I do not own Harry Potter or any of the characters.

Hiding Place

Alex looked around as they reappeared in the entryway of Grimmauld Place, right beside the portrait of Sirius's Mother.

"Severus Snape?" Moody's voice whispered out of the darkness.

"What are you doing-" Harry went silent as something swept over their heads and their tongues rolled back on themselves.

However, after barely a moment, the Tongue-Tying Curse lifted and Alex took a step forward. Something shifted in the shadows. Before any of them could say another word, a figure had risen up out of the carpet, tall, dust-colored, and terrible. Hermione screamed, and so did Mrs. Black, her curtains flying open. The gray figure was gliding toward them, faster and faster, its waist-length hair and beard streaming behind it, its face sunken, fleshless, with empty eye sockets. Horribly familiar, dreadfully altered, it raised a wasted arm, pointing at Harry.

"No!" Harry shouted, and though he had raised his wand, he cast no spell. "No! It wasn't us! We didn't kill y-"

On the word kill, the figure exploded in a great cloud of dust. Coughing, his eyes watering, Harry looked around to see Hermione crouched on the floor by the door with her arms over her head, and Ron, who was shaking from head to foot, patting her clumsily on the shoulder and saying, "It's all r-right...It's g-gone..."

Dust swirled around Harry like mist, catching the blue gaslight, as Mrs. Black continued to scream.

"Mudbloods, filth, stains of dishonor, taint of shame on the house of my fathers-"

"SHUT UP!" Alex exploded, swiping his wand at her and sealing her curtains before sighing and holding a hand to the ear beside her. "Christ she's loud. I'm using Dumbledore's books to get rid of her."

"That...That was..." Hermione whimpered, as Ron helped her to her feet.

"Yeah," Harry nodded, "but it wasn't really him, was it? Just something to scare Snape."

Alex walked the rest of the way down the hall, and Hermione and the others followed. No further surprises greeted them.

"Before we go any farther, I think we'd better check," Hermione whispered, and she raised her wand. "Homenum Revelio."

Nothing happened.

"Well, you've just had a big shock," Ron said kindly. "What was that supposed to do?"

"It did what I meant it to do!" Hermione said rather crossly, then shot Alex a dirty look as he snorted into his hand. "That was a spell to reveal human presence, and there's nobody here except us!"

"And old Dusty," Ron added, glancing at the patch of carpet from which the corpse-figure had risen.

"Let's go up," Hermione said with a frightened look at the same spot, and she led the way and up the creaking stairs to the drawing room on the first floor.

Hermione waved her wand and ignited the oil lamps, and Alex waved his own to warm the chilly, drafty room. Ron went to check the curtains.

"Can't see anyone out there," he reported. "And you'd think, if Harry still had a Trace on him, they'd have followed us here. I know they can't get in the house, but...what's up, Harry?"

Harry had given a cry of pain, and was clutching at his scar.

"What did you see?" Ron asked, advancing on Harry. "Did you see him at my place?"

"No, I just felt anger," Harry said. "He's really angry."

"But that could be at the Burrow," Ron said loudly. "What else? Didn't you see anything? Was he cursing someone?"

"No, I just felt anger," Harry shook his head. "I couldn't tell..."

Harry looked like he was growing irritated, and Hermione did not help as she said in a frightened voice, "Your scar, again? But what's going on? I thought that connection had closed!"

"It did, for a while," Harry muttered. "I...I think it's started opening again whenever he loses control, that's how it used to-"

"But then you've got to close your mind!" Hermione said shrilly. "Harry, Dumbledore didn't want you to use that connection, he wanted you to shut it down, that's why you were supposed to use Occlumency! Otherwise Voldemort can plant false images in your mind, remember?"

"Yeah, I do remember, thanks," Harry said through gritted teeth.

Harry turned away, only to spin back around as Hermione shrieked. A patronus soared through the window and formed a weasle, which stood and spoke in Mr. Weaey's voice.

"Family safe. So are the Lovegoods. Do not reply. We are being watched."

Ron let out a noise between a moan and a groan and dropped onto the sofa, Hermione sitting beside him instantly, hugging him tightly. Alex leaned back against the wall feeling the tightness in his chest ease slightly.

