Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor do I make any claim of ownership. All rights belong to the copyright holders and J.K. Rowling.
A/N
Hello again everyone! I humbly present to you, chapter four!
Once again, thanks to all my readers for the support, the wonderful reviews and the number of you that have followed and favourited this story. It's wonderful to know that people like my work!
Chapter five is going as planned, apart from the fact I am now breaking it into two - it's already close to 4,000 words and I'm barely halfway done with it, so it seemed like the sensible thing to do. Once the now-named chapter six is done, chapter five will go up.
In the meantime, please enjoy!
- JudgeKnox
Harry had work to do. The map of Magical Britain was pinned to the dungeon wall with a moderately-powerful Sticking Charm, the County of Wiltshire highlighted in red. Malfoy Manor was somewhere in Wiltshire – Harry knew that much – but he had no idea where exactly the estate was located.
Most likely Unplottable, and probably warded to the hilt. Damn it. Well, if this was going to be easy, I'd have done it already.
The last people Harry knew who made it to Malfoy Manor were the Weasley twins nearly eight years ago, and they didn't tell anyone how they'd found it, or how they were getting in. After they left, it was too late – they never came back. The only thing close to a confirmation of death came in the form of Mrs. Weasley's enchanted grandfather clock, as the twins' clock hands stopped working, remaining stuck on 'Lost' and never moving again.
Suddenly, Harry had an idea. Dobby had been Malfoy's elf – maybe he knew how to find the Manor?
"Dobby?" Harry called out, the elf appearing with a crack barely a second later.
"Can Dobby help Harry Potter, sir?" Dobby squeaked.
"Dobby, can you tell me where Malfoy Manor is?" Harry asked without preamble.
The elf screwed his eyes tight in concentration for a moment, before slumping and shaking his head, keeping his eyes on the floor. "Dobby is… sorry, Harry Potter, sir, but Dobby cannot reveal where to find bad master's house." Dobby's ears drooped a little as he replied, already sounding distraught at being unable to help.
"That's alright. I'm trying to find it – I need to break in, you see," Harry explained. "Is there anything you can say about the place? Whatever you're able to tell me will help," he asked tentatively. Dobby's ears lifted again as he gave Harry a small smile.
"Certainly Harry Potter, sir. What does Harry Potter wish to know?" Dobby asked in response.
"I need you to tell me everything you remember about the layout while I draw it out on this parchment." Harry said, already pulling a quill and ink off of a nearby shelf.
"Well, Harry Potter, sir – the grounds are many acres in size…"
It was early in Harry's sixth year that he and Professor Dumbledore had found out about Voldemort's Horcruxes. The Headmaster had had his suspicions, but it wasn't until Harry had convinced Professor Slughorn – cornering the rotund Potions Master after one of his many parties – to give him his memories of Tom Riddle, that Dumbledore had enough information to set his plans for Voldemort's defeat in motion. Unfortunately, when Harry and Dumbledore – accompanied by Sirius – found their first Horcrux that Christmas, Harry realised only too late what he was up against.
If anyone were to notice the three figures walking slowly along the icy country road, they would probably remark that they'd never seen a stranger group before. A dark-haired teenage boy – the most normal-looking of the bunch in his hoodie and jeans, was accompanied by a tall, handsome man in an expensive-looking pinstripe suit, the golden chain of a pocket watch clearly visible on his velvet waistcoat. Alongside these two and without a doubt the most unusual of them all, there strode an imposing old man, dressed in some sort of robes, exquisitely embroidered and coloured a deep, royal blue. The old man's long, silver beard was tucked securely into his belt, and he moved with a grace and fluidity that belied his years.
Nevertheless, the road was deserted, and Harry, Sirius and Dumbledore's arrival close to the village of Little Hangleton went unnoticed. Snow fell lazily from above, displaced in its descent by a gentle breeze. Slowly, the three made their way to a small break in the tall hedges that ran the length of the road. Without moving off of the tarmac, they looked upon an incredibly overgrown garden, which sat before a ruined, deserted shack: the hovel of the ancient Gaunt family, and the location of a piece of Voldemort's soul.
