CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The Threshold of Life
The hall clock struck eight, making Harry's elbow fall off the arm of his chair in his surprise. He shook his head, thinking that he must have dozed off for a moment. The sound of the chimes reverberated around the little house like a death knell, deep, loud, and full of foreboding. They had been waiting for hours - it felt like days - and still no-one had arrived. Soon the clock resumed its rhythmic ticking, like a bomb preparing to go off at any moment. It only served to increase the tension already present in the little lounge. The atmosphere could have been cut through with a knife.
He glanced around at the others, wondering if they felt as restless and uneasy as he did.
Evidently so, for Ron was sitting on the sofa, leaning his elbows on his knees, his face hidden by his hands. Beside him, Hermione watched anxiously, placing a gentle hand on his arm, and Mr Weasley's heavy sighs were becoming louder as the minutes passed. The twins were lying all over the floor with Lee and the girls, fiddling with loose threads in the hearth-rug or drawing pictures in the film of soot that blanketed the grate. Harry could tell that Fred was dying to say something, but Angelina's constant warning pokes and glances were keeping him in check.
"God, this is insane!" muttered Bill, from his vantage point by the door. He stretched his long legs out across the floor, placing his booted feet right under George's nose.
"Won't be long now," said Mr Weasley, in a calm, sing-song voice that failed to conceal his inner anxiety.
It seemed hours before several faint cracks broke the deafening silence. Suddenly, everyone had jumped to attention, and loud exclamations of eagerness ensued. What had been a deadly silence ever since Mr Weasley had returned now became a chaotic babble.
"WAIT!" bellowed Mr Weasley, stunning everyone into stillness. "NOBODY IS TO MOVE!"
Glances, both surprised and terrified, were exchanged across the room. No-one dared to sit down, or even move an eyebrow. Calmly and purposefully, Mr Weasley strode out, ordering Bill to follow.
Instantly the atmosphere relaxed, and a flurry of fervent conversation broke out in relief.
"I thought they were never coming!" breathed Hermione, falling backwards into the chair Harry had been occupying previously.
"Who is it, Fred, can you see?" urged Ginny, kneeling on the sofa to peer over Fred's shoulder at the scene outside the window.
"It's too dark," he replied, indignantly. "Damn! And I bet they'll leave without telling us anything!"
"They'd bloody well better tell us what's going on!" growled Ron. "I'm pissed off with being kept in the dark all the time!"
"Well, then, Mr Weasley. Perhaps you'd care to be enlightened."
Ron span round to face the owner of the new voice, revealing him to the rest of the room as he moved aside. Remus Lupin stood in the doorway, leaning against the frame, looking harassed and annoyed. But it was not the Remus Lupin that any of them remembered.
He was dressed from head to foot in the customary jet robes of The Order, with a single silver-rimmed opalescent clasp at his throat holding his cloak in place. Sleek hair the colour of burnt almonds fell neatly over his neck, and he surveyed them with brilliant emerald-gold eyes below dark brows, drawn together in a cryptic frown. The change in his appearance was so unexpected and drastic that Ron was temporarily struck dumb.
Closing his mouth, Harry decided to intervene.
"Are you going to explain what's happening?" he asked, as politely as he could. He had not forgotten the frustration he had suffered in his fifth year after being treated like an imbecile, untrusted and uninformed while everyone else discussed his future during his absence.
"Yes, I am," replied Lupin, frowning heatedly. "I think you all have a right to know, and the Headmaster agrees."
He moved slowly across the room with a tall, dignified grace that Harry did not remember observing before. His slim figure was no longer giving the impression of neglect and malnutrition, but of youthful energy and carefully trained physical strength. The anxious lines in his face had vanished, and those vivid green-amber eyes were not at all like the tired, grey ones of Harry's old DADA Professor. Underneath the nettled expression, which must have been due to more than just Ron's impatient crudeness, a virile, spirited vigour was flooding his entire persona.
"I suggest you all sit down," he said, bracing himself with a hand on the mantelpiece as he raised a booted foot onto the grate.
He waited a moment or two while everyone gathered their scattered thoughts and made themselves comfortable.
"How long are you staying?" asked Hermione, tentatively.
