The Second War

Chapter 2

Kreacher's New Master

"Um..." Bill said. Bill was a curse-breaker at Gringotts, a goblin-run bank. He had long red hair and a dragon tooth earring on his right ear. He was dressed in a black dragon-hide leather jacket and scuffed black jeans at present; on his shirt, there was a heading for a U2 and Weird Sisters Concert, titled Hags and Warlocks. Harry looked around at them for explanation, not receiving the sort of calculation he would have deemed worthy of such an unexpected visit.

"We come bearing gifts!" beamed Fred and George. Fred and George were identical to the last freckle and those who didn't know them frequently got confused when they dealt with the twins; it didn't help that they were also known to pull pranks as dreadful as the Hogwarts poltergeist Peeves' worst ones.

"Uh right," said Harry. "Really..." He couldn't say he believed them, they were known to pull tricks and to joke constantly.

"Um..." Bill said. "Can't...say..."

"We bring dragons," said Charlie sardonically. "Really, Harry, we just came to deliver a message to Arabella." Charlie was slightly taller than the twins were, but he was also tanner than the other Weasleys; that could have been a mistaken observation as he had so many freckles. He was also bruised in several areas and his arms were blistered and burnt.

"Who?" Harry said.

"Figg," said George.

Arabella Figg, who until now had been revealed as a Squib, lived only two streets away from Harry and had been watching Harry for Dumbledore since before Harry had known he was a wizard.

"The Squib," said Fred, beaming. "Not unlike our friendly caretaker."

Fred was, of course, alluding to the caretaker at Hogwarts School of Wizardry and Witchcraft, Argus Filch, a bitter man who had not an ounce of magical talent.

"Anyway," said George. "You're coming with us."

"No he's not," said Bill finally, "although I did try to settle the matter. We're just making sure you get there all right."

"Who says?" said Fred. "Why can't he come with us?"

"Severus," said Bill. "He's taking Harry..."

"I'm not sure we can trust Snape with Harry, considering their mutual feelings for each other," said Fred, "know my meaning?"

Snape was Harry's least favourite teacher at Hogwarts and for good reason: Snape hated Harry's blood since he had entered the school six years before.

"Yeah," said George. "You're on your own, Potter."

"I'm coming with you," said Harry abruptly. "You can't leave me with Snape."

"I'm afraid that it is my job, no matter how tedious it may be, to escort you to 12 Grimmauld Place," said a cold voice. "You really have no choice in the matter."

"I'm sure you'd love that, Snivellus!" spat George. "You think we trust you?"

Snape did not seem to care what was in the mind of a couple of teenagers, much the less the Weasleys. A small smile formed and he bared his yellowing teeth.

"Do you think I care what goes on in the little useless skull of yours?" asked Snape in a quiet, deathly voice. "If you do, you have severely miscalculated me, Weasley."

"It'd be four Weasleys if you wanted to fight," said Charlie threateningly. Bill made a move to correct this assumption, but thought better of it. Harry knew that Bill had it in his better judgement than to fight a former Death Eater, nonetheless one who had come to his first year at Hogwarts knowing more curses than most seventh years.

"Up, Potter," said Snape, "we have an early broom to catch."

"Wait a moment," said George angrily. "You can't go with--!"

"We can trust Snape," said Bill steadily, although he was making a job of keeping himself from breaking. "If Dumbledore wanted Snape to bring Harry to him, we have no choice but to endure."

"He's not going to Hogwarts or something!" said George. "We could have brought him; I mean no one is going to chase us when all time has been frozen except for us by Charlie."

"Quite the opposite of going back in time to save your godfather, isn't it?" asked Snape silkily. Harry glared daggers at Snape; Snape merely turned towards Bill. He glared at him. "I shall be going now. You four will be in charge of bringing Harry's entire luggage back to the hideout."

"Fine with me," said Bill. "But don't stand so close to me -- I'm not itching to become a vampire." Snape flinched.

"I don't know what you're talking about," said Snape as he pulled out an object from his robes; Fred and George whipped out their wands. "Don't be scared foolish children. I'm just making an authorized Portkey for the journey; no doubt you froze the first time you went on broom to the hideout, hmm?" He pointed his wand at a discarded can of tuna. "Portus." The can glowed brightly. "Touch the tuna, Potter."

Harry touched the tuna apprehensively; he didn't like the idea of going wherever Snape wanted him to go, even if Dumbledore did trust him. This feeling went beyond words--Harry hated Snape. And he was sure Snape would say the same thing about him...

Suddenly, he felt his body levitate into the air and he was being pulled towards, presumably, the late Sirius Black's house. Suddenly he crashed to the floor; loud cracking noises were alerting the street to their arrival. The cracking noise evaporated into the air and they walked onwards.

"Come on, Potter," said a voice which Harry did not at all like. "We're here now." Harry looked up and he saw the brass knocker on the door that he remembered so well.

"So you weren't lying?" said Harry spitefully.

"Of course not," said Snape and he pulled Harry up by the collar; no Weasley dared confront Snape as they walked into the house.

