Following the co-ordinates Dumbledore had given them, Harry and Ron made their way up to Scotland to the cottage where Voldemort had been held prisoner. Unfortunately as soon as they arrived at the cottage they knew they were too late. The door to the cottage was standing wide open and there was an eerie silence surrounding the place.
"We're too late," Ron cursed as they approached the front door.
"Let's double check the cottage and the surrounding area," Harry said.
Cautiously entering the cottage, the pair set about searching the place. It was soon obvious that someone had been living in the cottage, but it was just as obvious that the place had been deserted for days. Although, how long Voldemort had been gone was unclear. He may have escaped within hours of Dumbledore's death, or they may have just missed him by hours.
"What now?" Ron asked when it became clear the cottage was totally empty and devoid of any clues.
"We don't know how long Voldemort's been gone, or what state he's in. He might have collapsed somewhere nearby for all we know," Harry said. "I think we should search the area, before informing the rest of the Order about what's going on. Dumbledore may have been a great wizard, but I think he made a mistake by keeping Voldemort's existence a secret. We're not going to make the same mistake. We're going to bring the Order in on things, and we can decide as a group on the best way to proceed."
Heading back outside, Harry and Ron decided to split up to search the surrounding area. For almost an hour the pair covered as much ground as they could, looking for clues that Voldemort had passed by. However, they found no sign of the dark wizard. If he was in a bad way somewhere, it wasn't in the vicinity of the cottage. Wherever he was, he'd managed to put a fair bit of distance between himself and the cottage where he'd been imprisoned for so many years.
"Back to the Order?" Ron checked as the pair re-convened outside the cottage.
"Yeah," Harry replied. "Let's get going."
Returning back to Harry's house they spoke to Lily and got her help in gathering as many of the Order as they could. While Lily dealt with contacting the older members of the Order, Harry and Ron made sure their friends were also present. If they wanted to stop Voldemort from continuing where he'd left off all those years ago, they'd need the help of a new generation of witches and wizards. Especially if Voldemort got Hermione on side, and she fought with the dark.
Gathering the Order wasn't exactly a quick job and it soon became clear that not many people could just drop everything and head directly to the Potters. So instead, it was arranged for the meeting to be held later that evening. Anyone who couldn't turn up could be informed of the situation by others, but Harry was hopeful the majority of the Order would make an appearance.
"So are you going to tell me what's going on?" Lily questioned, once everyone had been contacted and arrangements were in place for that evening. "You just rushed out of here, and now you're wanting to organise a meeting with a group who have no purpose anymore."
"That's just the thing, we do have a purpose again," Harry said. "Voldemort's alive."
"Don't be silly Harry," Lily said with a small laugh. "He's dead, and has been for several years. You saw what happened to him yourself at graduation."
"If you don't believe me, read this." Harry pulled Dumbledore's letter from his pocket and handed it over to his mother.
Lily read the letter from Dumbledore, the colour draining from her face as she did so. All this time Dumbledore had lied to them. He'd let James kill Voldemort's wife, while all the time he'd only pretended to do the same thing to Voldemort himself. For years he'd let the wizarding world think they were safe from a monster, when all along he just had Voldemort locked up. And there was no doubt that Voldemort would now be out for blood. Dumbledore had taken everything away from the dark wizard, and while he couldn't get his revenge on Dumbledore, he could target the people he was associated with. Although right now all the possibilities with Voldemort didn't mean much to Lily, her only concern was that Dumbledore had turned James into a killer.
"See, we've got a hell of a problem," Harry said, plucking Dumbledore's letter from Lily's shaking hands.
"Is that all you've got to say?" Lily demanded as Harry tucked the letter back into his pocket. "Does it not bother you that Dumbledore is admitting to turning your father into a killer? He left James with blood on his hands, yet he walked away guilt free. He didn't kill a man in cold blood, but your father killed a woman in her sleep."
"Dumbledore was doing what he thought was best," Harry argued. "Besides, you read the letter, you know Voldemort couldn't be killed."