"I, personally, am staying until I see all four of you back on the train to Hogwarts." He took in Harry, Ron, Hermione and Ginny with a sweep of his hand. "We can't take any chances. Sirius, you will be pleased to hear, will be staying too."
Harry felt relief and excitement flood him both at the same time. He had several bones to pick with his godfather -
"What about Tonks and Kingsley and the others?" continued Hermione.
Lupin straightened his back, and tossed fugitive strands of hair out of his eyes. "Busy at the Ministry for the time being," he replied, curtly.
Harry was confused. "I thought Mr Weasley said that Professor Dumbledore was going to recall The Order."
"So he has. A new headquarters has been arranged and we will be moving out as soon as you are safely back at school."
"So it was me they were after?" said Harry, frowning.
"Nobody knows. It could be that they got word that you were here with Arthur Weasley, and they tracked Charlie to find where his family were living. Perhaps he discovered he was being followed and took them on, losing the fight one to God knows how many." Lupin scowled fiercely. He leaned against the wall beside the fireplace. "We won't know for sure until Charlie regains consciousness, but that could be days yet. In the meantime we have to allow for every possibility, hence the spells we are strengthening here tonight."
"Where is your new headquarters?" blurted out Fred, suddenly.
Lupin turned his scowl abruptly onto him. "Do you seriously expect me to reveal that, Mr Weasley?"
Fred didn't answer, and fidgeted in his seat.
"What are you planning on doing once The Order is re-established?" asked Harry. It was a question he had been dying to ask someone for weeks.
"Keeping an eye out; finding information; kicking Fudge out of office, hopefully."
His tone was so bland and droll that several giggles erupted, most inappropriately. Lupin's lips curved into a smile.
"Does that mean Dad's in?" asked Ron, hopefully.
Lupin shrugged. "That's not my affair. I can't think of a better replacement, though. Your father is an exceptionally intelligent man, and we need people like him at the top."
"Who decides?"
"The top-level Departmental Ministers. Dumbledore will get a say as well, being Headmaster of Hogwarts and the Head of The Order. Whoever they settle on, we should have Fudge out and the new chap in by October, no problem." His eyes glittered with feverish excitement as he relished the thought of Fudge's face when he reached the end of his term.
"And about bloody time and all!"
Sirius Black strolled into the lounge grinning widely. He made straight for Harry and clapped him on the shoulder. "How you doing, mate?"
He looked remarkably unstressed considering the devastating failure of the mission in Russia. His hair was tamed for once, and framed his golden-brown skin like a dark, silken aura. Had he not been wearing the handsome, trademark grin and been gazing at them with sparkling eyes, Harry would have likened him to one of the evil overlords from Muggle fantasy stories.
As it was, Harry suppressed the desire both to shout at him for being so damned cheerful after all the months he had been away and to start asking for every tiny little detail about the recent Russian expedition. "I'll be fine as soon as the pair of you start talking properly!" he replied, grinning back at his godfather.
Sirius and Lupin exchanged amused glances.
"Told you he'd start the second we walked in the door, didn't I?" said Sirius, with a laugh.
"I've explained about the immediate plan," said Lupin, seriously, though Harry observed an unusual expression in his eyes, relief coupled with entertainment.
"Excellent." Sirius dropped into an armchair, letting his arms flop casually over the arms. "God, I'm knackered."
This time Lupin could not hide a smile.
"Oh, Harry - Dumbledore's talking to Arthur in the kitchen," said Sirius, almost as an afterthought. "He wants a word, if you wouldn't mind. Ron and Hermione too."
"Dumbledore?" exclaimed Hermione, before she could stop herself. "What's he doing here?"
"Needed to see Arthur," replied Sirius, slightly more gravely. When he looked up at Harry his eyes were deadly serious, all the mischief gone. "And you." He nodded his head towards the door, indicating that they should go straight away.
With mixed feelings, Harry went out into the hall, followed by Ron and Hermione.
"Um - is anyone else slightly worried about this?" asked Ron, anxiously, pulling the door to behind him.
"Just a tad," replied Harry. Whatever had induced Dumbledore to leave the safety of wherever it was he usually stayed during the summer, it had to be very important.
