Hermione sat, feeling an air of expectation. Around a half dozen people sat around the table with her, cups of tea steaming, untouched, in front of each of them. No one spoke, but she could hear long speeches in the silent glances everyone exchanged. How so little time had passed, she was not sure. It felt like days since they had returned from the Ministry; however, if she had to guess, the clock in the hall would have only registered three hours.
Remus had been swift in gathering the Order. Of course, she was sure they wouldn't take their time. The tree was a serious thing. It was an interesting group, though, and few had really said anything since arriving. To her left, Harry tried to look calmly at everyone, but he wrung his hands quietly under the table. She took his right hand with a squeeze to help relieve his worry. He looked at her, questioning, but she just gave him a firm look and squeezed again. To his left, Flitwick sat, seemingly studying the wooden paneling of the table, frowning deeply, and deep in thoughts.
On Hermione's other side, Arthur Weasley sat, looking rather uncomfortable. He flicked regular glances back at the door to the living room. Hermione knew without looking that the door frame had an outline of bright, amber light. The twins - silent for once - sat beside their dad, looking at him with concerned expressions. Remus sat on the opposite side to Hermione, checking an old, crack-faced watch from his pocket every minute or two, sometimes twice within seconds without seeming to notice.
Hermione had tried to change the mood by offering everyone the tea, but that had only bought a couple minutes of activity while nothing whatsoever changed in the mood. There had been no spark of conversation. She only felt a slight sense of relief in that Mrs. Weasley had been unable to come tonight. The motherly woman was the most likely to have laid into them about their safety. Arthur had only frowned as they explained, and pulled each of them into a hug, saying he was thankful they were safe.
Click. Everyone rose at once, swiftly filing out of the kitchen at the sound. They found a slowly pacing Dumbledore entering, observing the tree with a hand over his eyes. In the light, Hermione could not make out any expression on his face, much less his eyes. Each of their guests had had a different reaction to the light, so far, some flabbergasted and staring, some babbling for a full minute before she could make sense of what they were going on about. Most had gone back to the Order, but the remnant had been asked to remain, waiting for this man. Dumbledore, though, stood and observed, like one would look at any old relic of interest. His calm, though pre-informed, was almost unnerving. It was not every day one saw an impossible relic, surely?
"Let's take care of that light, first," Dumbledore said. "It need not shine so brightly here as it is wont to do. Isn't that right?"
He did not seem to be addressing them in that last statement. Hermione thought she caught a light smile on the man's face. Then, he waved his wand in a slowly descending set of arcs and it was a thousand times dimmer in the room. Hermione felt like a veil had been thrown over the tree, like a powerful lampshade - even though no lampshade she had ever seen could have shielded their eyes from that glow.
"That's better," Dumbledore said, smiling at the rest of them while they blinked. "Let us sit and discuss."
He looked at the meagre seating in the living room and flicked his wand to summon additional chairs from some set he had previously Vanished. They were random in shape and assortment. Two poufs made an appearance, behind the twins, bright pink and nearly as eye-catching as the trees had been. The twins laughed as they took the seats, flopping back onto them. Hermione took a thin, wood, tall-backed chair that had appeared behind her. When everyone was seated, Dumbledore looked around.
"Does anyone know what this is?" he asked, not looking at the tree.
Hermione frowned. That had been the question, hadn't it? It was an artefact of power. Harry thought there had been more of them stored in the school, but why? Was it to protect them? Were they meant to be there or had someone lost them, forgotten in the Room of Requirement?
"It feels alive," Harry said, glancing at the tree and squinting. Even dimmer, the light was not easy to look at. "And gives off… emotions."
"It's clearly an artefact from an older age," Remus said, folding his hands over a knee. "What its purpose was, though, I cannot imagine."
"Do you suppose it predates the International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy?" Arthur asked with a puzzled expression. "A thing like that was not designed to hide from Muggles. They would notice it, I am sure."
"Do you know what it is, Albus?" Hermione asked, watching the man. His face had turned to each person speaking, but his expression had not changed.
"I have a theory," Dumbledore said, glancing over at the tree. "It is only a theory, however."
He stood, walking over to the tree, holding out a hand in the air towards it, but not touching it. His had retracted after a moment, and he frowned.
"We have all heard from Harry how he first and more recently saw the trees," Dumbledore said, turning back around, his hands folded behind his back. "Both occurrences were within the Room of Requirement, or Come and Go Room, as some know it. Both were in… might I suggest… desperate situations of some sort? Am I accurate at this point, Harry?"
Harry nodded, looking thoughtful. The others looked at Harry briefly before looking back at the Headmaster.
