The Silent Siege

Chapter 2

The Escape

The following morning, Constable Daniel Peters of the Metropolitan Police rubbed his eyes in weariness as he listened once more to the man's story. Last night, someone had evidently forgotten to tell the Fisher's dog that mating season had finished several months ago and that barking shrilly into the night was unlikely to attract the right kind of attention. Despite having three cups of coffee this morning, Peters wondered very much whether he could make it through the day. At times, he believed it was merely a case of mind over matter but, at other moments - such as when listening to this drunk vagrant who was now sitting on a bench near a busy platform at King's Cross Station - Peters felt a crippling fatigue descend over his body, starting from his head. It was as though a blacksmith was ceaselessly pounding his skull with an anvil.

"Your name again, sir, please." Peters tried to stifle a yawn.

"I already told yeh once, guv'nor."

"Then perhaps you could tell me again for the record." Peters managed to look the vagrant in the eye, daring him to accuse Peters of not paying attention the first time.

"Barnaby. Thomas Barnaby."

"Your, er, occupation, Mr. Barnaby." Peters' eyes fell on the large plastic bag full of recyclable bottles that rested on the bench to Barnaby's right.

Barnaby moved closer to Peters so that Peters could feel a wave of noxious breath sweep over him, and said in a conspiratorial tone.

"I'm on the vanguard, guv'nor, the front lines."

"The front lines of what, sir?" Peters tried to remain as professional as possible.

"I'm protectin' us all, from them." Barnaby's eyes widened meaningfully.

"And who, sir, are they?"

Barnaby stared wide-eyed at Peters and pointed a dirt-stained finger at the sky. "Them, guv'nor. The aliens. Little-green men. They're coming, guv'nor, don't yeh mistake that; they're coming an' they're gonna take us all. There won' be a man, woman, or child what's safe in this country."

"I see, sir." Barnaby checked a box on his notebook. "Self-employed." He looked up. "And what, Mr. Barnaby, can I help you with today?"

Barnaby pointed a bony finger straight at Peters, causing the constable to take a step back in surprise. As he did so, he noticed that Barnaby was aiming ever so slightly to his left. He looked back. There were loads of people milling about, some rushing for trains, others looking around, lost, but nothing seemed to stand out in particular. In fact, it seemed that Barnaby was pointing straight at a solid wall between platforms nine and ten.

"I seen 'em," Barnaby went on. "A whole family: mother, father, two older lookin' sons what was with 'em, twins they looked like, but that's their cover, see? And another boy an' girl with 'em. Hair all flamin' red."

"Many of our citizens have red hair, Mr. Barnaby."

Barnaby gave a small sigh and regarded Peters as a teacher might a truculent pupil. "They're all dressed all funny like, like they dunno how to, which, o' course," Barnaby's eyes lit up with excitement. "They don', do they, 'cause they in't really people, at all, guv'nor, you follow me?"

Peters' eyes watered over as he tried once again to stifle a yawn.

"They're them," Barnaby said meaningfully, "pretendin' to be just like that."

"I'm not sure, sir, that I can do very much with a report about people with red hair dressed strangely. Not every - "

Barnaby moved his hand forward as if to touch Peters' forearm causing the constable to recoil.

"Listen, guv'nor, that's at all. They walked up to that there wall, with all their luggage trolleys an' all an' blow me down, they walked straight through an' vanished."

"I see, sir." Peters paused. "That wouldn't be an open bottle of liquor you have there, would it, sir?"

Barnaby looked down at a half-empty bottle of Scotch ill-concealed in a paper bag.

Peters folded his arms. "I feel it my duty to warn you, Mr. Barnaby, that open bottles of liquor are not permitted inside King's Cross Station."

Barnaby wagged his finger emphatically once again. "Now listen here, guv'nor, my line o' work's not easy now, right, an' sometimes I need a little nip now and again to get me goin' in the mornin' but I seen what I seen."

Peters looked about to interrupt but Barnaby went on.

"That's not all. They're at the highest levels of gov'ment now. There's this funny chap what wears a bowler hat, with white hair and sideburns, what goes in an' talks to the PM 'imself at Downin' Street, just like them red heads, dressed not quite right, like he dunno how to do it. I got pictures an' all."

Peters felt his headache throbbing ever more urgently. This was going to be a very difficult morning, indeed.

***

On the other side of platform nine-and-three-quarters, the very same family of red heads was loading their luggage onto the Hogwarts Express. Ron Weasley was preparing for his sixth year at Hogwarts and his sister Ginny her fifth. Their older twin brothers, Fred and George, had finished school the previous year (though one couldn't very well say they had graduated) and much to the consternation of their mother, had spent most of the summer working to start up a joke shop in Diagon Alley, the wizarding shopping arcade in London.

Mrs. Weasley was fussing over the buttons on Ginny's cloak.

"Please stop fidgeting, Mum. People will see us. I'm fifteen years old."

Mrs. Weasley seemed oblivious to her daughter's growing embarrassment. "So you are. Just think, Arthur," she said to her husband, who was busy helping Ron load his trunk onto the train. "Our little girl, taking her O.W.Ls this year. I can still remember when - "

"Mum!" cried Ginny. "Please don't."

