After a minute or two, the roar died down, and Harry began to see trees. Soon, the forest where he had stopped for the night came into view. He was standing a little ways away from the lake.
Avoiding the urge to glance in it again, Harry walked carefully away from the lake, and miraculously found his broomstick, and Invisibility Cloak, both not damaged. He mounted his Firebolt again, pulling out Voldemort's map. Luckily, it was only afternoon, and he had not spent too much time in the lake.
Harry did not stop to rest that night, and flew on and on.
Finally, on the night of the third day, Harry arrived. He landed in the woods nearby. He hid his Firebolt under a pile of wood, and covered himself and his pack with his cloak, and headed towards Voldemort's cottage. He looked up at the sky, which was filled with dark gray clouds that seemed to be nearly bursting with rain.
Harry stepped onto the ring of rubble surrounding Voldemort's house, and took care to be silent. If Voldemort found him, Harry was as good as dead. A photograph among the rubble caught Harry's eye though. He bent down carefully, and picked it up.
It was a picture of a teenage couple. They looked about a year older than Harry. The couple reminded Harry of himself and Ginny, and the thought made him blush. He turned over the picture, and saw in familiar writing:
To P, from P.
After a moment's confusion, Harry understood what it meant. He gasped, and turned the picture back over. The couple smiled back at Harry. Harry smiled back. To P, from P meant To Prongs, from Padfoot, which were nicknames that James and Sirius called one another. This picture was of Harry's parents, given to James by Sirius many years ago. But, why was the picture here? And then Harry remembered that Hagrid had told him that his house had been destroyed. It was so clear: Harry Potter had come home. The rubble Harry was standing on was what was left of the house Voldemort had destroyed fourteen years ago.
Harry then felt a fat raindrop land on his head with a small plop. Then another fell, and another, and soon the sky seemed to have been ripped open. Rain was falling heavily. Lightning flashed, and thunder rumbled in the distance.
Harry felt anger rush through him. He felt angry with Voldemort for having the nerve to build a cottage right on top of Harry's old house. But, Harry remembered why he had come when he heard a familiar voice, which sounded like Sirius, call out, "Help! Over here!"
Harry followed the voice, and came to Sirius, who was tied to the side of the house. Harry came up close, and whispered, "Sirius!"
Sirius stopped yelling, but looked frightened. "Who's there?" he demanded.
"It's me, Harry! I'm wearing the Invisibility Cloak," Harry explained.
"Harry? Harry, what are you doing here? I told you not to come rescue me," hissed Sirius. Harry pulled off the cloak. His glasses began to blur, as big drops of rain began covering them.
"I came anyway. Besides, Hermione's been kidnapped too," said Harry. He helped untie Sirius. "Where's Hermione?"
"Inside, with Voldemort," said Sirius. Then he looked, and cried, "Harry, look out!"
Harry turned around, and Voldemort's snake, Nagini, was right in front of him, ready to strike.
"Stupefy!" called Harry, pointing his wand. Nagini immediately became stunned, and Harry sighed with relief. Then, he noticed something odd.
In Harry's second year, he had learned about basilisks. Basilisks were large serpents, and even their stare was deadly. However, a blindfold was tied around Nagini's eyes. She was clearly not meant to kill Harry, only hurt him. Or distract him.
"I wonder why she's blindfolded, don't you, Sirius?" said Harry. But he received no answer. Instead, Harry uttered a muffled scream as a large hand grabbed Harry and covered his mouth and nose. Harry started to cry out, but was lulled to sleep by the smell of something in Sirius's hand. The last thing he heard before blacking out was Sirius's raspy, familiar voice saying, "Welcome, Harry."
Harry slowly regained his senses. Weakness was all Harry could feel. All of his energy had been drained from him. He was tied to the back of a tall, wooden chair. He was now inside the cottage and before him stood a short, stalky wizard in shabby robes, with a large bald patch on the top of his head.
"You!" hissed Harry. Wormtail turned to look at Harry. His eyes widened with fear as he saw Harry begin struggling to escape from the chair
"You're too weak, Harry. Don't thrash about, please! M-My Lord will be most displeased! You're very weak now," explained Wormtail, drawing closer to Harry.
"STAY BACK! Don't you come near me," yelled Harry.
"Lord Voldemort will return soon, and he'll kill me if you don't calm down!" Wormtail pleaded with Harry. Harry stopped, partly out of sympathy and partly out of being exhausted. "Thank you, Harry" sighed Wormtail.
"Where are Sirius and Hermione, Wormtail? Where are you and Voldemort hiding them?" asked Harry. Wormtail's eyes grew even wider.
"They're fine, Harry. I would worry more about what Voldemort is going to do to you once he… returns."
Wormtail never met Harry's eyes. Harry noticed his hesitation before saying that Voldemort would return.
"What did Voldemort do to them? Tell me, Wormtail! They're my friends!" Harry demanded.