"Little is known or recorded about Hogwarts, truly," Dumbledore said, shrugging. "Even books like 'Hogwarts: A History' are quite limited in information about the school itself, and its founding. Of the Founders, themselves, we know little more than the Sorting Hat will tell. His brim is quite tight-lipped outside of his yearly poems. I think, perhaps, that was to more purpose than any vanity the four might have had in regards to their legacies.
"A school, while a noble and necessary place for the growth and stability in any society, has always seemed an interesting choice for four of the greatest Wizards and Witches of their age. We are so far down in the ages that no one questions the choice. Of course, the four greatest Wizards and Witches of an age created this legacy of their skills and knowledge. But, at the time, it was unheard of. No one had done it. The older schools - and yes a few survive - in various locales the world over were never on the scale of Hogwarts. It was only after its great example became known that the likes of Beauxbatons, Durmstrang or Ilvermorny became the norm for new students."
"What are you saying, Albus?" Remus asked, nonplussed.
"You believe the Founders may not have created Hogwarts only to teach," Flitwick said, his squeaky voice slower than usual, more thoughtful.
Dumbledore nodded, taking a seat on the sofa beside Arthur. "Aberrations of magic in nature have been known to happen," he said. "It is conceivable that the trees were either brought there or existed at the site of the school centuries before there was a block of stone set for the foundation."
"So, they're protected by the school?" Fred asked.
"And perhaps used in the magics that keep the school functioning still," Dumbledore said.
"Wicked," the twins said together.
"And dangerous," Remus said. "If You-Know-Who had one, he might have the others."
"The thought had crossed my mind," Dumbledore replied.
"If he knows where it comes from," Hermione said, "we cannot just return it, can we? They would find it in the same place they did the first time, wouldn't they?"
"Unless we can protect it better," Flitwick squeaked.
"Better than the Founders did?" Fred asked, sounding doubtful.
"Surround it by a gurgling lake that makes fun of you while you try to cross it," George said. "They'd never stand a chance."
"Yeah, You-Know-Who is a real softie," Fred said, laughing.
"Albus," Hermione said. "If all of them have been removed, what will happen to the school?"
"I do not know," Albus replied. "It is only a theory, after all. In any case, we should ascertain if the others have been taken, and find out what we can about the trees before we try to find where any have been taken."
"The urgent thing is to bring down the barrier," Arthur said. "We have people on the other side. The enemy can come and go as they wish while we're stuck abandoning wands and having duplicates made in other countries to physically get through."
"It is restricting our movement," Harry said. "And that is the reason we found the tree in the first place."
Albus looked at the tree. "I will see what I can do about that," he said, rising once more. "Excuse me, a moment."
He drew his wand, holding it lightly in his hand. His face was calm but Hermione could see the man's eyes were focused with a hard energy behind them. Albus began to pace around the tree, slowly, staying back from it, but letting his eyes flow down it and around, in the air past it. What he was seeing, Hermione could not begin to imagine. The air practically crackled with the intensity of the slow, dance-like circling.
"So, what?" Fred said, startling everyone sitting with the suddenness of his speech. "We going to break into Hogwarts to check if the trees are still there?"
"Sounds fun," George said.
"Dangerous," Remus breathed, his facial expression not changing a hair.
"We know secret ways in," Fred said. "You couldn't want anyone better looking."
"From a certain map?" Remus asked, blithely. "A map, I might add, that was confiscated with certain other belongings of Harry?"
"Oh, is that what happened to it?" Harry asked. "I had hoped someone had grabbed it."
"The Ministry swept in and confiscated all of your belongings," Remus said, nodding.
"We'll find a way in, anyway," George asserted, backing up his brother. "We've gotten past many a prying eye there."
"Don't we know it," Flitwick said, sighing. "However… I will ascertain whether the trees still may be found therein. I do work there, after all."
Fred looked ready to say something, but Hermione just laughed. "You can't really argue with that," she said, smiling at her old professor.
"I am curious what you think would be the best way in to see the trees, Harry m'lad," Flitwick said, serious. "I have heard about this room, but…"
"The entrance is across from the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy," Harry said, "up on the seventh floor. You… you need to walk past that blank space of wall three ways, back and forth, while thinking of what you need. The room is dependant on what you need, and the more specific you are, the better. I think in this case, honesty would help, too. Making the castle know you need to check on the trees, that we have found one outside the castle and want to ensure the others are safe, too. Something like that. It would need to believe you."
"How curious," Remus said, nodding to himself. "We certainly never added that to the map. I'm guessing it works on a similar principle to the hat, reading thoughts and intentions."
"Could we add it in?" Fred asked. "When we get the map back, I mean."
"It would be brilliant to add to your map," George said.
Remus chuckled. "I think James would love the idea of more mischief leading to more on the map," he said. "I am certain he never believed it was done."