"Oh, go on, Mum," said George snickering. "It's been ages since you told the one about the time she made her pacifier disapparate."

"Days at least," added Fred.

Mrs. Weasley looked irritably at her two twin sons. "One would think that you two would finally grow out of this habit of teasing your sister."

"But we never get to see her, anymore," Fred protested. "We have to make up for all the lost time, don't we, Ginny?"

Ginny did not condescend herself to respond.

"Seriously, Gin," said George. "What is it with the hair?" He traced his finger in the air to mimic the shape of her curls.

"I like it," replied Ginny, shooting a menacing look at her brother. "It's different. Just like Hogwarts without the two of you."

"The real question," said Fred, "is does Harry like it?"

Fred and George shared a conspiratorial smile which faded slightly when Ginny's hand rubbed idly over the top of her wand.

"I'd be careful if I were you," she said frostily. "I've heard there are quite a lot of bats flying about in King's Cross Station."

"I think her hair's lovely," added Mrs. Weasley, as Ginny continued to glare at her elder twin brothers, apparently not having heard or understood what her daughter had just said. "And I don't care if Harry does like it," she added, glancing reprovingly at Fred.

Mr. Weasley tried to shoot a warning glance in his wife's direction but she ploughed on.

"He's such a poor, sweet, dear, lonely boy. And he would make such a wonderful addition to our family."

"I have a boyfriend, Mum, and his name isn't Harry Potter," replied Ginny acidly.

"Well, of course, you do, dear," said Mrs. Weasley, a little vacantly. "An attractive girl like you is bound to have many admirers, I suppose."

Ginny flinched as her mother absently adjusted the collar of her coat.

"Though I still remember when Harry first - "

Mr. Weasley cleared his throat.

"Molly, dear, I think Ron and Ginny had better be getting on the train."

"Oh, yes, goodness, the time," said Mrs. Weasley, looking at her watch. "Come on then, you two."

She kissed Ginny on the cheek as she left for the train.

Ron quickly kissed his mother in turn and moved to follow but Mrs. Weasley held him back by his arms.

"What?" he demanded impatiently.

"You are the oldest now, Ron." Mrs. Weasley shot an angry glance at Fred and George. "Not that it will make much difference, of course. Please promise me that you'll take good care of your sister."

Ron nodded.

Just as Ron was about to board the train, he heard a scurry of footsteps approaching him from behind. The whole family turned around to see a girl of Ron's own age, of about medium-height with bushy brown hair that fell haphazardly around her face as she ran.

Ron's eyes lit up. "Hermione!"

Hermione smiled briefly and for a slight instant Ron felt something descend in his stomach. But Hermione's smile quickly faded and she adopted the reflective, quizzical expression that she used whenever she was trying to solve a problem, which was most often.

"Ron, thank goodness I found you. Oh, hello, Mr. and Mrs. Weasley," she said, with a smile that was brief but genuine. "I can't see Harry anywhere. I thought he must have been with you."

Mr. Weasley shook his head. "I'm afraid not, Hermione. Perhaps he already boarded the train."

Hermione bit her lip anxiously. "But we arranged to meet him here on the platform."

Ron frowned, too, and also began to look anxious.

Hermione drew closer to Mr. and Mrs. Weasley and lowered her voice.

"Wasn't he supposed to be coming here with the Order again?"

Mr. Weasley cleared his throat.

"The Ministry was due to bring him, actually," he said softly. "Talked to old Phyllis Flittler about it just yesterday. Things have changed since last year, of course." He glanced about the platform meaningfully.

Hermione looked over to Ron who titled his head in a slightly less subtle manner toward an inconspicuous-looking wizard in loose-fitting black robes a little to their right whose eyes shifted back and forth along the platform taking in his surroundings carefully as the families around him lifted their children's belongings onto the train. Glancing elsewhere down the platform, Hermione could see that every fifty yards or so along the platform were wizards and witches dressed in similar robes, taking in their surroundings carefully, but with no apparent connection to any of the students or their families.

"Aurors," whispered Ron. "They've got everything locked up tight in case You-Know-Who tries anything."

Mrs. Weasley put a reassuring arm on Hermione's shoulder and addressed both her and Ron. "Now don't you worry, dears, I expect the Ministry has made other arrangements."

"But, Mum," said Ron. "Don't you think he would have told us?"

"He may not have had chance. Now, the best thing for the two of you to do is to get on board the train. It will be leaving soon. There's nothing any of us can do about it now."

Both Ron and Hermione nodded reluctantly and moved onto the train. A few moments later, their faces emerged from one of the compartment windows. Ginny was with them on the other side. All three of them continued to wave until the whistle sounded and train started on its way slowly out of sight.

Mrs. Weasley sighed and turned back to her husband.

"Only two more years now, Arthur. I'll miss coming here to see them off."

She sighed.

"Oh, I do hope Harry's all right, really," she added.

Mr. Weasley laid a reassuring arm around her back. "I shouldn't worry, dear. The Ministry aurors are listening to the Order, now." He turned to Fred and George. "Coming, lads?"

"Sorry, love to," replied George, "but business calls. Back to the shop. We can take the Knight tube from Platform 10 5/8."