"And that makes it acceptable, does it?" Lily snapped, disgusted with her son's attitude. "You think it was right for him to let James believe they were killing together."
"What does it matter?" Harry spat. "Dad still killed Voldemort's wife. It doesn't matter if Dumbledore killed Voldemort or not, Dad would still be a killer."
"It matters to me," Lily said with a sob as she turned on her heel and rushed off upstairs.
"Is she coming back?" Ron asked. He'd been keeping out of things while Harry and Lily were arguing.
"I don't know," Harry answered with a shrug. "But we've got more important things to worry about. Unless Voldemort's dead in a ditch somewhere, we're all in deep trouble."
"We need to take him out before he causes too much trouble," Ron agreed. "Although we will have to think about the Horcruxes. Dumbledore may have destroyed two, but he was sure there was more out there. It took him over fifteen years to destroy two Horcruxes. How long will it take us to destroy the rest? Especially considering we don't know how many there is and what they are."
"I admit, it's a problem," Harry conceded. "Maybe we can try and lock him up again as we search for the Horcruxes. But either way, we can't just sit back and do nothing. He won't just fade away and live a quiet life. He's going to want revenge for what happened."
As Harry and Ron settled down to try and make a plan of action before the rest of the Order arrived, an owl swooped in through an open window. The owl dropped a letter on the table in front of Harry, before soaring back outside and into the clear blue sky. Opening the letter, Harry found it was from Hermione confirming that she was willing to meet them in a café in Diagon Alley on Saturday afternoon.
"Perfect," Harry remarked with a grin as he showed Ron the letter. Considering what was now happening with her father, a meeting with her was perfect timing and it could be just what they needed to get some valuable information.
G.O.V.
A heavy silence filled the kitchen of the Potters house as the group digested what Harry had just told them. A good portion of the older members of the Order had shown up, including Remus and Tonks, McGonagall, Kingsley and Moody and the Longbottoms. Apart from Arthur, Ron's family were all present, including Ginny much to Molly's disgust. Ginny wasn't the only younger person at the meeting as Harry and Ron had ensured a few of their school friends were present at the meeting. Of course one person who hadn't been invited was Severus Snape. While Dumbledore may have trusted him, Harry and Ron didn't and they didn't want him involved with the Order any longer. Lily had even shown up at the meeting, although it was obvious to Harry that she was still upset by what was happening.
"Do you seriously expect us to believe this letter?" Bill Weasley demanded, breaking the silence in the room.
"You doubt the letter?" Harry questioned with a frown.
"I do," Bill declared with a nod. "If this is true, Dumbledore was willing to go to Azkaban for a murder he didn't commit. Who would do that?"
"Bill's right," Fred said. "If all this is true, why didn't Dumbledore say something when he was alive? He was arrested for murder, yet according to him, his victim was still alive. If that was me, I would have given up Voldemort's whereabouts."
"Unless of course this is just some rouse, and Voldemort is, and always has been, dead," George said. "What if he planned the entire thing? What if he found a way to kill himself and then left this letter to try and get people to think he wasn't a killer."
"I believe this letter," Harry insisted. "It's genuine, I know it is. Voldemort is alive, and he's a threat. He'll find his way back to Hermione, and together they'll bring us all down."
"And that's my cue to leave," Neville Longbottom declared as he rose to his feet. "I'm sorry Harry, but I will not be part of a witch hunt with Hermione as the target. She's done nothing wrong, and I refuse to go after her just because you're too stubborn to see that the people at fault here were Dumbledore and the Order. They caused this mess, and they hurt Hermione in a terrible way."
"And does anyone else feel this way?" Harry demanded sharply. "Because if they do, they can sod off."
Shaking their heads at Harry, Dean Thomas and Seamus Finnigan got to their feet and left with Neville. The twins and Bill then left, followed by a few more of the younger crowd. Even those that stayed expressed their scepticism and made it clear that they would stay and hear Harry out, but they weren't committing to aiding his campaign against Hermione and Voldemort.
"I think with before we go any further, we need to speak up about our own worries," Frank said solemnly. He had briefly thought about following Neville from the meeting, but he felt as though he and Alice should at least stay and find out the state of play.
