"Ginny, Ginny!" Arthur Weasley shouted from upstairs.

Ginny Weasley. Flaming red hair, brown eyes, freckles across her nose that she still often glared at in the mirror and quick, nimble fingers that was playing with a snitch, was shaken out of her reverie as she was sitting beside the window in The Burrow's kitchen and watching the rain outside by her father's shout. She frowned. Her father never shouted. In fact, the number of times Arthur Weasley had raised his voice could be counted on hand, and still it wouldn't cross more than two fingers. She could even remember him once preaching that raising your voice tended to affect you're your voice box very much. Not much that Ginny ever cared; her mother's shouting, though now lessened to a degree now that all her children had grown up, made up more than enough for that. So without further ado, she climbed the stairs quickly, and was surprised at the assembly in the twin's room. All of her brothers were present there. Now that, she concluded, meant the matter was more serious than the twins somehow managing to exchange Bill's robes with Fleur's one day. Although, that was a source of hearty laughter for many days to come.

"The thief stole again, dear!" Molly Weasley told her with a bit of trepidation in his voice, and, Ginny noted, with a bit of awe at the news. Ginny mentally rolled her eyes at the article on the newspaper, but snatched it out of Charlie's hand to read the article closely.

THE THIEF STRIKES AGAIN!

It seems that the wizarding world is in for a serious bit of crime for the last two years. For those of our readers who aren't acquainted with the near-impossible feats of thefts this criminal has been executing in the past few years, we give a brisk overview:

Two years ago, there was intense uproar over the fact that heirlooms were disappearing from prominent pureblood families. In fact, there were even complaints of robberies, but there was no evidence of any forced occurrence, instead it seemed the heirlooms had been willingly given away. But we ask our readers; is it possible that rich and prominent names like Malfoy, Longbottom, Johnson, Nott, Avery and so on would give up their most treasured and jealously guarded possessions so easily?

And here comes in the unbelievable feats of theft. For this criminal appears to be a master at his crime: no piece of evidence can be directly traced to him. Yes, the only thing that the Aurors have been able to gain knowledge of (as told by a trusted source) is that a wizard, and a powerful one, is involved in this. He has masked his magical signature perfectly, has broken through all protective runes placed on the artifacts, and yet, has left no piece of evidence which may event pointto forced abduction of property. They have kept tabs on the local markets for any selling of the artifacts, but they had not turned up for sale. Then what might the thief be doing for this?

And now, the uproar is over the fact that a portrait of immense historical value has been stolen from the family of Greengrasses. It is one half of the portrait, that, rumor has it, had been drawn by both Rowena Ravenclaw and Godric Gryffindor in their early years of friendship. It showed a couple walking side by side in the sunset along the coast, which does stoke the ancient question of a possible romance between the two charismatic Founders. The portrait, was divided into two parts(it being massive) and one part, featuring Ravenclaw, was passed down her line, till it was bought by the Greengrasses, whom it had now been stolen from. The other half of the portrait, was, supposedly handed down the Gryffindor line, and then, had vanished. There has been no trace of that portrait for over more than half a millennia. And it is rumored that when the two halves would be joined, it would reflect on the lives of those two that brings it together, for it had a curious inscription on each half, as rumored: Neither can walk without the other.

The Auror Office have issued their declarations that they are soon set to apprehend the thief, but the subtlety and the evasiveness of the Thief is sure to make it an exciting chase! We here at the Daily Prophet rest our hopes on our esteemed Aurors that they would make short work of this thefts and finally apprehend the criminal.

" I don't get it. " Bill said in a low whisper, "How is he being able to break through the runes? The only blasted place that he hadn't broken into yet is Gringotts!"

Ginny knew that Bill took his work seriously; hence if a prominent curse-breaker and an expert in runes like him was becoming agitated, then it must be a big thing. She tended to keep out all and any news; she had made this a habit since newspapers had started pairing her up with all and any prominent wizard since she caught the snitch in the league nineteen times in a row. But this, she was impressed. This thief, whoever he was, was doing a great job by the looks of it. The only thing that didn't add up was: what was he stealing them for? Family heirlooms had no magical property, they had only historical value. That also, most wizards digressed on, for those artifacts rarely told anything about the history of the wizarding world other than the bloodline which it was a property of. They had that kind of special importance to the bigoted Pureblood families only, though, Neville's grandmother had seemed to be a bit down after losing a ruby necklace passed down from the early Longbottoms.