"Harry," Ron began, "I-"

"It's not a problem," Harry said, looking almost sick. "It's your family. 'Course you were worried. I'd feel the same way." He paused, undoubtedly thinking of Ginny. "I do feel the same way."

Ron and Hermione agreed to stay in the drawing room together using sleeping bags and Harry excused himself to the bathroom. Alex excused himself to head down to the kitchen in the basement, lighting a cigarette on the way, then dropped into a chair at the table. He stared at the other seats as he smoked, memories of the more happy times spent around the table, times when he was with Luna, playing in his mind and superimposing themselves into his sight. He smoked his cigarette for a long while, nearly fifteen minutes, then flicked the burning end. The ashes and glowing bit fell off, leaving a perfectly preserved, unlit cigarette behind, which he slid back into its pack. Using a self activating Refilling Charm had been a method fornan endless cigarette he had never thought would work, but he was glad it had. He'd need it.

"Master?" Winky asked. "What should Winky do?"

Rest for tonight, Winky," Alex sighed. "You need it as much as the rest of us. Tomorrow, you and I will start cleaning this place up."

Winky bowed and walked out of the room, Alex catching her begin to yawn just before she stepped out of sight. Alex sighed and conjured a jar, then put a Bluebell Flame in it before setting it on the table in front of hinself. Then, he pulled out Dumbledore's journals and began to leaf through them in earnest, searching for the spell he needed. After hours of searching without sleep, he heard someone wake up above him, heading up the stairs. About half an hour later, Ron came pounding down the steps, looking scared.

"Have you seen-"

"He's upstairs, probably in Sirius's room," Alex said tiredly, tuning another page and sighing.

"Upstairs, right!" Ron nodded, sprinting back up.

Alex searched the journal for another few minutes before sighing and sticking a bookmark in it, then headed upstairs, finding the others in a room marked as belonging to Regulas Arcturus Black. Alex stared at the name as he made the connection. The real Horcrux Locket was stolen by R.A.B. Regulus' initials were R.A.B.

"Is Regulus who I think it is?" Alex asked, walking into the room.

"We think so," Harry nodded, helping the others search the room.

Hermione tried summoning it, but when that didn't work, Alex joined in the manual search. However, they found nothing and trouped back out onto the landing together.

"It could be somewhere else in the house, though," said Hermione in a rallying tone as they walked back downstairs, Harry and Ron looking extremely discouraged while Hermione looked, if anything, more determined by their failure. "Whether he'd manage to destroy it or not, he'd want to keep it hidden from Voldemort, wouldn't he? Remember all those awful things we had to get rid of when we were here last time? That clock that shot bolts at everyone and those old robes that tried to strangle Ron; Regulus might have put them there to protect the locket's hiding place, even though we didn't realize it at...at..."

Alex groaned out several colorful words, the others all staring at them.

"What?" Harry asked.

"There was a locket no one could open in that cabinet," Alex said. "I remember it because it was right before that music box thst was cursed to put everyone to sleep, and right after that little box that made my fingers swell up."

"We threw it away," Hermione breathed in horror.

"Kreacher knicked loads of stuff back from us!" Harry said desperately. "He had a whole stash of them under the cupboard in the kitchen!"

"I hope he liked that locket, then," Alex said, everyone sprinting down the stairs.

The portrait of Sirius's mother began to shriek, but Alex flicked his wand at it and its curtains snapped closed sharply. When they reached the cupboard, they found it empty, except for Kreacher's blankets and his book on wizarding geneology. Harry shook out the blankets, but all that fell out was a dead mouse.

"It's not over yet," Harry said. "Kreacher!"

There was a loud crack and the house elf that Harry had so reluctantly inherited from Sirius appeared out of nowhere in front of the cold and empty fireplace: tiny, half human-sized, his pale skin hanging off him in folds, white hair sprouting copiously from his batlike ears. He was still wearing the filthy rag in which they had first met him, and the contemptuous look he bent upon Harry showed that his attitude to his change of ownership had altered no more than his outfit.

"Master," Kreacher croaked in his bullfrog's voice, and he bowed low, muttering to his knees, "back in my Mistress's old house with the filthy half-breed, the blood-traitor Weasley, and the Mudblood."

