"Voldemort is coming."
The statement was simple enough. Just three words, but Harry's confidence plummeted instantly.
"How can you be sure mom?"
"The same way we found out about this afternoon," Sirius said softly. "We have to leave tonight."
"But- then- won't whoever the spy is get in trouble?" Harry stammered.
Everyone in the room looked nervous, except for Mrs. Figg. Her expression was as savage as Harry had ever seen; face set and eyes like steel she came over to Harry, Ron and Hermione.
"This is what we are going to do. You three and Remus are going to hide in an undisclosed location Dumbledore has set up. Sirius and Arabella are going directly to Dumbledore." She paused briefly. "I am going to stay here with my cats."
Now that Harry was reminded about the cats he noticed there were five sitting in the room. They had slunk in without anyone noticing, and were sitting quiet still with cat scowls on their faces.
"But, when You-know-who-" Ron was interrupted by Mrs. Figg.
"No, I don't know Ron, who?" Ron looked skeptically at Mrs. Figg, but felt she meant business.
"Voldemort." He said, shivering at his own voice. "When Voldemort comes won't he kill you?"
Harry could sense the confidence and even reassurance Ron had gotten from saying Voldemort's name.
"He will not be able to find me." Mrs. Figg smirked "we are going to burn the house."
Harry, Ron, Hermione and Arabella all protested at once, but Mrs. Figg held her hand up to silence them.
"If you will be quiet I will explain to you exactly what will happen."
***
Scorn sat quietly by the brown haired girl on the arm of the couch, listening to them argue. She had never seen a room so tense. Turning to Tipsy she said "can you believe them? Arguing at a time like this, if they don't get going they will never get everything moved in time."
"Humans can not be reasoned with," the delicate gray cat stuck up her nose "even Mrs. Figg-"
"There is nothing wrong with Mrs. Figg." Scorn cut her off angrily.
A black and white spotted cat sauntered over to the other two.
"Not fighting are we girls?"
Scorn glared at him before replying in a dignified voice "Hello Trouble, we were just discussing the need for these people to act soon."
"I wish Mrs. Figg would notice we are back, should we tell her? Have you seen Jasper or Mirth?"
"Someone call?" A huge gray and white tiger stripped cat said from behind Trouble.
"Hi Jasper, where is Mirth?"
"Over on the armchair."
All four cats turned to look. Sure enough a light colored Siamese cat was posed gracefully on the armchair. She spotted all the other cats staring at her and stared back. Trouble called her over.
"Oh no," groaned Tipsy "don't!"
But it was too late, Mirth had joined their group.
"What's going on guys?"
"We are discussing what to do about these people," said Jasper. "They are taking far too long talking. They should be leaving already"
Scorn stood up suddenly. "Alright, I'm done discussing. Honestly, we are acting just as bad as they are. Trouble, let's go talk with Mrs. Figg."
Trouble and Scorn slunk over beside Mrs. Figg who was watching the dark haired boy speak. They each took a side and nipped her ankles. Mrs. Figg let out an interjection and looked down at them.
"You are back already?"
"We have been back for a while, you just didn't notice," Trouble pointed out to her. "We just though we would remind you how little time you have."
"Everyone needs to leave if we are going to start the fire before Voldemort comes." Scorn reprimanded.
"Right you both are." Mrs. Figg said seriously with just the slightest twinkle of amusement in her eyes. "why don't you take Jasper, Mirth and Tipsy out at do one more search for rats and by the time you get back I will have everyone gone."
The cats didn't answer, but walked back to the others. After a brief second all five got up and went into the kitchen going out through the back door, ignoring the strange looks the humans were giving them.
"Now remember, if you find a rat Mrs. Figg needs it alive."
"We know Scorn." sighed Jasper, "which side of the house do you want?"
Scorn gave Jasper a nasty look and headed towards the right side.
After about ten minutes Scorn, Trouble, Jasper and Tipsy were all back in the living room. To the cats pleasure the humans had gone, and Mrs. Figg had nearly completed stuffing useful items into her coat and handbag.
"Well," she asked them. "did you find anything, where is Mirth?"
"Probably lost." said Tipsy under her breath. Trouble shot her a look.
"We didn't find anything. I'm sure Mirth will be back soon."
Mrs. Figg turned to her cats "We can't wait much longer, Tipsy will you go and find her?"
Tipsy looked at her with indignation. "I am NOT her babysitter. If you want her YOU go and find her."
