The Heart of Gryffindor
by SJR0301
Chapter Seven
The quiet outside was broken by the loud roar of an engine zooming up the street and then back again. The roar came closer and stopped at an idle just at Number Four.
“That sounds like a motorbike,” Dudley said curiously. He moved to the front window to peer outside and Harry stopped with his foot on the first stair to turn back and see what all the commotion was.
“Wow!” Dudley said. “That’s some bike.” Then his excitement tailed off as he saw something else and Harry tried to decide which of Dudley’s pack of goons might be coming to pay the Dursleys a visit. A loud banging sounded on the door. Not just a bang actually, but a pounding that made one think the door would blow down.
“Who is it? Who could it be?” Petunia asked nervously, and Uncle Vernon yelled testily from the kitchen, “Go away. We don’t want your kind here!”
The pounding sounded again and then a familiar voice boomed out, “Open up, Dursley!”
Harry flew to the front door and opened it before anyone could stop him. “Hagrid?” he exclaimed. “What are you doing here? And why did you come on that?” That was a large motorcycle. It was one of the coolest ones Harry had ever seen. It had sleek chrome wings and looked as though it could practically fly.
“Well, it’s yer birthday, Harry,” Hagrid answered. “It’s not every day yer young man turns seventeen, y’know. So I had ter come, an’ I told Dumbledore so meself.” Hagrid beamed at Harry and enveloped him in a great hug. Harry felt happy again for the first time in weeks upon weeks.
“Get him out of here,” Uncle Vernon whispered furiously. Dudley, on the other hand, was sidling back toward the kitchen with a meaty hand covering his behind. Hagrid had given Dudley his first true taste of magic, when he had given Dudley a pig’s tail on the memorable evening in which he’d first come to give Harry his letter from Hogwarts.
“Come on and take a look,” Hagrid said.
“At that?” Harry asked. He looked again at Hagrid. Hagrid’s wiry black hair was wilder than ever and he beamed happily at Harry as he waved Harry over to the motorcycle. “I didn’t know you had a motorcycle, Hagrid.” Harry looked admiringly at the shiny chrome and saw that front had been designed with what looked like a griffin’s head and wings. He didn’t add that he’d had no idea Hagrid could even drive.
“Well, I don’t,” Hagrid, said. “It’s yours.” Harry gawped at him in disbelief.
“What are you talking about, Hagrid?” Hagrid coughed and his beady black eyes looked sorrowfully at Harry.
“See. That motorcycle there belonged to Sirius, yeh see. An’ now that yer seventeen, everythin’ he left to you is yours. So, I brought it to you. I reckoned yeh’d find it useful an’ all. An’ yeh can ride it to get to where we’re goin’ soon’s the rest of the guard show up.”
“The guard?” Harry asked. Excitement welled up. He was getting out of here for real. He didn’t even have to run away. “But, Hagrid,” he said. “I don’t have a license. And I’ve never learned how to drive.” Hagrid smiled happily.
“Well, strictly speaking, Harry, I don’ think Sirius had a license either. And since yeh already know how to fly, I think yeh’ll be jes’ fine.”
"This is great," Harry, said fervently, "just brilliant." Then he thought again and said, "But Hagrid, it's broad daylight. The Muggles will see us if we fly."
"Ah," Hagrid answered, "we're not flying this time." And he looked terribly disappointed. "But seein' as its yer birthday, I thought yeh'd like to see her, an' maybe have a short ride in her." Hagrid patted the great bike and pulled a leather bag off the rear.
"We'll jus' go in yer aunt's house and yeh can pack while we wait fer the others."
Harry grinned happily and remembered just in time to say, "Duck. The door's a bit low in this house."
When Hagrid ducked inside after Harry, Aunt Petunia shrieked. "Get upstairs, Dudley!" She stood in front of her huge son like a cornered mother wolf and said quite fiercely; though her voice was shriller than ever, "Get away! Don't you dare touch my son! Don't you dare!" Harry stared at Aunt Petunia in astonishment.
"Hagrid won't hurt him," Harry said in annoyance. He thought it would irk him forever that he and his friends were unwelcome in the house in which he had grown up.
"Won't he?" Uncle Vernon blustered. Stupidly, he had got out a rifle, a rather larger one than the one he had tried pointing at Hagrid when Harry was eleven. Harry sighed and pushed the barrel up at the ceiling.
"Don't be stupid, Uncle Vernon," Harry said quietly, "If you shoot that thing off, the neighbors will notice and think you're strange." Uncle Vernon swung the gun back down so that it pointed straight at Harry and said, "I've had enough of your rudeness. I've had enough altogether! Owls in and out using my house like a barn! Flying cars, exploding fireplaces! And him putting that tail on Dudley. I WON'T HAVE IT! NOT IN MY HOUSE!"