The house was in even greater disrepair than when Harry had seen it in the memories of the Ministry official Bob Ogden and Marvolo Gaunt's son, Morfin. Where before the house might have been just barely liveable, it was little more than a ruin now. The outer walls were covered in creeping plants that reached almost to the sagging, partially-collapsed roof, the small windows dotted here or there sitting broken and filthy. Nearly everything about the house screamed its dereliction, except for one thing – the front door, which had been covered in splinters and peeling paint in Morfin's memories, was now immaculate, and the rich green paint that now adorned it looked as if it had been applied that very day. In the centre of the door, there was a silver knocker in the shape of a biting snake head, its eyes glittering with small emeralds.
"Yes, I think this confirms my suspicions," Dumbledore remarked quietly, his eyes darting across the long, frozen grass in front of the shack, looking for threats.
"Well, this is a rather lovely place, don't you think so, Harry?" Sirius stated in a falsely jovial tone. Despite the importance of their mission, it seemed the pleasure of being outside again was still not lost on Sirius, his sarcastic humour a welcome change from his previous moods.
"I think, Sirius, that it's somehow more awful than it was the last time I saw it," Harry replied drily. "But that door looks new, and it definitely wasn't like that before. Professor, do you think Voldemort put that there?" He asked Dumbledore, the Headmaster turning and meeting Harry's eyes, before glancing back to the door.
"Yes, Harry, I do believe that he did." Dumbledore responded. "As for its purpose, I am quite sure that it is part of the defences Voldemort will have put in place to protect the ring. As such, we should proceed with extreme caution." Turning to fully face the other two, Dumbledore drew his wand from his sleeve, the others mirroring his actions. "You both remember the conditions on which I brought you here?" He asked in an authoritative tone. Harry and Sirius nodded. "Anything that I order you to do, you must do so immediately, and without question. Do you understand?" The two nodded again. "Good. Sirius, your job is to keep Harry safe from whatever we might encounter here."
Seeing Harry start, about to interrupt, Dumbledore held up his hand.
"It is not that I don't believe that you are capable, Harry – you've come a long way indeed since we started training back in the summer, but because you are too valuable to lose here. We know that Voldemort has more Horcruxes, and although you will undoubtedly be of assistance today, I'm afraid you will do little good for the Light if you are dead." Dumbledore's frank words brooked no discussion from Harry, the latter's shoulders slumping a little as he nodded his head.
"Yes, Professor."
"Very good. As the most skilled here, I'm going to go first, and I will highlight my footprints as I go. Listen carefully, both of you. Only step where I step. Although we'll be stuck in single file for the moment, it will guarantee your safety. I have no idea what kind of traps we face, but we can safely assume they will be both devious and lethal. Now then, get behind me." Dumbledore ordered, waving his wand in complicated patterns and muttering incantations, alternately pointing it at the snow-covered ground, the frozen undergrowth and the air around the shack.
After a minute or two, Dumbledore lowered his wand slightly, and took a single, bold step onto the property, his snow making a soft crunch beneath his foot. When nothing unexpected happened, Harry let out a breath he didn't know he had been holding, and continued to watch Dumbledore patiently. As the Headmaster took a few more careful strides, his footprints glowed with golden light, letting Sirius – who all of a sudden was looking like he'd rather be locked inside back at Grimmauld Place again – follow them perfectly.
"Your turn, Harry," Sirius called back, "take it nice and slow, okay? Don't make any sudden moves that might set the defences off." Harry took a deep breath, and carefully stepped out into Dumbledore's footprints, his heart thumping loudly in his ears. Thankfully, nothing happened, and Harry started to follow in Sirius' wake, the older man offering calm encouragement over his shoulder.
