In Which A Little Effort Goes A Long Way.

Madam Pomfrey released his wrist with a small sigh. Harry rubbed his pulse point, sure it was sluggish as lead in his veins, but the matron didn't even notate it on her parchment. Instead, she asked, 'Any headache?'

'No, Madam,' Harry said.

She glanced sidelong at Fawkes. The phoenix was perched on the chairback beside Harry's bed, proud neck arched almost ninety degrees so he could chew at a ginger biscuit and keep Harry in his sights. Fawkes gave off a cheery little bleat, dropping crumbs, but Pomfrey seemed to take that as a sign Harry was telling the truth. Fawkes had been serving as an honesty barometre all morning, and Harry was getting rather cross about it.

But, as it happened, it was true. There was almost a complete absence of sensation in his scar, unless he rubbed especially hard at it. But Pomfrey kept eyeing it with a bitten lip, and she'd asked a dozen times in a dozen different ways if it pained him. Little did- he was numb all over, and he hardly noticed the twinges when she picked slivers of glass out of his cheeks with small gold tweasers. She'd stripped him ruthlessly to bare skin and sat him in the hip-bath, scrubbing him gently but determinedly with a sponge and then she'd slathered him all over with a sticky paste that smelt like mouldy bread and she'd brushed his hair with a comb, fixing it in place with a charm. Then she'd dressed him like a doll, head-first and then both arms into a warm jumper, pants and pyjama trousers one after the other- he didn't have it in him even to blush- thick ribbed stockings on both feet, and then suddenly she'd put her arms about him and held him for a long minute, her breath shuddery against his ear.

'Is he ready?'

'I don't like this,' Pomfrey said plainly, but she let Harry go with only a quick swipe at her damp eyes, and knelt before him again to place slippers on his feet. 'They've no call to question him without a guardian.'

'Mr Potter's well-documented refusal to fetch them rather compounds the issue.' Snape stood with his arms crossed over his chest, his thumb rubbing rhythmically over his left inside arm. He had not looked once in Harry's direction, as if staring at the clock required all his concentration.

'He must have rights. An advocate of some sort.'

'He has,' McGonagall said shortly, rising from her chair. 'A student's Head of House can serve in loco parentis as a representative of a minor child's interests. With Mr Potter's relatives unavailable and his godfather- unavailable- I will fulfill my duties. That means,' she told Harry, abruptly speaking to him and not the matron, 'I will decide what questions you do and do not answer, and my only responsibility is your safety and health, is that understood?'

Harry bobbed his head. No-one seemed happy with that, so he exercised his rusty voice. 'Yes.' Somehow, that made everyone look more miserable, putting more effort than ever into not meeting his eyes. Fawkes began to grumble and waddle on his chairback, so Harry put out his arm. Fawkes climbed to his spot on Harry's shoulder and nipped playfully at Harry's glasses. McGonagall put her hand on Harry's other shoulder, and with a small squeeze guided him for the door.

Chief Auror Scrimgeour awaited them in the Gryffindor common room. Harry supposed, idly, that the student body must still be confined to the Great Hall, because even in the middle of the night the common room had never felt so empty as it did now, mid-morning on a brightly sunny winter's day. When Pomfrey had come for him in his own dorm, Harry had been too confused and weary waking from an uneasy sleep to question the absence of his roommates, and Pomfrey had hustled him through examination and bath too quick for his sluggish brain to produce any actual questions. Harry was directed to the sofa with the mismatched cushions, though with the hearth gone out and cold ash the worn leather gave him the shivers. McGonagall sat beside Harry, regally looking down her nose at Scrimgeour, who stood scowling into a cup of weakly steaming tea.

'Help yourselves,' the Chief Auror said, motioning to the tray that rested on a stool. 'Though it's barely adequate. The bloody house elves are wic wew this morning. You can hear them wailing all down the corridors.'

'They are as susceptible to the Dementors and dark spells as any creature,' McGonagall replied sharpish. 'Not to mention they sense the absence of the Headmaster.'

'That's as good a place to begin as any. Potter.' Scrimgeour paused, then said gruffly, 'Potter, fix yourself a cuppa. You look like death warmed over, boy.'

It took a bit of effort. Fawkes made everything three times more difficult than if he'd stayed out of the way, poking his beak at everything. Harry popped a cube of sugar into Fawkes's open maw, and that contented him. The tea was very weakly brewed, Scrimgeour was right about that, and by the time Harry had a cup of it most had spilled into the saucer and it was largely half-melted sugar and overmuch cream, anyway, but it warmed him a bit, halting his shaking. MchGonagall tapped a small pillow into place behind his back and slathered him a triangle of burnt toast with butter and marmalade, though Fawkes ate half of it and left a mess on Harry's pyjamas.