Wormtail bit his lip. He swallowed and pointed over to a far corner. There, two cloaked wizards or witches stood, watching. One was significantly taller than the other. Harry didn't understand. Then, Wormtail beckoned them, and they came. Wormtail waited a second, and then turned to Harry. "These, Harry, are Sirius and Hermione. But, they aren't your friends any more."
"What? What are you talking about, Wormtail?" demanded Harry. The taller cloaked figure stepped forward, and removed his hood. Sure enough, it was Sirius. Harry was speechless, and he remembered what Sirius had done, just outside the cottage.
"Everyone hated me. They thought that I was guilty, even though they had no real proof that I had killed anyone that day. They threw me into Azkaban without seeing if I was guilty or not. I am sick and tired of trying to prove to everyone that they are wrong. So, I am now proving to myself that they were right. That I am everything they feared that I was," explained Sirius, looking alarmingly proud.
"Sirius! What about me? What about Dumbledore? Hermione, Ron, and Lupin? What about everything we've done for you? Lupin even let you stay in his house! The ministry almost caught you and he got in trouble for it!" shouted Harry. He noticed that there was something wrong with Sirius though. Sirius did not seem to be acting like he would.
"That's only a small group of people compared to most of the entire wizarding world!" sneered Sirius. Something was definitely wrong. Sirius never acted like this, especially with Harry.
Harry turned to Hermione, expecting her to give him a reason for her new support for Voldemort. She turned away from Harry. "I decided that I'm too powerful to stand against Voldemort. I don't want him to kill me, so I joined his side."
Harry didn't believe her. What was going on?
Harry glanced around the cottage, giving himself time to sort out his thoughts. When his eyes passed a large window, his scar began to burn. He flinched. Then, he was visited by an idea. He kept passing his glance past the window, and every time his scar began to hurt. That could mean only one thing. Lord Voldemort was behind that window, waiting for the right moment to enter the cottage. Harry thought hard, and realized what Voldemort had done to Hermione and Sirius. It was so obvious. He had used the Imperious Curse. The Imperious Curse allowed the wizard complete control over their victim's body. Voldemort's wand must have been powerful enough to control both Sirius and Hermione.
A lot of good that does me, Harry thought. So what if I know which curse he's using? I have to figure out how to break the curse without Voldemort stopping me.
Harry knew it was risky, but decided it was better to at least see Voldemort, if he was facing him.
"Voldemort!" yelled Harry.
"What are you doing, Harry?" asked Wormtail.
"Voldemort! Voldemort — VOLDEMORT!" Harry called, again, and again, and again. Over, and over, he said the name, louder and louder.
The glass in the window shattered. Wormtail leapt back. Voldemort had entered at last. Harry's scar burned, and Harry saw the familiar, terrifying sight of Lord Voldemort. He was tall, thin, and extremely pale. His face resembled that of a snake, with slits for eyes, a nose, and a mouth. His eyes were alive with fury.
"M-My Lord…" whispered Wormtail.
"Silence!" hissed Voldemort. He kept his eyes on Harry, and drew closer to him. "Hello, Harry Potter."
Harry gained enough strength to look up at Voldemort, whose dead-white face was in a horrible, paper-thin smile that sent chills up and down Harry's spine. "I see that even I could not fool you, Harry Potter. But, you cannot fool me." He walked up close to Harry. "I see that you are no stronger than last year. In fact, you're weaker! You are underfed," he said, taking hold of Harry's wrist, causing searing pain in Harry's scar. "You have horrible bags under your eyes. Tsk tsk… I'm almost insulted that you're forcing me to kill you when you're so weak.
"I see that you received my letter. How brave, how noble…and how stupid. Coming after your precious Sirius and Hermione. Too bad you won't succeed."
Harry gathered all of his strength and said, "You haven't killed me yet, Voldemort. I also know why you choose this location for your cottage. I found a picture of my parents outside. How could the Muggles not notice you?"
Voldemort sneered. "Surely you don't think that I'm stupid enough to do anything that would give away our world? I hate Muggles anyway. This entire area was evacuated after your parents' deaths. They were planning to rebuild houses here, but my most loyal Death-Eaters thought I might want this spot eventually, so they put Muggle-repelling charms around this entire area. No Muggles have come here for years. Now, at last, I shall triumph, and kill you once-and-for-all!"
"That's what you always say, Voldemort. And you're always wrong. What makes you think you won't be this time?" said Harry.
"Because I have your godfather and friend on my side, Harry. And for your information, I am more powerful then any wizard can comprehend! Wizards dislike me because I am too powerful for them! That is why Albus Dumbledore hates me!"
"THAT'S A LIE!" Harry yelled at the top of his lungs. "Albus Dumbledore does not hate you, because he does not feel threatened by you since, he knows he's twice the wizard you'll ever be!"
Voldemort's eyes glared. He spoke, barely whispering, "Is that so, Harry Potter? Then why doesn't Albus Dumbledore, the great wizard, face me himself? Why does he send you instead?"