It always amazed Harry how fast Hagrid could move. In a trice, he had Vernon's gun in his huge hand and was about to give it the same treatment he had given the last one. "Don't, Hagrid," Harry said.
"Why not?" Hagrid said grumpily. "Yeh don' really want ter leave him with a working weapon do yeh?" Not really, Harry thought.
"You never know if he might really need it," Harry answered. He held out a hand for the gun and heaved a sigh of relief when Hagrid handed it over. He wasn't quite sure what to do and felt rather nervous holding it; especially as he wasn't sure if it was loaded. Gingerly he found the catch that let him unload it, and pocketed the rounds that had been in it.
"That's enough of that," he said boldly to Uncle Vernon as he handed the empty gun back. "Save that for someone who really means you harm." Harry led Hagrid into the lounge and invited him to sit. Aunt Petunia cringed with horror as Hagrid dropped his giant form on her best sofa.
Marge, who had mercifully remained silent throughout all, said, "Just look at him. They belong in a sideshow, don't they, the two of them. Freaks, they are. Unnatural." Harry could see Hagrid's face darken and he hastily said, "Just ignore her."
Then being afraid Hagrid might do something to Marge that would get them both in trouble, Harry said coolly to his aunt, "Just shut her up, all right. I'll keep my word not to blow her up, but Hagrid is very loyal to his friends and might feel the need to erm..." Harry waved his wandless hand to illustrate his point and Petunia and Vernon both turned a funny shade of gray.
Hoping that he had got the situation back under control for the moment, Harry turned to Hagrid and said, "I'll just go up and pack."
"Now wait just a minute," Hagrid said. "Yeh haven't got yer present yet."
Dudley had edged out to the opening between the kitchen and dining room. "That...that motorbike. Isn't that his present?"
Harry was quite astounded that Dudley had even got up the nerve to speak to Hagrid. Then it occurred to him that he, Harry, for the first time in his life, had been given something that Dudley might want very badly and couldn't have.
"Ah," Hagrid said shrewdly, as if he understood quite well what was going on in Dudley's mind. "Matter of fact, the bike was already Harry's. That's part of his inheritance. This is his present." And so saying, Hagrid held out a largish package wrapped up in old editions of the Daily Prophet.
A warm feeling slid down his throat as he took the package and opened it. He shook out what at first sight appeared to be a shapeless black lump and at second truned out to be a three-quarter length black jacket that looked like it was made of leather. Then one saw that there was actually a faint pattern to the skin and hints of bronze underlay the pattern, and the whole of it had a subtle shimmer.
"Whoa, Hagrid," Harry said softly, "That's beautiful!" He slipped on the jacket and felt in the pockets. There were matching gloves as well. And the other shape that had made the package lumpy was actually two objects, a pair of matching boots. Dudley looked enviously at the jacket and boots.
"What's that made out of?" he asked, and the words seemed to come from him without his volition.
"Never mind what it's made of," Petunia said. "You can have anything in the store that you want."
Hagrid grinned slyly at Harry and said genially, "Aye, well. Not this, he can't. Dragonhide isn't fer sale at the Muggle stores yeh know."
Harry admired the shimmery black hide and saw that the inside had a sleek, silky fur lining that would keep one warm no matter how cold it got.
"Hungarian Horntail," Hagrid said. "In honor of the first one yeh beat."
Harry kicked off his trainers and slid on the boots. They were soft and comfortable and most important, the fit perfectly without pinching. "Thanks, Hagrid," he said.
He started to go up the stairs once more to pack, but a choking sound from his Uncle's direction stopped him. "Dragons," Vernon sputtered. His face was turning beet red again and then a purplish magenta, and then a royal purple Harry had never seen before. "THERE'S NO SUCH THING AS DRAGONS! I WON'T HAVE THIS NONSENSE IN MY HOUSE!"
Hagrid looked at Vernon with alarm and with something almost like pity. "Some people are like creatures, yeh know," he said shaking his head. "They jes' reach a point where they can' take no more. Then they go mad yeh know."
Uncle Vernon gaped at Hagrid, but where he might normal roar in fury, no word emerged. Not one sound. Outside, everything had returned to normal again. Cars were passing by, but they went unnoticed by everyone in Number Four, and everyone jumped when another knock sounded on the door. This one wasn't a thunderous one like Hagrid's. This one sounded like any ordinary knock.
"Get the door, Dudley," Uncle Vernon said.
"Tell Harry to get the door," Dudley answered.
Some things, Harry thought, never changed. He started toward the door only to have Aunt Petunia shriek, "Not him! Not in that jacket! What will the neighbors think?"
