A/N: It's the longest chapter ever…I'm not kidding, you may want to spread it out over quite a period of time…it's so long I'd take to it with a pair of hedge clippers I weren't such a wuss…

Lost: One Godson, Answers to Harry

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"You getting off here?" the bus driver asked. With the theatrics of great effort he twisted around to look at Frank, seated a few rows behind. The old man, his cap askew, was jolted out of his thoughts and took a moment to register the bus driver's question.

The bus was idling on the edge of a lightly wooded road, where a decrepit blue sign declared bus stop to the sunlit trees, which stood rooted without giving any indication that they required a bus to stop at all. There was no other sign of habitation, except for a thin tarseal road cutting away into the scanty forest.

"I thought this bus stopped at the village?" Frank queried, his joints aching at the mere thought of being put into use after the long and shuddering ride.

The bus driver jerked his thumb at the small road. "This is as close as you get. It's a short walk that-a-way."

Frank pressed his lips together in resignation and slowly got to his feet, hearing his back creaking and the complaints of what he was sure was his muscles stretching. He thanked the bus driver half-heartedly, picked up his travelling case and walking cane, and hobbled off the bus. The bus driver did not even bid him farewell, but slammed the vehicle back into gear and chugged away without looking back. Frank watched him disappear around the corner and then limped across the road and onto the thin lane that the driver had indicated.

It was only about ten minutes walk before the trees gave way to furrowed fields. Frank found himself standing on the lip of a wide bowl in the landscape, hills surrounding a perfect nest. Below him and around the corner of the headland he could make out the outskirts of a small village.

A white signpost greeted him at the next bend in the road; its letters hand-carved and painted a soothing dark blue, and reading Ottery St Catchpole.

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Number twelve Grimmauld Place did not exist. This was the only conclusion Frank had come to. Two days of searching London had revealed only one street named Grimmauld Place. Frank had tracked it down and plodded along it, keeping a close eye on the letterboxes on either side, clutching the scuffed and bloody letter deep in his coat pocket. At the end of the street, he came to a halt and had to rub his eyes once to convince himself that what he was seeing was not some strange hallucination. Number eleven and number thirteen stood side by side – of number twelve, there was no a trace.

Poor Harry must be insane, after all, was Frank's first thought. His second was, Now what am I to do? This was supposed to be the end of this wretched adventure! His third was even more venomous; I've had enough of this conspiracy. I'm not going to go gallivanting across the whole country looking for the imaginary rescuer of a mad boy. I'm going home to my garden.

But, of course, that was not what he had done.

He'd gone asking about number Twelve Grimmauld Place, but if it had existed, none of the neighbours seemed to be able to remember precisely where. One of them, a scrawny old woman in track pants who smelled of cigarettes, eventually recalled that there had been someone living next door who had vanished without a trace. A long-haired lout who always wore funny clothes, and a boy who'd walked past her house every day, with a face "messed-up something awful." But she could not provide any more information, and Frank parted with a dreary feeling that he had hit an impassable chasm in what should have been the simple act of delivering a letter.

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In the village of Ottery St Catchpole, Frank Bryce stopped at the post office and asked for directions to the farmstead run by the Weasley family. The lady at the desk was a tiny, mousy girl with enormous spectacles. She tipped her head on one side like a squirrel and said, "Don't know that name, sir, I'm sorry."

"Weasley," Frank wheezed, leaning on his cane, "W – E – A –"

"No, sorry, sir, there's no one in the village with that name," the woman put her hands overtop of one another and peered at him. "Are you sure you've got it right? You're not thinking of Weatherby? They run the butchers just down the road…"

"No, it's definitely Weasley," said Frank, feeling gloomy now. Not another dead end. Surely he hadn't come all this way only to find the people he was looking for had moved out? Was it possible Frank was in the wrong village? But there was nowhere else for miles… "I think sometimes the farmstead is known as the Burrow," he said, trying to remember everything Harry had told him about his school friends, which was quite a lot.