'Do you know,' asked Scrimgeour, when all the fuss had done, 'where the Headmaster is, Potter?'

'No,' Harry answered. 'He's not in the Pensieve anymore?'

'Something is in the Pensieve, which has been active all night. The question is whether it's safe for anyone to go in after him, if he can't escape it himself.'

'I don't know. That's what Voldemort- sorry,' he said, as Scrimgeour flinched just slightly. 'That's what Quirrell said.'

It didn't hurt, he noted dimly. To say Quirrell's name. Or even to think it. Not even a twinge. His hand shook again, though, all unaware there was no pain. Tea sloshed out of the saucer to stain his trousers.

'What did he say exactly?'

'That- I don't know, I don't- that it was clever, I think, that-' McGonagall rescued the cup before it rattled to the carpet.

'First warning,' his Head of House told the Chief Auror in very frosty tones. 'I won't give many.'

'Then you consign Albus Dumbledore to being lost,' Scrimgeour said just as bluntly. 'Potter, I need an answer to this. Take a breath and try to remember.'

He didn't want Dumbledore to be lost. But everything was all jumbled up in his head. 'He said it was a clever trick, I think. That... he hoped they were enjoying the memory he'd picked for them.'

'Dark magic,' Snape said, from somewhere behind Harry.

'Obviously, thank you, Professor,' Scrimgeour snapped, but contained himself. 'I'd prefer not to get the Unspeakables involved in this. They'll be ages plumbing the mystery of it and we might never see Albus again.'

'Or Nicolas Flamel,' added Snape.

'Can a Muggle even use a Pensieve?'

'Evidently.' Snape came out of the shadow enough to fetch himself a cup of tea, favouring Harry with an inscrutable look as he bent over the tray to pour. 'And Flamel might be a more urgent matter than the Headmaster. Unless Potter can confirm what's happened to the Philosopher's Stone.'

Harry glanced to McGonagall for clarification. 'It's missing, too?'

Her reluctant nod was overridden by Scrimgeour's cold response. 'Missing,' said the Chief Auror, 'presumed taken.'

'By who?'

'That's what I'd like to know, Potter. And you seem to be the only one who might be able to tell me, since Quirinus Quirrell's corpse has an air-tight alibi.'

'Second warning,' McGonagall said furiously, standing. 'For shame, deliberately provoking a child-'

'A child who killed, Headmistress. I have already made an extraordinary concession in conducting this interrogation at Hogwarts-'

'Interrogation!'

'-instead of the Ministry, yes, madam, and all the righteous indignation in the world doesn't change the fact that we have a dead man who claimed to be possessed by a Dark Lord and a bloody school governor swearing he only opened the Floo under Imperio and Sirius bloody Black locked in a broom cupboard-'

'Are you going to send me to Azkaban?'

Silence fell. McGonagall glared defiantly at Scrimgeour. Snape, standing at the tea tray and Harry's left, shifted just slightly closer to him. Scrimgeour grimaced heavily.

'No, Potter,' he said, and put his cup on the mantel with a clink. 'However irrationally rash it was of you to personally confront Quirrell, I have no intention of arresting you for manslaughter. The act was clearly self-defense.'

Harry felt only a dim relief at that. His throat had come over sore. He could hardly get a swallow of tea past the horrid lump in it.

'I can try to get the Stone back,' he said. 'I did it before. It's what I meant to do, not... not... what I did to him. I can go in the Pensieve. That's how I got it before.'

Scrimgeour looked to Snape for confirmation. Snape seemd to chew on it, before giving a jagged shake of his head. 'I am not an expert in this branch of magic,' he admitted with extreme reluctance. But that was nothing to the sour pout he wore forcing out the next sentence. 'But sending a child into a Pensieve awash with Dark magic is unacceptable. I shall go.'

McGonagall gave Snape a look of distinct surprise, but covered herself by putting on her most professional and censorious air. 'No-one is accompanying anyone anywhere til we have a much clearer idea of the danger involved,' she said. 'You're too valuable, Severus, and no Auror, if I need to remind you.'

'No- I am an advanced Occlumens,' Snape said with biting precision. 'A far more valuable skill in confronting magic manipulating memories than the ability to run and use a wand simultaneously. And I owe it to Albus. And as I have been recently reminded- sometimes one must weigh priorities to decide where one's honour is at stake. For better or worse, I'm staking my honour on you.'

'Me?' McGonagall spluttered, but Harry looked up in to the black scowling eyes gazing down at him, and knew exactly who Snape meant.