"Oh, do be careful," cautioned Mrs. Weasley, "and don't eat any strange looking gruel. You can always apparate back for supper."

Mr. and Mrs. Weasley turned back to the barrier as the twins left in the other direction.

***

"So yeh gonna take me in, guv'nor, is that it, eh, eh?"

Peters rubbed his forehead, trying to massage the pain away. He looked around. A crowd was starting to gather. He stared at several onlookers and cleared his throat. That caused the majority to move away.

He turned to Barnaby. "That isn't really necessary, Mr. Barnaby, if you'd just - "

"Look, guv'nor." Barnaby poked his finger in the direction of Peters' stomach once again. "I'm gonna say this one last time. There - "

Barnaby stopped in mid-sentence, his eyes bulging. He tried to make a sound with his mouth but his throat got caught on his saliva. He pointed a shaky finger behind Peters. "Blimey! It's them! They - they - just bloody well - " Barnaby cowered down lower on the bench, his eyes never leaving the two red-headed aliens who had just emerged out of the wall from which they had disappeared a half an hour earlier.

Peters turned around to see a middle-aged couple with red hair walking down the platform toward them. He tensed himself in case Barnaby tried anything. The couple stared at Barnaby in confusion.

"Is he all right?" asked the man.

Barnaby whimpered.

Peters turned around slightly, one eye still on Barnaby. "I'm very sorry, sir. This gentleman appears to be a bit disturbed at the moment. I'd just make your way along, sir, if I were you."

"I see," replied the man. "Yes - yes, we will."

Peters turned around to look at the man and suddenly did a double take.

There was something a bit odd about them. The man was wearing an inside-out bright orange sweater over a mustard yellow shirt with beige trousers that ended just above his ankles. The woman was wearing a long maroon evening dress and a bright pink sweater. He looked back down at Barnaby. Where did all of these people come from?

"A bit of a close call back there," Mrs. Weasley whispered to her husband. "They've put a new bench in. We'll have to be more careful from now on."

Mr. Weasley nodded. "A good thing we were dressed in Muggle clothing." He turned around to look over his shoulder. The Muggle policeman and that odd man on the bench selling long-necked flowerpots were engrossed in agitated conversation again. Neither of them noticed the Weasleys turn the corner and vanish into thin air.

***

Mr. and Mrs. Weasley re-apparated in their living room.

Mrs. Weasley immediately started looking about the house for anything her children might have forgotten that they still needed at school that year. They had come back the night before to make sure Ron and Ginny had had everything ready to leave the next day (which, of course, they hadn't) but it still helped to make sure. Mrs. Weasley sighed as she noticed how quiet the house was now. There were none of the usual sounds of children playing or laughing that still filled the summer time air of the Burrow. She realized that it wouldn't be long before even the summer in the Burrow was still and quiet and here she was, with her husband, spending their last precious summers before their children all grew older and moved out, locked away in the secret headquarters of the Order in Number 12, Grimmaud Place, trying to fight an enemy that still preferred to be unseen until he struck with devastating terror. It sometimes seemed to Mrs. Weasley that Voldemort's silence was just as frightening as his attacks for they knew that when he was wasn't attacking, it was only because he was planning something even more destructive. And despite their best efforts all summer and even with the support of the Ministry, they still had made very little progress in discovering what that was.

"Perhaps I should check with the Order about Harry, just to be - "

Mr. Weasley stopped dead in his tracks. Albus Dumbledore's likeness was already staring at him out of the fireplace.

Mrs. Weasley gave a small gasp and walked over to her husband.

"Albus?" said Mr. Weasley. "This is an unexpected surprise. I'm sorry we weren't here when you first called."

Dumbledore did not reply for a moment. His eyes were downcast. Mrs. Weasley had never thought of Dumbledore as being old, even though he had been headmaster since their own school days but he suddenly seemed to look ancient, as though he could hardly continue to go on much longer.

"Molly, Arthur," he finally said. "My friends."

Mrs. Weasley gasped. A tear slowly welled in Dumbledore's azure blue eye and fell slowly down his cheek. She had never seen him look so utterly defeated, not even when James and Lily had died.

"Albus?" Mr. Weasley repeated.

Dumbledore swallowed. "The Ministry went to Privet Drive this morning to collect Harry."

Mrs. Weasley suddenly felt a horrible sensation in the pit of her stomach.

Dumbledore continued. "There seems to have been an attack. The house was - has been destroyed," he finished slowly.

"Harry?" Mrs. Weasley asked.

Dumbledore shook his head. "The Ministry went to check with the Muggle police. They found his body. I'm so very, very sorry."

Mrs. Weasley let out a small cry and began to sob. She fell back against Mr. Weasley, who simply stood there with a stunned expression on his face.

"The children," Mrs. Weasley forced herself to look up between sobs. "They've already left - "

Dumbledore held up his hand. "Minerva will take Ron and Hermione aside when they arrive. She is the head of their house."

Mrs. Weasley nodded.

"Albus, surely, how could this have happened?" Mr. Weasley finally found his voice. "He was guarded at all times. Who - "

Dumbledore shook his head again.