"I forbid you to call anyone 'blood traitor' or 'Mudblood,'" Harry growled. "And no 'filthy half-breed' either." He paused and took a long breath. "I've got a question for you, and I order you to answer it truthfully. Understand?"

"Yes, Master," Kreacher said, bowing low again just as Winky walked in, holding a feather duster but stopping and watching the scene in interest as she joined Alex.

"Two years ago," Harry said, "there was a big gold locket in the drawing room upstairs. We threw it out. Did you steal it back?"

There was a moment's silence, during which Kreacher straightened up to look Harry full in the face. Then he said, "Yes."

"Where is it now?" Harry asked jubilantly as Ron and Hermione looked gleeful.

Kreacher closed his eyes as though he could not bear to see their reactions to his next word. "Gone."

"Gone?" Harry epeated, deflating. "What do you mean, it's gone?"

The elf shivered and swayed.

"Kreacher," Harry growled fiercely, "I order you-"

"Mundungus Fletcher," the elf croaked, his eyes still tight shut. "Mundungus Fletcher stole it all Miss Bella's and Miss Cissy's pictures, my Mistress's gloves, the Order of Merlin, First Class, the goblets with the family crest, and...and..." Kreacher was gulping for air. His hollow chest was rising and falling rapidly, then his eyes flew open and he uttered a bloodcurdling scream. "And the locket, Master Regulus's locket! Kreacher did wrong, Kreacher failed in his orders!"

Harry reacted instinctively. As Kreacher lunged for the poker standing in the grate, Harry launched himself upon the elf, flattening him. Hermione's scream mingled with Kreacher's but Harry bellowed louder than both of them: "Kreacher, I order you to stay still!"

He felt the elf freeze and released him. Kreacher lay flat on the cold stone floor, tears gushing from his sagging eyes.

"Harry, let him up!" Hermione whispered.

"So he can beat himself up with the poker?" Harry snirted, kneeling beside the elf. "I don't think so. Right. Kreacher, I want the truth. How do you know Mundungus Fletcher stole the locket?"

"Kreacher saw him!" the elf gasped as tears poured over his snout and into his mouth full of graying teeth. "Kreacher saw him coming out of Kreacher's cupboard with his hands full of Kreacher's treasures. Kreacher told the sneak thief to stop, but Mundungus Fletcher laughed and r-ran..."

"You called the locket 'Master Regulus's,'" Harry noticed. "Why? Where did it come from? What did Regulus have to do with it? Kreacher, sit up and tell me everything you know about that locket, and everything Regulus had to do with it!"

The elf sat up, curled into a ball, placed his wet face between his knees, and began to rock backward and forward. When he spoke, his voice was muffled but quite distinct in the silent, echoing kitchen.

"Master Sirius ran away, good riddance, for he was a bad boy and broke my Mistress's heart with his lawless ways. But Master Regulus had proper order. He knew what was due to the name of Black and the dignity of his pure blood. For years he talked of the Dark Lord, who was going to bring the wizards out of hiding to rule the Muggles and the Muggle-borns...and when he was sixteen years old, Master Regulus joined the Dark Lord. So proud, so proud, so happy to serve.

And one day, a year after he joined, Master Regulus came down to the kitchen to see Kreacher. Master Regulus always liked Kreacher. And Master Regulus said...he said..." The old elf rocked faster than ever. "...he said that the Dark Lord required an elf."

"Voldemort needed an elf?" Harry repeated, looking around at Ron and Hermione, who looked just as puzzled as he did.

Alex on the other hand, paled considerably and set a hand on top of Winky's head, Winky setting her hand over it as she watched Kreacher with wide, sympathetic eyes.

