Chapter Twelve

The Den of the Snake

"Who would like to go first?"

Harry's teeth grinded together. It wasn't the pain from his burns that set his jaw so. Nor was it Madam Pomfrey, whose fussing and harrumphing made Harry feel as though she blamed him personally for getting burned in the first place.

No. It was the sight of Severus Snape couched behind the desk of the greatest wizard Harry had ever known, peering at Harry over steepled fingers with a smug, irritated look that made Harry's fingers flex involuntarily into fists.

The entire headmaster's office had been transformed. The myriad esoteric devices and magical, mysterious objects that Dumbledore had spent a lifetime collecting were gone. In their place sat the trappings from Snape's office, the bottled, pickled menagerie of snakes and gnarled rodents, murky beakers stoppered and sealed with wax, and cauldrons of every shape and substance imaginable. The grotesqueries of the dungeon had escaped and, like their owner, taken a place they didn't deserve. Just the sight of them in that office made Harry's stomach churn.

He focused instead on Ginny and Dresden. They, like he, had been dragged into Snape's office straight from the Great Hall by Snape's pack of Aurors to wait until the headmaster deigned to interrogate them. Their newest teacher had spent the time in a thoughtful and uncharacteristic silence, his eyes resting heavily on the floor. Ginny had tried to do likewise, but her hands had twined together, twiddling nervously, and her eyes kept darting to Harry's face when she thought he wasn't looking. He tried to give her a reassuring smile, but the effort did little for either of them.

Now that Snape had arrived, fixing them with dark stare, Harry's smile was gone. He folded his arms and stared back, lifting his chin.

Snape leaned over his steepled fingers. "Very well," he said. "Then allow me to begin with the evening's aftermath. We have two Aurors injured or worse. We have a great fissure in our Great Hall, the formation of which very nearly incinerated this school's headmaster. And standing at the center of it all is the illustrious Mister Potter. Why am I not surprised?" His words were languorous and dripped with sarcasm. The tiniest hint of a smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth.

"I think you're forgetting about the big honkin' werewolf, chief."

Dresden's words turned every head in the room. He couldn't have gotten a better reaction from Snape if he had slapped the man full in his face. There was the barest hint of a smirk in the corner of Dresden's mouth, which Harry knew full well Snape could not miss.

"You will address me as 'Headmaster,' Professor Dresden," Snape all but growled.

The almost-smirk on Dresden's face became that much closer to real. "Whatever you say, Chief Headmaster. But that wasn't exactly the neighbor's dog that got into your castle," he said. "So why don't we stay focused on the real problem instead of any very superficial accidental renovations that may have occurred."

As Harry watched, Dresden's gaze flickered to Harry's leg, and then up to his face. Their eyes met for a scant instant, and then the professor turned his attention back upon Snape. Whatever traces of mirth Harry had seen in the grizzled wizard was gone.

"Tsh," harrumphed Madam Pomfrey. "The only real worry here is why I've been dragged from a hospital wing full of injured people to take care of one little blister."

She spread a thick paste onto Harry's burn, making little effort to be gentle. Harry bit back a cry as his skin barked at the cold slather. Then he sighed through his nose as the pain dulled into a blissful numbness. The smell of cream and mint wafted up from his leg as the school's stout nurse began wrapping the burn in swathes of gauze.

Snape turned his sour look upon her. "The Aurors have brought their own Healer for security reasons, as you well know. You are to show her every courtesy and leave all Auror concerns to her."

"Oh, naturally, Headmaster," Pomfrey said, her voice dripping sarcasm. "Why, if you like, I can simply give the entire wing to that miserable sawbones and solve the whole dilemma."

As Snape drew a large breath to retort, the doors to the Headmaster's office banged open, and one of the castle's Aurors entered. He was a tall man, older, and pale. The skin over his hollow features was stretched tightly to the point of breaking, and his mouth was drawn like a bowstring. His bald pate glistened with a thin layer of sweat.