He pushed the kitchen door open.
Mr Weasley was sitting in his usual place with a huge mug of tea, deep in conversation with Professor Dumbledore. They both raised their heads.
"Ah!" said Dumbledore, in his customary calm tones. "Come in, take a seat. Thankyou, Arthur."
Mr Weasley nodded, left the room swiftly.
Anxiously, the three shuffled into chairs facing the Headmaster, who viewed them over the rim of his half-moon glasses, gravely.
"Now, I want it understood that under no circumstances do I wish to disrupt the planned festivities for next week, but I fear that what I have to say may cause some distress among you."
They glanced awkwardly at each other, wondering what on earth he was about to tell them.
Dumbledore leaned forward onto his elbows, staring keenly into Harry's eyes. "Chiefly, what I have to say concerns you, Harry, but since your friends are never ones to leave your side, I thought it best that they should hear too."
Harry nodded. "I would tell them anything, sir," he replied.
"So I had anticipated." He paused for a moment, before shifting his stare to Ron, seated beside Harry. "I am terribly sorry about your brother, Mr Weasley. It was a tragic incident which The Order ought to have prevented. I have just been offering my consolations and my apologies to your father."
Ron appeared to be thoroughly dumbstruck, and merely dropped his eyes onto the table.
"This is deadly serious, isn't it, Professor?" said Harry, deciding to move things along a little. If Dumbledore was about to break some ghastly news to him, he would prefer to get it over with quickly.
"Extremely. Unfortunately, Harry, the events of past months have led us further out of our way than we ever imagined. Times are dangerous, more so than ever, as I'm sure you can appreciate."
"Obviously," Harry muttered, frowning. He was starting to get annoyed. "It's rather hard to forget with spells and restrictions and censors and warnings ruling your life!"
Dumbledore leaned back in his chair again, with a faint smile twitching at the corners of his mouth. "I always knew you'd stand up to me in the end, Harry. It was something that your father did too. He couldn't bear to be shepherded around like a child, guarded and protected all the time. Mind you, he yelled the place down when I told him I was having a twenty-four hour surveillance guard put on him." He chuckled reminiscently. "But not you. You've got your mother's temperament." He waited for a moment to let Harry and the others process his words. "You are also in a great deal more danger than he was. And you are several years younger too. Are you sure it's a wise thing to start throwing protection back at the people who offer it to you?"
Harry frowned again, fighting the desire to raise his voice and say something that he might regret. If he had his mother's temperament, she must have been a hell-raiser!
"I appreciate the fact that it must be hard to keep tabs on me, sir," he replied, keeping his tone as polite as he could. "And I appreciate the effort that is being made for my safety, but I would like to be given a chance to protect myself for once. I can't be hidden away forever like an incompetent idiot!"
Hermione's sharp intake of breath indicated that he might just have crossed the line. He simmered down, and sighed.
"I'm sorry, sir. It's just frustrating."
"I know," said Dumbledore, sympathetically. "I can quite see that. You'll be of age next week, Harry. An adult. A grown man. You've proved yourself on a great many occasions to have wisdom beyond your years. So, I have decided to offer you a compromise."
Harry's eyebrows rose. "What's that, sir?"
If it was possible for Dumbledore's face to become ever graver, it did at that moment. "Your safety is the most important thing in this issue, Harry. You must be kept alive and unharmed at all costs. For the past two years you have been watched over by The Order - Sirius, Tonks, Remus, Arthur, all of them. They are all trained in defence, and most of them are fully trained Aurors as well as Order members. They are a competent guard, you understand."
Harry nodded in agreement, wondering where this was going.
"I am going to offer you something that I have been reluctantly forced to consider since last year. And due to the recent attack on Mr Weasley, I have been forced to reconsider it even more seriously. I have now made my decision. The rest is up to you. This is not an order, nor an obligation, but a piece of grave advice, Harry, which I want you to think about very carefully before you answer me."
He drew in a great breath as if loathe to speak the words, but knowing all the while that they must be uttered. "The opportunity is open, Harry, for you to forego your final year at Hogwarts, that is N.E.W.T.S. also, in favour of preliminary training in the arts of defence with a view to your future as a fully qualified Auror."