"Remus was assigned to guard Harry all night. He was to turn him over to the Ministry aurors when they arrived. Dedalus reports that he relieved him yesterday evening around five o'clock but no one has seen him since, either." He sighed. "I'm afraid I must ask both of you to return to London as soon as possible. We need to find out exactly what happened."

The three of them stood there for a moment before Dumbledore's face slowly faded. Mr. and Mrs. Weasley knew that it was important for them to pack their things quickly to return to the Order's headquarters but neither seemed able to bring themselves to move. Mr. Weasley slowly moved his arms around his wife as both stood speechless in the empty house. The only thing he could hear were the low soft moans of Mrs. Weasley's quiet grief for the boy they had all come to love.

***

Later that day, Harry Potter woke to feel a warm nighttime breeze blow over his face. As conscious thoughts slowly moved back into his mind, he realized that he wasn't in Privet Drive, nor was he in his dormitory at Hogwarts. Harry was torn between opening his eyes to investigate and returning once more to sleep. He had almost decided on sleep when he heard a soft moaning sound nearby. Suddenly wide awake, he was up on his feet, his glasses out of his pocket and on his face and his wand outstretched even as he realized he was still clutching it in his hand.

And found himself face to face with an alarmed looking sheep which backed away quickly.

Harry sighed and put his wand back in his pocket, trying to still his fast beating heart. Fighting off a wave of disorientation that seemed to move from his head to his stomach, Harry tried to get a grip on his surroundings. He appeared to be standing on the side of a steep craggy mountain. It was still warm, but much damper than his home in Privet Drive. A gentle fog was rolling in from the hills that encircled him. The ground around Harry was completely covered in heather and, looking down at the flattened ground where he had been laying in it, Harry immediately became aware of a numbing soreness that ran all the way up his side. He could just make out a faint light from a small house in the distance and another from what appeared to be a small boat on a distant loch in the valley below. A dying patch of light on the horizon marked the place where the sun was either about to rise or had just set. From the temperature and the direction of the breeze blowing through Harry's hair, he supposed it was just after sunset. Harry wondered how long he had been asleep. His throat felt parched and his stomach started to rumble.

He looked at the sun for a moment, his mind still feeling much like the thick fog that was rolling all around him. He became dimly aware that the sun was falling even lower in the sky. It would be completely dark soon and Harry needed to find some source of water and food and then get some idea about where he was. From what he could see of the valley below, it seemed that he was still in the Muggle world somewhere.

Muggles?

Harry stopped in his tracks as something stirred on the edge of his consciousness. A sudden panic seemed to start in his stomach and rise up through his chest unbidden. He stumbled forward awkwardly trying to stop himself from falling and his foot caught on something long and wooden rising up out of the ground. With a strange curiosity that seemed to sharpen his mind with the suddenness of the dying sun cutting through the clouds ahead of him, Harry reached to the ground and pulled out a broomstick. It began to vibrate in his hand as soon as he rubbed away the dirt from the handle with his thumb and Harry felt his heart suddenly calm as if his godfather Sirius was still alive and speaking to him through the very last thing that had been shared by them both.

Harry was still holding his broomstick when something soft fell from where it had been wrapped around its handle and landed gently on top of a clump of heather below him. Curious, Harry reached down to pick up a long square piece of plain white cloth in his hand which seemed to throb with energy, just like his broomstick, but just as his fingers were about to close over the it, he forced them to retract as if stung.

And then with another rush of panic far more horrible than the first, Harry sunk to his knees in the earth and remembered.

***

It had been the longest summer Harry could remember since he had first received the news, on his eleventh birthday, that he was a wizard, like his parents before him, and would be leaving his Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon and wretched cousin Dudley for the best part of each year. Every summer before this, Harry had managed to escape the Dursleys for the last few weeks of the year: whether at his best friend Ron's home in the Burrow, in the Leaky Cauldron at Diagon Alley, at the Quidditch World Cup, and at the beginning of his fifth year, in the secret headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix at Number 12, Grimmaud Place in London. As soon as his birthday had passed, and the warm days of August had swept over the deceptively well-kept lawns of Privet Drive, Harry had fully expected that any day he would receive a note by owl post or perhaps even a shout up his window from the many invisible members of the Order (along with the occasional Ministry auror) whom he could occasionally hear apparating in and out of the grounds of Privet Drive. But one day, when a note finally did arrive, attached to the disillusioned beak of Ron's own owl Pigwidgeon, it did not contain the news that Harry had much hoped for. Rather, it had been the exact opposite: Dumbledore had felt it too dangerous for Harry to leave Privet Drive at all that summer, not, that was, until the Ministry arrived to escort him and his belongings personally to King's Cross Station on September 1. This was apparently not because Voldemort and his Death Eaters were on the rise again but rather that things had been far too quiet. Dumbledore apparently felt certain that Voldemort was up to something and that that something had to do with Harry. And though Ron had not said so directly, Harry sensed that he suspected Dumbledore knew considerably more than he was telling.

The letter itself, signed by Ron, but clearly penned by an army of well-intentioned Weasleys, had been something of a work of strategy in itself, aimed at keeping Harry from doing himself an even worse mischief than anything the Dark Lord may have had planned.