Mrs. Figg turned back to her handbag and rolled her eyes. "Jasper?"
"Consider it done," he said bounding off with a satisfied look.
In a second he was back with Mirth.
"No reason to worry Tipsy, she wasn't lost, just grabbing a bite to eat!"
Trouble took a flying leap up to the bookshelf, knocking over an ugly vase to the floor. The noise as it shattered served to cover whatever bad word Tipsy had just called Jasper as well as get everyone's attention. Mrs. Figg was glaring at Trouble.
"You never liked that vase did you."
"No, I've wanted to break it for years," Trouble said blandly. "Seems like this was my last chance."
Mrs. Figg sighed and took one last look around. She was heading into the kitchen when the door burst open. It was too late, Voldemort had found her. He stood in her doorway, death eaters behind him.
Scorn disappeared behind the couch as the evil man came in. She glanced at Trouble who was crouching very still on the bookshelf, and then to Tipsy, who was wrinkling her nose in disgust, and Jasper who had moved silently underneath the table by the front door. Mirth had taken a place just behind Mrs. Figg. They were all ready.
"My dear Mrs. Figg," said the evil man glancing at her full handbag and stuffed overcoat. "You weren't think of leaving were you?"
He smiled wickedly and started to move inside "Shame on you, no manners. I will just invite myself in."
"Stop."
Scorn moved slowly around the couch so as not to attract any attention, making eye contact with Tipsy and wrinkling her nose in agreement. This man smelt of evil, they had to get him out of here. The two cats moved like one, positioning themselves as close to the other smelly men as they could. As Scorn moved beside one of them she noticed that his right foot was mangled. He seemed a bit more tense than the rest, and perhaps not as evil smelling. Frightened though, horribly frightened. But she didn't have time to consider the man because something caught her eye, a rat.
Trouble watched the evil man laugh at Mrs. Figg. He wished he could rip out his little red eyes.
"Stop? And how exactly are you going to stop me you mudblood? You might have scared me a long time ago, but you are an old woman now, and you have lived too long in the muggle world."
Trouble glanced at Mrs. Figg nervously. She was standing up straight with pure hatred in her eyes. Anger boiled inside him, if this man made even the slightest move to hurt Mrs. Figg heads would roll.
"I decided a long time ago I would stop you from getting Harry, at all costs."
"Your death will not save that boy." The evil man said cruelly. "Goodbye Mrs. Figg." He raised his wand and pointed it at her "Avada-"
Chaos ensued. Trouble leaped from the bookshelf at the same time the evil man seemed knocked off balance by some invisible force.
Scorn, Tipsy and Jasper ran desperately underfoot of the nasty smelling men chomping their ankles. It worked, soon they were in a jumble on the floor. Scorn noticed that the man with the crippled foot managed to fall into two of the other men and then tripped up a third rather cunningly, she only gave him a playful nip. Trouble did not have as much success. The evil man had Trouble by the neck in front of him. Trouble clawed and scratched at the arm that held him, but the evil man did not seem to feel it. Scorn noticed that Mirth was no where to be seen. It was up to her to save Trouble. She tried desperately to bite the evil man, but he didn't seem to notice she was attacking him with all that she had. Trouble fought to stay conscious, but the evil man was slowly cutting off his air. Soon all Trouble could see was black and tiny little red eyes.
"Wand!" Scorn heard Mrs. Figg yell. Biting the hand of the crippled foot man she grabbed his wand and flew to Mrs. Figg who pointed it at the evil man and yelled "forcio aperacium!"
The evil man disappeared. Trouble dropped to the ground in a heap and the evil smelling men eyed Mrs. Figg with horror before climbing to their feet and disappearing as well. The last man to make it up was the one with the crippled foot and Scorn might have noticed the slightest bow in Mrs. Figg's direction before he too disappeared.
Mrs. Figg went over to Trouble, who besides being humiliated and angry, was fine. Jasper and Tipsy were both licking their mild wounds.
"Who were those awful men? One of them stepped on my tail." Tipsy said indignantly.
"They were rather stupid if you ask me." Jasper said airily. "We were heavily outnumbered and yet it was a solid victory. People always underestimate cats."
Mrs. Figg started to laugh.
"What's so funny?" asked Tipsy. You saw it, they were scared out of their wits."
Tipsy's comment didn't pacify Mrs. Figg who was now rolling on the floor with laugher.