"Did that answer your question, Professor?" Hermione asked, focusing again on the little man. His face did not look so certain.
"Professor?" Harry asked, nearly jumping beside Hermione at the look on the man's face.
"The seventh?" Flitwick asked, sighing and sitting back in his chair. "That could be some trouble."
"No one really goes down that corridor," Hermione said. "It's sort of a backway between the Ravenclaw and Gryffindor common rooms, and most people will go down the main hall, anyway."
"No one did," Flitwick said, resigned, "before this term. Practically a garrison of the Ministry has made camp in that very hallway. They've set up cots and guard at each end. They justified it - as much as there is any justification - as keeping an eye out for insurgent parties."
"What, do they expect the Gryffindors from starting a riot?" Harry asked.
"They might," Fred said.
"Merlin knows how close a few of the Quidditch parties got," George said with a smile.
Arthur shook his head, frowning. "So, how are we to get in?" he asked.
"When did they garrison the Ministry there?" Harry asked, frowning.
"A week before the term started," Flitwick said. "The Gryffindor house was no happier about it than the Ravenclaws."
Harry groaned.
"What are you thinking, Harry?" Hermione asked.
Vaguely, she noticed that Dumbledore had stopped circling the tree and was gently waving his wand over it. Everything he had done had been silent, and he had not taken part or noticed their conversation.
"If someone had gotten into the room before they put the troops there, he or she could open it to anywhere else in the school," Harry said, shrugging. "It was worth asking."
"I will have to work out some excuse for going in there," Flitwick said, frowning. "It must be done and…"
"You lot are all ignoring the obvious," Fred said, laughing.
"Completely," George said, amused.
The rest of them stared at the twins. Both looked at them as though they were the funniest thing they had ever seen.
"Too many rule-abiding bookworms here," Fred said, "right Georgie?"
"Indeed, brother," George said. "Do you think a little thing like guards would keep students out?"
"Heck, if we were there," Fred said, "the challenge itself would be all the incentive we'd have needed."
"That's before it became important," George said. "You think no one in the DA realised the advantage the room would have in their hands and out of their hands?"
"But how would they keep it open without someone staying inside?" Hermione asked. "They couldn't risk sneaking back in every night even if they did once."
"They'd find a way around it," Fred said. "The DA learned from the best, after all."
"Us!" George exclaimed, giving everyone a cheesy grin. "Oh, and Harry, I suppose… Hermione, too, but really, us most of all, right?"
"So," Fred said, before anyone could cut in, "you'll need to find a way to ask them without anyone noticing."
"And to figure out whom to ask," George said.
"I have most every student in the school in my classes," Flitwick replied. "Unfortunately, the DA has been disbanded, all organisations outside of Quidditch have been."
"Officially, you mean," Harry said, smiling. "It continued when Umbridge banned it, too."
"Who would keep it going, though?" Hermione asked, thinking. "Harry was always the leader."
"Neville always wanted to have meetings," Harry said, considering.
"Longbottom?" Flitwick asked, eyes surprised.
"Or our sis," Fred said. "Just don't tell mum if she is involved."
"Ron might be involved, too," George put in. "Gin definitely would. She's got a bone to pick with You-Know-Who anyway, and she sounded more determined than ever before she went back to school."
Arthur looked torn between pride, wanting to stop his daughter from doing something dangerous and the worry about his wife hearing about it. Remus put a hand on the man's shoulder, giving him a knowing look. Arthur chuckled.
"If you do speak with my children," Arthur said, "please remind them that their parents worry."
"I will," Flitwick said, sharing a look with the father.
A flash of light came from the other side of the room, drawing everyone's attention back to Dumbledore. Hermione rose as she saw the man stagger, but Arthur and Remus were there before anyone else, catching Albus by the arms and helping him sit.
"It is done," Albus said, catching his breath as he sat. "Tom put a rather tricky trap on the tree. It is a wonder no one was hurt moving it here. But it is severed, and the tree is free of the spells they used."
Hermione looked at the thing. It glowed, still dimmed by the spell from before, but the aura it gave off was different, lighter. It made a warm ball deep inside her feel a bit of relief. She hadn't even noticed that she felt clenched, tense. The tree had far greater impact on them than she had expected.
The others were working out the nuances of who to contact first outside and inside the broken barrier and how best to approach the students to find out about the trees in the school. Hermione stayed out of it for a moment, just watching them. The energy had certainly increased. There was momentum, now, and she hoped they could keep it up. Even tired, Albus had a new fire in his eyes. Harry was in it thick with the Weasleys and Remus. She smiled. Despite the risks and all that, they had done something good tonight. They could be proud of that.