Harry felt anger rush through his veins. "Because he knew that you would kill Sirius and Hermione before he had a chance to save them!"
"Then why hasn't Dumbledore ever tried to defeat me? Your first year, he merely removed Quirrel's hand from your face and ran off with you! He didn't even try to get rid of me! If Dumbledore is unafraid of me, why does he stay away from me?"
Harry thought hard. How could he answer that? Harry was angry that he had no response, but he could not think of a good answer.
"You see, Harry? Perhaps Dumbledore is not as powerful as you think he is."
No, Harry thought. Dumbledore is that powerful. "Dumbledore has never been able to be there when I face you!" Harry then remembered something that he had been told in his first year at Hogwarts. "Also, I've heard that you are afraid of Dumbledore! And surely Lord Voldemort wouldn't be afraid of a wizard that was less powerful than himself?"
Voldemort was silent, but his eyes glowered. "I am not afraid of Albus Dumbledore, Harry Potter."
Harry decided to drop the topic of Dumbledore and figure out how to break the Imperious Curse. "Voldemort, explain something to me. Why did you want Sirius? The whole Ministry is after him."
"I'm not afraid of the Ministry, Potter. Sirius is very, very strong and a great ally. We mailed the letter to the Ministry to get Sirius on the run. Wormtail followed you back to Hogwarts, and heard Dumbledore send Sirius to Remus Lupin's house. We got him on the run, and then we found him and brought him to our side!" explained Voldemort. "I had Lucius Malfoy follow him and take him when it was time. Then, we sent Wormtail to Hogwarts to get Hermione and — a treasure of unlimited value." Voldemort's snake-like eyes glazed over. "Yes… he snuck in as a rat, and found the treasure. He turned it into a Portkey, and had it take him into the Girls' Dormitory of Gryffindor. Then, when your friend Hermione came to look up the Counter-curse to help your owl, Wormtail got her. Then, the treasure became a Portkey yet again, and brought Wormtail and Hermione to me." An unfamiliar tone of admiration was in his voice. "Do you know what treasure I am referring to?"
Harry shook his head. Voldemort motioned behind Harry and turned the chair around. Standing there was the Mirror of Erised, a tall mirror with a gold frame and two large claws. Voldemort had clearly put some spell on it, and to Harry's horror, he could see the story that Voldemort told inside the mirror, like a horrible movie.
"When I was a first year at Hogwarts, I knew nobody. I had come from an orphanage, without any idea about this remarkable world. I was young, but I always had known that I was special. When I arrived at Hogwarts, the older Slytherin students delighted in tormenting me. They pointed me in the wrong direction for classes, held the Common Room door shut from the inside, or persuaded the portrait on the door to change the password without telling me. One particularly nasty prank they pulled was shoving and locking me in an old, abandoned classroom. It was the middle of December, so it was freezing cold. I had no coat on and was scared half to death.
"I banged on the door and shouted over and over again, but they had carried me to a place in the castle that was rarely ever used. I realized that no one was going to believe that I had been locked in there, and the boys would never confess. When I was looking for a place to lay down, I noticed a large mirror with a golden frame that was engraved at the top."
"I looked deep into the mirror and saw myself. I was much older though, at lest ten or twenty years older. I had people lined up behind me. I didn't know any of them. Then I saw one of the older Slytherin boys, aged as much as I was, coming and begging at my feet. With a twist of my wand, he fell to the ground, dead. I still am not quite sure exactly what happened, but I felt an emotional rush. I wanted the power that I had in the mirror, at any cost. I didn't care what happened to me, as long as I had the power to make my enemies beg for mercy.
"I decided that the only way to do that would be to learn in school. And I promised that when I got out of there, I would do that.
"An hour later, I heard footsteps in the hall. I heard the voices of the Slytherin boys, lying about how I had gone there myself. Dumbledore unlocked the door, and stepped in. I looked at him, expecting him to be disgusted with me. But he wasn't. In fact, he didn't even seem to think I'd purposely gone in the room. But he looked at the mirror, and then at me. It was as if he knew what had happened, but knew he couldn't change it. He didn't say anything for the longest time, and then he finally said, 'I see what has happened. I urge you, Tom, to be more careful.' And he let me leave, without punishment or anything.
"I became the most attentive student Hogwarts ever saw. I began to accept that those fools who picked on me would one day be sorry. I had already come up with the name Voldemort and was promoting people's use of it. It had much more power in it than Tom Riddle. One or two people already thought that I was the most powerful wizard of Hogwarts. I never did see the mirror ever again, until your first year at Hogwarts, when you stopped me from getting the Sorcerer's Stone. Now, it is mine and shall be forever more."
That was why the mirror had been moved before. Harry remembered what Professor Dumbledore had said to him in his very first year at Hogwarts: "Men have wasted away before it, entranced by what they have seen, or been driven mad, not knowing of what it shows is real, or even possible." Harry understood now what Dumbledore meant. Voldemort had gone mad because of what the mirror had shown him and that was why he had become himself.