The tense moments that followed as Dumbledore neared the front door seemed to stretch out far longer than they should, and Harry watched the Headmaster intently, not even realising that he'd stopped moving.
Dumbledore stood in front of the door, making sure to stay off of the front step. Raising his wand, he pointed it at the door and began saying incantations, too far away for Harry to hear clearly. Suddenly, the door glowed a bright blue – Harry and Sirius recoiled, twisting on the spot in an attempt to avoid whatever danger Dumbledore had triggered, unable to run or leap aside – and several seconds passed in panicked silence before Dumbledore called out to them.
"It's alright, I think my detection spells merely encountered a ward on the door." Dumbledore stated, his voice reassuring. His tone changed to one of mild interest – as if he were consulting the Daily Prophet over breakfast – as he continued. "It is… quite fascinating, this protection. I believe, Harry, that you might be of some assistance here." Harry glanced at the door, unsure of what the Headmaster meant.
As if Dumbledore could read Harry's thoughts, he elaborated. "The door is protected by several rather nasty wards that are quite unlike anything I have ever seen, except for one, that I recognise from one other place. Can you guess where that might be, Harry?" He asked, making a subtle gesture with his wand to the snake door knocker. Harry looked over Sirius' shoulder at the Headmaster quizzically, before he remembered searching Moaning Myrtle's Bathroom in his second year, finding a snake engraved on a tap at one of the sinks.
"Of course! It was the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets, wasn't it, sir?" Harry replied, the discussion helping ease some of the tension in the air.
"Indeed." Dumbledore sounded very pleased that Harry had worked it out. "I think Voldemort might have replicated this Parseltongue ward as a master key to the house's protections. The Gaunts were the only known Parselmouths of their time, and perhaps Voldemort, believing himself to be the only surviving Parselmouth after the death of Morfin, sought to recognise the house of Slytherin's descendants with some of the dramatic flair he was known for in later life." Dumbledore paused, once more examining the door over his half-moon spectacles. "In short, Harry, if you can open the Parseltongue ward on the door, I think that the other protections on it should fall away, granting us entry. Once more, Voldemort's blind belief in his own power and uniqueness undermines his strategies." Dumbledore spoke the last part quietly, more to himself than anyone else.
Sirius took this moment to speak up. "If you need Harry with you, Albus, how are we going to get him over here without setting off the traps?" He asked, his voice tense.
Dumbledore smiled, his eyes twinkling with humour. "Not to worry, Sirius – although I don't doubt Harry's acrobatic abilities, a simple levitation charm shall suffice." Turning fully around to face Harry, he pointed his wand at the teenager, his voice serious once more. "Now, Harry, please don't move. I'll take it from here." With a small flick, Harry's feet lifted off of the snow, and he floated lazily towards Dumbledore. It was an odd sensation, but Harry trusted the Headmaster not to drop him.
Sure enough, after a few moments of gentle flight, Harry was held in the air next to Dumbledore, smiling a little at how strange he must look. Harry glanced back at Sirius, shooting him a reassuring grin and a wink when he noticed how tense his godfather looked. Sirius smiled gently back, but his face returned to an expression of mild panic within moments. Turning back to the door, Harry looked down at Dumbledore, his position in the air making him at least a foot taller than the Headmaster.
"Er… what should I say?" Harry asked awkwardly.
"I think something straightforward should suffice here. Voldemort already assumed that he was the only Parselmouth in Britain, and perhaps the World, and I think it's unlikely that he implemented any kind of password." Dumbledore responded.
Harry looked back at the door, and focused on the door knocker, locking eyes on the biting snake's head. Drawing in a breath, he spoke.
"Open!" He said, except instead of English, his voice came out in the sharp, tell-tale hiss of Parseltongue. Dumbledore nodded at Harry, and sent him gently hovering back to his original spot behind Sirius, his feet landing on the snow a moment later. Looking back at the Headmaster, Harry could see him once again performing detection spells on the door, before he nodded to himself and strode onto the front step, opening the door and looking into the ruined house.