"Oh, I so want to hex Snape," whispered Fred to George as they followed him, lugging the many pieces of Harry's luggage.

"Nothing's stopping you except his knowledge of the Dark Arts," said Bill nastily. An odd gleam lit up his eyes.

That was true, as Snape had known more Dark Arts when he had entered Hogwarts than most graduates of the school.

"But Hermione fancies him, don't you know?" asked Ron as they entered the vestibule. They moved into the living room, where Remus Lupin and Mundungus Fletcher were conversing in quiet voices.

"Are you kidding?" asked Fred; George gagged uncontrollably.

"No," said Ron. "Listen, she so believes that Snape has shifted to our side... and she was also convinced that Lockhart had done all the stuff he had written. And she liked Lockhart, remember?"

"Rings a bell," said George. Fred stepped forward and slapped Ron across his cheeks.

"Stop acting jealous, you overgrown git," said Fred. "Just because your relationship lasted five minutes doesn't automatically mean she's in love with Snape or - or Dumbledore."

"Who's in love with Dumbledore?" asked Harry; he was rubbing his neck intensely.

"Ron reckons Hermione likes Snape," said George.

"You're a git," said Hermione. "Hello Harry. Did Ron tell you anything?" Harry looked Hermione up and down; she was wearing a pair of blue jeans and a black blouse.

They walked into the living room, Ron and Hermione glaring at each other as two territorial dogs might.

"I haven't heard from him all month," said Harry. "What happened?"

"We hooked up," said Hermione. Harry smiled. He had always had the feeling that they would end up together. Ron's continuing jealousy and Hermione's subtle hints had been getting on Harry's nerves. It seemed as if every conversation had one or the other. "Then we broke up..." Harry looked up and frowned, obviously surprised. "God he's an idiot and he thinks I like Snape?" Snape looked backwards from where he was sitting, having been reading the Daily Prophet. "Honestly Harry, you don't think I like Snape, do you?"

"No," said Harry. She smiled and kissed him on the cheek. Ron groaned heavily and gave Harry an evil look.

"Well it's your own fault our relationship didn't last at that level," said Hermione. She turned to Harry. "After we had hooked up, he was ready to snog, the clueless git. Oh, and did you hear? The Death Eaters broke out last month."

"I heard about it," said Harry. "But as long as I come back to where my blood is, I'm protected. And I have already been."

"Excellent," she said and she beamed. "Oh, I missed you so much!" She embraced Harry even further in a hug; Harry, panicked, threw an arm around her apprehensively.

When she finally released him, he looked around at them.

"So what's happening here anyways?" asked Harry. The room had an unnerving feeling about it. Hermione looked away, as if afraid that she would upset Harry.

"They're holding a funeral for Sirius," said Ron. "It'd be kind of hard because there was no body."

"I'm really sorry, Harry," said Hermione.

"No it's all right," said Harry quickly. Inside he felt a squirm of guilt. All this time he had refused to acknowledge the fact that Sirius had died. He hadn't even thought of what would happen at this point.

"But it hardly makes a difference, though," said George. "Loads of wizard funerals don't have bodies because they disintegrated or something; stuff happens every few years like that." Hermione frowned. "It's going to be soon, I think..."

"Well, we can mope around all day," said Ron, "or we could wait until this meeting begins and hear from our reliable resources, yes?"

"Bugger off," said George, "you'll spoil the surprise for Harry." Harry, on the other hand, did not care to hear about some reliable resources; all he wanted right now was a steaming bowl of tomato soup or the like. His insides had grown cold or he had realised now that they were uncomfortably squirmy.

"We'll have to make do, anyway," said Remus Lupin, as he crossed the room, looking onto the group that had congregated in the living room. "Anyway, non-members will go to their rooms right now, and you four, come with me."

"What's going on?" asked Harry, as he, Hermione and Ron walked up the stairs.

"Meeting," said Ron. "Another top-secret report from Snape, I reckon."

"So Fred and George are in the Order?"

"Yes," said Hermione. "They've been recruiting at the joke shop... they don't recruit the normal customers or anything like that; they've got a thing where people the Order thinks are qualified will come to the shop and they will have learned a secret word or phrase from one of our guys...then we will transfer them to the Hog's Head at Hogsmeade where the bartender there will take care of the rest."

"You mean that old guy?"

"Dumbledore trusts him," said Hermione.

"They're friends or something," said Ron.

"Harry!" Ginny walked into the room holding up a small piece of parchment. "Guess what we've got?"

"Parchment?" asked Harry.

"No, silly," said Ginny smiling mischievously. "We've got connections so we know what's going on in there."

"And how?" asked Harry.

"Sneak Parchment," said Hermione. "Get it over here, I want to read it!" Ginny laid the parchment on the table; Harry found it to be written similarly to the manner of a screenplay.

Harry scanned it from the top, which was starting to fade as the parchment became fuller.

Dumbledore: Welcome to the thirty-second meeting of the Order of the Phoenix. (Applause.) Our speaker today is Severus Snape who has brought some interesting news from his work as a double agent.