"I expect Dumbledore knows what he is doing," one line of the letter had read, sounding suspiciously like it had been coached by Mrs. Weasley.

"We're not going to London this summer, either," another line had added, this time sounding more like Ron's own penmanship. "And Hermione's not even here; she's still with her parents. Dumbledore reckons it's too dangerous for any of us to move now."

Harry could almost hear the slightly timid squeak in Ron's voice as if he were standing in front of Harry saying the words, terrified that any more bad news would be the spark that would finally light the dry tinder that was Harry right into Ron's face. Even the invisible Pigwidgeon seemed to be keeping a safe distance, his camaflouged toes upsetting an irate Hedwig's owl treats and revealing his hidden location at the far rear of her cage.

But the truth was that Harry did not feel angry at all. He felt something far, far worse. He felt ashamed.

Harry had first experienced shame at its most obvious source: he was responsible for the death of his godfather, Sirius, the closest thing Harry had ever had to a parent. Harry had tried to doubt this for the first few days of the summer holidays. He told himself as he had the summer before when he had taken Cedric Diggory with him to the graveyard that still haunted his nightmares and waking thoughts in equal measure that Sirius - as Cedric - had been murdered by others, that he had been merely a pawn in their traps, but Harry had given up trying to convince himself of this very quickly. No matter which way Harry looked at it, it was impossible to get around the fact that Sirius would still be alive right now if it wasn't for him.

But Harry's sense of shame had not stopped at this revelation. It had grown like a horrible rash for which there seemed no cure. Once Harry had realized and accepted his own part in his godfather's death, it was a very small leap to appreciate how unfair he had been to his friends ever since Voldemort's return. It seemed unfathomable to Harry that someone who had spent most of his life with no friends at all could have disposed of all his fears, frustrations, and as Harry quickly came to realize - his cowardice - at the feet of the few people in the world who had been trying to help him.

And now his friends were obviously afraid of him. All of the joy Harry used to feel at finally having real friends like Ron and Hermione, all of the anticipation at meeting them once again in the Burrow or in Diagon Alley, faded whenever he read their mail and sensed the unease that poured out in between the lines of page in the text of their letters. Neither of them had said very much except to constantly remind Harry of how little they knew. Neither, of course, dared to mention Sirius as if the very word had some kind of dark talismanic power like the name of a disease one fears to mention in front of an ailing relative lest it prove the final breaking point of their already fragile health. He wondered if both Ron and Hermione were breathing a secret sigh of relief that they were not going to meet until the start of term after all. They had no way of knowing his change in attitude, of course; with another pang of guilt, Harry realized he had never told them. He had stood at King's Cross Station, Ron, Hermione, and the members of the Order in front of him expressing their solidarity in front of the Dursleys, but he hadn't been able to find the words to express what it had really meant to him.

Of course, one of Harry's friends hadn't avoided mentioning Sirius. And it seemed to Harry to be the least likely person of all: Ron's younger and only sister Ginny had sent him two letters over the summer, both attached to the same parchment as Ron's. The first had said simply: "I'm sure I don't understand how you must be feeling about Sirius but you've got to go on, Harry" and the second, which had arrived with Ron's long explanation of Dumbledore's decision to keep him at Privet Drive all summer, had said only: "Don't give in, Harry. It's only a few more weeks. You'll be OK."

Strangely, Ginny's short letters to Harry had seemed much more satisfying than Ron and Hermione's long diatribes. It seemed difficult for Harry to believe that the girl who had once scarcely been able to look at him without sticking her elbow in the butter dish was now the only person bold enough to mention the name of his godfather. But almost as soon as this thought started to cheer him up, Harry remembered how he had snapped at Ginny after he had his false vision of Sirius being held by Voldemort and then again at the Department of Mysteries, all because she had delayed Harry from leading them all to what had eventually been Sirius' doom. And here she was writing letters back to him, letters that although short still contained the ink smudges from where Ginny's quill had obviously rested thoughtfully on the parchment as she, like Ron and Hermione, had struggled to find the right words to write. As far as Harry was concerned, he didn't deserve the effort.

The only thing that had given Harry some small pause for joy over the summer was that living with the Dursleys was ever so slightly less horrible than usual. While Harry may have felt ashamed at the frightened undertones in the letters from his friends, he took no small amount of pleasure in the wary manner in which his aunt, uncle, and cousin now seemed to regard him. Of course, his Uncle Vernon was still very much capable of the odd bark but this was soon followed by a regretful silence and a series of furtive glances around whichever room in which he had seen fit to rest his substantial posterior as if to spot some divine power that was about to exert its wrath. Harry was in no confusion about what had caused his aunt and uncle's change in attitude: the members of the Order of the Phoenix whom Harry knew were keeping watch on him all summer had warned Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia that they would be checking closely for any signs that Harry was being mistreated. The only thing that Harry could recall having brought a smile to his face all summer was overhearing his Aunt Petunia attempting to explain to their neighbor Mrs. Quibble, a toffee-nosed middle-aged woman perhaps even nosier than Aunt Petunia herself, that the loud cracking noises that frequently emitted from outside her home when an invisible member of the Order apparated or disapparated were in fact sonic booms from Royal Air Force jets which had most inconveniently altered their flight patterns to cross directly over Number 4 Privet Drive.