Harry saw the wand clutched in the man's whitened fingers and the bandoleer of multicolored glass vials slung across his chest, and it occurred to him that he had never seen another Auror older than this one. Even Mad-Eye Moody hadn't looked so old, and he had been retired. Harry made silent note to keep carefully out of the man's notice.

"Auror Stewart," Snape greeted him, rising from his seat.

"Crosby's dead," the man said matter-of-factly. "Ribcage was crushed entirely. I expect she didn't suffer."

Ginny's face blanched at the news. Harry couldn't blame her. The memory of the Auror falling from Greyback's massive claw came back to him, hearing her last breath rattled wetly as she slid down the wall. It wasn't the first time Harry had seen death. It wasn't even the most horrible death he had ever seen, which was a horrible thought all its own. But the Auror's death—Crosby's death—had been fast and brutal.

And as he remembered it again, it was Ginny's slackened face he saw sliding down the wall instead of the Auror's.

He shut his eyes hard until the thought retreated.

"Dorn is still unconscious, but he'll recover soon enough. Though our Healer is having trouble sorting out one kind of salve from another. If you wouldn't mind, ma'am?" He glanced at Madam Pomfrey.

She shot Snape a scathing look, and said, "It seems my attentions are required elsewhere, Headmaster. If I have your leave, I'll go give the Aurors full run of my stores."

Snape nodded, and Madam Pomfrey left in an icy swirl of robes. Once the doors slammed shut, Snape raised an eyebrow at Stewart, and said, "Well?"

Stewart rummaged in his robe and produced a short, gnarled object, which he tossed onto Snape's desk. It wasn't until Ginny yelped that Harry recognized the object. The skin of Harry's ankle crawled as the severed hand thumped onto the desktop. His hand twitched reflexively toward his robe's pocket.

"This is the only bit of evidence we could find," said Stewart. His puckered expression turned toward Dresden, and he added, "Aside from the architecture, that is."

"Buildings and I have a love-hate relationship," Dresden said without a hint of embarrassment.

Calmly, Snape took up the hand and turned it over. The skin that remained on the hand had become runny in its final moments, and now better resembled ghastly candlewax than anything that belonged to a person. Snape ran his thumb over the blackened stump, and then tested each finger. Then he set it aside and fixed Harry with a look. "And we're to be believed that this is the hand of Fenrir Greyback?"

"You can believe whatever you like. But that was Greyback," Harry said, his voice growing hot at Snape's raised eyebrow.

"It was!" Ginny added. When Snape's dark look fell upon her, she added, "...Headmaster."

Snape stared at them for a long moment of silence. Then he said, "You have each completed your O.W.L.S. Furthermore, I believe you each received exemplary marks for Defense Against the Dark Arts. Thus I am forced to believe that both of you are capable of tracking the phases of the moon."

"Of course we—" Harry began.

"Which is why," Snape continued, raising his voice, "you must certainly understand how ludicrous it would be to claim to have seen a transformed werewolf during a waxing moon."

The heat crept up into Harry's face. His fists balled at his sides as he said, "I know when a werewolf is attacking me. It doesn't matter where the moon is. He transformed."

"And it was Greyback!" Ginny insisted again. "I remember him from last year, when—"

"That is enough," said Snape.

He stood so sharply that his heavy chair screeched against the stone floor. A look of fierce disapproval filled the glare he fixed upon Harry and Ginny, but Harry knew their new headmaster well enough to see the pleased, contemptuous feelings behind the look. Snape had never missed a single opportunity to watch Harry squirm, and now that he ruled Hogwarts, the greasy potion-monger was enjoying the first of what was sure to be many new opportunities.

Without looking away from either of the Gryffindors, Snape handed the arm back to Stewart. "What is your assessment of the matter, Auror?" he said.

As the Auror took the arm, Dresden piped in, "It was a werewolf, by the way. A loup-garou. I don't know how often you let your kids play with werewolves, but I've seen more than a few in my day. Just in case you were interested in the facts."