"What will he do with a portrait, that," Ginny told as she read the article about the portrait in detail, "doesn't even move?"

"I don't know," Arthur said, "But the Auror Office is in uproar at the Ministry. According to them, it's a pretty hefty sum of galleons that one half will fetch. Maybe it's for the money?"

"I'd rather say-" George Weasley began,

"He's doing it-"Fred Weasley continued,

"For the sheer-"

"Thrill of it." They ended together.

"You guys are insufferable." Charlie stared at them. " You think he's getting past malevolently guarding wards, keeping his life on the line, and wiping all evidences, just for the thrill of it? There must be something behind all this."

"Unfortunately, Mr. Weasley, I fear you may be correct." Minerva McGonagall said as she appeared with a pop at Charlie's shoulder.

"Hello Arthur, hello Molly, dear."

"Minerva! Sit down, sit down! You saw the Prophet?" Molly asked her.

McGonagall took a seat at the table, and sighed to herself.

"Yes, Molly. In fact, it is for that reason that I'm here."

Arthur Weasley sat down also, and all the Weasleys followed him along the table, everyone leaning towards McGonagall.

She cleared her throat, and adopted the crisp, Professorial voice that all the Weasleys were familiar with, and said, "Well, for starters, there has been a break-in at Gringotts."

"What!" Immediately, almost everyone shot to their feet. McGonagall said again, "Sit down, and listen the rest."

As all sat down, she said, "The Ministry has pressurized the Prophet into keeping the news out of the paper, as mass hysteria and panic might spread among the Wizarding population because of this. It seems, that early morning, the wards at a certain deep, underground vault at Gringotts flared a dark red, and the Goblins rushed to it immediately, sensing a break-in. However, they, surprisingly, did not succeed in apprehending the Thief. They're saying he adopted a surprising way to escape: he let loose quite a few Nifflers and succeeded in confounding them to burrow a deep tunnel together, through which he went and bludgeoned his way past the Goblin Guards, appearing straight at the door of Gringotts, and disapparated in full view in the Diagon Alley. The surprising fact is that no one managed to catch a glimpse of his face: such strong was his notice-me-not charm. Even the goblins didn't manage to do so."

"Albus was summoned, and the Minister practically begged him to take the artifact under his control and keep it in Hogwarts, but he surprisingly refused, saying he can't allow the risk of the Thief breaking into Hogwarts and endangering the wards. But he suggested another course of action: he said that the artifact might be given to the Weasleys, since it is obvious that for some unknown reason, they remain the only Purebloods to have not been targeted by the Thief."

All the Weasleys sat dumbstruck at the pronouncement, and watched as McGonagall expanded her bag and pulled out an ornate frame from it, housing a portrait, of a man with messy black hair and a strong body, adorned with rippling robes of scarlet and gold, walking along a beach, with his left arm around someone, at the point of which the frame of the portrait cut it off. Engraved in the bottom of the frame were the words: Neither can walk without the other. And, Ginny noted, some strands of flaming red hair were strewn across the man's left shoulder, signifying that someone had laid their head there.

"That is Gryffindor?" Almost all the Weasleys asked, except Ginny, who asked McGonagall, "Ravenclaw had red hair?"

McGonagall sent a strained smile at her, which clearly told, I don't know much about Ravenclaw than you do, and turned to the other Weasleys, telling them that yes, that was Gryffindor, as was confirmed by the goblins. Yes, there had been no protraits of Gyffindor except this one, so he could only have appeared like this.

Arthur asked her, "Minerva, do you think this will work?"

"Albus assured me it will work that way."

Molly told her, "But Minerva, there-there's a reason why anything hasn't been stolen from us! We don't have any heirlooms handed down to us! Now you go giving us this, then that thief's going to come after us also!"

"Indeed, Molly," Albus Dumbledore said gravely, as he appeared with a crack at Fred's side, "Yes, I'm afraid he will, indeed. However, from a certain…..trusted source, I've come to know that the thief has been employed by smugglers who are supposedly selling the artifacts to rich wizards in other countries, and that, for this portrait, he has been set a deadline of a month. Already, one half of the portrait has been stolen. It's rumored that the Thief's employers are brutal; they kill if they're not delivered to on time. That has led me to the realization that if we could keep it out of his reach for only a month somehow, his employers will take care of him, and we'll breathe easy again. That's why I volunteered you; no other family is willing to take this chance."

"I'll do it." Ginny said abruptly.

"Ginevra Weasley! You will do no such thing!" Molly glared at her.

