The Locket
Disclaimer: I don't own HP.
Kitty awoke early next morning, wrapped in a sleeping bag in the drawing room. Ron and Hermione were still asleep. Harry's sleeping bag was empty, but he was nowhere to be seen in the room. Instinctively drawing her wand, Kitty got to her feet and checked in all the rooms downstairs before going upstairs.
Kitty kept growing more and more anxious, as she looked in all the rooms and couldn't find Harry. She reached the topmost landing where there were only tow doors. One of the doors was ajar. Raising her wand, she crept slowly towards it, and pushed it open.
She gave a sigh of relief, and lowered her wand, as she saw her brother standing before her.
'You gave me such a fright,' said Kitty.
'Look at that,' said Harry quietly, pointing to a photograph on the wall.
With a leap of pleasure, Kitty recognized her father, his untidy black hair stuck up at the back like Harry's, and he too wore glasses. Beside him was Sirius, carelessly handsome, his slightly arrogant face so much younger and happier than Kitty had ever seen it alive. To Sirius's right stood Pettigrew, more than a head shorter, plump and watery-eyed, flushed with pleasure at his inclusion in this coolest of gangs, with the much-admired rebels that James and Sirius had been. On James's left was Remus, even then a little shabby-looking, but he had the same air of delighted surprise at finding himself liked and included.
Kitty smiled at looked around at the rest of the room. There were several large Gryffindor banners on the walls, pictures of Muggle motorcycles, and (Kitty had to admire Sirius's nerve), several posters of bikini clad Muggle girls.
'And look at this,' said Harry, handing her a bit of parchment.
Kitty took it and read:
'Dear Padfoot, Thank you, thank you, for Harry's birthday present! It was his favorite by far. Three years old and already zooming along on a toy broomstick, he looked so pleased with himself. I'm enclosing a picture so you can see. You know it only rises about two feet off the ground but he nearly killed the cat and he smashed a horrible vase Petunia sent me for Christmas (no complaints there). Of course James thought it was so funny, says he's going to be a great Quidditch player but we've had to pack away all the ornaments and make sure we don't take our eyes off him when he gets going. We had a very quiet birthday tea, just us and old Bathilda who has always been sweet to us and who dotes on Harry and Kitty. We were so sorry you couldn't come, but the Order's got to come first. James is getting a bit frustrated shut up here, he tries not to show it but I can tell, also Dumbledore's still got his Invisibility Cloak, so no chance of little excursions. If you could visit, it would cheer him up so much. Wormy was here last weekend. I thought he seemed down, but that was probably the next about the McKinnons; I cried all evening when I heard. Bathilda drops in most days, she's a fascinating old thing with the most amazing stories about Dumbledore. I'm not sure he'd be pleased if he knew! I don't know how much to believe, actually because it seems incredible that Dumbledore…
'Where's the next page?' said Kitty.
'Dunno,' said Harry, 'that's all there was.'
Kitty looked down at the parchment and read it again. The writing, her mother's writing, was so like hers. The letter was an incredible treasure, proof that Lily Potter had lived, really lived, that her warm hand had once moved across this parchment, tracing ink into these letters, these words, words about her and Harry.
Why had Dumbledore got her father's Invisibility Cloak, though? Had he been afraid that James might sneak out of the house under it? Wormy was here... Pettigrew, the traitor, had seemed "down" had he? Was he aware that he was seeing James and Lily alive for the last time?
Harry was on his fours in Sirius's bedroom, looking for the rest of the letter. He picked up a torn piece of paper and looked at it. Then he passed it to Kitty. It proved to be most of the photograph that Lily had described in her letter. A black-haired toddler was zooming in and out of the picture on a tiny broom, roaring with laughter, and a pair of legs that must have belonged to James was chasing after him. Lily was standing with a small baby in her arms, that was wrapped in a bundle of robes.
'Harry! Kitty! Harry!' came a voice.
'We're here!' called Harry hastily, as Ron and Hermione came bursting inside.
'What're you…' Hermione began and stared at the letter in Harry's hand.
Harry showed it to her. When she had read it, she looked up.
'And there's this too,' said Kitty, handing her the photograph. Hermione smiled as she looked at Harry zooming around on the broom.