"Oh yes," Kreacher moaned miserably. "And Master Regulus had volunteered Kreacher. It was an honor, said Master Regulus, an honor for him and for Kreacher, who must be sure to do whatever the Dark Lord ordered him to do...and then to c-come home." Kreacher rocked still faster, his breath coming in sobs. "So Kreacher went to the Dark Lord. The Dark Lord did not tell Kreacher what they were to do, but took Kreacher with him to a cave beside the sea. And beyond the cave was a cavern, and in the cavern was a great black lake...There was a boat...There was a b-basin full of potion on the island...The D-Dark Lord made Kreacher drink it." The elf quaked from head to foot. "Kreacher drank, and as he drank he saw terrible things...Kreacher's insides burned...Kreacher cried for Master Regulus to save him, he cried for his Mistress Black, but the Dark Lord only laughed...He made Kreacher drink all the potion...He dropped a locket into the empty basin .He filled it with more potion. And then the Dark Lord sailed away, leaving Kreacher on the island. Kreacher needed water, he crawled to the island's edge and he drank from the black lake...and hands, dead hands, came out of the water and dragged Kreacher under the surface."

"How did you get away?" Harry asked, and he was not surprised to hear himself whispering.

Kreacher raised his ugly head and looked Harry with his great, bloodshot eyes. "Master Regulus told Kreacher to come back."

"I know...but how did you escape the Inferi?" Harry reworded his question.

Kreacher did not seem to understand. "Master Regulus told Kreacher to come back."

"I know, but-"

"He Disapparated," Alex spoke up.

"But...you couldn't Apparate in and out of that cave," Harry said, "otherwise Dumbledore-"

"Elf magic isn't like wizard's magic," Alex reminded him. "They canApparate and Disapparate in and out of Hogwarts when we can't."

There was a silence as Harry digested this.

"Of course, Voldemort would have considered the ways of house-elves far beneath his notice," Hermione said icily. "It would never have occurred to him that they might have magic that he didn't."

"The house-elf's highest law is his Master's bidding," Kreacher intoned. "Kreacher was told to come home, so Kreacher came home."

"Well, then, you did what you were told, didn't you?" Hermione said kindly. "You didn't disobey orders at all!"

Kreacher shook his head, rocking as fast as ever.

"So what happened when you got back?" Harry asked. "What did Regulus say when you told him what happened?"

"Master Regulus was very worried, very worried," Kreacher croaked. "Master Regulus told Kreacher to stay hidden and not to leave the house. And then...it was a little while later...Master Regulus came to find Kreacher in his cupboard one night, and Master Regulus was strange, not as he usually was, disturbed in his mind, Kreacher could tell...and he asked Kreacher to take him to the cave, the cave where Kreacher had gone with the Dark Lord..."

"And he made you drink the poison?" Harry asked, sounding disgusted.

But Kreacher shook his head and wept. Hermione and Alex's hands leapt to their mouths. Winky began to tremble, hugging Alex's leg like a frightened child.

"M-Master Regulus took from his pocket a locket like the one the Dark Lord had," Kreacher said, tears pouring down either side of his snoutlike nose. "And hetold Kreacher to take it and, when the basin was empty, to switch the lockets..." Kreacher's sobs came in great rasps now. "And he ordered...Kreacher to leave...without him. And he told Kreacher...to go home...and never to tell my Mistress...what he had done...but to destroy...the first locket. And he drank...all the potion...and Kreacher swapped the lockets...and watched...as Master Regulus...was dragged beneath the water...and..."

"Oh, Kreacher!" Hermione wailed, crying. She dropped to her knees beside the elf and tried to hug him.

At once he was on his feet, cringing away from her, quite obviously repulsed. "The Mudblood touched Kreacher, he will not allow it, what would his Mistress say?"

"I told you not to call her 'Mudblood'!" Harry snarled, but the elf was already punishing himself.

He fell to the ground and banged his forehead on the floor.

"Stop him! Stop him!" Hermione cried. "Oh, don't you see now how sick it is, the way they've got to obey?"

"Kreacher, stop, stop!" Harry shouted.

The elf lay on the floor, panting and shivering, green mucus glistening around his snout, a bruise already blooming on his pallid forehead where he had struck himself, his eyes swollen and bloodshot and swimming in tears. Harry had never seen anything so pitiful.

"So you brought the locket home," he said relentlessly, for he was determined to know the full story. "And you tried to destroy it?"

"Nothing Kreacher did made any mark upon it," the elf moaned. "Kreacher tried everything, everything he knew, but nothing, nothing would work. So many powerful spells upon the casing, Kreacher was sure the way to destroy it was to get inside it, but it would not open. Kreacher punished himself, he tried again, he punished himself, he tried again. Kreacher failed to obey orders, Kreacher could not destroy the locket! And his mistress was mad with grief, because Master Regulus had disappeared and Kreacher could not tell her what had happened, no, because Master Regulus had f-f-forbidden him to tell any of the f-f-family what happened in the c-cave."