Despite their threats and the frequent evidence of their apparations and disapparations, however, no members of the Order were actually seen, not that was, until the very last day of the summer holiday.

As he had every summer, Harry had been marking the days down on his calendar until there was only one left. Which each day, Harry began to breathe easier, not only because he knew that he would soon be returning to Hogwarts but also because he knew that Voldemort had still been unable to break Dumbledore's magic and get past the members of the Order who had been guarding him. But on the morning of August 31, Harry woke up and felt a sudden surge of pain from the scar on his forehead, the scar that Voldemort had given him the night he had killed Harry's parents. While Harry's scar had twinged almost daily since Voldemort's first return more than one year before, he had only felt such intense pain when Voldemort had been particularly excited, angry, or somewhere very nearby. Harry waited all morning, hoping the pain would not return. In one day, he reasoned, he would be safely back at Hogwarts.

But the attacks of pain had returned throughout the day, increasing in both length and intensity. Once, just before lunch, the pain had been so extreme that Harry was sure he would pass out and begin to experience the chilling visions that he had suffered during his fifth year at Hogwarts or, worse, that Voldemort may have finally found a way to completely possess his mind. Finally, when Aunt Petunia told Harry to fetch his cousin for his lunch of boiled spinach greens, Harry slipped into his own room, wrote a quick message to the Order, and tied it to Hedwig's leg. Hedwig, sensing in her own way the urgency of the situation, quickly glided out of his window. As soon as he had returned to his own room after visiting his cousin, Harry could see that Hedwig had already returned, squawking at her own cleverness. Harry passed her a brief snack and looked out of the window curiously. As always, there appeared to be no one there but Harry was sure that whomever had been assigned to guard him must not be too far away.

The pain in Harry's scar continued as the afternoon wore on. The pain was still intense but it also seemed to stop quite quickly each time, almost as if something or someone was stopping it from maturing any further. Nonetheless, he felt it a throbbing after ache as he served a large supper of steak, peas, and mashed potatoes to his Uncle Vernon, and a much smaller plate of carrots and peas to a sulking Dudley.

"Bloody great cracking noise again this afternoon!" Uncle Vernon complained, clearly unruffled but still unwilling to shout quite as loud as he used to. "When are your lot going to finish using my house like a barking loony bin?"

"I'm not sure what you mean, Uncle Vernon," Harry said, trying to sound innocent as he carefully poured a glass of red wine for his aunt.

Uncle Vernon's beady eyes narrowed as he looked at Harry. He seemed to be restraining himself with an unusual degree of effort.

"When your lot finally clear out of here, there will be hell to pay for you, my lad. Don't think you're too old to get a bloody good hiding!"

"I'll be sure to pass that along," remarked Harry coolly, serving the meager remains of the dinner onto his own plate.

"You think you can threaten me, don't you, boy?" said Uncle Vernon, his voice still carefully lowered but his face the color of a beetroot. "I know your lot are here to make sure you get special treatment in this house but - "

"Actually," said Harry, feeling his temper start to rise. "My lot are here to make sure that you don't suffer a horrible death at the hands of Lord Voldemort. I don't know why they bother sometimes though. It - "

An unusually loud crack suddenly filled the kitchen. Dudley began to choke on his peas, Aunt Petunia dropped her glass of wine, and Harry turned around and gasped.

But Uncle Vernon, whose chair was facing away from the living room, simply flung his napkin to the floor and exclaimed:

"THAT"S IT! I'VE HAD IT! NO MORE, NO MORE! I DON'T CARE WHAT THEY DO TO ME. I DON'T CARE IF VOLDIE THING COMES INTO THIS HOUSE HIMSELF! I WANT THEM OUT, OUT, OUT!"

Dudley whimpered.

"Don't you worry, son," said Uncle Vernon with an unusual smile. "They won't get to you. I'll - "

"Vernon," said Aunt Petunia nervously. She pointed a shaking bony finger to a point somewhere behind him.

"I'm sorry to disturb your supper," said the calm, measured voice of Harry's old Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher Remus Lupin, who was suddenly standing in the doorway of the kitchen, "but I'm afraid I need to ask you all to come with me."

Petunia screamed and grabbed Dudley. The two of them ran over to the corner of the kitchen, staring Lupin up and down in fright. Petunia began to simper ineffectually and Dudley let out a low moaning sound while shaking visibly. He hadn't looked this disturbed since he had fallen into a cage at the zoo with a boa constrictor just before Harry's first year at Hogwarts.

Vernon, the man of the family, was as good as his word: he did not back down but instead fell to his knees on the floor in front of Lupin. On other occasions when members of the wizarding world had visited the Dursleys, Vernon had managed to overcome his initial fear and put up some type of - usually ineffective - resistance, but on this occasion, faced with a man he believed was about to carry out the final, horrible punishment for all of his years of mistreating his nephew, Vernon seemed totally overcome.

"Please!" Vernon croaked, fear written all over his face. "We - we never meant the boy any harm! It - It was all for his own good! W - W - We knew the boy was famous! We didn't want it to get to his head, you see. P - Perhaps w- we were a little harsh, at times. You forgive us, d - don't you, son?" he looked imploringly at Harry.