Stewart sniffed. "Thank you so kindly for your opinions, 'Professor,' " he said. His tone transfigured the word into a bitter insult. "But the real facts of the matter will be determined by us. Normally, we could test the remains for the presence of a lycanthropic curse, but that's impossible—"

"Bull," said Dresden.

"—because," snapped Stewart, glaring at Dresden, "said remains have been roasted in enough fire to wipe any residual magic well and clean away."

Dresden sucked his retort back through his teeth. "That's actually a fair point," he admitted.

"And certainly an expert such as yourself would know all manner of ways by which a man might gussy himself like a werewolf," Stewart said, mock-lecturing. "Animagi, illusions, cursed cloaks, bewitched hair...we've no shortage of plausible explanations that we need to go chasing the fancies of an injured Auror and three panicked civilians."

"Panicked?" Harry protested.

"Civilian?" Dresden protested.

Stewart's gnarled hands wrapped around the stump, twisting anxiously as he scowled at his three star witnesses. He spoke sidelong to Snape, saying, "What's best now is to isolate each of them. A few hours of questions, perhaps a touch of Veritaserum, and we'll have a better notion of these goings-on, Headmaster."

Snape looked ready to voice his agreement when the doors slammed open once more, and Professor McGonagall rushed into the office. The bags under her eyes were twice as heavy as Harry had ever seen them, and her pallor was ghostly. Even so, when she spoke, Harry felt his spine straightening on reflex.

"Headmaster!" huffed McGonagall. "So sorry to be late. I'm afraid our new Aurors have had me running all over the castle trying to find you. Not two of them could give me the same answer. But never mind. Now, if you'd be so kind as bring me up to speed..."

The muscles in Snape's jaw bunched as he made a face Harry had only ever seen the man aim at him. "Professor McGonagall. We were just questioning these two students from your house and your recent addition to our faculty regarding this night's unpleasantness."

McGonagall stiffened. "Professor Dresden was hand-picked by Professor Dumbledore for the position of Defense Against the Dark Arts. You must have quite a bit on your mind, Headmaster, as I'm certain I've told you this several times before."

Harry felt his eyebrows rise at that. He knew as well as McGonagall that Dumbledore had never known anything about Dresden. What other falsehoods had she spun for Snape's benefit? Better still, what lies had she told Harry? He decided it was better to listen than ask, and bit down on his tongue.

"Yes," Snape said in an overly patient tone. "And yet, I continue to find myself wondering why our esteemed former Headmaster would choose a replacement for a position that was already so capably filled."

"Perhaps you'll recall, Headmaster," McGonagall retorted politely, placing extra emphasis on his title, "that the post of Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher is historically a tenuous one. Even your recent good fortune has led you to leave the post."

Snape's eyes tightened. "My current appointment has nothing to do with fortune, Professor McGonagall," he said in a low, dangerous tone.

Without so much as blinking, McGonagall raised a hand to her breast and said, "Of course. Forgive my slip of the tongue, Headmaster."

Dresden cleared his throat loudly, twice. When neither of the other professors would look at him, he spoke anyway. "Excuse me? Hi. Defense Against the Darkness teacher, right here. Quick question: just how many times do we have to be questioned about this? Because at least three other wizard cops have grilled us already, and I'm getting a little tired of sounding like a broken record."

It was Stewart who replied. "Being that this is an Auror matter, 'Professor,' I believe you'll stay at my leisure, and not leave one second earlier." The old man's face puckered, and his hand clutching the wand grew tighter still.

Dresden's smile grew brittle. Harry saw the man give his gloved hand a tiny shake, and then caught the glinting of the silver charm bracelet settling at the base of Dresden's wrist. Dimly, Harry recalled seeing the bracelet once before, when their professor-to-be had summoned a wall of blue force to break a phalanx of charging brownies. If Dresden fought here like he had in the sporting goods store back then, the Auror would make short work of him.

But then the throbbing pain in Harry's leg made him recall what Dresden had done in the Great Hall. Suddenly he wasn't so certain who would win the fight, but he did know he did not want to be there when it happened.

