Chapter Ten: The Package
"Shut the door, Aberforth," said the man from the chair without turning his head.
"Aberforth?" Hermione looked quickly at the tall, stooping wizard as he moved to obey. "You're Professor Dumbledore's brother! Your animagus -- "
"Thank you, Miss Granger, that will be quite enough. Leave showing off to the classroom," snapped the man.
"You!" Harry's wand was raised and trembling in his hand. "How dare you even show your face around here! How dare you speak to Dumbledore's brother! How dare --"
"I talk, think, and breathe," Snape said lazily. He turned in his chair and fixed Harry with his glittering, malevolent eyes. "If you'd shut your mouth for five seconds, Potter, the confusion would subside. Though I'd doubt it, given the apptitude you've shown in my classes."
Harry's jaw clenched in anger, but Ginny placed her hand on his arm and looked up at him.
"Five minutes, then you can kill him," she said with her eyes twinkling.
Harry resisted a smile and pocketed his wand.
"Well done, Miss Weasley," sneered Snape. "Idiocy has an antidote afterall." His eyes shifted to Ron and Hermione, "You're in luck, Weasley, perhaps Miss Granger can provide the same services."
Ron went brick red, "Just kill him, Harry. Kill him and be done with it."
"No," Hermione said, looking breathless. She took a deep breath and said through her teeth, "He has information. Right now, we need him."
They crowded closer to the fire, aware that Aberforth remained behind them beside the door.
"Before the night of the tower," began Snape, not looking at Harry and the others, "Professor Dumbledore gave me something to keep in my possession, something I was ordered to pass on to you."
"Why are you obeying his orders now?" demanded Harry, watching Snape through narrowed eyes. "Feeling guilty, are you? Feeling sorry?"
"Potter," spat Snape, eyes dancing as they watched the flames. "You're so pathetic. I don't have time for your childishness. Do you have the fake locket?"
"Yes," said Harry in surprise. He'd kept it with him since Dumbledore's death on the tower. Without waiting to be asked, he drew it from his pocket and held it in the firelight.
Everyone stared at it.
"Good. For once you've done something right, Potter." Snape waved Aberforth over, who stomped toward them as he dug in his pockets.
"He's rather like Hagrid, isn't he?" muttered Ron. "Always shoving things haphazardly in his pockets."
Aberforth withdrew at last from the inside of his long cloak a small velvet box, long and sort of dusty. He picked a few bits of lint off, blew on it, and handed it to a disgusted Snape.
"Yes, thank you," said Snape, unmoved as the velvet box was held under his nose. He stared up at Aberforth impatiently from his glittering eyes. "To Potter, please, Aberforth!"
Aberforth started, but obeyed, shoving the box instead under Harry's nose.
"Thanks," Harry said uncertainly as he was releaved of the fake locket. He opened the box to be sure the real locket was there, and there it was: the golden locket lay on its velvet cushion, glistening innocently in the firelight.
"Sure you want to destroy it? Should make a nice present for little Ginerva," sneered Snape.
"Why did you do it?" Harry whispered, and the others paused near the door.
"Harry, forget it, come on," begged Hermione.
"No!" Harry yelled. "I want to know!" He marched up to Snape's chair again, who looked up at him with heavy, loathing eyes. "Why! Why did you kill him!"
Snape smiled nastily, "He asked me to."
"You liar!" Harry yelled, pulling his wand.
"Harry!" squealed Hermione.
"He's not worth it," said Ginny.
"Come on, mate," Ron strolled over and tugged Harry's arm. "Come on, we've got what we came for. There's only one more."
The task ahead came flooding back to Harry and he lowered his wand, his eyes remaining fixed on Snape. He couldn't stop glowering at Snape as Ron steered him out of the room, but Snape turned his eyes back to the flames and sat with his fingers curled under his chin.
"What's the last horcrux, you suppose?" wondered Ron quietly when they'd reached the street.
But Hermione was watching Harry carefully, "It has to do with the thing in your pocket, doesn't it?"
"What thing?" asked Ron in surprise.
"Don't miss a beat, do you?" said Ginny sarcastically. "When Harry came out of The Three Broomsticks he had a bulge in his jacket pocket. So what happened, Harry?"
Harry didn't know how to tell his friends that the last horcrux was himself. He merely walked to a table outside a cafe, sat, and pulled the grubby little package from his pocket.
"Can't sit if you don't order," said a cross witch with two sticks in her gray bun and a quill behind her ear.
"Four firewhiskeys," said Ron offhandedly.
The witch squinted at them suspiciously, "We don't serve firewhiskeys, and anyway, aren't the lot of you too young --"
"Four coffees please," Hermione said briskly, and the witch clicked away with an indignant huff. Then breathlessly to Harry, "Go on, then."
Harry began to peel the package open as the others waited, holding their breath. The witch with the gray bun returned with their drinks and paused to say in wonder, "That's a timeturner, that is! I used one in school once to get to all my classes. Was the cleverest witch of my age." She puffed with pride.
"So how is it you wound up here, then?" Ron asked, sipping from his coffee.
The witch huffed again and stormed away. "You've got five seconds!" she growled over her shoulder at them.
"Nice going, Ron," said Ginny.
"What?" said Ron innocently. "It's sad really, her being here. Hermione, you'd better keep on your toes. I can't be seen with a girl who works in a coffee shop."
Hermione gave Ron a dirty look but otherwise ignored him. "What do you think it means, Harry?"
Harry was holding the timeturner in his hand and staring vaguely across the street. Dumbledore wanted him to go back in time, but for what?
"Good question."
Harry looked around, startled, to see his old headmaster perched on the cafe's railing, one foot dangling enough to reveal a white boot. He smiled at Harry.
"You have the power, Harry, to rewrite an existance entirely different from the one you live now," Dumbledore told him. "That power -- the power of good intent, love, selflessness -- is what is locked in the Ministry at this very moment. It's something few understand, and is therefore revered in all who can wield it."
"And I've got that power . . . in me?" Harry asked.
"Who the bloody hell is he talking to?" Ron demanded of the others, his eyes wide.
Harry looked up, "It means it's time I went to Godric's Hollow."