'Did you make this mess?' said Ron, looking around.
'No,' said Harry, 'Someone's been here before us. They searched every room.'
'What were they after?' said Kitty.
'Information on the Order, possibly,' said Harry.
'But Snape must have already told them all they needed to know,' said Kitty.
'Well then,' said Ron, 'what about information on Dumbledore? The second page of the letter, for instance. You know this Bathilda your mum mentions, you know who she is?'
'I dunno, but I think I've read the name somewhere,' said Kitty, frowning.
'Bathilda Bagshot,' said Hermione 'is the author of A History of Magic. She's a very famous magic historian.'
'And she's still alive,' said Harry, 'and she lives in Godric's Hollow. Ron's Auntie Muriel was talking about her at the wedding. She knew Dumbledore's family too. Be pretty interesting to talk to, wouldn't she?'
'I understand why you'd love to talk to her about your mum and dad, and Dumbledore too,' said Hermione. 'But that wouldn't really help us in our search for the Horcruxes, would it?'
Harry did not answer, and she rushed on, 'Harry, I know you really want to go to Godric's Hollow, but I'm scared. I'm scared at how easily those Death Eaters found us yesterday. It just makes me feel more than ever that we ought to avoid the place where your parents are buried, I'm sure they'd be expecting you to visit it.'
'But, Hermione…' began Kitty.
'We'll talk about this later. I think we should go and find some breakfast,' said Hermione, walking out of the door. Ron, Harry and Kitty followed her.
'R.A.B.' said Harry suddenly, 'Look at that!'
Kitty looked at the door he was pointing at, and saw a sign saying: 'Do Not Enter Without the Express Permission of Regulus Arcturus Black.'
'Of course,' aid Kitty, 'that's who R.A.B. is.'
'Sirius's brother?' whispered Hermione.
Ron kicked the door open and the four of them entered the room. Regulus's bedroom was slightly smaller than Sirius's, though it had the same sense of former grandeur. Whereas Sirius had sought to advertise his diffidence from the rest of the family, Regulus had striven to emphasize the opposite. The Slytherin colors of emerald and silver were everywhere, draping the bed, the walls, and the windows. The Black family crest was painstakingly painted over the bed, along with its motto, TOUJOURS PUR. Beneath this was a collection of yellow newspaper cuttings, all stuck together to make a ragged collage. Hermione crossed the room to examine them.
'They're all about Voldemort,' she said. 'Regulus seems to have been a fan for a few years before he joined the Death Eaters ...'
'Accio Locket!' said Kitty, but nothing happened. They combed every inch of the room for more than an hour, but were forced, finally, to conclude that the locket was not there.
'It could be somewhere else in the house, though,' said Hermione in a rallying tone as they walked back downstairs. As Harry, Kitty and Ron had become more discouraged, she seemed to have become more determined. 'Whether he'd manage to destroy it or not, he'd want to keep it hidden from Voldemort, wouldn't he? Remember all those awful things we had to get rid of when we were here last time? That clock that shot bolts at everyone and those old robes that tried to strangle Ron; Regulus might have put them there to protect the locket's hiding place, even though we didn't realize it at ... at ...'
Harry, Kitty and Ron looked at her. She was standing with one foot in midair, with the dumbstruck look of one who had just been Obliviated: her eyes had even drifted out of focus.
'... at the time,' she finished in a whisper.
'Something wrong?' asked Ron.
'There was a locket.'
'What?' said Harry, Kitty and Ron together.
'In the cabinet in the drawing room. Nobody could open it. And we ... we ...'
Harry felt as though a brick had slid down through his chest into his stomach. He remembered. He had even handled the thing as they passed it around, each trying in turn to pry it open. It had been tossed into a sack of rubbish, along with the snuffbox of Wartcap powder and the music box that had made everyone sleepy ...
'Kreacher nicked loads of things back from us,' said Harry. It was the only chance, the only slender hope left to them, and he was going to cling to it until forced to let go. 'He had a whole stash of stuff in his cupboard in the kitchen. C'mon.'