Kreacher began to sob so hard that there were no more coherent words. Tears flowed down Hermione's cheeks as she watched Kreacher, but she did not dare touch him again. Winky was sobbing in sympathy, understanding perfectly how Kreacher felt, and Alex was hugging her comfortingly, watching Kreacher sob and finding hinself wanting to comfort him as well, though he knew Kreacher wouldn't allow it. Even Ron, who was no fan of Kreacher's, looked troubled. Harry sat back on his heels and shook his head.

"I don't understand you, Kreacher," he said finally. "Voldemort tried to kill you, Regulus died to bring Voldemort down, but you were still happy to betray Sirius to Voldemort? You were happy to go to Narcissa and Bellatrix, and pass information to Voldemort through them."

"Harry, Kreacher doesn't think like that," Hermione said, wiping her eyes on the back of her hand. "He's a slave. House-elves are used to bad, even brutal treatment. What Voldemort did to Kreacher wasn't that far out of the common way. What do wizard wars mean to an elf like Kreacher? He's loyal to people who are kind to him, and Mrs. Black must have been, and Regulus certainly was, so he served them willingly and parroted their beliefs. I know what you're going to say," she went on more loudly as Harry began to protest, "that Regulus changed his mind...but he doesn't seem to have explained that to Kreacher, does he? And I think I know why. Kreacher and Regulus's family were all safest if they kept to the old pure-blood line. Regulus was trying to protect them all."

"Sirius-"

"Sirius was horrible to Kreacher, Harry, and you know it," Alex said, Harry scowling but not arguing. "Kreacher was completely along for over a decade, and when the last of the Black family showed up, he probably would have done anything for him, if only Sirius had been kinder to him."

"I'm sure 'Miss Cissy' and 'Miss Bella' were perfectly lovely to Kreacher when he turned up, so he did them a favor and told them everything they wanted to know," Hermione added. "I've said all along that wizards would pay for how they treat house-elves. Well, Voldemort did...and so did Sirius."

Harry remained silent, knowing they were correct, regardless of his feelings about Sirius.

"Kreacher," Harry said after a while, "when you feel up to it, er...please sit up."

It was several minutes before Kreacher hiccupped himself into silence. Then he pushed himself into a sitting position again, rubbing his knuckles into his eyes like a small child.

"Kreacher, I am going to ask you to do something," Harry sais. He glanced at Hermione for assistance, and she smiled encouragingly. "Kreacher, I want you, please, to go and find Mundungus Fletcher. We need to find out where the locket...where Master Regulus's locket is. It's really important. We want to finish the work Master Regulus started, we want to...er...ensure that he didn't die in vain."

Kreacher dropped his fists and looked up at Harry. "Find Mundungus Fletcher?"

"And bring him here, to Grimmauld Place," Harry nodded. "Do you think you could do that for us?"

As Kreacher nodded and got to his feet, Harry pulled out Hagrid's purse and took out the fake Horcrux, the substitute locket in which Regulus had placed the note to Voldemort.

"Kreacher, I'd, er, like you to have this," he said, pressing the locket into the elf's hand. "This belonged to Regulus and I'm sure he'd want you to have it as a token of gratitude for what you..."

"Overkill, mate," Ron said as the elf took one look at the locket, let out a howl of shock and misery, and threw himself back onto the ground.

It took them nearly half an hour to calm down Kreacher, who was so overcome to be presented with a Black family heirloom for his very own that he was too weak at the knees to stand properly. When finally he was able to totter a few steps they all accompanied him to his cupboard, watched him tuck up the locket safely in his dirty blankets, and assured him that they would make its protection their first priority while he was away. He then made two low bows to Harry and Ron, and even gave afunny little spasm in Hermione and Alex's direction that might have been an attempt at a respectful salute.

"Winky, I want you to go with Kreacher and help him," Alex said. "And...be nice to him."

Winky nodded, walking over and taking Kreacher's hand before Disapparating with the usual loud crack.

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