As if sensing the sudden tension, McGonagall stepped between the men, though she continued to address Snape. "Of course, I'm sure our students and our new professor are eager to cooperate with Auror Stewart. Within reason, of course."

"Reason," Snape echoed.

"Lest we forget, Mister Potter and Miss Granger are students. More than that, they were victims of tonight's attack," McGonagall said. "And considering they and the professor all begin class tomorrow, and that they've already spoken with other Aurors, I'm sure we can content ourselves with taking one more statement from each of them. If Auror Stewart has further questions for them, they can certainly wait until tomorrow."

Snape's brows knitted into one enormous frown.

"We are, after all, here to serve our students' best interests," added McGonagall.

A full minute passed as Snape and McGonagall stared down one another, each trying to be more impassive than the other. The only sound in the room was the soft sputtering coming from Stewart as he tried unsuccessfully to interject on behalf of his interrogation.

Then, blinking slowly, Snape said, "A wise suggestion, Professor. Once we find a stenographer, we may proceed—"

McGonagall's hands emerged from her robes with a golden quill and several sheets of parchment rolled together. Smiling, she offered the items to the sour-faced Auror. "As luck would have it, I happen to have a self-writing quill with me. If you would care to begin, Auror Stewart?" she said.

Stewart took the proffered materials a bit more roughly than necessary, and then proceeded to question Harry, speaking mostly through his teeth as he did. Harry was first, and told exactly the same story he had told the other Aurors. Once he was done, he took small pleasure in watching Stewart interrogate Ginny and Dresden. His eyes kept drifting back to Dumbledore's old desk and the farce sitting behind it. Snape kept staring at him with smoldering, unblinking eyes, and every time Harry looked, he found himself back in that tower watching Dumbledore tumble backwards, disappearing over the edge of the stone wall, the fading green light of Snape's killing curse trailing after him. The memory made his hand twitch, aching to draw the wand in his pocket.

Someone shook him by the shoulder, breaking his reverie. He looked up and saw Ginny's concerned expression. Only then did he realize that the rest of the room was watching him.

"Er, you see, Headmaster?" said McGonagall. "Our students have been through so much today. I really must insist that they be seen to bed."

Snape sniffed. "Very well," he said. "You are excused. You as well, Professor Dresden."

"Not that it hasn't been fun," Dresden said as he followed McGonagall, who ushered out Harry and Ginny, "but between the carlag, the time difference, and the werewolf-related adrenaline, I have a lot of staring at my ceiling wide awake all night to do."

As they reached the doors, Harry half-turned as Snape raised his voice. "And Professor Dresden? Hogwarts is pleased to have you here...for however long you are with us."

Harry couldn't help but smirk at that. Snape had decided to loathe Harry forever before he even met him. Now, it seemed, Dresden had been weighed and measured just as quickly, and found just as wanting as Harry had.

"Appreciate that," Dresden said as he closed the doors behind him. Just before they shut, he added, "Chief Headmaster, sir."

McGonagall led them down the hall. Once they were out of earshot, she whirled on them, and the heavy lines in her face contorted into a scowl. Harry and Ginny stopped so abruptly that Dresden nearly plowed over them both. "Now," McGonagall hissed, you will tell me exactly what happened. All of it, not whatever poppycock you gave the Aurors."

Ginny protested before Harry could even draw a breath. "We didn't lie!" she exclaimed. "Everything happened just the way we said."

"We didn't need to lie," Harry added hotly. "We were the ones attacked. And we're a little tired of being treated like we let Greyback into the castle ourselves."

McGonagall's eyes widened. "Then it really was Greyback?"

"Yes!" Harry snapped, and threw his hands in the air.

Realization dawned across McGonagall's features. She drew back, clutching a hand to her mouth. A string of mumblings emerged from between her fingers, too soft to be intelligible. Harry might have felt a moment of victory if he didn't feel so angry at her for the secrets she refused to share, the secrets she whispered into her hand now.