He ran down the stairs taking two steps at a time, the other three thundering along in his wake. Harry ran the length of the room, skidded to a halt at the door of Kreacher's cupboard, and wrenched it open. There was the nest of dirty old blankets in which the house-elf had once slept, but they were not longer glittering with the trinkets Kreacher had salvaged. The only thing there was an old copy of Nature's Nobility: A Wizarding Genealogy. Refusing to believe his eyes, Harry snatched up the blankets and shook them. A dead mouse fell out and rolled dismally across the floor. Ron groaned as he threw himself into a kitchen chair; Hermione closed her eyes.
'It's not over yet,' said Harry, and he raised his voice and called, 'Kreacher!'
There was a loud crack and the house elf appeared.
'Master,' croaked Kreacher in his bullfrog's voice, and he bowed low; muttering to his knees, 'back in my Mistress's old house with his sister and the blood-traitor Weasley and the Mudblood…'
'I forbid you to call anyone blood traitor or Mudblood,' growled Harry. 'I've got a question for you and I order you to answer it truthfully. Understand?'
'Yes, Master,' said Kreacher, bowing low again.
'Two years ago,' said Harry, his heart now hammering against his ribs, 'there was a big gold locket in the drawing room upstairs. We threw it out. Did you steal it back?'
There was a moment's silence, during which Kreacher straightened up to look Harry full in the face. Then he said, 'Yes.'
'Where is it now?' asked Harry jubilantly as Ron, Kitty and Hermione looked gleeful.
'Gone.'
'Gone?' echoed Harry, elation floating out of him, 'What do you mean, it's gone?'
The elf shivered. He swayed.
'Kreacher,' said Harry fiercely, 'I order you…'
'Mundungus Fletcher,' croaked the elf, his eyes still tight shut. 'Mundungus Fletcher stole it all; Miss Bella's and Miss Cissy's pictures, my Mistress's gloves, the Order of Merlin, First Class, the goblets with the family crest, and…and…and the locket, Master Regulus's locket. Kreacher did wrong, Kreacher failed in his orders!'
'Kreacher, I want the truth: How do you know Mundungus Fletcher stole the locket?' said Harry.
'Kreacher saw him!' gasped the elf as tears poured over his snout and into his mouth full of graying teeth. 'Kreacher saw him coming out of Kreacher's cupboard with his hands full of Kreacher's treasures. Kreacher told the sneak thief to stop, but Mundungus Fletcher laughed and r-ran …'
'You called the locket Master Regulus's,' said Harry. 'Why? Where did it come from? What did Regulus have to do with it? Kreacher, sit up and tell me everything you know about that locket, and everything Regulus had to do with it!'
The elf sat up, curled into a ball, placed his wet face between his knees, and began to rock backward and forward. When he spoke, his voice was muffled but quite distinct in the silent, echoing kitchen.
'Master Sirius ran away, good riddance, for he was a bad boy and broke my Mistress's heart with his lawless ways. But Master Regulus had proper order; he knew what was due to the name of Black and the dignity of his pure blood. For years he talked of the Dark Lord, who was going to bring the wizards out of hiding to rule the Muggles and the Muggle-borns ... and when he was sixteen years old, Master Regulus joined the Dark Lord. So proud, so proud, so happy to serve ...
And one day, a year after he joined, Master Regulus came down to the kitchen to see Kreacher. Master Regulus always liked Kreacher. And Master Regulus said ... he said ...'
The old elf rocked faster than ever.
'... he said that the Dark Lord required an elf.'
'Voldemort needed an elf?' Harry repeated, looking around at Ron, Kitty and Hermione, who looked just as puzzled as he did.
'Oh yes,' moaned Kreacher. 'And Master Regulus had volunteered Kreacher. It was an honor, said Master Regulus, an honor for him and for Kreacher, who must be sure to do whatever the Dark Lord ordered him to do ... and then to c-come home.'
Kreacher rocked still faster, his breath coming in sobs.
'So Kreacher went to the Dark Lord. The Dark Lord did not tell Kreacher what they were to do, but took Kreacher with him to a cave beside the sea. And beyond the cave was a cavern, and in the cavern was a great black lake ... there was a boat ...There was a b-basin full of potion on the island. The D-Dark Lord made Kreacher drink it ...'
The elf quaked from head to foot.