'I'm no more thrilled than you are,' Snape added in an undertone, but in truth he didn't seem all that angry, actually. If anything, the heavy lines by his eyes and mouth lightened, and he looked younger, as if a weight had come off him. His chin lifted high as he faced Scrimgeour, and folded his arms across his chest. 'Chief Auror, I will need an anchor. I'd hope for someone with at least two years' practise in Occlumency or Legilimency. I believe Auror Tonks is qualified.'

'The first thing I'm going to do when Albus is back with us is read him a lengthy lecture on using my Auror Corps as his personal-' Scrimgeour pulled himself up short. 'Fine,' he agreed shortly. 'At the least it keeps this situation contained amongst those who already know. But don't get lost in the Dark, Professor Snape- I've questions for you yet about what you knew of our friend Quirrell, and how you came to know what you knew.'

'By all means, fetch a barrell of Veritaserum. You won't learn anything other than what I've already told you, but you're welcome to my own store- Ministry verified, if you want a seal of authentic brewing.'

'Don't think I won't, Snape,' Scrimgeour retorted. 'Rest up, Mr Potter. I suspect we've got plenty left to hear from you as well.'

'I am quite sure you didn't just threaten to use Veritaserum on a student,' McGonagall interrupted coldly.

'I am quite sure such words never left my mouth, Headmistress.'

'Good.'

Scrimgeour forced a smile. 'Good,' he agreed, and turned an abrupt swivel on his heels to go, gesturing Snape to fall in after him.

McGonagall had Harry on his feet before the portrait had even swung closed after them. 'Poppy, stop listening at doors and come with us,' she called, and hardly waited for Madam Pomfrey to hurry down the stairs to join them. 'Now you listen to me, Potter,' McGonagall said, taking him by the wrist and hustling him along. Harry tripped at her heels as they exited the Gryffindor dormitories as well, though they turned left where Snape and Scrimgeour had gone right. 'There's much to do and very little time for it, so I won't mince words with you, Potter. The school's in chaos. We've got Dementors at our doors, the Forest is in an uproar over the murder of the unicorns, and the Ministry have placed us under emergency lockdown to keep a thousand murderous parents at bay once word gets out what's happened here. Rufus Scrimgeour's an ambitious man first and a fair man only second to that, and I don't put it past him to run rough over a little truth if it covers him in glory. He'll have plaudits to spare arresting Sirius Black, but even more if he can knock Dumbledore and Cornelius Fudge off their pedestals in one blow.'

'Minerva, you don't think-' gasped Pomfrey.

'I think a man claiming to be the Dark Lord very nearly got hold of the Philosopher's Stone after Dumbledore bypassed the Wizengamot to hide it in a school full of vulnerable children. What's done is done, but it only takes one tip to Rita Skeeter to splash the scandal pages with enough blood to drown all his political enemies, and Scrimgeour will be ready and eager to step into their shoes.'

'But what can we do?'

'Be ready.'

'But-'

'The students are our priority.' McGonagall whipped her wand at a stairwell, and it swung toward them with unusual alacrity. McGonagall put her foot out confidently to thin air, and the stairwell swept to meet her. Harry had cause to be glad it obeyed so swiftly, since McGonagall pulled him along with her. Pomfrey had just enough time to make it on before the stairs moved on again. 'Man the hospital as you've been doing. Let no student say they had inadequate treatment. Once we regain contact with the outside world, reach out to St Mungo's and ask for a contingent of Mind Healers. Potter-'

Harry stumbled after her as they descended to the landing, on a path he now realised led to the infirmary. 'Professor?'

Her hand on his wrist squeezed tight. 'If it comes to questions, Scrimgeour will learn the truth about your relatives.'

'He'll... he'll make me go back, won't he.' Harry slowed without meaning to; McGonagall halted at the first tug of resistance. 'I can't go back there,' he said. 'Please.'

Her eyes dipped away. 'There may be no preventing it. You can only be ready, Harry.'

'No-'

'Potter.' She faced him solemnly. 'No-one wins every battle. But there comes a time in war when you learn how to cede ground, to fight another day. Daring, nerve, and chivalry- those are the traits of our House, but sometimes courage is about doing hard things, not brave things.'

Draco had said something like that, once. It didn't feel any better to hear it the second time. Harry hunched his shoulders miserably.

'Go,' McGonagall told him, and Pomfrey stepped forward to lead him the rest of the way, as Hogwarts' Deputy Headmistress strode off toward the Great Hall.

For once, Harry Potter walked into a room and no-one noticed.