"Whoever he was, he was definitely a loup-garou," said Dresden. "And whatever Headmaster Skin-Problems says, he's right about the moon. We're weeks away from worrying about the furry contingent, which means there's some hocus pocus going on that I've never seen. I'm going to start poking around, maybe ask some of these 'Aurors' what—"

"No!" McGonagall said. Then, more calmly, she said, "No. I'll bring this to the attention of...other individuals who can address this matter. Discreetly."

Harry scoffed. "Would that be the Order, Professor? The same Order that harbored a traitor for years?"

Glacial anger darkened in McGonagall's face. She drew herself up to her full height, which Harry couldn't help but notice still left her the shortest person present by almost a full head. "I will thank you not to speak of such matters, Potter. I want you and Miss Weasley to focus on your classes." Glancing aside, she added, "And that goes for you as well, Professor Dresden. You will leave this to me."

Harry seethed until he heard Dresden say, "Pass."

Blinking, McGonagall looked at him and said, "Excuse me?"

"Pass," Dresden said. "As in 'I'm going to investigate the werewolf that tried to kill me.' See, I'm a do-it-yourselfer. Plus the asshole broke my staff. I take that kind of thing personally."

Harry folded his arms, grinning as he watched McGonagall's wrath shift from him to the towering American. "Mister Dresden—" she began.

Dresden matched her glare with one of his own. All of the humor left his voice, replaced with an edge that made the hairs on Harry's neck prickle. "'Professor' Dresden," he said.

Unblinkingly, McGonagall echoed darkly, "'Professor.' You are here at my discretion, and at Ebenezer McCoy's request. And if Wizard McCoy were here—"

"Except," Dresden snapped, "Ebenezer isn't here. He duped me into coming to this funhouse version of a school to protect kids like Goggles and Red here."

Ginny frowned, puzzled. "Red?" Then her hand found a lock of her long hair, and she said, "Oh."

"So here I am," Dresden continued, and threw his arms out wide. "And guess what? I have a little problem with authority, especially when that authority gets in my face about protecting people. Thirty seconds ago, it was the low-rent Hans Gruber in that office. Now it's you. So, yeah, I'm going to tell you 'pass,' and then I'm going to goddamn well do what I do because that's...what I do." His voice trailed off as he finished.

As McGonagall sputtered for words, her eyes met Harry's. He smiled smugly, and said, "Don't look at me, Professor. He was Dumbledore's first choice, remember?"

"This matter is not finished," McGonagall warned them.

Dresden simply walked past her, letting his hip push the older woman out of the way. "So finish it somewhere else. I'm putting these kids to bed." Then he paused, and turned long enough to add, "And if you think for one second that Ebenezer McCoy would sit on the sidelines with his thumb up his ass, then you clearly don't know the first thing about him."

Harry's grin widened as he and Ginny fell into step behind Dresden. He didn't dare look back for fear of laughing in the face of McGonagall's rage, which he could feel following them all the way around the first corner. It was well past time someone put McGonagall in her place. Perhaps she thought otherwise, but she was no Dumbledore, and she had no business ordering everybody around as if she were. He could only imagine what state the Order of the Phoenix was in, what with the great wizard gone and his killer's true colors revealed.

After they turned the second corner, Dresden stopped to scratch his head. He looked back at Harry and said, "Full disclosure? I don't actually know where griffon-guys go..."

"Gryffindors," Harry corrected him. "And we're perfectly capable of finding our own way, Professor."

Dresden snorted. "The hell you are. The last time you were alone, Lon Chaney nearly ate you. Consider all of your dates chaperoned from now on."

Quick as could be, Ginny piped up, "It wasn't a date, Professor." She refused to meet Harry's bewildered gaze as she said, "We're just friends."

The towering wizard looked between them, and then drawled, "Right. Well, lead the way, super-friends."

They climbed the stairs to Gryffindor Tower in awkward silence. Harry kept trying to glance sidelong at Ginny, but her eyes were kept firmly locked ahead of them. He couldn't begin to guess why. Had the werewolf attack and their subsequent interrogation by Hogwarts' new police state taken such a toll? A squirming discomfort took hold of his spine as he wondered if he was supposed to hold her hand or say something particularly comforting to her.