Hagrid's face darkened again and Harry was more than a little annoyed himself. He felt like a new person in his new coat and boots; in fact, he felt almost respectable, and at least, he felt, that he didn't look like a tramp anymore. Uncle Vernon stamped over to the door in exasperation and opened it saying, "We don't want any..." But he stopped in the middle.
The two people at the door were as respectable looking as anyone who'd ever visited. The tall blond man wore a perfectly pressed charcoal gray suit that went well with his silver-gray eyes. And the tall woman with the champagne hair wore a navy suit that was as crisp and business-like as any corporation's Director's.
"Can I help you?" Uncle Vernon said as politely as his original sentence had been rude.
"You certainly can," the tall man said calmly. "I'm looking for Harry Potter." Harry stared at the man. He'd last seen him and his partner a month ago at Kings Cross station when Voldemort had attacked him and Aunt Petunia.
"Who are you?" Uncle Vernon asked. Harry could practically see the thoughts jumping behind his uncle's face. A respectable person like that, looking for Harry?
"Inspector Bones and Sergeant Kray," the tall man replied calmly, "from Scotland Yard."
"You've come to arrest him, then?" Aunt Marge said gleefully. Harry's heart sped up. It occurred to him that when he had last actually spoken with Bones, Bones had told him to stay put in the very car that was parked outside Number Four and that Harry had disobeyed him and then run off chasing the Death Eater who had attacked them.
"Arrest him?" Sergeant Kray said, "Certainly not. Recruit him, more like."
Harry gawped at her. Their presence here in Privet Drive was nearly as jarring as if Mad-Eye Moody came to tea. Uncle Vernon stared at them in astonishment and as one, Aunt Petunia, Dudley and Aunt Marge stared at Harry.
"But why are you really here, Inspector?" Harry asked.
"Guard duty," Hagrid answered for him.
"Right," Bones said. "We're part of your escort. The others should be here shortly."
"I don't understand," Harry said. "I mean, you work for the Muggle police. Scotland Yard."
"Right," Bones said again cheerfully. "But as it happens, we've been seconded to MI-7 for the moment."
"There's no such thing as that," Uncle Vernon said testily. His hopes of seeing Harry arrested and carted off from Privet Drive permanently dashed, Vernon's always trick temper was on the rise again.
"It's quite secret," Sergeant Kray said with every evidence of amusement.
"Well, if it's secret," Uncle Vernon blustered, "why are you talking about it?"
"What is it, anyway?" Harry cut in. Now that he knew he wasn't going to be arrested, he was dead curious to know why they were really here and what was going on.
"MI-7?" Bones answered. "It's a secret intelligence department that works directly for the monarch and reports on to the Prime Minister himself." His lips quirkied in a small smile and he continued, "I only just learned about it myself recently. It seems to be one of our oldest intelligence services actually, and basically it's meant to monitor any magical activities that threaten national security. But there's been no serious activity in this department since World War II."
"I still don't understand," Harry, said, "why are you on guard duty then? And why for...me?"
"On account of Voldemort, a 'course," Hagrid answered.
"Right," Bones said. "His recent activities have annoyed every police department in the country and we're having a terrible time keeping the whole magical world secret because of him. So Sergeant Kray and I were seconded to the department because we worked on the recent murder and gang cases he'd been involved in and our present assignment is to liaise with the Ministry of Magic and others regarding his capture and defeat."
"Yes, but..." Harry started to object, but Bones answered before he could finish.
"Why you? It's simple. You're the only who's ever defeated the monster in any way. And we know he's after you. So we figure keeping track of you will lead us to him eventually. And we generally have an antipathy to murderers who keep attacking innocent children."
"I'm not a child anymore," Harry replied. He wanted, more than anything, at that moment, to climb on the motorbike that sat out on the street, and fly it somewhere he chose. He wanted, finally, to have some sort of control over his own life, and not to be forever subject to the whims of his Aunt and Uncle, or even to the more beneficent dictates of Dumbledore.
"Yes," Bones answered. "We know that. But even adults who are imperiled deserve protection from the police. That's our job." Harry felt a sudden weariness, quite complete and quite thoroughly mixed with sorrow.
"You mean," he said, "that you want to keep me safe long enough to defeat Voldemort for you for good."
There was a dead silence then. Not even Aunt Marge seemed able to think of anything to say to that. Surprisingly, it was Sergeant Kray who answered. Quite without evasion or qualification she said, simply, "Yes."
"I'll just go pack, then," Harry said. "We ought to get out of here before Voldemort shows up and goes after my family."
"Now wait just one minute," Uncle Vernon said. Some kind of calculation was going on behind his beady eyes."You're saying that he," and he pointed to Harry, "is the only one that can defeat this Voldemort?"