'Kreacher drank, and as he drank he saw terrible thing ... Kreacher's insides burned ... Kreacher cried for Master Regulus to save him, he cried for his Mistress Black, but the Dark Lord only laughed ... He made Kreacher drink all the potion ... He dropped a locket into the empty basin ... He filled it with more potion.'
'And then the Dark Lord sailed away, leaving Kreacher on the island ...'
Kitty could see it happening. She watched Voldemort's white, snakelike face vanishing into darkness, those red eyes fixed pitilessly on the thrashing elf whose death would occur within minutes, whenever he succumbed to the desperate thirst that the burning poison caused its victim ... But here, Kitty's imagination could go no further, for she could not see how Kreacher had escaped.
'Kreacher needed water, he crawled to the island's edge and he drank from the black lake ... and hands, dead hands, came out of the water and dragged Kreacher under the surface ...'
'How did you get away?' Kitty asked, and she was not surprised to hear herself whispering.
Kreacher raised his ugly head and looked Kitty with his great, bloodshot eyes.
'Master Regulus told Kreacher to come back,' he said.
'I know, but how did you escape the Inferi?'
Kreacher did not seem to understand.
'Master Regulus told Kreacher to come back,' he repeated.
'Well, it's obvious, isn't it,?' said Ron. 'He Disapparated!'
'But ... you couldn't Apparate in and out of that cave,' said Harry, 'otherwise Dumbledore…'
'Elf magic isn't like wizard's magic, is it?' said Ron, 'I mean, they can Apparate and Disapparate in and out of Hogwarts when we can't.'
There was a silence as Kitty digested this. How could Voldemort have made such a mistake? But even as he thought this, Hermione spoke, and her voice was icy.
'Of course, Voldemort would have considered the ways of house-elves far beneath his notice ... It would never have occurred to him that they might have magic that he didn't.'
'The house-elf's highest law is his Master's bidding,' intoned Kreacher. 'Kreacher was told to come home, so Kreacher came home ...'
'Well, then, you did what you were told, didn't you?' said Hermione kindly. 'You didn't disobey orders at all!'
Kreacher shook his head, rocking as fast as ever.
'So what happened when you got back?' Harry asked. 'What did Regulus say when you told him what happened?'
'Master Regulus was very worried, very worried,' croaked Kreacher. 'Master Regulus told Kreacher to stay hidden and not to leave the house. And then ... it was a little while later ... Master Regulus came to find Kreacher in his cupboard one night, and Master Regulus was strange, not as he usually was, disturbed in his mind, Kreacher could tell ... and he asked Kreacher to take him to the cave, the cave where Kreacher had gone with the Dark Lord ...'
And so they had set off. Kitty could visualize them quite clearly, the frightened old elf and the thin, dark man who had so resembled Sirius ... Kreacher knew how to open the concealed entrance to the underground cavern, knew how to raise the tiny boat: this time it was his beloved Regulus who sailed with him to the island with its basin of poison ...
'And he made you drink the poison?' said Kitty, disgusted.
But Kreacher shook his head and wept. Hermione's hands leapt to her mouth: She seemed to have understood something.
'M-Master Regulus took from his pocket a locket like the one the Dark Lord had,' said Kreacher, tears pouring down either side of his snoutlike nose. 'And he told Kreacher to take it and, when the basin was empty, to switch the lockets ...'
Kreacher's sobs came in great rasps now; Harry had to concentrate hard to understand him.
'And he ordered Kreacher to leave without him. And he told Kreacher to go home and never to tell my Mistress what he had done but to destroy the first locket. And he drank all the potion and Kreacher swapped the lockets and watched ... as Master Regulus ... was dragged beneath the water ... and ...'
'Oh, Kreacher!' wailed Hermione, who was crying. She dropped to her knees beside the elf and tried to hug him. At once he was on his feet, cringing away from her, quite obviously repulsed.
'The Mudblood touched Kreacher, he will not allow it, what would his Mistress say?'
'I told you not to call her 'Mudblood'!' snarled Harry, but the elf was already punishing himself. He fell to the ground and banged his forehead on the floor.
'Stop him …stop him!' Hermione cried. 'Oh, don't you see now how sick it is, the way they've got to obey?'
'Kreacher stop, stop!' shouted Harry.