Trouble, Jasper and Tipsy were looking at Mrs. Figg as if she was mad. Trouble approached her cautiously.
"Are you certain you are alright? Sure that evil man didn't hurt you?"
Mrs. Figg sat up, and got herself partially under control, wiping tears from her eyes.
"The next time those death eaters show up they will be on the look out for all of you. I suspect they will never underestimate a cat ever again Jasper."
At this she started laughing again.
"I don't think it's very funny. Aren't you embarrassed that five cats were able to defeat seven wizards?" Tipsy was looking very offended now.
"Four cats," said Scorn who had been sitting off to the side. "Mirth's not here, and I think we had help."
She looked pointedly at Mrs. Figg, who looked straight back.
"That man with the crippled foot, " Scorn continued "the one who left last, he was helping us. He's the spy isn't he."
Mrs. Figg sighed. "Well, I don't know anything about the crippled foot, but the last man to leave, yes, he was the spy."
Trouble looked surprised. "Who was it?"
"I don't know."
"What about Mirth?" Jasper asked.
"I don't know that either. Perhaps you and Tipsy should look for her."
Tipsy might have argued, but a glare from Scorn stopped her and she followed Jasper out of the room.
Scorn and Trouble looked at each other, and then at Mrs. Figg who was examining the wand in her hand.
"It's been a very long time since I used one of these. I am rather surprised that the spell worked."
"What did you do to him?" asked Trouble.
"It's a very old spell," a self satisfied smirk lit her face. "I forced him to aparate."
"To where?" Scorn said, obviously impressed.
Mrs. Figg chuckled "No where, that's the best part of the spell. It stops half way, trapping the person."
"The evil man is trapped?"
"Oh, not for long. He'll get out of it soon enough, but it will slow him down. And it got him out of my living room anyway."
"We didn't even have to burn the house." Scorn pointed out.
"Which reminds me," Mrs. Figg turned a stern eye on Trouble. "You owe me a vase."
Before Trouble could protest Jasper and Tipsy came into the room looking sullen.
"We couldn't find any sign of her." Jasper said.
"Well," said Mrs. Figg standing up and brushing the dust off her clothes. "I think the first thing we need to do is pay a visit to Albus. All of us."
The statement was simple enough. Just three words, but Harry's confidence plummeted instantly.
"How can you be sure mom?"
"The same way we found out about this afternoon," Sirius said softly. "We have to leave tonight."
"But- then- won't whoever the spy is get in trouble?" Harry stammered.
Everyone in the room looked nervous, except for Mrs. Figg. Her expression was as savage as Harry had ever seen; face set and eyes like steel she came over to Harry, Ron and Hermione.
"This is what we are going to do. You three and Remus are going to hide in an undisclosed location Dumbledore has set up. Sirius and Arabella are going directly to Dumbledore." She paused briefly. "I am going to stay here with my cats."
Now that Harry was reminded about the cats he noticed there were five sitting in the room. They had slunk in without anyone noticing, and were sitting quiet still with cat scowls on their faces.
"But, when You-know-who-" Ron was interrupted by Mrs. Figg.
"No, I don't know Ron, who?" Ron looked skeptically at Mrs. Figg, but felt she meant business.
"Voldemort." He said, shivering at his own voice. "When Voldemort comes won't he kill you?"
Harry could sense the confidence and even reassurance Ron had gotten from saying Voldemort's name.
"He will not be able to find me." Mrs. Figg smirked "we are going to burn the house."
Harry, Ron, Hermione and Arabella all protested at once, but Mrs. Figg held her hand up to silence them.
"If you will be quiet I will explain to you exactly what will happen."
***
Scorn sat quietly by the brown haired girl on the arm of the couch, listening to them argue. She had never seen a room so tense. Turning to Tipsy she said "can you believe them? Arguing at a time like this, if they don't get going they will never get everything moved in time."
"Humans can not be reasoned with," the delicate gray cat stuck up her nose "even Mrs. Figg-"
"There is nothing wrong with Mrs. Figg." Scorn cut her off angrily.
A black and white spotted cat sauntered over to the other two.
"Not fighting are we girls?"
Scorn glared at him before replying in a dignified voice "Hello Trouble, we were just discussing the need for these people to act soon."
"I wish Mrs. Figg would notice we are back, should we tell her? Have you seen Jasper or Mirth?"
"Someone call?" A huge gray and white tiger stripped cat said from behind Trouble.