"That's right," Hagrid said proudly. "Done it more than once already, he has." Harry thought, this isn't good. And it wasn't.
"Then he's not going anywhere," Uncle Vernon said. "He can stay right here and protect his aunt. She's the one he attacked at Kings Cross last month. It's his fault. He can just stay here and make sure it doesn't happen again."
"Sorry," Bones said politely, "but you see he's going to go where we say, and that's on the authority of the Queen."
"He's in our care!" Uncle Vernon roared. "We took him in and raised him up, and he's not out of school yet. Even the Queen can't take a child away from his family." Harry stared at Uncle Vernon. To be claimed as family now, under these circumstances, was more galling than if his Uncle had disowned him altogether.
"He's seventeen today," Bones answered. "Which means by wizard law he comes of age today. As of today, he can be called up to do his duty as the Ministry and the government see fit."
"Called up?" Harry echoed.
Bones looked at him searchingly. His gray eyes quite kind, and then they seemed to focus as if kindness were a luxury he could ill-afford. "It's my understanding," Bones said calmly, "that you volunteered to work for the Order of the Phoenix two years ago."
Harry frowned. The rememberance of that earlier more innocent time, when Sirius had been alive and he had never heard the prophecy that had marked him forever and killed his parents, was painful, bitter. A great gulf separated his present self from that still innocent child. "Yeah," he said. "But they wouldn't let me. 'Cause I wasn't out of school yet. They wouldn't even take Fred and George Weasley, and they were of age."
"Yes, well," Bones said almost regretfully, "we're taking you up on your offer now." Harry stood rooted to the spot. He felt as though he stood on the edge of a cliff and was about to step off into a space unknown, with no bottom to it, and no way of knowing how he'd navigate through the dark.
"Right," he said at last. And then coldly, fiercely, he said, "I will do, whatver I can, whatever is necessary, to stop him. He's destroyed my family and friends and he'll go on doing it until we're all gone, if he gets his way. And don't worry," he added, turning to Aunt Petunia, "He won't come after you if I'm not here. It's better, if I go." Aunt Petunia stared at him. Her face was quite white and her long neck looked stretched beyond its usual length, as if she were looking off into something she could hardly see to.
"Go, then," she answered with unusual dignity, "and come back whenever you want to, or need to. There will always be a place here for you, if you need." Harry stared at her in utter astonishment. They were quite the kindest words she'd ever spoken to him. The only ones, in fact, that weren't tinged with dislike, or distaste. As if she understood his stare for the question left unspoken, she answered, "I promised Lily. We Evanses keep our promises. Be sure you remember that." Wordlessly, Harry nodded and ran up the stairs to pack.
Up in the smallest bedroom at Number Four, Harry sat down on the bed and tried to figure out what he felt. Over the past sixteen years, virtually every moment he had spent in the house at Number Four, Privet Drive had been miserable at best, and downright dreadful at its worst. Yet now it appeared he might be leaving for good, Harry felt a very odd sense of loss, as if he were leaving something of himself behind. A ghost, perhaps, of a small unhappy boy would dwell in the cupboard under the stairs forever.
His pleasure in his birthday and the gifts he'd been given had evaporated. Harry took one last look around the room and said "Pack!" as he flicked his wand. Watching his tumbled books, clothes and possessions fly into his trunk gave him one piece of satisfaction. Hedwig clucked in her cage and shifted back and forth from one foot to another. Her amber eyes blinked as Harry swept her cage up with one hand and took the trunk in his other and the snowy white bird made a funny sound that might have been interpreted as encouragement, but turned to scolding as the trunk bumping on the stairs made a noise the owl disliked.
Bones took the trunk from him at the foot of the stairs and went outside to place it in the boot of his silver Miata. As the blond Inspector slammed it closed, another car pulled up in front of Number Four. This one was an elderly black taxicab that looked as though it had seen better days. It made a lot of noise and its rear right fender had a dent. Rather more people spilled out of the cab than anyone would ever suspect could fit in and most of them had the brightest, reddest hair anyone could imagine.
Ron Weasley jumped out first, followed by Hermione Granger, and then a smaller girl with a long mane of red hair seemed to win a fight with whoever else was still inside. Harry felt a big grin settle on his face, and he strode out the door of Number Four at a pace just under a run. Ron clapped him on the shoulder and Hermione and Ginny both threw themselves at him at once.
"Budge off, girls," Fred Weasely said. He prodded Ginny with a long index finger and his twin George added, "She's gotten awfully demanding without us around to keep her in her place. Mum lets her get away with murder and Ron has no control over her at all."