The mousy girl scratched her chin with her nails, which were bitten down to stubs. "You know, now you mention it," she looked at the ceiling thoughtfully for a moment, "I think maybe there could be a place like that round here somewhere. Burrow, you said?"

"That's right," Frank knew his patience was not going to last much longer.

"Yes, we had a couple of funny folk come in last year asking after a Burrow," the girl nodded. "Dodgy pair, really, all done up like they was in a parade of something, big bright jackets as long as their ankles and these hats all pointy-like, you know, like ladies used to wear in medieval times. You know the sort, with the veils hanging down, only they didn't have no veils."

"I know," said Frank, gripping his cane and longing to hit someone. "Did they find this Burrow Place?"

"Yeah, turned out they were looking for that odd family, the ones that live way up in the forest," the mousy girl said, nodding. "Funny lot. Hardly ever see them around, keep to themselves, I guess. The red-haired fellow comes down to buy things from the mechanics store. His wife uses the phone box outside sometimes. They got about twenty kids, I reckon, she seems to have a different one with her every time she comes."

"That sounds like the people I'm looking for," said Frank, feeling a bit more at ease. "Could you give me directions to their house?"

"Um, yes, I suppose so," said the girl in a procrastinating manner. She took her time finding a spare piece of paper to draw a map on as if she hoped Frank would get bored and go away. Frank stood resolutely in place. Finally she pushed a quick sketch of the village roads across the counter to him and indicated the directions with her pen. "That should take you straight there," she finished.

"Thank you," said Frank. His grip on his walking stick relaxed. Finally he was getting somewhere.

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By the time he had reached the top of the hill, Frank felt as if his old bones were finally ready to give way. His bad leg ached so much the other leg was starting to hurt just out of sympathy. At last, as he came around a bend in the rugged farm track that the girl at the post office had directed him to, he paused to look upon the strangest house he had ever seen.

It was several stories high, but looked as if a good strong breeze might send it toppling into its own hodge-podge vegetable garden. Each storey seemed to be made out of something different, and there were windows popping out at random intervals, as if drawn on by a child with no sense of architectural aesthetics. The roof was thatched, and several chimneys stuck out the top, bent and shabby as if they were held together by nothing more than paperclips. In the yard, chickens were pecking about in clusters. They fled as Frank approached, clucking loudly.

Frank was only halfway across the yard when the front door opened and a stout, red-haired boy come out. He was wearing a dark blue home-knitted sweater and pointing something at Frank. For a terrifying moment Frank thought it might be a gun, but then he realised it was nothing more than a small rod, or a stick of some kind. When the boy saw Frank he lowered the rod at once.

"Hello! Sorry about that, anti-intruder alarms blaring off and all, thought you might be…well, never mind. You from the village?" he called cheerily, stowing the strange stick into his back pocket.

Frank, rather out of breath, paused a few feet away from the boy and said. "No, I'm a visitor."

"Yes, I rather gathered that," said the boy. "I mean, are you our kind or not?"

"I don't know what you mean," said Frank, feeling a little irritated and wishing the boy would invite him inside. Children were so inconsiderate.

"That'd be a no, then," shrugged the boy with a quick wink. "Are you lost?"

Frank straightened up. "No, I'm not lost. I'm looking for Weasleys."

The boy raised his eyebrows as if he didn't quite believe Frank was telling the truth. "Well, you found us."

"That's good to know," Frank tried not to sound sarcastic. "Couldn't you offer me a cup of tea or something, lad? I've just walked all the way up your blasted hill."

To his great annoyance, the boy seemed to think about this for a while before finally saying, a little reluctantly, "Alright, come inside, then." He stepped back onto the threshold, not even holding the door open for Frank, who followed him inside.