"Very good, Harry," Dumbledore called back, "it appears that all defences on the door have been deactivated. Unfortunately, both outside and inside the house remain protected, so take care, both of you, as you make your way to me." Not waiting for any reply of assent, Dumbledore once more began casting spells into the house, waving his wand in wide, complicated arcs in every direction.
Harry followed Sirius to the front step, and seeing that Dumbledore was now fully onto the property, followed both the Headmaster and his godfather inside.
If the outside had looked bad compared to Morfin's memories, the inside was, if possible, even worse. Whilst the Gaunt house had always been in a particularly filthy state of disrepair, it was at least recognisable as a living space – if only barely so. Now, with the damage to the roof and windows, the inside of the house was rotted and mouldy, the remaining furniture splintered and ruined. Despite the fresh winter climate outside, the air inside the house was stale and musty, every surface sitting under a thick layer of dust and leaves from outside. Discoloured plant shoots grew up through the damaged floorboards, the house slowly returning to the earth.
"Wow," Sirius remarked as he glanced about the inside of the house. "This place is a dump. At least in Azkaban, we had fresh air." Harry smiled at his godfather's bleak humour.
"Professor, the weather's getting worse." Harry pointed out after glancing out of a broken window, noticing the now steady snowfall outside. Dumbledore turned and nodded, agreeing with Harry's assessment.
"We must hurry, then. If we take too long, we'll lose my footprints." Dumbledore said gravely.
Not needing any more encouragement, Harry and Sirius began casting basic detection spells around the room, whilst Dumbledore made complex incantations and wand movements. After about a minute of busy silence, the Headmaster walked over to one end of the room.
"Harry, Sirius – I think I've found it." Dumbledore said quietly, the other two immediately hurrying over to his side. Dumbledore had his wand pointed at the floorboards in front of him, and as they began to peel away, bending out of shape thanks to the Headmaster's transfigurations, a gold box was revealed, sitting on the ground underneath the floor. Dumbledore grimaced a little. "Yes, this is it. Step back, the both of you." He ordered, Harry and Sirius hastening to comply. Levitating the box out from under the floor, Dumbledore placed it in the centre of the room, and began weaving his wand over it carefully. After a moment or two, the Headmaster straightened up, before pointing his wand at the box and calling out "Desolatus!"
The golden box started to bubble and lose texture, as dully-coloured liquid dripped off of the edges. Harry realised with a start that it wasn't any liquid at all – Dumbledore was melting the box completely!
Within moments the box was little more than a puddle of molten gold in the hole under the floor before it abruptly reformed back into shape, the floorboards folding down into place, covering the box as if it had never moved. The ring of Marvolo Gaunt hung suspended in the air.
Suddenly, Dumbledore, a strange look on his face, reached for it, and put it onto his finger.
The reaction was immediate – Sirius yelled out "Wait, Albus-" and even as he did so, the ring glowed a sickly yellow, and the Headmaster started screaming.
Harry stood in shock as the old man fell to his knees, his mouth open and eyes wide with terror and pain, yelling and thrashing as beams of yellow light pulsed up his arm, the flesh on his fingers turning an unnatural grey. Sirius ran towards the Headmaster, trying in vain to summon the ring from his finger, before grabbing him under the arms and hauling him towards the door, grunting with the effort.
"Harry!" Sirius cried, breaking Harry out of his shock. "We need to get back to Hogwarts now!" Harry nodded, and ran to the door – looking out, his heart stopped in his chest.
Their footprints were gone. They couldn't set foot outside.
"Sirius, the footprints are gone!" Harry exclaimed, Dumbledore's yelling nearly drowning him out.
"Bollocks!" Sirius shouted, trying to keep the old man still. "There's no time!"
Harry had a sudden idea. "Sirius, banish me across the garden to the road, then I'll summon the both of you to me!"