Harry returned Vernon's pleas with an expression of total disgust.

"I assure you I am not here to harm you or your family," replied Lupin, his voice as calm as Uncle Vernon's was agitated. "But you have to come with me now. You are not safe here. This house has been compromised - "

"T - that much is clear, sir," Vernon carried on, seeming to have heard only Lupin's last sentence. "I - I beg of you."

Lupin sighed somewhat warily. He reached into the folds of his robe and produced a faded white cloth from his hand, which he proceeded to unfold on the Dursleys' kitchen table.

"This," he tried to explain, his voice remaining calm but growing slightly more urgent, "is a portkey. We need to take it now to get away from here!" He took a step toward Vernon and held out his hand.

This was too much for the Dursleys. Vernon scrambled to his feet, bones cracking with the effort. He then shuffled to the rear of the kitchen and shepherded Petunia and Dudley into the adjacent dining room.

Lupin's lips tightened as he turned to Harry. "We have to leave now, Harry," he said decisively. "Let out Hedwig, but don't take anything else. Voldemort, the Death Eaters...." Lupin's voice trailed off and Harry's heart sank at the defeated look that had crept into his eyes. "They've broken the old magic, Harry. They're attacking. We had no warning. I've sent word to the rest of the Order but I'm not sure it will get to them in time. You, I, and your aunt, uncle and cousin have to leave now."

Harry didn't need to be told another word. He raced up the stairs to his room and opened Hedwig's cage. At first, she only sat there but then he waved at her with his arms.

"Fly! Go! We're being attacked! It's not safe!"

Hedwig stared at Harry for a moment before spreading her white wings and flying outside the window. In his heart, Harry wasn't sure whether he would see her again. Professor Lupin had told him to take nothing but he had still found himself opening his closet and taking out the one thing he valued the most, the only thing he had left of Sirius, the Firebolt broomstick his godfather had secretly given to him his third year. Broomstick in hand, he quickly made his way out to the door.

Harry's hand had only just reached the handle when he felt a tremendous wave of heat come over him. His scar suddenly exploded again with violent pain and he had to restrain himself from falling to his knees. His head still feeling fit to burst, Harry looked at the walls of his room: was it his imagination or were they suddenly growing darker? Had Voldemort managed to transport him once again to another place and time where he was about to commit some violent deed? Blinking the pain away, Harry could see that he was still looking at the walls of the stairway in his aunt and uncle's home but the white didn't seem to be so white anymore and the walls appeared to bleed and almost bubble. First, Harry thought that the pain in his head was affecting his vision but then a crack appeared in the wall behind his bed, causing his Gryffindor banner to fall onto the floor. A burning blackness suddenly seemed to emerge out along the cracks where the ceiling met the walls and smoke began to curl around the edges.

"Harry!" he could hear Lupin cry. "Quickly!"

Harry ran down the stairs. He felt the floorboards weaken under his step. In the distance, he could hear the Dursleys sobbing with fright in the dining room. He turned back to see a jet blackness sweeping like a cancer all over the walls of the top floor. The corridor was now filled with smoke. It was as if the house was imploding in upon itself.

Harry managed to clamber into the kitchen. He could hear Lupin and the Dursleys talking in the dining room. He tried to reach them but before he could, there was another surge of pain in his forehead and he fell to his knees on the floor. He could hear Lupin speaking but even though it was only in the adjacent room, it felt to Harry as if he was underwater.

"You have to come with us now," he heard Lupin say. "There isn't any time to discuss this."

"I - am - not - going - anywhere - with - you!" Vernon's booming voice sounded in reply. Harry heard him trying the handle of the back door, then yelping back with pain.

"It's - it's on fire!" Vernon cried in disbelief.

The kitchen where Harry was sitting was now filled with smoke coming from down the corridor. There was an enormous crashing sound as what had once been Harry's room came falling down into the front living room.

"Even if you could make it outside," Lupin was saying, "the Death Eaters are waiting there."

"The what?"

"And when they are finished burning down your house," Lupin continued, his voice still a study in calm, "they are going to come in here and make sure that Harry is dead, along with any witnesses. The only way out is to come with me, with us."

Lupin must have tried to move closer to the Dursleys again because at that moment, they all came bouncing back into the kitchen in a tragic parody of musical chairs. Flames started to leap all around them. Harry dimly saw the three Dursleys move under the kitchen table in fright. He could vaguely hear Lupin shouting at them from somewhere nearby. He tried to get up again but his legs felt like led. Smoke stung his eyes and he began to cough. He was dimly aware that a hand had grabbed his when a new surge a pain struck his scar and his world began to slip into darkness.

***

Harry opened his eyes and stared at the white cloth on the ground below him, trying to difficulty to reason in his still dazed mind how it was he had survived the fire that had threatened to engulf Privet Drive and found himself here. It seemed obvious to Harry even in his present confused state that he and his Firebolt had traveled here by portkey.