Within the house, it was just as curious as outside. The kitchen Frank was standing in reminded him very much of a burrow of some kind, which explained the name. The walls were hung with every conceivable utensil, and so many types of vegetables and dried herbs Frank did not think he could pick them all, and he was a gardener. The only clear surface was the wooden table in the centre, and he sunk gratefully into a spindly chair beside it.

"Who is it, George?"

Frank looked up and blinked. He rubbed his eyes, wondering if the blood had gone to his head too fast. The boy who had met him at the door had been joined by a second boy who was identical in every way, right down to the last freckle, except that he was wearing a dark yellow sweater instead of blue.

"I dunno," the first boy, George, glanced at Frank with just as much irritation as Frank was feeling. "Some old codger from the village, I think. Probably wants to talk to Dad about all those toenail clippers he ordered from the chemist the other day."

"Excuse me," said Frank loudly. "I'm not completely deaf, you know."

Both boys looked at him as though they had forgotten he could talk. George's twin opened his mouth to say something, but just then a third red-haired boy came into the kitchen behind him, this new one wearing horn rimmed glasses and an austere expression. Frank remembered what the man at the post-office had said about the Weasleys having twenty children, and had a strange vision of twenty red-haired babies down a rabbit hole.

"If you don't mind taking a hand in controlling our sister," the austere boy said haughtily. "She's making an awful racket through the wall and I'm trying to read…who on earth is that?" his eyes fell on Frank and he jumped as if he'd been given a quick electric shock.

A fourth redhead entered the room, this one a girl carrying a small tin which was rattling loudly. "Oh, Percy, stop complaining, I was just tidying up. Look, Fred! I caught another Doxy in my room, d'you want it…?" Then she saw Frank and said, "Oh!" in a rather bemused voice. "Who's that?" she quickly shoved the rattling tin into her pocket, out of sight.

"I'm Frank Bryce," said Frank angrily, "and I am bone-weary and would appreciate a cup of tea, if somebody would oblige."

The two twins looked at each other. Frank distinctly heard Fred mutter, "What're we supposed to do? I don't know how to use the kettle without mag-"

"Oh, for goodness' sake," said the girl, pushing past her brothers and going to fill the kettle from the sink. Frank noticed that the tap turned on without her touching it, and shook his head, "Did you come here about Dad's toenail clippers?" the girl asked Frank politely.

"No," said Frank. "No, I just came looking for Weasleys. I was sent by a boy called Harry Potter."

There was a very loud crash as the girl dropped the kettle into the sink, breaking several dishes that had been underneath it. Fred and George, who had been whispering to each other, each turned their heads so sharply they looked like a pair of owls, especially as their eyes had grown as wide and round as billiard balls. The girl was staring at Frank with her mouth hanging open, apparently unaware that the tap was still gushing water all over her hands.

One of the twins, Fred, stepped back, stuck his head out the door, and bellowed, "Ron! Ron, Hermione, get down here quick! This is so urgent you wouldn't believe!"

George was still gaping at Frank as if he had sprouted an extra head. "Say that again," he said, gulping. "Say it with a straight face."

"I was sent by Harry Potter," Frank swelled proudly at the reaction these words produced.

"Blimey, he's not joking," said the boy, shaking his head.

There came the loud thumping of heavy footsteps on the stairs, and a third red-haired boy, lankier and slightly taller than the first two, emerged into the kitchen. A bushy-haired girl still trying to pull her hair into a ponytail followed him.

"What? What is it?" the new boy said. He looked younger than his two brothers, but was already nearly as tall as them. The bushy-haired girl's hair-band snapped and in impatient irritation she pushed her hair back from her face.

"Say it again," George nodded eagerly. "Say it, go on!"

"I was sent by Harry Potter," repeated Frank for the third time.

The new boy, Ron, simply stared at him for a moment. The bushy-haired girl grabbed his arm, and said in a squeaky voice, "Is he serious?"

"Course I'm serious," said Frank. "And I can tell you exactly how serious I am, if someone would only hurry up and serve me my ruddy tea."