Harry grinned wider and said, "It's quite your fault anyway, George. She gets all her ideas from you and Fred, you know."
"You budge off, Fred," Ginny said, "Unless you want to give him a hug and a kiss, too." Hermione giggled and let Harry go, but Ginny held on a moment more to give him a peck right on his cheek. Harry closed his eyes and hoped that when he opened them everything would stay just the same. He did and they had. The very suddenness of of the joy he felt struck him then, almost painfully; a fleeting moment so piercingly and perfectly right that he wished it could be that way forever. Ginny stepped back and the moment was gone, but the happiness lingered, a wisp of emotion, delicate, evanescent, like the fragile scent of flowers in the spring air.
"That's one amazing coat," said the next person who emerged from the car. Aunt Petunia's face was undoubtedly as pinched in disapproval as it could possibly get if she could see the violent shade of magenta hair that Tonks was displaying in a series of long fluffy waves that fell down to her waist.
"My birthday present from Hagrid," Harry answered. The taxi driver got out and swept the street with a startling electric blue eye.
"We'd best be getting off," Mad-eye Moody growled nervously. The Muggles are watching and who knows who else."
"Don't worry," Bones answered. "They'll be too busy watching the next show to even remember a couple of unorthodox visitors." Sergeant Kray smiled coolly. Her vivid blue eyes were locked on her watch, an elegant one with a black pearl face.
"Get out of the street, quickly now," she commanded, and a veritable parade of police cars swept through town, their sirens blaring, lights blinking and chasing a red Ferrarri going easily a hundred and sixty kilometres an hour. By the time the procession had gone by, half the people on Privet Drive had run down to the corner to see where the red car had gone. Kray smiled in satisfaction and said to Bones, "Right on time. We'll have to take Graves to the pub for a pint or two after that favor."
"What was that?" Harry asked.
"Ah," Bones said, "everyone here will think it was a real chase, but it was actually practice. They were supposed to run it through Richmond, but we got our friend Graves to route it through here instead. Diversions, you know, work best, when they look real, or are real." He looked around and said calmly, "Is everyone ready?"
"Where are we going?" Harry asked. He was hoping for the Burrow, his favorite place in the world next to Hogwarts. Hagrid had come out of Number Four, and he paused to say something to Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon, but Harry couldn't hear it. He had to wonder what it could be that would make Aunt Petunia look more disapproving and Uncle Vernon angrier than usual. Hagrid was down the drive in three great steps.
In the daylight in Privet Drive, there in front of the tidy respectable house with its perfectly tamed garden, Hagrid appeared far wilder and larger than it was possible for any human to be."Yeh'll be wanting to ride the bike," he said to Harry.
"Oh, yeah," Harry said fervently.
"Do you think that's a good idea?" Hermione said nervously. "I mean, do you know how?" she asked Harry.
"Don' worry," Hagrid said, "He'll be all right."
Harry thought and said regretfully, "But Hagrid, I don't think you'll fit in any of the cars, you know."
Hagrid smiled and said, "Don' worry about me. I can get back on me own. It's really as easy as flyin'. Yeh'll be fine."
Moody cut in and said, "We're not flying. Everybody got that? This is a concealment job. We drive just like any Muggles. So far's anyone knows, we're just ordinary Muggles. Got that?" He repeated as he jammed a battered bowler hat on his grizzled head and clumped back to the driver's side of the taxi cab after one more sweep fo the street and his charges with his all-seeing eye.
Tonks shook her magenta head and said, "I don't think I've ever seen anyone who looks less like an ordinary Muggle." She got into the front beside Moody and Harry looked at the motorbike.
"Can I really?" he asked Bones.
Sergeant Kray started to speak. "Has he got his..."
"Go on," Bones said. "It is yours as I understand it from Hagrid." Harry handed Hermione Hedwig's cage and walked over to the motorbike.
"Right," he said. "Let's go." He swung a leg over the bike and sat gingerly on the seat. There was no key and he couldn't figure out how to start it for a moment. Then it came to him. He took out his wand and tapped the bike, which sprang to life obediently.
Sergeant Kray said in a funny voice, "Remote control by magic. Who knew?"
"All right?" Bones asked. Harry nodded and the tall Inspector said, "Follow me."
He slid into the silver Miata and off they went, the Miata in the lead, and Harry in the middle, tailed by the elderly taxicab driven by Moody. One of the strangest processions ever to go through the streets of Little Whinging, if anyone had known who they were.
On the ride north to London, Harry concentrated first on getting used to the bike. In some respects, it wasn’t all that different from flying. There was still the wind, and gravity pulling at you when you made a turn. Unlike quidditch, however, nobody was actually trying to knock you off your bike. After a bit, he found he was quite grateful for his new jacket. Even though the day was a warm summer day, when they hit the motorway north, the wind was cool on his face, cool enough in fact, to blow the fog out of his brain and get him thinking again. Of all the times Harry had left Privet Drive for the magic community, this one was both the least strange and the most.