When they reached the hidden entrance, the Fat Lady was already dozing in her portrait. Harry cleared his throat loudly, but he still couldn't rouse her. It must have been later in the night than he had thought.

"...are we stopping for an art break?" Dresden asked him.

The question startled the Fat Lady, who awoke with a shout. Dresden cried in alarm and wheeled backwards. His wand was already out, the tip of it glowing. Harry would have laughed if he didn't feel the heat of the glow against his face. The back of his leg began to throb again.

"Oh. I beg your pardon," the Fat Lady said, and brushed at the frills of her ridiculous pink dress. "I was just resting my eyes. Password, please."

Harry groaned. "We don't have the password," he said. "We didn't come up with the others after dinner."

The Fat Lady sniffed. "I can see that, young sir. And I'm far too polite to ask why two students are still out at such an impertinent hour, being marched guiltily back to their beds by an adult. But I cannot simply let anyone in because they ask. Otherwise I'd be wasting my time here, wouldn't I?"

"Imagine that," Harry grumbled under his breath.

Dresden brushed past him to stare the Fat Lady in her widening eyes. "The password is 'open up because I'm a freaking teacher,' " he snapped. His wand was still drawn, although the tip had ceased to glow.

Flustered, the Fat Lady stammered an apology. Her portrait swung aside to reveal the entrance to their common room. Harry started to step over the threshold when Dresden's softened voice made him turn. "Hey, Harry..." Dresden said, fidgeting. "I'm...sorry about the leg."

Harry frowned, puzzled by the wizard's sudden sheepishness. His leg hurt, but Madam Pomfrey's salve had cooled the burn into a minor irritant. And considering how his first day at Hogwarts had gone, Harry doubted it would be the worst he was hurt in the year to come.

He shrugged. "It's not so bad," he said.

Leather creaked loudly as Dresden clenched his left, gloved hand. "Yeah," he said. "Well, get some sleep. And if you remember anything else about the attack, make sure you tell one of the tools in charge."

"I will," Harry lied. His fingers tapped the outside of his robe's pocket.

"But make sure you tell me first," Dresden added through an awkward smile. The man held his ungloved fist out to Harry expectantly. After some hesitation, Harry tapped the upraised knuckles with his own. "Partners. Right?" Dresden asked, letting his fist drop.

"Right," Harry lied again. "Partners."

"Great. Now, where the hell is my room?" Dresden muttered as he started back the other way.

When Harry turned back to the door, Ginny had already stepped inside. The glow of a dying fire spilled across her face, alighting in her hair. She looked back at him as though she had sensed his gaze. Her eyes were cold and unreadable in the warm light as they stared back at him for a long, silent moment. Then, wordlessly, Ginny climbed the shadows of the stairs and disappeared into the girls' dormitory.

Hermione's voice pierced his confusion. "So what did she say?" she asked, half-serious.

The portal swung shut behind Harry. He walked toward the fireplace, spying two silhouettes seated on the same cushion in front of the embers. As his eyes adjusted, the expectant faces of Ron and Hermione grew clear in the empty room. A second cushion was arranged pointedly next to them. Harry plopped down onto it.

"Nothing," he groused.

"Well, what did you say?" she insisted.

"Nothing!" Harry snapped.

Ron groaned and rubbed at his shorn hair. "Hermione, will you just leave it? I think Harry has other things to tell us without you pestering him for details on snogging my sister."

"Oh, don't be thick," she retorted. "Of course Harry's going to tell us about the werewolf. But if I don't press him now, we'll never get it out of him."

Harry knit his brows. "The werewolf is the story," he told her firmly. "We were talking, and somehow Molly...got brought up."

Ron scoffed as Harry began to squirm. "Serves you right. I don't know what you were thinking with that Slytherin girl, but you need to straighten out your priorities."