It wasn't as bad as it had been in the Great Hall last night- only last night, he thought, though it felt a thousand years ago. In fact, it was almost hauntingly quiet. Susan Bones lay in the bed nearest the door, sniffling into a kerchief, and hardly stirred as Pomfrey bent over her. Next to Susan was one of the Hufflepuff prefects, wiping at tears of her own. Every bed, in fact, had at least two occupants, some three or four huddled together in silent misery, boys and girls, first years and seventh alike. No-one had been spared the torture of a unicorn's death. Harry's halting steps slowed, when he saw Millie, her face pale and tear-streaked, rubbing Crabbe's shoulder where he lay curled unmoving in a quilt.

'Oh,' he heard, and then Hermione launched out of no-where at him, burying her face in his neck. Harry breathed in her bushy hair, scented just a bit like roses, even after the night they'd had, and closed his eyes.

'I'm sorry,' they said at once, and Harry pulled back to stare at her.

'Why on earth would you be sorry?' he said, just as Hermione said that, too.

'Oh, Harry,' she said, and hugged him even tighter than before. 'Don't apologise. You did what you had to do!'

Harry couldn't. He didn't try, just shaking his head in the comforting curtain of her hair. 'Why would you be sorry?' he rasped.

'Sorry for you.' Fawkes cooed, and Hermione managed a sad smile. Her small fists dug into the collar of Harry's jumper, a little sweaty but not unpleasant, solid and warm. 'Oh, Harry. I'm so sorry.'

'Harry.' It was Ron, and Cedric came too, and they both shook his hand, Ron clapping him on the shoulder, and they led him to Neville who was resting in a bed, though he was adamant he didn't need it, having slept off the effects of being Stunned senseless already. Harry, familiar with Pomfrey's potions and their effects, chose to believe Neville, though he seemed a little wobbly yet. It was a wobbly sort of day. Harry had the wobbles himself, when he caught Ron glaring resentfully at the far corner, and saw Draco Malfoy sitting alone beneath the window, balled as small as he could be so that only a bit of blond hair peeked out over the arms covering his head.

Harry eased onto the cold tile beside him, tucking his slippered feet under his knees. Fawkes squawked and complained, but settled when Harry stroked his feathered chest.

'Hi,' he said.

Draco's shoulders heaved. 'Don't.'

Harry shrugged a little. 'Either you did it because your dad told you to, or because you were scared of Voldemort. If I were you, I reckon I might've done it, too.'

Draco's head came up so fast it creaked. 'No,' he said fiercely. 'Harry, I didn't- I didn't! I swear I- he-'

'Tell me.'

A fat tear gathered in Draco's eye. It spilled down a flushed cheek, but Draco didn't blink, his eyes wild and angry. 'He was in my mind,' Draco said flatly. 'He pointed his wand at me. He said a word- he said- he said-'

'Tell me.'

'I couldn't fight it. I tried. He was in my head. Harry.' Draco's voice dried up as Harry took his hand. Another tear fell, splashing onto Harry's wrist.

'I believe you,' Harry told him.

'Why?'

Trust a Slytherin to look a gift-horse in the mouth. Harry examined Draco's nails, all bitten to the quick and freshly bloody. 'Did he get your dad too? That Chief Auror said your dad said he was Imperiused.'

'He must have. I don't know. I was asleep.'

That was a lie. Draco said it confidently enough, as if he'd practised it over and over. It was too composed, but Harry didn't tell him that. The truth was that no-one could have slept through the unicorns being murdered, and the proof was all the students stuffed into the infirmary still suffering the effects. The lie itself wasn't the curious thing; it was what truth Draco was trying to cover with it that Harry wondered at. Like who opened Hogwarts' Floos to let Quirrell back into the school if Quirrell hadn't Imperiused Mr Malfoy til he was already inside. Or who had cast the Imperius on Draco, that carefully worded 'he'. Draco stared at him, desperate in more ways than Harry could truly understand. As awful as Harry felt just now, he wouldn't have traded Draco for anything.

'Here,' he said finally, and lifted Fawkes from his shoulder to Draco's. Fawkes nipped at Draco's pale hair, feathering it with his beak and emitting delighted trills. The harsh taut lines of Draco's face eased, just a little. He wiped the back of his hand across his eyes and pretended he hadn't. His knee bumped comfortably with Harry's, in silent thanks.

'Harry?' It was Cedric, and behind him Ron, Hermione, and Neville had come as well. 'Everything all right here?'

'Yeah,' Harry nodded. 'It is.' Ron squeezed in at Harry's right, and the others sat in a semi-circle around them, though it didn't escape Harry that they all regarded Draco with suspicious reserve. Harry had no energy to spare on bickering, so he made a point of keeping his hand in Draco's even with all them watching. 'What happened after?' he asked all of them. 'Did the Aurors get my invisibility cloak?'