Snape: Thank you. As of today, as far as Lucius's gossip concerns, the Death Eaters have returned from Azkaban since their escape early this month. (Some members flinch; others shudder uncontrollably.) The Dark Lord is plotting some sort of an attack on some Muggle/Wizard band by this time next year.

Lupin: What does he plan on achieving?

Snape: Listen and you might learn, werewolf. (Some members: Ooh!) He hopes to achieve a war between the Muggles and the Wizards. Whoever is left will fight the Dark Lord's Army. Mostly he wants to be rid of one of his enemies before he starts fighting.

Diggle: This is an outrage!

Hermione and Harry looked at each other in shock. Ron's eyes were spellbound by the parchment. A war with the Muggles, thought Harry.

Shacklebolt: We will intervene somehow. Did you learn who would be the target? When will this take place?

Snape: Sometime next year, summer, maybe August; it'd be an important band if he wants to make the right impact.

Tonks: Disgraceful! (Some members shudder violently.)

Dumbledore: Is this all, Severus?

Snape: It is all I have to say. Oh, and Potter's in terrible danger.

Trelawney: I knew it! I knew it! Will he die?

Snape: Probably...we're all keeping our hopes up...

Suddenly two massive signatures appeared on the parchment, deleting all of the words from the parchment that were already there.

"Okay, we know what's happening," said Ginny. "Are you guys happy?"

"War with the Muggles," said Harry. "That sucks

"Reckon you'd bayonet your cousin?"

"I am not killing Muggles," said Harry, "and neither are any of you guys. We know what we have to do now! Stop the bastards from killing the band."

"Any wizard slash Muggle bands we know about?" asked Harry; Ginny raised her hand as if she were answering a very difficult Potions question and she had realized what it was.

"The Police went out already, but there's Sting," said Ginny. "Radiohead's sort of new out there and U2 is a favourite in Ireland and sort of famous in America. And everyone here loves the Weird Sisters, but they're not Muggle slash Wizard."

"U2's doing the Popmart thingy," said Hermione. "But they haven't planned out the schedule for their Europe round, although they've got America already."

"So they might be in America?" asked Ron. "Well if they've got a following there, You-Know-Who's bound to be there!"

"Or not," said Hermione. "They want to get rid of our Ministry first. We were the first to know that Voldemort was back--and quit flinching, Ron!"

"Well thank god for Sneak Parchment," said Ginny. "Brilliant stroke of genius on my part, wouldn't you agree?"

"I could kiss you," said Harry.

"I truly wouldn't object, but I wouldn't regret it if you didn't, either," she said coolly, "If you get my drift." Harry laughed. Ron laughed as well, and said quietly, nudging him in the back, "Go for it!"

"It'd take a really bad kite not to take your drift," said Harry. Hermione sniggered as she imagined a kite in the middle of a windstorm, floating quite still.

"Um, bad metaphor, Harry... anyway, let's hide the parchment," said Ginny as she heard a group of footsteps emerge from downstairs. She pressed the parchment into a niche in the four-poster bed where a huge U2 banner was flowing along the hangings.

"Kreacher!" said a hoarse voice outside the room. "I'd like you to meet your new master."

"Kreacher is having another master after that blood traitor son of Lady Black?" asked the unpleasant voice of Kreacher. There was a strangling noise and then the door burst open.

"Meet your master," said Remus Lupin as he entered the room, clutching the house-elf's neck; the house-elf gagged unpleasantly. "Harry Potter..."

Master, thought Harry as he looked at the old house-elf. He had a house-elf. What was he supposed to even do with it? "What do you mean?" asked Harry as this realisation set upon him.

"Well, since Sirius mentioned you getting everything in his will..." Remus began. "Well, you get everything that belonged to him--this house, the elf, the furniture, the fortune..."

Harry looked at the house-elf, numb with disbelief. If it hadn't been for this house-elf, Harry might have still had his godfather, and now he was supposed to keep it?

"Fine," said Harry nastily. "Ron... you're getting half the fortune--!"

"What are you talking about?"

"I knew you would be this way," said Harry. "But if you don't give this to your parents, I'll give it to your brothers for their joke shop and I'd like to see you having some money for a change. You're always complaining about owning rubbish!" ("No way," said Ron.) "You own all this junk instead of having decent dress robes and decent books, I think your family deserves this more than anyone in the entire wizarding world."

"Kreacher," said Harry, hoping to sound kind now, "Would you please prepare a dinner for the Order?"

"Yes, why not?" asked Kreacher. "It's not as if you're all a bunch of mutated Mudbloods and traitors anyway."

"And," said Harry through gritted teeth, "please don't think that way about us...we're not all that bad, Kreacher."

"Yes," said Kreacher as he left the room, "make dinner for the half-blood Master and his unwelcome guests..."

"Wow," said Hermione, beaming, "I'm glad to see that you were nice to the house-elf."

"He's out of his tree trusting you with that elf," said Ron. "I mean Lupin and Sirius--they loved each other!"

"Who told you that?" asked Lupin; Ron jumped. "And how did you suddenly get from Kreacher to me and my unmentioned relationship with Sirius?"