"Oh, for Merlin's sake, mother! It's just a month, and I'm the only one who's free at the moment! The League still has three more months to start after! I can look after it all the time!"

"Then guard it carefully, Ms. Weasley,' Dumbledore told her, "Although it's not safe anywhere in Britain, I have my full confidence in you."

Ginny caught the sudden twinkling in his eyes.

"Not safe in Britain?" She mused for a moment, and took a deep breath, calculating her chances. If she could pull this off…"I'll go abroad then. I'll go out of the country. It'll be safe then."

The Weasleys again opened their moths, but Ginny held up a hand.

"Look, guys. You're all busy on your work; you can't just take a leave. That'll create suspicion. But I'm free. And you can't leave the country. I can. If I can just take it out of the country, his radius in which to search for becomes infinitely larger. He can search me out in the whole world, but that's going to take far more than a month. Look guys, I can pull this off. I stay in hiding for a month, keep the portrait all right, and we all breathe easy again."

"A nice plan, Ms. Weasley." Dumbledore said with a smile.

"It does have a high chance of succeeding. I get it that you'll start as early as you can?"

Ginny nodded.

"Very good. I wish you the best of luck. Our hopes rest on you. Have a nice day, everyone."

And he disapparated, as Ginny headed up to her room with the portrait.

Hundreds of miles away, the floo in the Headmaster's Office at Hogwarts School Of Witchcraft and Wizardry burst into emerald fire, as a stranger burst out of the fireplace into the room, stumbling and coughing.

"Damn it," he muttered, "I still stumble. Brooms are much, much better than this."

"Welcome." He righted his round glasses to see an old man with pearly white hair and beard streaming down his back and front respectively, spread his arms wide, his eyes twinkling madly.

"Save it, Albus." He said, and stood up straight.

He was of medium height, and lithe in appearance, though his well-maintained muscles rippled under his t-shirt as he undid the scarlet robe he wore and draped it across a chair. Stretching with a groan, he accepted the glass of mulled mead that Albus Dumbledore handed to him, and thanking him, he turned to the fireplace and studied the flames, a thoughtful expression on his face, and the firelight reflected in his brilliant emerald eyes. He ran a hand through his messy hair, and closed his eyes and took a sip, enjoying the drink after an apparently tiring day.

"The escape was rather creative, I see." Albus said with a smile in his voice to the man, as the man turned to him and grimaced.

"Creative my ass. I almost got it. But at that moment, that stupid dragon had to wake up and start roaring. I got back on one piece to the tunnels in pure luck. It only helped that Hagrid's birthday gift of nifflers were still in my pocket. Otherwise, I'd had to fight my way out of there, and that certainly wasn't a happy though. Sirius and Dad is possibly laughing in his grave at me."

"Ah, you put too much pressure on yourself. However, I've managed to slip you a good chance, it seems."

"Oh?"

"Yes. That portrait needs to be out of this country like all others. You've got one half. You should be able to get the other half now that it's abroad."

"It's abroad now, is it?" there was a faint trace of amusement in the words.

"Yes." Albus Dumbldore's twinkling blue eyes held the gaze of the striking emerald eyes, as the man thanked Sirius Black mentally for suggesting that Dumbledore teach him Legilimency, for he didn't want the portraits in this blasted room to hear their whole plan.

"You didn't show me who the woman was. You didn't even show me her face. Why?"

"Where would the fun be if I had done that?"

And he knew Dumbledore wouldn't answer any more. So he sighed, and started pulling the robe onto himself again, evidently eager to leave now.

"How long?"

"Pardon me?" he turned to the old man.

"I said, how long will this continue, Harry? We could've curbed the problem in better ways than this. How long will you charade as a thief?"

Harry smiled at Dumbledore cynically, and looked to the fire.

"Are not we all a thief in the end, Albus? We are fleeing. We are stealing precious moments of life from Death, which will come at the end. I am fleeing from my actions. Myself. My past. My present. For the hope of a better future. Which we all, in the end, are doing in some way or the other. Yes, this will end someday, Albus. I'll go away. In some unknown city, in some unknown world, in some unknown life, with an unknown name. But it's time for me to seal the deal. One half remains. I'll go now. Good night, Albus."

With that, he stepped into the emerald flames, and vanished, as Albus Dumbledore silently crossed his fingers for one, last, theft to succeed.

"This is going to be interesting, Fawkes." He told the phoenix by his side, which let out a trill that sounded like a hearty assent at his words.