great idea trying to keep this news from Harry. There James and Lily stood, Sirius at their side, waving merrily. It wasn't so bad. Harry wasn't born yet so he couldn't be at their wedding, anyway.

Ron and Hermione were clearly getting depressed at Harry's mood as well. He had taken to not wearing the Order of Merlin necklace out of protest. Snape took this is as a personal insult. In his mind, Harry had it and didn't wear it which was even more spiteful.

As such, conversations between the two became even more heated and the time could not be worse to be arguing with Harry over a subject so touchy as -

"Your parents, they would be proud, I'm sure," said Snape coldly, his sallow face contorted into the sickest of nasty smiles. "Pulling Sirius from Azkaban, getting front page on the Daily Prophet, too!"

Harry never more felt like pulling out his wand, making the mark of ancients glow as bright as the sun and casting one last Clades Ultimus. His fingers were trembling, making the goblet in his hands spill it's contents onto the floor. Not much of it made it into his cauldron. He pointed his wand at a cloth on Snape's desk, which flew into his hand, and he wiped the mess up.

Harry then muttered, "Accio necklace," under his breath so no one could hear. Within seconds, in from a crack in the dungeon door came the Order of Merlin necklace, right into Harry's outstretched hand. He put it on, right in front of Snape. There was a vein throbbing in Snape's temple. He continued to tower over Harry like some kind of overbearing beast, his hair as greasy and disgusting as ever. Something about the angle at which he stood magnified the crookedness of his nose.

Maybe it was the tenseness of the moment, but Snape blurted out something that he didn't truly mean, or did he?

"Deserved what he got, your father, as did Sirius."

And it was plainly obvious from Harry's reaction that Snape should not have said that. The entire classed turned to look at Harry as he squeezed a tad too hard on his goblet and it shattered beneath his fingers. There was no controlling the visible shaking throughout his entire body and the heavy breathing that ensued. His tone was far more cold and venomous than Snape's had ever been. It wasn't fear, it wasn't even hatred; it was a wish for Snape to just disappear and never come back. He didn't look at Snape as he spoke, he simply looked at some place in front of him.

"Never," Harry started softly, unable to control the shaking in his voice, "- talk - about my parents - in front of me - EVER - again." He didn't need to shout it for it to have the effect he wanted.

Even Snape stood rooted to the spot, his eyes on the tip of Harry's wand, which was clutched tightly in Harry's hand and from which gold and scarlet sparks were emitting. Everyone listened for a minute to the terrifying silence before Harry spoke again.

"I've got too much to think about without your damn useless babble."

Snape took it as a warning rather than an insult and backed away.

Harry had a chance to relieve some of his pent up energy in Herbology later that day. Professor Sprout brought in man-eating plants. You had to cut it's head off with a pair of extra long scissors (or a really long sword if you weren't feeling up to managing ten foot long scissors) before you could work with it.

Professor Sprout watched in horror as Harry wasted no time in smashing the head of his with his foot against the desk, killing it. He clamped his hand tightly around it's jaws and yanked hard, tearing the head right off and he then chucked it into the trash bin Professor Sprout set up for the heads.

Hermione's tried to bite her hand off a few minutes later but Harry pulled the head off with both hands in one quick, smooth motion. She goggled at him.

"Are you going to extract the juice out of it or aren't you?" he snapped.

Hermione hurriedly squeezed the main stem over a huge goblet, the juice pouring out of it.

One good thing that had recently come was the fact that Draco Malfoy was no longer popping up at random intervals cracking jokes or otherwise upsetting Harry. It indeed looked like he had his ways changed the minute Harry had stopped that sword from killing him. Now if only he could do the same for Snape...

The next few weeks were some of the most boring and irritable ones Harry had ever experienced even when compared to a few similarly miserable ones during the Triwizard Tournament two years ago. Not Cho's face nor the start of the Quidditch season brightened Harry up. Professor Trelawney did not make matters any better by goggling at Harry during class every time and reminding him that she saw what would happen to Sirius the minute they put him on the Soul-Saver potion. Nor was Harry made to feel any better by frequent nightmares, nightmares of Sirius yelling at Harry from a cell in Azkaban.

"You - killed - me!" Sirius growled, his face screwed up in the angriest face Harry had ever seen in his entire life.

"No!" Harry shouted back. "I - I didn't... I just..."