No Muggle watching would even realize there was anything odd about the small cavalcade of vehicles driving sedately down the road according all the normal rules of traffic. Following Bones’ Miata, they stopped at every red light, made sure to yield at every roundabout, and broke no law of physics, not even to slip into spaces that regular cars couldn’t.
On the other hand, Harry himself was driving. He was seventeen and driving his very own real grown-up motorbike, and if he chose, he could turn that motorbike in any direction he desired. As they slid their way smoothly through the city traffic, Harry felt as free as he had ever been and he laughed out loud, all thoughts of Voldemort and Death Eaters subsumed in his newfound freedom.
The London neighborhoods grew less and less pleasant as they passed through the heart of the city and back off toward an anonymous nook of elderly town homes that sat cheek by jowl with sad looking pubs and deserted warehouses whose cracked windows looked like dispirited eyes that had seen too much. The sad scenery upset Harry not at all until he recognized the street they had pulled into and finally stopped at: Grimmauld Place.
On one side, loud music thumped out of the grimy houses to the left and to the right and the smells of cabbage and curry and rotten garbage permeated the square. Harry tapped his motorbike to turn of the engine and reluctantly got off. Bones stepped out of his sleek silver car, and Harry couldn’t help but think that the tall well-dressed Inspector seemed utterly out of place in the seedy street.
“Do you think it’ll be all right to leave these here?” Harry asked nodding at the motorbike and the Miata. Bones smiled and said, “Certainly,” and sure enough, Sergeant Kray had placed a portable blue police light right in the front window of the Miata where no one could miss it.
Harry felt a good bit better then, but less than he might have as he thought the address of the house they were going to in his head. Number 12 Grimmauld Place. Out of nowhere, another town house pushed its two neighbors outward, and the chipped black door with its tarnished silver serpent handle appeared. The House of Black. Sirius’s house. The one he’d been living in when Harry had made the disastrous choice of going to rescue his godfather, only to find out that he’d been tricked, only to find out that Sirius had never been in trouble to start with, and only to lead Sirius to his death after all when he had come to rescue Harry from the trap.
The last time they had arrived, Moody had tapped the door with his wand and Harry had heard locks and bolts clicking open to let the visitors in. This time, as soon as the black door appeared, the door swung open smoothly as if the house recognized him. Harry hesitated at the step.
”I knew he wasn’t going to want to come here,” Hermione said softly behind him.
Mrs. Weasley flew out the door and gave him a great hug and somehow he had stepped inside without even realizing when the exact moment was. “Hurry up,“ Mrs. Weasley fussed. “We don’t want the neighbors recognizing us.”
Harry nearly laughed again just then. “Mrs. Weasley,” he said, feeling quite amused by her odd worry about the neighbors, so like and yet so unlike Aunt Petunia’s, “it’s normal for Muggle neighbors to recognize each other. They feel better about it if they recognize you, even if they never meet you or learn your name.”
“Really?” she said, “I must remember that next time.”
Behind him, Sergeant Kray said, “I’m not sure I like all this Muggle stuff. It’s not a nice word, Muggle, is it?”
Everybody stopped and Harry felt hugely embarrassed. “No,” he said. “It’s not. I’m sorry.”
Inspector Bones said calmly, “You’ll just have to get used to it, Fay, unless you want another assignment. Consider it part of the scenery.”
“Part of the scenery?” Sergeant Kray echoed. “I think you’re just going native Edgar, that’s all. So much for sensitivity training and all of that.” Everyone else seemed quite as embarrassed as Harry by now. But Bones didn’t seem bothered by her come-back either.
“You should have spent more time with your Great-aunt Matilda,” the Inspector replied. Peculiarly, he seemed rather amused and the Sergeant unaccountably blushed. “Just as long as there are no ghosts,” she answered back sarcastically.
It wouldn't have been so awful, Harry thought later, and he might not have lost his temper so completely if Tonks hadn't bumped into the troll's leg umbrella stand just as everyone had gotten inside. The stand fell over with a loud clatter and immediately voices began to scream.
"BLOOD TRAITORS! VILLAINOUS OCCUPIERS OF THIS MAJESTIC HOUSE! THROW THE TRAITORS OUT!"
It was, Harry knew, the portrait of Sirus's mother, and it was joined by the yelling of other portraits, so that the room was a cacophany of noise. He stil might not havelost his temper if it hadn't been for the addition of one more voice. A low voice, that sounded like a bullfrog's speaking words. "There they are, the unnatural brats, back again to dirty my mistress's house. Oh, my poor mistress, throw them out, she says, and throw them out I will." Something welled up then, so that Harry felt he had never known himself until then.