The elf lay on the floor, panting and shivering, green mucus glistening around his snot, a bruise already blooming on his pallid forehead where he had struck himself, his eyes swollen and bloodshot and swimming in tears. Kitty had never seen anything so pitiful.
'So you brought the locket home,' she said relentlessly, for she was determined to know the full story. 'And you tried to destroy it?'
'Nothing Kreacher did made any mark upon it,' moaned the elf. 'Kreacher tried everything, everything he knew, but nothing, nothing would work ... So many powerful spells upon the casing, Kreacher was sure the way to destroy it was to get inside it, but it would not open ... Kreacher punished himself, he tried again, he punished himself, he tried again. Kreacher failed to obey orders, Kreacher could not destroy the locket! And his mistress was mad with grief, because Master Regulus had disappeared and Kreacher could not tell her what had happened, no, because Master Regulus had f-f-forbidden him to tell any of the f-f-family what happened in the c-cave ...'
'I don't understand you, Kreacher,' Harry said finally. 'Voldemort tried to kill you, Regulus died to bring Voldemort down, but you were still happy to betray Sirius to Voldemort? You were happy to go to Narcissa and Bellatrix, and pass information to Voldemort through them ...'
'Harry, Kreacher doesn't think like that,' said Hermione, wiping her eyes on the back of her hand. 'He's a slave; house-elves are used to bad, even brutal treatment; what Voldemort did to Kreacher wasn't that far out of the common way. What do wizard wars mean to an elf like Kreacher? He's loyal to people who are kind to him, and Mrs. Black must have been, and Regulus certainly was, so he served them willingly and parroted their beliefs. I know what you're going to say,' she went on as Harry began to protest, 'that Regulus changed his mind ... but he doesn't seem to have explained that to Kreacher, does he? And I think I know why. Kreacher and Regulus's family were all safest if they kept to the old pure-blood line. Regulus was trying to protect them all.'
'Sirius…'
'Sirius was horrible to Kreacher, Harry, and it's no good looking like that, you know it's true. Kreacher had been alone for such a long time when Sirius came to live here, and he was probably starving for a bit of affection. I'm sure 'Miss Cissy' and 'Miss Bella' were perfectly lovely to Kreacher when he turned up, so he did them a favor and told them everything they wanted to know. I've said all along that wizards would pay for how they treat house-elves. Well, Voldemort did ... and so did Sirius.'
Harry had no retort. As he watched Kreacher sobbing on the floor, he remembered what Dumbledore had said to him, mere hours after Sirius's death: I do not think Sirius ever saw Kreacher as a being with feelings as acute as a human's ...
'Kreacher,' said Harry after a while, 'when you feel up to it, er ... please sit up.'
It was several minutes before Kreacher hiccupped himself into silence. Then he pushed himself into a sitting position again, rubbing his knuckles into his eyes like a small child.
'Kreacher, I am going to ask you to do something,' said Harry. He glanced at Hermione for assistance. He wanted to give the order kindly, but at the same time, he could not pretend that it was not an order. However, the change in his tone seemed to have gained her approval: She smiled encouragingly.
'Kreacher, I want you, please, to go and find Mundungus Fletcher. We need to find out where the locket…where Master Regulus's locket it. It's really important. We want to finish the work Master Regulus started, we want to…er…ensure that he didn't die in vain.'
Kreacher dropped his fists and looked up at Harry.
'Find Mundungus Fletcher?' he croaked.
'And bring him here, to Grimmauld Place,' said Harry. 'Do you think you could do that for us?'
As Kreacher nodded and got to his feet, Harry had a sudden inspiration. He pulled out Hagrid's purse and took out the fake Horcrux, the substitute locket in which Regulus had placed the note to Voldemort.
'Kreacher, I'd, er, like you to have this,' he said, pressing the locket into the elf's hand. 'This belonged to Regulus and I'm sure he'd want you to have it as a token of gratitude for what you…'
'Overkill, mate,' said Ron as the elf took one look at the locket, let out a howl of shock and misery, and threw himself back onto the ground.
It took them nearly half an hour to calm down Kreacher, who was so overcome to be presented with a Black family heirloom for his very own that he was too weak at the knees to stand properly before Disapparating with the usual loud crack.
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