But where was here? And why weren't the others with him? If Lupin -

Harry's thoughts seemed to freeze in his head as he reached their inevitable conclusion. If he was here with the portkey then only he had made it out of the burning house. That meant that the others -

Harry didn't want to think anymore. All he wanted to do was to collapse back onto the ground and let sleep dull the pain that had begun to grow from a horrible lump in his throat. Instead, he slowly got to his feet, swallowed, and started to walk to the lake. He did not know where he was or how he could get out safely; he did not know whether his family and his friend were still alive, or whether he would be able to bear the burden of grief if they weren't. All Harry knew was that he might not be able to survive for much longer without water; his fears and feelings would have to wait until later.

***

Wolfram Harrell lay down on the ground staring up at the sky, an expression of total disbelief written on his face.

Harrell was an extremely fit man whose friends had often remarked how young he looked for his age. He frequently took to his broomstick over the spacious grounds of his family's palatial estate. He had built his own Quidditch pitch and prided himself that he could still fly as fast and turn as surely as he had in the days when he had played as a chaser on the Slytherin House team. Indeed, any medical examiner, whether Muggle or wizard would have very much approved of Harrell's physical condition.

Except for one small detail. At that moment, Wolfram Harrell was very much dead.

Voldemort placed his wand back into his pocket. He watched as Nagini circled Harrell's body not quite knowing where to begin her feast, the light from the fire in the Riddle House where Voldemort was hiding reflecting on her silky skin.

Voldemort once again spoke in the high-pitched snake-like language of Parseltongue.

Nagini stared back at him, a slight look of self-pity in her jet black eye and grudgingly curled up next to Harrell, waving the back of her tail back and forth impatiently.

"Just a little while longer, Nagini," said Voldemort in English. "We do not want to disgust our guest."

He turned to Lucius Malfoy who was standing to his right, clutching the top of his stomach gingerly.

"Harrell has just returned with some valuable news, Lucius."

"I - Indeed, my lord." Malfoy tried to put on a brave smile.

"Yes," replied Voldemort, smiling. "At my instruction, he returned to Surrey this morning. The Ministry wizards arrived as predicted, made inquiries with the Muggles, of course, and planted a few memory charms. Harrell followed them back to the Ministry and then, for reasons I fear have much to do with his second conscience, he returned to the house and what do you think he found?"

Malfoy shook his head. He didn't like to think.

"It seems that something quite remarkable had happened, something that seemed quite beyond the abilities of the Muggles themselves. Harrell found the burned down house brilliantly restored in the span of a few hours right down to its three Muggle occupants, precisely the same Muggles that seemed to have been burned to a crisp after our attack the day before. Harrell even spoke to them in fact, posing as a Muggle policeman. It seemed that they had no memory as to what exactly had happened, only that their nephew had somehow left and returned to school."

What color remained on Lucius Malfoy's face quickly disappeared. "The house was - transfigured? P - Potter?"

Voldemort nodded. He sighed and looked down at Harrell's body. "Potter is still alive," he said flatly. "He escaped. I wouldn't have minded if Harrell had told me the truth. It was, after all, a very difficult operation. But he had raised my hopes last night and when he arrived today, I was so very disappointed."

Malfoy repressed a shudder.

Voldemort turned to look back at Malfoy. "We still have a chance. It seems that the Ministry is not yet aware of Potter's resurrection; of the Order I cannot say. Yet my sources inform me that Potter did not board the train to Hogwarts this morning. This suggests he is still at large somewhere. I gather, Lucius, that you have some information that may be of use in finding him."

Malfoy smiled slightly, and could not resist straightening his shoulders with self-importance. "Yes, I think I might. I assume you are referring to the list of Potter's possible hideouts that came into my possession."

"Yes, indeed." Voldemort took a step toward Malfoy. "I still remember your Quidditch days, Lucius. I trust you haven't lost your touch."

"No, my lord."

"Good. Take a party of your best men to scour the areas where you believe Mr. Potter to be hiding and find him - tonight. We don't have much time, Lucius; he is resourceful as are those who are protecting him. It won't be long before he finds his way back to Hogwarts."

Malfoy nodded. He did not move.

"Is there something more you wish to say to Lord Voldemort?"

"Y - yes, my lord." Lucius cleared his throat. "The information on Mr. Potter's whereabouts was provided by my son."

"Ah, yes." Voldemort smiled. "Young Draco. And what of it?"

"I - I was merely thinking about our agreement, should our search be successful - "

"Should your search be successful, we might talk."

Malfoy smiled wanly and turned to disapparate.

"Lucius."

Malfoy turned and looked back to his master.

"Do not lie to me, Lucius." Voldemort looked meaningfully at Harrell. "If the operation is not a success, we do have another plan, albeit a slightly more difficult one." He pulled Tom Riddle's diary from his cloak and showed it to Malfoy.

A shrewd smirk crossed over Malfoy's features.

Let the fool think he did me a great favor, thought Voldemort, rather than jeopardizing everything I have worked for. At that moment, Voldemort knew that he needed Lucius Malfoy's vanity as much as he needed his fear.

"Nevertheless," said Voldemort, causing Malfoy's smile to fade slightly. "I grow impatient. Tonight remains our best opportunity. I do not care much whether you return Harry Potter to me alive or dead."

Malfoy's jaw hardened and a hungry look surfaced in his eyes. He nodded to Voldemort, then disapparated.