Ice crept into Hermione's voice as she said offhandedly, "You didn't think his priorities were out of sorts when you first saw her."

"That was before I knew she was a snake!" Ron protested. "She just tricked me with those...and that..."

Even in the dim light, they could both see Hermione's mouth tightening in anger. "It's not like that," Harry said quickly. "And anyway, like I was trying to tell you, we didn't get to talk at all before Greyback—"

Ron rocked forward, nearly unseating Hermione from the cushion they shared. "Then it really was him? And he transformed?"

Harry drew a long breath to gird his patience. Then he told them the events of the night. He left out nothing from the fight, nor the repeated interrogations by Hogwarts' new police, and finally ended with Dresden's rebuttal to McGonagall.

Hermione had her hand over her mouth in shock. "He didn't."

"He did," Harry said. "It was fantastic."

"Did he really put a hole in the Great Hall?" asked Ron. "Someone said it was so big that you can drive a carriage through it."

"Bigger," Harry said. He tugged at his pant leg, showing them both the burn. The angry red of the flesh had already faded to a dull pink. By morning, Madam Pomfrey's efforts would likely heal it in full. "And that's just from being near the edge of the spell. He hit Greyback dead-on with more fire than I've ever seen a wizard conjure. There wasn't anything left but a hand and a hole in the room."

"I suppose you can't blame Snape for being upset," Hermione said. Harry flashed her an angry look, causing her to quickly add, "Or skeptical. I mean, a werewolf between full moons? Is that really possible?"

Harry dug into his robes. "It is," he said. "And I think this has something to do with it."

He produced the large silver bracelet that Greyback had worn. As he handed it over to Hermione, he explained how he had found it at the end of the severed hand wrapped around his ankle after the fight, and how he had slipped it into his robes during the confusion.

Studiously, Hermione ran her fingers over the bracelet. Heat had warped away part of its face, but the rest remained intact. A wolf's profile had been engraved along the outside of the bracelet, with depictions of the phases of the moon spread out around it. Inside, she found the inscriptions that Harry had noticed earlier, written in a language that didn't make any sense to him.

"Greyback used some kind of incantation and touched this bracelet." Harry's eyes screwed shut as he tried to remember the words. "Loopa... Loopy... Luna... Definitely 'luna' in there somewhere, I think."

Her voice fell into a hush. "I've never seen anything like this before, Harry. I've never even read about anything like it before."

Ron's eyebrows rose in alarm. "Really?"

"Yes, really," she said irritably. "I don't know everything, Ron."

"You could have fooled me."

Harry stepped in before their argument could find its legs. "Enough about what I've been doing. What were you two doing all summer?"

Now that they were away from prying eyes, Harry hoped they could tell him loads of good news about all the progress they had made in the hunt for the Horcruxes. But instead, Hermione's expression became hangdog. "We've been looking, Harry. We really have," she began.

His mouth dropped in shock. "Nothing? Not even anything new on the note?"

"Do you have any idea how many 'R-A-Bs' there are out there?" Ron asked. "Or how many wizards with the initials 'R-B' don't put their middle name on anything so it's impossible to sort out?"

Hermione nodded. "And we haven't had access to anything except old copies of the Daily Prophet. And even then, we had to sneak out to the library to read them."

Ron grunted. "Mum and Dad were lunatics about keeping us at home. They're worried we were going to disappear and wind up on the wrong end of some Death Eater's wand."

"They weren't exactly wrong to worry," Hermione scolded him.

Harry gritted his teeth, trying to bite back a string of curses. The war for the wizarding world was well underway, and they had just wasted an entire summer being confined in one hole or another. There was no telling how much damage Voldemort had already done. If the man in charge of Hogwarts was a Death Eater, where else had they seized control.

"Then we're back where we started," Harry said at last.

Hermione exchanged a glance with Ron, who nodded. Drawing a folded piece of paper from her robe, she said, "Maybe not. We did find something else in the Daily Prophet that might be a clue."