"What worries are those?" Molly asked. "I hope you're not going to join in with blaming Hermione for everything." As she spoke, she glanced accusingly at her two youngest children and Harry. Their attitude had already driven people away, and if the Longbottoms backed them up, even more people could leave rather than helping.
"We agree that Hermione is just a victim in all of this," Remus said. "Our worries are about Dumbledore."
"And specifically what his motives were in having us launching an attack on Voldemort's house," Frank added. "To be honest, this latest news just confirms that we made a huge mistake in trusting him so implicitly."
"I'm still not clear what your worries are," Lily said with a frown. "We can probably all agree that Dumbledore wasn't as trustworthy as he appeared."
Even though Harry disliked anyone thinking of Dumbledore as dishonest, he knew better than to argue. Given the events of the day, it was hard to justify Dumbledore's actions. Or at least it was hard to justify him not confiding in anyone about Voldemort.
"We have doubts about the prophecy that led to us launching our assault on Voldemort's home," Frank announced.
"You doubt the prophecy?" McGonagall questioned. "Why?"
"We've been thinking, and we've decided the timing was very convenient," Remus answered. "Dumbledore had been wanting us to launch a personal attack on Voldemort for some time, and it was the prophecy that prompted us to change our minds and agree to his plan."
"You think he made up the prophecy to get us to attack Voldemort," Molly gasped.
"We think it's a possibility," Frank confessed. "And if he's telling the truth that Voldemort didn't die, we have to question Dumbledore's motives."
"After all, he was the only person to speak to the Death Eater that told him about Hermione," Remus added. "There's a strong possibility that he made up the prophecy to suit his own agenda."
Of course, several people had plenty to say on the subject and a lively debate followed as the group tried to decide if the prophecy was genuine or not. Eventually it was decided that it couldn't be proven either way, and just to be on the safe side they would proceed as though it was real. And that meant they would have to face up to the fact that Hermione was now with the dark, and if Voldemort was indeed back, it could spell trouble for them all.
"I still refuse to believe that Hermione will turn on us," Molly declared, and a lot of the remaining Order nodded their agreement.
"Not many of us think she would under normal circumstances," Remus replied. "But things aren't normal, are they? She's just found out her entire life has been a lie, and now her father is back from the dead. We can't deny she could be dangerous given where she is at the moment."
"Fine, I'll concede there's potential for problems," Molly said with a sigh. "But I will not condemn her until we know she's done something wrong."
"No-one will be condemning anyone without proof," Kingsley stated as several other people agreed with his statement. It was clear that while people would help fight if they had to, they weren't going to be the ones to start a war, and especially not against Hermione, who most people still viewed as innocent.
"So what do we do now?" Lily asked. "How do we deal with the fact Voldemort might still around?"
"There's no might about it, he's back," Harry insisted.
"I think we need to make this official," Frank said. "Of course the Order should be prepared for anything, but I think we need to tell the Ministry what's going on. We can't keep Voldemort's potential existence a secret, it's not fair, and it could be dangerous. If he is back, the public needs to know it."
"But that will drag Dumbledore's name further through the mud," Harry protested. "Everyone thinks he's a murderer, and this will just make them question him further. Can't we stay quiet and protect what little of his reputation is still intact."
"To hell with Dumbledore's reputation," Lily growled angrily. "I say we let the world know how manipulative he truly was. He turned my James into a killer and kept his own hands clean."
"Don't you think the public deserves to know there's a dark wizard on the loose?" Tonks asked Harry gently as he glared at his mother, looking as though he was going to start an argument with him. "It's not our place to keep something like that from the public. Imagine the guilt if something happened because the public didn't know to be on their guard."
"I say we take a vote," Remus said.
A few minutes later it was decided by a majority vote that the Ministry would be informed of Voldemort's return. They would make plans once they saw the reaction of the Ministry, but for now they were going to go down official channels. The first step was to alert the world to Voldemort's presence, and then they would think about what to do next and how to defeat him again.