Every time Harry woke with a start, sweat glazing his forehead, always aware of his breath, always aware of the heat in his face and never forgetting how long it took before he could fall back to sleep each time -- if he could at all. Not once did it wake anyone else up, thankfully. And what good did it matter that Sirius wasn't really dead? He wasn't going to get up from that bed and walk around any time soon, kept telling himself. And every time Harry had the dream, he believed more and more that he was responsible for Sirius...

During one particular class in which Professor Trelawney was trying different methods of making them see during dreams, she had Harry sprawled out across the floor on a wolf pelt. There he lay on his back, spread-eagle, feeling more like an idiot than anything else. At least it was cooler in the room when you were lying down but the smell still caught his nose.

"Just so you know," Harry reminded everyone, "if I see anything about You-Know-Who, I'm saying his name." For once, Ron and Hermione didn't shudder at the thought of hearing "Voldemort," but everyone else did, including Professor Trelawney.

Harry cleared the hair out of his eyes, fixed his glasses and prepared himself to be waking up with his scar burning in pain. Professor Trelawney told him that he might see a way out of his current state of troubles. Harry told her she just might as well have him stare at a brick wall. She also let him know that the reason he didn't get to have a go last time was because she knew he would see what happened to Sirius...

"Now, my dear," she began in her usual misty voice that upset Harry more than usual, "clear your conscious," -- try as he might, and he didn't try very hard as it was just not possible, he couldn't -- "relax the Inner Eye."

He closed his eyes, dreading what might pop up, and felt Professor Trelawney slip a few drops of sleeping potion down his mouth.

Harry felt the world disappear and the floor beneath him became as air. The heat of the room became satisfyingly cool and the horrible smell disappeared. He felt the Order of Merlin plaque, which he wore again ever since Potions, pressing against his chest underneath his robes become lighter and lighter until it felt like it was no longer there. His arms and legs no longer sent any signals to his fingers and toes to move and the rest of his body became dead weight.

All Harry could see was utter blackness as he felt like he was being released from his body, being pulled upward. It was easily the strangest feeling he ever experienced. Everything was black, everything, until swirls of colors and shapes, small as dust floating in the air, grew larger and larger. Distant sounds that echoed, echoed less and less as they came closer and closer. The rising sensation stopped and the sight before him eventually filled his eyes completely. Sound became perfectly normal again, as if he was there.

What he saw made no sense. He saw through the eyes of someone but there was no way of telling who. They were running, fast, through a forest. Something in the back of Harry's head wanted to wake up, tried to get his brain going. His mind did not work on his request and try as he might to interpret it right here, right now, he couldn't and so the best he could do was watch.

He caught a glimpse of a pair of human feet but there was no way of telling who the owner was just by their white, dragon hide boots. The sound of branches and grass and everything else as he ran past died away and all he heard was the heavy breathing of the person he was seeing through and their extremely heavy footsteps. The person must be very tired or simply wanted to run as fast as possible.

The sound returned to normal again as the person tore through a path on the forest ground. He did not recognize any part of it but this was, again, probably because Harry's brain wasn't responding. The person stopped moving and his view suddenly fell several feet, almost level to the ground. This new view didn't last long.

Everything faded away, the sound with it, and he felt himself falling. Feeling returned to his fingers, legs, arms and toes. Harry became aware again of the Order of Merlin necklace pressing against him and the wolf pelt beneath him. There was no reason to be sweating or feeling awkward at all -- and he didn't. The dream was just very odd, to say the least.

Harry's eyes jerked open and Professor Trelawney was standing over him, in such eagerness to know what Harry saw that she was bursting to say, "My dear! What did you see!"

"Nothing too interesting for once," said Harry, the left part of his upper lip curling, squinting his eyes in confusion.

He turned to look at Ron sitting on a pouf next to him, who let out a great breath of relief and smiled. Though it didn't appear to be anything bad, Harry still didn't feel like smiling.

"Well, my dear?" said Professor Trelawney.

"Right," said Harry, trying not to forget anything. Trouble was, there was not much to forget and for some reason, this bothered him. "I was seeing through the eyes of someone running through a forest very fast. They seemed scared and there were odd sounds coming from everywhere, like really large creatures. After a bit, they stopped and I think they fell and it was over."

Professor Trelawney, for once, looked at Harry, not with a tragic expression, but one of great confusion.

"Have you ever had this before?"

Harry racked his brains, which thankfully, were fully functional. Yes, he did have this once before, something very similar, but... He would have to explain it and he felt himself go pink around the ears.