Sirius looked at him like he'd lost his mind, before simply nodding and pointing his wand at Harry, who angled himself into the doorway. "Depulso!" Sirius yelled, sending Harry flying through the air, soaring headlong over the overgrown garden before crashing onto the icy tarmac, crying out at the impact.
Struggling upright, Harry pointed his wand at Sirius and the thrashing Dumbledore, before roaring "Accio!", the two men being flung towards him as if fired from a cannon, both landing badly on the road in a heap.
Getting to his feet, Sirius pulled the still-writhing Dumbledore up and held him tightly to his side. "I'll take Albus back now, Harry, and I'll come to get you as soon as I can! Stay here!" Sirius ordered, before Disapparating on the spot with a sharp crack.
When Sirius came back for Harry a few painfully tense minutes later, he was pale and worried. Getting back to Hogwarts, Sirius filled Harry in as they hurtled through the deserted corridors to the Hospital Wing. Himself and Madam Pomfrey had managed to get the ring off, and Professor Snape had prevented the spread of the curse for the moment – but Dumbledore was badly injured from their escape from the Gaunt shack, and his condition was serious.
It was a subdued Harry that had retreated to Gryffindor Tower that night, unable to stop thinking about how he could have prevented this catastrophe from happening. Harry didn't sleep, and for the first time in his life, genuinely doubted his chances of defeating Voldemort.
The Headmaster had never fully recovered from the incident with the ring, and although they destroyed the Horcrux later that week with the Sword of Gryffindor, the incurable curse it had carried would ensure Dumbledore's death within a year. Weakened, and needing to use a cane to walk around from then on, the Headmaster looked almost like a different person, weary and frail, but the old man had still smiled and congratulated Harry on his quick thinking for their escape. He didn't ever tell Harry why he'd tried to put on the ring, and whenever Harry asked him would merely sigh, and say vaguely that it was "a terrible lapse in judgement".
It was seeing first-hand the lengths that Voldemort would go to in order to protect the Horcruxes that made Harry realise just how underprepared he was to face him. Unfortunately for Harry, he never had much of a choice.
Looking over the plans for Malfoy Manor once more, Harry thought about everything Dobby had told him. After hearing about the town of Marlborough nearby, where the elf had gone to buy food for the pantry, Harry had worked out the rough location of the Manor, firmly setting Dobby at ease over not being able to reveal its location. With a rough schematic for the house and grounds, Harry began to carefully plan the heist.
Making several trips to the area over the next few days, Harry – under his Invisibility Cloak – headed deep into the forests near Marlborough to try and find the estate's entrance. After several attempts and many hours of searching, Harry stumbled onto a neat gravel road, finding himself looking up at a set of impressive metal gates. Casting a few simple detection spells from under the cloak, Harry learned of some interesting charms on the gates, as well as powerful protective spells on the neat walls and hedges to either side.
This has to be it. But how to get in?
Harry paused a moment to marvel at his luck when he heard the tell-tale crack of Apparition further up the road, followed by approaching footsteps. Darting out of the way and into the treeline, Harry watched a black-robed wizard, undoubtedly a Death Eater, stride up to the gates before pulling back his left sleeve, revealing the Dark Mark in what looked like some kind of salute. Suddenly, the gates seemed fuzzy, and Harry reflexively checked to make sure his glasses were still on, in case it was his eyesight that was tricking him. Watching carefully, Harry saw the Death Eater walk through the gates, the metal simply disappearing like smoke as he moved over the threshold, before reforming into solid bars the moment he passed through.
Unless I want to blast my way in, I'm going to need to get my hands on a Death Eater. Shouldn't be too hard, considering how many there are these days.
Returning to the ruins of Hogwarts for some rest and food, Harry spoke with Dobby one more time, going over the last of the information the elf could give him about the Manor, before retiring to bed. He'd capture a Death Eater tomorrow, and launch the heist under cover of darkness.