'No, I did,' Ron said, nudging Harry for his attention and discreetly revealing the cloak, folded up as small as it could go, tucked inside his shirt. 'It was a near thing, they booted us out of the Headmaster's office fast as they could, after you... after you left.'

'Harry,' Hermione said, 'the Aurors arrested Sirius Black.'

'Arrested?' Scrimgeour had said something, hadn't he- everything had been happening so fast in the common room, he had hardly absorbed it. Locked in a broom cupboard or something like that. 'But they'll let him go, won't they? They'll know he helped us.'

'We tried to tell them,' Neville said earnestly. 'But Miss Tonks just told us it wasn't time for that yet. But no-one's come to ask any more questions about anything-'

'They asked about you,' Cedric interrupted gravely. 'About what you did.'

Harry's mouth dried out like a desert. Draco squeezed his hand so hard it hurt. Or maybe that was him, seizing up so hard his muscles all strained under his skin. 'Scrimgeour said he won't arrest me. That it was... it was self-defence.'

'Course it was!' Ron protested loudly, and glared to find himself hushed by the others. 'It was,' he repeated stoutly. 'We all saw, Harry, you had to do it.'

Even if he'd wanted to talk about it, no words would come. 'Sirius,' he managed. 'What's going to happen to him?'

His friends exchanged long looks. Cedric took reluctant lead, meeting Harry's eyes at last to say, 'I heard one of the Aurors say that with so many Dementors handy, wouldn't it be easier to just have him Kissed and spare the public the bother of a trial.'

'Kissed?'

'It's what makes Dementors so horrible,' Hermione explained quietly. 'Not just that they can take your happy memories. That they can take your soul. People who are Kissed don't die. They're just empty forever after.'

'So,' Ron prompted him.

Harry coughed to clear his throat. 'So what?'

'So- what are we going to do about it?'

'We... what?'

'Obviously you're going to do something,' Neville said. 'We thought about going ourselves, only we knew you'd go running off as soon as you heard, and, well, we're not sure where he is or what to do if we find him, we can't very well smuggle him out the school with the Dementors all around, that's as good as feeding him straight to them-'

'We could give him the invisibility cloak,' Hermione put in, as if she'd made this suggestion several times already and was still quite convinced it was the best solution.

'He'd still be stuck inside, and the Aurors will sweep the school if they find him missing,' Cedric shook his head. 'It's no guarantee.'

'The twins know all sorts of hiding places and secret passageways,' said Ron, 'we could keep him out of sight.'

'I reckon he already knows a lot of those himself, if he's been in the school before,' Draco said diffidently. His attempt at dignity was rather spoilt by Fawkes perching on his head like a ridiculous hat, wings half-spread and head twisted as he tried to eat a strand of Draco's hair. 'But if he tries to hide now, they'll just go on thinking he's guilty.'

Harry watched them all arguing. His Knights. Ron had a streak of dirt on his nose and Hermione's dressing gown was torn and Neville still looked white at the gills, and Cedric had nearly as many cuts and scratches as Harry from duelling Lucius Malfoy, and not a one of them looked as if they'd slept a wink, but every one of them was ready to go at his word. Even after what he'd done. Harry dug the heel of his free hand into his eye socket, displacing his glasses and then sticking them back on firmly. Right. Time to fall apart later, when Sirius was free and clear.

'Veritaserum,' he said.

'Veriwhat?' Ron asked.

'Truth serum,' Cedric said, eyes widening. 'Oh, Harry, good show.'

'What is it?' Hermione demanded. She always hated not knowing anything, and for once Harry was the one who knew something she didn't. He had, after all, spent a lot of time poring over the index of their Potions text, with Snape taunting him about his brewing.

'They use it in trials before the Wizengamot,' Cedric explained. 'But it's controversial. Some people say it's like a liquid Unforgivable, because it overrules your will. You have to take it willingly for it to be legal.'

'If Sirius took Veritaserum and told the truth about Peter Pettigrew, everyone would have to believe him.' Harry took his cloak from Ron, fingering the silky weave. 'And Snape told Scrimgeour he has some of it here. Ministry-approved. They'd have to believe Sirius, then. And if they don't... well... then I'll help him run. He's saved my life before. I owe him.'

'One problem,' Draco interjected. 'We've got to find Black before the Aurors find us.'

'Actually-' A grin tugged at Ron's mouth, irrepressible. 'I think I've an idea for that.' He eyed his fellows. 'All in?' he asked.

'All in,' Hermione answered firmly.

Ron put his hand out, palm open and flat to the ground. 'All of us.'

Cedric covered Ron's hand, beating Neville by only a moment. Hermione put hers on the pile. And Draco lifted his hand linked with Harry's, and placed theirs on top.

'Thank you,' Harry whispered.