"I had a dream before I woke up in the forest after Voldemort" -- and the reaction was as he liked it to be -- "hit me with Avada Kedavra again. Some voice told me to run so I got to my feet and, well, ran."

He didn't feel much like explaining the feelings that ran through him again as he recalled exactly every part of that dream. It was clear as day, he felt all the things he felt during the dream that he wished to never feel again.

"After a few minutes I just fainted and when I woke up, I really was in the forest. Why would I have the same dream twice?"

But really, he knew there were some differences. He wasn't wearing dragon hide boots. Should he hide this detail? It made less sense with it. Then he remembered his promise to Sirius, which, at this point, meant everything. The promise was that he would tell anyone anything about everything if it bothered him.

"Okay, not the same dream," Harry admitted. "The person was wearing dragon hide boots. I had Quidditch boots."

Professor Trelawney was left at a loss for words. This could only mean one of two things, as Ron pointed out over dinner.

"Either she knows what's going on, or she doesn't and it's left her worrying even more," he said matter-of-factly.

But Harry had the dream more than once. That very same night, it returned exactly as it had, everything exactly as it was during Divination, only when he woke up after it was over, there was a slight tingle in his scar. It put quite a bit more fear in him than he was comfortable dealing with on his own so he woke Ron up without thinking.

Harry told him about his scar hurting a little and it was still tingling during the several-minute silence as Ron thought of something to say. After several more minutes of both of them just staring blankly at each other, Ron opened his mouth to say something and moved it once but no sound came out.

And for the very first time as Ron explained the situation to Hermione at breakfast with Harry quietly eating, they knew everything of what was bothering him just as it had come. It made him feel quite a bit better and holding the Order of Merlin plaque started to have an effect again. Things were almost back to normal, Harry thought, before he discovered about Sirius.

But there was still the guilt he felt over Sirius and it only took one accidental mention by Neville, comparing Sirius to his own parents halfway into breakfast to put Harry back into a dark mood again. Sirius, Harry's parents and the disgusting comparison to Neville's own parents made Harry lose his appetite. He let go of the plaque and listened as Hermione looked at Neville with fire in her eyes.

"NEVILLE!" she bellowed angrily.

Neville merely made a few indistinct noises in the back of his throat. As much as his own parents bothered him, deep down he knew the feeling was nothing compared to what Harry had been feeling ever since Sirius fell ill again. Neville kept his mouth shut through lunch that day, too.

Ron must have sent a letter home explaining about Harry's very depressing, somewhat contagious behavior because when Hedwig dropped an owl during lunch into Harry's plate, Ron turned as red as his hair. It was obvious because Harry could count the number of times he got mail. He gave Hedwig a strip of bacon and she flew off happily towards the Owlery. Harry then read the letter to himself.

Dear Harry,

I hope Ron isn't around when you get this because he's going to be very upset with me. Perhaps if it would make you feel any better, Ron's father and I spoke to Dumbledore and he agreed you could possibly stay with us during Christmas vacation. Do try to cheer up. Ginny tells us that even Peeves is starting to look dismal.

Sincerely,

Molly Weasley.

Indeed, Harry's bad mood started to permeate through some people. Peeves started to listen to him as well as the usual people: the Bloody Baron, Slytherin House's ghost, and Dumbledore. Usually, Peeves spited everyone. But Harry's newly-found, yet unfortunate, aura of I'm-going-to-curse-you-if-you-bother-me started to have an effect on the ravenous poltergeist. Sure enough, stupid Peeves tried to trip Harry on a rug after being particularly mean to the caretaker, Argus Filch. Peeves must have been feeling particularly smug because he pushed his luck.

"DRACONUS ICICLIA!" thundered Harry. Professor McGonagall, behind him, jumped, he shouted so loudly.

A tremendous flurry of snow erupted at the end of Harry's wand like a blizzard. It formed into a dragon made of ice so large it was size of Dumbledore's lightning dragon but with the strength charm, Fortitudinus, cast with the mark of ancients. The muscles around it's arms, neck, legs and tail bulged out so much that Peeves darted headlong through the nearest wall, narrowly missing getting the front end of a Hagrid-sized snowball. It collided with the wall and exploded into a thousand flurries, making it look like it had snowed inside the corridor.

Professor McGonagall melted them with a heating charm and Harry entered Transfiguration with an evil smirk on his face.

Clearly, something had to be done about Harry's mood and there was only one other person left in the world that he held a special place for (but he would never admit it).

That person... was Cho.