"SHUT UP!" he roared. His wand was in his hand and he raised it to blot out the noise and the voices of anathema. Kreacher's long fingered hand poised in mid air, perhaps in the very act of executing his long dead mistress's will. Harry pointed his wand at the house-elf intending action, something dreadful.
"The only traitor here is you," Harry said very softly now. "You betrayed your master's secrets and his silence. You gave up the information that sent Sirius to his death. You, you miserable treacherous thing, you led the last Black to his death, when you deceived me, and now you shall pay." All the portraits ceased their jabber, even the portrait of Sirus's Mum. The house elf's huge eyes stared in terror at Harry; terror and defiance.
"He let the blood traitors in," Kreacher said, "he betrayed his own House associating with the impure. My mistress disowned him. He should never have had this House. He should never have brought his nasty Order here."
"Sirius was the last Black," Harry said, "and he left this house and everything in it to me. Including you." Harry pointed his wand steadily at the wretched old house elf and felt nothing but rage. Everyone stared at him and later he was to find it surprising that no one interfered sooner.
"What shall I do with you?" Harry asked even more softly than before. "What good is a house elf that fails to keep his master's secrets and his silence? What good are you, you miserable piece of treachery?"
From out of the portrait of Sirius's mother, a different voice emerged: the cold, dry voice of Phinneas Nigellus. "Kill the traitor," the cold voice said. "He knows too much and he's bent and disloyal. Dispose of him. It's your right." The house elf huge eyes grew wider still and his bat-like ears drooped; yet some bit of defiance lived in him.
"I betrayed no one," the elf said in his deep croaking voice. "I kept my mistress's secrets and her silence and I keep her wishes now. He was banished, blood traitor that he was. No respect for his House. Throwing out his heritage, he was. Giving it away to thieves and mudbloods and blood traitors."
Again, the cold dry voice of Phineas Nigellus came. "The only traitor here is you. You alone destroyed the House of Black. The last living child of my blood is gone because of a worthless house elf. Dispose of him, godson of my House, lest he betray us all again unto our deaths, like Sirius."
Harry pointed his wand at the elf and could find no pity in himself for the frightened defiant elf. He drew breath, but Hermione stepped in front of the wretched thing and said, "No, Harry. No!"
In the back of his mind, a voice whispered, it's easy, you know. The voice whispered and his mind agreed, he deserves it. I hate betrayers. I want only the loyal to follow me. Punish him, Harry, he's done you harm.
"Step aside, Hermione," he said coldly.
"No, Harry," she said. "It's not his fault. He is what he was made. He's wretched and distorted and wishes us ill because we wizards made him that way. There would be no betrayal," she added pleadingly, "if he had been free as he should have been."
He said quite calmly, "You're right, Hermione. Now step aside." She frowned at him as if she could send him a message just by thought, and had he been willing to listen, he might have heard it. He waited, wand still pointing, until she moved and then he said more softly than ever,
"You're right. It wouldn't have happened if he'd been free to begin with." He flicked his wand and his trunk, which was sitting right in the entryway still, opened up and a pair of socks flew out at his word. Not wanting to touch the traitorous elf, Harry flicked his wand again and banished the socks right into the elf's hand.
"There you are, Kreacher. Socks for you and freedom. You will never serve me faithfully. Go and be free and do as you will."
There was again a painful silence and Phinneas Nigellus's dry voice said roughly, "Fool! You stupid romantic fool. I thought you had brains, but you're just like all those stupid Gryffindors. You think with your heart and forget your brains. Now he will betray you for sure."
The elf stared at the socks in his hand and threw them down and howled. The sound broke through the cold that froze him and Harry thought, was I stupid, and was it a mistake. Hermione's eyes were wet, but everyone else looked disconcerted, as if he had done the last thing they would have expected.
Then the hateful voice of Sirius's mother brayed at him out of the portrait once more. "BLOOD TRAITORS. THEY ARE ALL BLOOD TRAITORS," and the cool voice of Phinneas Nigellus said, "Dumbledore will have to know." A thin black shadow flowed out of the frame as all the protraits began to yell again.
This time, the fury that rose in him was hot and mixed with a terrible grief. "SHUT UP!" he snarled again and when the portraits continued their noise, he silenced them mercilessly, one by one, so that their reproachful stares were all the expression they had left. And when he was done, he waved his wand once more and the curtains that covered them all fell into place and no sound could be heard but the pitiful sobbing of the elderly elf.
"Ghosts," Sergeant Kray said, "would be quite tame compared to that."