'Ron, you're a genius,' said Neville.

'Yeah,' Ron agreed modestly. He bore a Cheshire grin, undimmed even by the chaotic din all around them. 'I just thought, you know, who's so obsessed with Harry they'll do anything for him, even if it breaks the rules?'

Hermione sniffed, crossing her arms over her dressing gown. 'The way wizards treat house elves is appalling,' she told them severely. 'It's no wonder they like Harry- he's at least polite- Ron, put that down!'

'I'm hungry,' Ron protested, through a mouthful of egg and watercress sandwich being served to him by a weepy-eyed house elf.

Ron's idea had been rather clever, Harry could acknowledge- the house elves could get to anywhere in Hogwarts, through locked doors and invisible doors and any other kind of door a thousand years of magic had imagined. But Scrimgeour had not been exaggerating how upset the staff of house elves were by events. It had taken several tries to get one to come when he called; he'd never called for one before and wasn't sure how to go about it, but once he'd started going through the names of every house elf he knew he got a wave of them appearing with little pops, filling up the loo in which Harry and his friends had chosen as their temporary headquarters. The problem was that many had appeared in a state of such distress that talking to them was difficult, if not impossible. It was several minutes reassuring them, and fortunately Cedric was a dab hand at conjuring handkerchiefs. This earned him nearly the same ecstatic adoration he got from the female students. Cedric was quite red with embarrassment as Mipsy and Dilly stared at him with their hearts in their eyes.

When at last the elves had calmed and Ron had stopped sending them back to the kitchens to fetch him food, Harry gathered their attention, and said, 'I need your help.'

'Oooh,' gasped Tippy, and a quiver of happiness went through all of them, their ears visibly pricking up.

'Really,' huffed Hermione, but not loudly enough to disrupt Harry's speech.

'You know there are Aurors in the school,' Harry told the elves. 'They're here to, er, to fix everything that happened last night, with the-'

'Don't say it,' warned Neville, 'they'll only get in a strop again.'

'The... things that happened in the Forest, and to the Headmaster and to us. To me.' He had to stop and breathe a moment, feeling stretched taut in his own body. He wet his lips. 'But they made a mistake. They accidentally arrested a friend of mine. Maybe you've even noticed him in the school? Sirius Black? Sometimes he's a dog.'

Jiffy put up his hand. Feeling rather foolish, Harry called on him. 'Jiffy remembers Sirius Black,' said the elderly elf, nodding importantly. 'He wore the red and gold. Troublemaker, that one. Maybe the Aurors don't make a mistake arresting Master Harry Potter Sir Just Harry Please's friend? Master Harry Potter Sir Just Harry Please hadn't ought to be friends with baddies and troublemakers, oh no.'

'But he's not a baddie,' Harry tried. 'He's a good man. He didn't kill anyone, he swears, and I think I can prove-'

'Kill!' Jiffy swooned at this. 'Naughty Sirius Black! Oh, he was a bad one, Master Harry-'

'Please just Harry.'

'He steals,' piped up Nippy.

'He sneaks!' said Emmy.

'Always where he hadn't ought to be!'

'Nasty Sirius Black, always creeping after Professors-'

'He did that because I asked him to,' Harry cried, growing frustrated, and inadvertently plunging the loo into resounding silence. The elves stared at him. A few lips trembled, but Gimby was the one who broke first, falling into tears with a muffled wail as he buried his face into Cedric's kerchief.

'Master Harry Potter Sir,' Jiffy scolded him quite severely. 'The elves is very disappointed.'

'It's not troublemaking,' Harry pleaded, rubbing his face and wondering how to explain. 'Sirius is my friend because Sirius- Sirius is a good man. He saved my life when the trolls attacked. He was watching Professor Quirrell for me because I thought Quirrell was up to something- and we were right. Quirrell's the baddie, Quirrell's the one who's been sneaking and stealing and doing horrible things.' Inspiration hit. 'Quirrell's the one who killed the unicorns.'

It was a calculated risk, given the very mention of it might launch the elves back into their noisy show of grief. He had underestimated them. As one, they stilled.

'Only the most terrible person could do that,' Harry said. 'And Quirrell is the most terrible, awful person. Was. But he's gone, and the Aurors don't have anyone to be angry at for all the bad things that happened, so they're going to blame Sirius. They'll give him to the Dementors. I can't let that happen. The elves know Hogwarts top to bottom and inside out- you must know where the Aurors are holding him. Please, please tell me. I just want to save him the way he saved me.'

'And get us into Snape's locked cupboard,' added Ron, sharing his plate of biscuits with Fawkes. 'Spares us getting caught trying.'

'Please,' Harry said.