Taking the paper, Harry unfurled it in his lap and read it. It was the torn top half of a Daily Prophet, with a headline that read Hogwarts History Finds Family! "What is this?" he asked.

"Seventeen years ago," Hermione began, "a small collection of historical relics turned up at an auction house. Nobody knew where they came from, and since the auctioneers were goblins, nobody ever found out."

"Goblins," Ron said. "Twice the riddle at half the height. Bill says that a goblin—"

Harry's eyes skimmed over the article, and then down to the picture below. He cried out as he spied a disgustingly familiar face in the newsprint, lurking just above the crease. "That's Lucius Malfoy," he said.

Draco's father lurked in the picture next to a display of curios situated on a velvet table. The Death Eater was considerably younger, and much handsomer, belying the atrocities he had already committed in Voldemort's first bid for power.

With a nod, Hermione leaned forward and tapped at the picture. "That's right. According to the article, Malfoy won the most prized lot of the auction."

He followed her finger to the center of the display, where a golden cup sat on a velvet pillow. It looked more a trophy than a cup to Harry, with its two wrought handles. Some complicated picture had been worked onto its front, but the cup was too small in the photograph for Harry to make it out. "A cup?"

"Apparently, there was quite the furious bidding war," Hermione said. "But that's to be expected when something of Helga Hufflepuff's comes to light."

Harry's heart caught in his throat. "The cup!" he said, strangling his own shout halfway through. "The cup," he said again, this time more softly, as he brushed at the paper. Now that he squinted, he imagined that the picture worked into the golden metal was actually that of a badger, the symbol of Helga Hufflepuff's house in that very school.

"Everybody knows the Malfoys have it," Hermione said, "but the funny thing is, no one can recall seeing it. I asked Kingsley Shacklebolt about it at Bill and Fleur's wedding—"

"—which you missed—" Ron said pointedly.

"—and he couldn't recall seeing it," Hermione continued, sparing a moment to glare at Ron. "And he led the Aurors' search of the Malfoy home when Lucius was arrested last year."

Ron's mouth twisted in disgust. "The Aurors didn't leave a single floorboard of that rat's nest unturned, so we figure it isn't there. But, we figure Draco's rotten dad would want to keep it safe, but also want to keep it somewhere he could still get to it without much trouble."

"Mind you, we don't know anything for sure," Hermione added quickly. "We're really just guessing, but..."

"But," said Ron, "where do you suppose a rich old wizard like Lucius Malfoy keeps something important where no other wizard can get to it?"

Harry saw where they were leading him. "Gringotts," he said.

"Exactly," Ron crowed. "Goblins, just like I said."

Furrowing his brow, Harry delved into his memories of being escorted through the cavernous depths of Gringotts Bank. Thick vault doors arranged in a labyrinthine maze struck him as good protection for such a historical artifact, and that was only the foundation for the countless spells and wards the goblins had undoubtedly layered into their prized bank for centuries.

"Getting in is going to be tricky," he said.

Ron gaped at him. "Tricky? No, mate. Getting you out of Hogwarts without that trace going off will be tricky. Getting into Gringotts is going to be one for the bloody history books! No one in the history of everything has ever gotten in there."

Harry scowled and nodded. Looking to Hermione, he said, "Then I guess you'll have to find a way around McGonagall's trace."

She looked reproachfully at him. "Harry, a trace spell is severely complex. I might not be able to just 'find a way around it.' How on Earth did she even—"

"We're going to do it," Harry told his friends. "McGonagall thinks she brought me to some kind of safe house, but she didn't. All she did was bring us back together and give us a headquarters, one with some of the finest magic and the best books in the world.

"We'll figure out a way to retrieve this cup from the Malfoys' coffers," he said, waving the newsprint sharply. "And we'll find 'RAB' on our own, without McGonagall or Professor Dresden. We'll find all the horcruxes."

And when they had done all that, Harry thought to himself, it would be that much easier to give Snape his just rewards. After all, the slimy turncoat had made himself an extremely tempting target when he had stolen Dumbledore's chair, a target Harry didn't intend to miss twice.