Surprisingly, it was Inspector Bones who spoke the next words, though they were the ones that everyone else must have been thinking. "You haven't finished the job yet, Mr. Potter," he said.
"I haven't finished cleaning the muck out of the house, yet, no," Harry agreed. He looked at the heads of the dead house elves mounted on the walls and he sight revolted him.
He raised his wand to blast them off, but Bones' voice stopped him. "You freed him," he said pointing to the sobbing elf, "but you haven't cast him out. You haven't finished the job."
Harry swallowed and tried to think. His head was pounding and his scar felt like a raw open wound that seared its way straight into his brain. The shivering elf sat sobbing in the center of the room, as ugly and hateful a sight as any Harry had ever seen. He wanted to cast out the elf; he wanted never to see the wretched creature again; he wanted it to suffer as he had for the loss of Sirius, for all his losses; and yet, looking at the sobbing wretched elf, he simply could not. He shook his head trying to clear it of pain and tring to discard the pity that unexpectedly now made him shudder at his own hardness. How many times had he stood in his Uncle's house and feared he would suffer the same fate?
He shook his head and said simply, "No, I can't." Then feeling a great weariness that had nothing to do with any any physical effort he'd undertaken, and everything to do with his puzzled heart, he looked around and said, "What now?"
Mrs. Weasley came and hugged him once more and said as if he were quite a small child, "A decent meal, is what." She wiped her eyes and said fiercely, "It's a wonder you can think at all with all the things you've been through. I told Dumbledore this wasn't the right place to bring you. I knew it wouldn't be right."
Harry frowned at her and said, "Where else would we be safe? It's still the Order's headquarters, isn't it?"
"Yes," Moody said, "but it looks like we'll be needing a new place now that you've freed that elf but left him to come and go as he pleases."
"The I'll give the house to Dumbledore," Harry answered with annoyance, "and he can decide what to do with him."
"Always so damned hasty and thoughtless," came the cool dry voice of Phinnease Nigellus from behind the curtains once more. "But you're right about one thing, at least Dumbledore has the brains to decide things. He did learn some subtlety eventually, after fifty years coaching or so."
The door swung open at a tap from the outside and Dumbledore came in. His blue eyes met Harry's and Harry felt truly calm again for the first time since he had arrived. Then they fell on the still sobbing form of the wretched house elf and Harry said with shame, "I've mucked things up again, haven't I?"
Dumbledore frowned very slightly and said, "You let him stay?"
Harry sighed and said, "I freed him, but I can't cast him out. It's the only home he's ever had. I lost my temper and acted the fool," he added, "and now I pity him." Harry looked at Dumbledore waiting or him to say what had to be done, but he said nothing. "You'll have to take the house," he said impatiently. "I don't want it. And it's not safe for the Order now."
Dumbledore's blue eyes had a funny gleam in them. "It's your house, Harry," he replied, "Sirius wanted you to have it. He could have left it to the Order if he wanted to, but he did not." Dumbledore tipped his head slightly as if he were thinking as he observed the still sobbing elf.
"I'm not sure," he said quietly, "that you've done anything wrong at all. But if freeing him was wrong, then casting him out would hardly make that right." Harry hoped with all his heart that Dumbledore was right. Somehow though, he still felt both relieved that he didn’t own Kreacher, and uneasy that he hadn’t had the strength to throw him out. And he had a terrible feeling that nothing good could come of this. It’s this house, he thought. It’s so tainted with dark magic that anyone who lives here must be affected. He wondered whether Sirius’s reckless temperament hadn’t been influenced by the wicked atmosphere of the place and immediately tried to think whom else he could give the place to. Gloomily, he followed Mrs. Weasley into the kitchen, which almost miraculously felt warm and free of the dark.
Harry’s spirits rose bit by bit as he filled himself up on all his favorite foods. At the end of the meal, he was completely taken aback when a huge pillared cake decorated with swirls of frosting sailed out to land in front of him. Seventeen candles circled the cake and glowed over the letters that read, Happy Birthday, Harry. He stared at the cake wordlessly as everybody sang Happy Birthday in various keys and mostly out of tune. But he didn’t care. It was the first real birthday party he’d ever had and he was quite hard put not to burst into tears like any small child. He continued to stare even after everyone had finished singing.
“Make a wish, Harry,” Ginny said.
He closed his eyes and tried to think of a wish that was good enough and big enough for such a momentous occasion. He opened his eyes and said, “All right, I’ve made my wish. You can eat it now.”
“You have to blow out the candles, first,” Hermione replied.
“Oh,” he said. “Right.” Then he took a deep breath and blew out all of the candles on his birthday cake for the first time ever.