"Hi Jasper, where is Mirth?"
"Over on the armchair."
All four cats turned to look. Sure enough a light colored Siamese cat was posed gracefully on the armchair. She spotted all the other cats staring at her and stared back. Trouble called her over.
"Oh no," groaned Tipsy "don't!"
But it was too late, Mirth had joined their group.
"What's going on guys?"
"We are discussing what to do about these people," said Jasper. "They are taking far too long talking. They should be leaving already"
Scorn stood up suddenly. "Alright, I'm done discussing. Honestly, we are acting just as bad as they are. Trouble, let's go talk with Mrs. Figg."
Trouble and Scorn slunk over beside Mrs. Figg who was watching the dark haired boy speak. They each took a side and nipped her ankles. Mrs. Figg let out an interjection and looked down at them.
"You are back already?"
"We have been back for a while, you just didn't notice," Trouble pointed out to her. "We just though we would remind you how little time you have."
"Everyone needs to leave if we are going to start the fire before Voldemort comes." Scorn reprimanded.
"Right you both are." Mrs. Figg said seriously with just the slightest twinkle of amusement in her eyes. "why don't you take Jasper, Mirth and Tipsy out at do one more search for rats and by the time you get back I will have everyone gone."
The cats didn't answer, but walked back to the others. After a brief second all five got up and went into the kitchen going out through the back door, ignoring the strange looks the humans were giving them.
"Now remember, if you find a rat Mrs. Figg needs it alive."
"We know Scorn." sighed Jasper, "which side of the house do you want?"
Scorn gave Jasper a nasty look and headed towards the right side.
After about ten minutes Scorn, Trouble, Jasper and Tipsy were all back in the living room. To the cats pleasure the humans had gone, and Mrs. Figg had nearly completed stuffing useful items into her coat and handbag.
"Well," she asked them. "did you find anything, where is Mirth?"
"Probably lost." said Tipsy under her breath. Trouble shot her a look.
"We didn't find anything. I'm sure Mirth will be back soon."
Mrs. Figg turned to her cats "We can't wait much longer, Tipsy will you go and find her?"
Tipsy looked at her with indignation. "I am NOT her babysitter. If you want her YOU go and find her."
Mrs. Figg turned back to her handbag and rolled her eyes. "Jasper?"
"Consider it done," he said bounding off with a satisfied look.
In a second he was back with Mirth.
"No reason to worry Tipsy, she wasn't lost, just grabbing a bite to eat!"
Trouble took a flying leap up to the bookshelf, knocking over an ugly vase to the floor. The noise as it shattered served to cover whatever bad word Tipsy had just called Jasper as well as get everyone's attention. Mrs. Figg was glaring at Trouble.
"You never liked that vase did you."
"No, I've wanted to break it for years," Trouble said blandly. "Seems like this was my last chance."
Mrs. Figg sighed and took one last look around. She was heading into the kitchen when the door burst open. It was too late, Voldemort had found her. He stood in her doorway, death eaters behind him.
Scorn disappeared behind the couch as the evil man came in. She glanced at Trouble who was crouching very still on the bookshelf, and then to Tipsy, who was wrinkling her nose in disgust, and Jasper who had moved silently underneath the table by the front door. Mirth had taken a place just behind Mrs. Figg. They were all ready.
"My dear Mrs. Figg," said the evil man glancing at her full handbag and stuffed overcoat. "You weren't think of leaving were you?"
He smiled wickedly and started to move inside "Shame on you, no manners. I will just invite myself in."
"Stop."
Scorn moved slowly around the couch so as not to attract any attention, making eye contact with Tipsy and wrinkling her nose in agreement. This man smelt of evil, they had to get him out of here. The two cats moved like one, positioning themselves as close to the other smelly men as they could. As Scorn moved beside one of them she noticed that his right foot was mangled. He seemed a bit more tense than the rest, and perhaps not as evil smelling. Frightened though, horribly frightened. But she didn't have time to consider the man because something caught her eye, a rat.
Trouble watched the evil man laugh at Mrs. Figg. He wished he could rip out his little red eyes.
"Stop? And how exactly are you going to stop me you mudblood? You might have scared me a long time ago, but you are an old woman now, and you have lived too long in the muggle world."
Trouble glanced at Mrs. Figg nervously. She was standing up straight with pure hatred in her eyes. Anger boiled inside him, if this man made even the slightest move to hurt Mrs. Figg heads would roll.