This time it was Taffy who raised her hand. 'Master Harry Potter Sir? Wouldn't it be easier for us to get Sirius Black for you?'

Not even Ron had thought of that. 'Er,' Harry said. 'Well... yes, it would.'

Taffy beamed. And then without so much as a follow-up question she vanished with a pop, and re-appeared a moment later with a man trapped up in so many chains he could hardly squirm, gagged against crying out, though his eyes bulged over the rough cloth binding him. Harry fell on Sirius immediately, ripping out the gag, and searching for any kind of lock or tie in the chains. 'Cedric, Finite them!'

It took the combined effort of all of them to cancel the magic that had conjured the chains; even six students were no match for a full-grown Auror's spells, but soon Sirius was stripping away the limp iron and staggering up to his feet. He was shuddering all over, his eyes squeezed tightly shut as he shook his head back and forth, back and forth. As soon as he was free he threw himself to the wall, pressing his face to the brick and wrapping his arms about his head. 'Nononono,' he was hissing. 'No no no nonono.'

'Sirius.' Harry touched his hunched back, not surprised that Sirius flinched away, skittering into the corner. This was worse than Draco's hurt, which had cried out for comfort. The lively, laughing Sirius who'd flung himself into the adventure last night had gone as if he'd never been- as if he'd been smothered and broken beneath the Sirius who'd been a decade trapped in Azkaban slowly going mad. It was awful, and Harry ached with helplessness. 'Sirius,' he tried again, 'Sirius, it's Harry. You're all right. You're in Hogwarts with me.'

'Give him the Veritaserum,' Ron suggested uneasily.

'You want him compelled to tell the truth when he's in this state?' Cedric disagreed.

'Would calm him down at least, wouldn't it?'

'Sirius.' Harry tried again to lay hands on him, rubbing soothingly at the knobby spine between two jutting shoulderblades. 'He was awake,' he realised slowly, glancing back at the others. 'They tied him up and left him awake so he'd know he was trapped. He's had all night and morning to work himself up.'

'Oh.' Hermione came creeping forward on tip-toes. 'Mr Black? Sirius.' She bit her lip, and Harry could see the thoughts turning over in her brain, so clearly expressed on her face. Which, not a moment later, firmed in decision. She took a deep breath to steel herself, then put her arms about Sirius's shabby coat and hugged him from behind.

Harry tensed, anticipating Sirius would strike out, shove her back, hurt her somehow- he knew, none better, that Sirius didn't know his own strength. But it didn't happen. Sirius stiffened tight as a board, but his constant muttering died. Brilliant Hermione, Harry thought, and willingly followed her lead. He took his place next to her, wrapping Sirius up til he could feel those heaving ribs and furiously beating heart. And, bless them, next came Neville, tentative at first then bravely worming his way in, and Ron, blushing but determined, tall enough to reach over Hermione's shoulders, and Draco, who could only get close enough to stand sideways and tug on Sirius's coat. Cedric whipped up another of his kerchiefs, and when Sirius lifted his head from the wall in befuddlement, it was already on offer, needing only a little reach. Sirius wiped his face with it, shuffled about awkwardly in the hold of so many children, and his hand came down, trembling finely, on Harry's hair.

'You're real,' he croaked.

Harry nodded. 'We're real. You're all right. And, Sirius-' He swallowed, and said it. 'Uncle Sirius, it's all right.'

'Uncle, eh.' Sirius exhaled something that might generously pass for a laugh. 'I could get used to that.' Gingerly he turned about, shuffling in the circle of their arms. 'You, uh. You lot are right quick, aren't you. How did you...'

'The house elves helped.' Harry eased away enough to keep his balance, but kept both hands on Sirius, steadying him as the others let go and gave him a bit of breather space. 'Are you hurt? Do you need- could you get him something to eat, Jiffy?'

'Here,' Ron said, producing an apple, half a bap, and a pair of chocolate digestives from his pocket, ignoring Hermione's eyeroll. Sirius took the food with cringeing fingers, but tore into it hungrily, hiding his voracious chewing with Cedric's kerchief. Harry checked him subtly for injury, but Sirius was so filthy it was hard to distinguish dirt from bruises. Sirius avoided his eyes.

'He can't go out there looking like a criminal,' Cedric said. 'Even with the Veritaserum, those Aurors will attack on sight.'

'How much time you reckon we have til they realise he's gone?'

'Well, he's just disappeared from a locked room.' Neville shrugged at Harry over Sirius's elbow. 'We have until they get the Dementors gone and open up the Floo, I'd bet. Not long, they've been working at it all night.'

'Maybe a little longer than that.' They had til Snape got Dumbledore out of the Pensieve, Harry would bet. Adults hated anything to go wrong and they would want to make it look like Dumbledore had been safe and in charge all along. And then there'd be a lot of talking about that, no doubt, and only then, maybe, would they go looking for Sirius to transport him back to Azkaban or- he shuddered even thinking about it- having him Kissed by a Dementor outside. But Neville was right in that it wasn't near as long as Harry would have liked.

'Hot water and soap,' Harry said, 'and scissors, we need scissors, and fresh robes.' He chanced a look at the elves. He'd already asked a lot of them, but one more request to save a life was worth it. 'Can you?' he asked.

Jiffy put up his wrinkly chin proudly. 'Oh, Master Harry, we certainly can.'

It took all of them working in tandem, and all of them watching their mental clocks in crawling worry about the time, but with the elves helping it went faster and better than it might have done. Hermione took the scissors to Sirius's shaggy long hair and beard, and Harry and Ron wore a dozen flannels down to dingy nubs scrubbing ten years of grub out of Sirius's long bony limbs. Draco, Cedric, and Neville were heads together over the robes the elves had found, an old spare prefect's robe long abandoned in the laundry, and between them they removed the patches and the Ravenclaw blue stripes and got the hem lengthened, if unevenly, to fit a tall grown man. Hermione politely turned her back as Sirius dressed, but she was watching over her shoulder with a smile as Sirius faced himself in the mirror over the sinks for the first time.

'That's me?' Sirius stuttered, self-consciously touching his shorn hair. It had been so full of tangles and splits that Hermione had cut it back all the way to his ears. He wasn't quite the handsome boy he'd been in his school pictures, but he was recognisable for the first time as that carefree boy who'd been head thrown back in laughter in every frame. He was terribly thin, but in good robes instead of his tatty clothes he looked bigger, too, with broad shoulders to balance his height. There was no fixing his holey boots, but one of the elves, Twizzy, got the mud out with a spell.

'What now?' Cedric asked Harry.

He had gone over their options in his head as they'd cleaned Sirius up. 'Scrimgeour, he's the Chief Auror, he'll want to arrest Sirius no matter what. And I don't know about the Order, but I think they're a better chance than any of the teachers, because no-one will listen to the teachers if it comes to shouting and fighting and all that. Tonks might listen to us, but Scrimgeour's her boss, isn't he, so she could get in trouble.'

'Bill,' Ron said, concluding, just as Harry had, that a Weasley was their best bet. 'I can talk to him first, get him to come here. He works for Gringott's, not the Aurors. They can't tell him what to do.'

'Can you take him?' Harry asked the elves, and it was as easy as that. Fergy took Ron by the hand, and popped him away to fetch his brother. Harry let out a big breath. 'I hope this works,' he said hollowly.

'It will,' Draco said. 'You're Harry Potter. You're the hero.'

Harry wasn't that confident. There was no-where really to sit in the loo, but Harry had ants in his blood and was too twitchy to rest, anyway. He washed a few of the flannels in the sink before the elves, appalled, stopped him working on it, so he splashed his face with cold water and pushed his hair back off his flushed face. Oh. No wonder Pomfrey had been staring at his scar so much. It had gone quite red. It looked fresh as if newly inflicted, actually, and he thought it was longer- surely it hadn't always stretched from hairline to eyebrow? He didn't think it had. But when he touched it, there was no pain.

'Harry,' Sirius said, 'could we... is that a phoenix?'

'Yeah,' he said, brushing his fringe flat over the scar and turning away from his reflection. 'That's Fawkes.'

'He looks a bit peaky,' Sirius said dubiously, and he was quite right. Fawkes was making an odd hiccough sort of sound, if birds could hiccough- well, evidently magical birds could do. Fawkes stretched his neck and gave off a massive belch, making Hermione giggle and Neville gape. Harry reached out a hand to give Fawkes a little swat for bad manners, but Fawkes eyed his hand coming in, opened his beak wide, and spat up on him.

'Ew,' Harry began, disgusted to find half-masticated biscuit all over his arm, but Fawkes belched again, and this time there was something big stuck in his long throat. 'Fawkes?'

'Phwack,' Fawkes coughed, and choked up a big wet gob into Harry's palm. And right in the middle of that stinking mess sat the Philosopher's Stone.

'I don't know if you're too silly to eat rocks or too clever for words,' Harry breathed, staring at it. 'Fawkes, you brilliant thing.'

'Pfft,' Fawkes said, and began to clean his claws fastidiously.

There was a louder pop than usual, and Fergy re-appeared with Ron and Bill on either arm, bravely holding them separate as Ron tried to wrestle Bill's wand away.

Harry sighed from deep in his toes, and threw himself into the fray one last time.