"I decided a long time ago I would stop you from getting Harry, at all costs."
"Your death will not save that boy." The evil man said cruelly. "Goodbye Mrs. Figg." He raised his wand and pointed it at her "Avada-"
Chaos ensued. Trouble leaped from the bookshelf at the same time the evil man seemed knocked off balance by some invisible force.
Scorn, Tipsy and Jasper ran desperately underfoot of the nasty smelling men chomping their ankles. It worked, soon they were in a jumble on the floor. Scorn noticed that the man with the crippled foot managed to fall into two of the other men and then tripped up a third rather cunningly, she only gave him a playful nip. Trouble did not have as much success. The evil man had Trouble by the neck in front of him. Trouble clawed and scratched at the arm that held him, but the evil man did not seem to feel it. Scorn noticed that Mirth was no where to be seen. It was up to her to save Trouble. She tried desperately to bite the evil man, but he didn't seem to notice she was attacking him with all that she had. Trouble fought to stay conscious, but the evil man was slowly cutting off his air. Soon all Trouble could see was black and tiny little red eyes.
"Wand!" Scorn heard Mrs. Figg yell. Biting the hand of the crippled foot man she grabbed his wand and flew to Mrs. Figg who pointed it at the evil man and yelled "forcio aperacium!"
The evil man disappeared. Trouble dropped to the ground in a heap and the evil smelling men eyed Mrs. Figg with horror before climbing to their feet and disappearing as well. The last man to make it up was the one with the crippled foot and Scorn might have noticed the slightest bow in Mrs. Figg's direction before he too disappeared.
Mrs. Figg went over to Trouble, who besides being humiliated and angry, was fine. Jasper and Tipsy were both licking their mild wounds.
"Who were those awful men? One of them stepped on my tail." Tipsy said indignantly.
"They were rather stupid if you ask me." Jasper said airily. "We were heavily outnumbered and yet it was a solid victory. People always underestimate cats."
Mrs. Figg started to laugh.
"What's so funny?" asked Tipsy. You saw it, they were scared out of their wits."
Tipsy's comment didn't pacify Mrs. Figg who was now rolling on the floor with laugher.
Trouble, Jasper and Tipsy were looking at Mrs. Figg as if she was mad. Trouble approached her cautiously.
"Are you certain you are alright? Sure that evil man didn't hurt you?"
Mrs. Figg sat up, and got herself partially under control, wiping tears from her eyes.
"The next time those death eaters show up they will be on the look out for all of you. I suspect they will never underestimate a cat ever again Jasper."
At this she started laughing again.
"I don't think it's very funny. Aren't you embarrassed that five cats were able to defeat seven wizards?" Tipsy was looking very offended now.
"Four cats," said Scorn who had been sitting off to the side. "Mirth's not here, and I think we had help."
She looked pointedly at Mrs. Figg, who looked straight back.
"That man with the crippled foot, " Scorn continued "the one who left last, he was helping us. He's the spy isn't he."
Mrs. Figg sighed. "Well, I don't know anything about the crippled foot, but the last man to leave, yes, he was the spy."
Trouble looked surprised. "Who was it?"
"I don't know."
"What about Mirth?" Jasper asked.
"I don't know that either. Perhaps you and Tipsy should look for her."
Tipsy might have argued, but a glare from Scorn stopped her and she followed Jasper out of the room.
Scorn and Trouble looked at each other, and then at Mrs. Figg who was examining the wand in her hand.
"It's been a very long time since I used one of these. I am rather surprised that the spell worked."
"What did you do to him?" asked Trouble.
"It's a very old spell," a self satisfied smirk lit her face. "I forced him to aparate."
"To where?" Scorn said, obviously impressed.
Mrs. Figg chuckled "No where, that's the best part of the spell. It stops half way, trapping the person."
"The evil man is trapped?"
"Oh, not for long. He'll get out of it soon enough, but it will slow him down. And it got him out of my living room anyway."
"We didn't even have to burn the house." Scorn pointed out.
"Which reminds me," Mrs. Figg turned a stern eye on Trouble. "You owe me a vase."
Before Trouble could protest Jasper and Tipsy came into the room looking sullen.
"We couldn't find any sign of her." Jasper said.
"Well," said Mrs. Figg standing up and brushing the dust off her clothes. "I think the first thing we need to do is pay a visit to Albus. All of us."