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The tea had a strong flavour, and smelled of musk. Frank sipped it out of a bowl-like teacup with two handles, as the children moved around him in a slow shuffle, pretending to clean the dishes or rearrange stacks of old newspapers but unable to take their eyes off him. Percy was pretending to read a book but he hadn't turned any pages and he kept flicking glances at Frank. They were all speaking in whispers like people in a museum and saying funny words like "Floo" that Frank thought might have been Welsh or something. He drained the teacup and placed it back onto the table.

It was as if everyone else had been holding his or her breath. They dropped their feigned activities and leapt to the table at once.

"Well?" one of the twins – Frank had already forgotten which was which – asked impatiently. "Don't keep us in suspense, my good man!"

Frank cleared his throat. The children leaned forward. Frank put his hands together on the table. "I'm a gardener," he said. "I've been befriended by your young Mr Potter over the past few weeks and he has told me all he can about his situation. When he first contacted me he sent me this," Frank took the yellowed, brown-splodged letter and flattened it out on the table, "to give to his Godfather. But I haven't been able to locate the man. I'm hoping you can help."

He folded his arms again and there was a quick tussle for the letter. One of the twins snatched it out of the other's hand while Ron and Ginny both slapped each other's wrists to reach it first. Percy and Hermione were simply pushed aside. The twin with the letter (it might have been George) held it out of their reach and read it aloud. When he had finished, everyone returned their gaze to Frank.

"Sirius Black. Where's he?" Ron asked, glancing at his twin brothers. "He's friends with Professor Jones, isn't he? Can she find him?"

"Don't look at us, we don't know," Fred shrugged. "We don't spend our detentions rummaging through her address book."

"We should call Dad. I bet Mr Black's in the Order," Ginny piped up.

"Father is on business with his group," Percy said, frowning at his sister. Percy did have a point; since they knew Frank would be going straight back to close contact with Death Eaters, spreading information about the Order was not a sensible course of action. "He won't be back for several days yet. We shouldn't bother him, he sounded very distressed when he left, and he said something awful had happened in the group. And Mother said she's coming home tomorrow night…"

"But Mum said we're not allowed to use the fireplace, the Floo network's too risky at the moment!"

"This is an emergency," Ron pointed out.

"All the more reason we cannot take the chance of being overheard in the fireplace," Percy said.

"You won't mind staying for the night until Mrs Weasley gets home? She can contact Mr Black," Hermione said, turning entreatingly to Frank.

Frank, who had completely lost track of the conversation once everyone had begun talking about fireplaces, blanched and shook his head. "I can't," he said helplessly. "The caretaker of the house where Harry is being held will be suspicious if I'm not back tomorrow. I'll have to catch a bus in the morning just to make I return in time as it is."

A worried groan ran around the circle. Hermione waved her hand to silence them. "It's alright," she said, though she sounded flustered. "Mr Bryce can tell us everything we need to know and we'll pass it on," she looked at Frank hopefully. "Can't you, Mr Bryce?"

"Of course," said Frank. "The estate where I work is situated above a little-" and here he paused, as if something had just occurred to him. He began again, "Above a place called…" and again, he stopped mid-sentence. A frown spread across his face. "I've come from-" but he seemed to have forgotten what he was trying to say. All the children tersely waited, but though Frank opened his mouth, no words came out.

"Has he fallen asleep?" Fred asked, cutting through the silence. "Poke him, Ginny, wake him up."

"I am not asleep!" Frank protested angrily. "What I was trying to say was…" but what he was trying to say would not come to him. He tried to say, Harry's in Little Hangleton, and he tried to say, guarded by Peter Pettigrew, but as the words reached his jaw they seemed to slip away from him and his tongue lay limply in his mouth. "Damn it!" he said furiously, balling his fists.

Hermione gave a little gasp. "Oh! It's a jinx," she said faintly. Everyone turned to look at her, but she was staring at Frank with a look of great concentration. "Or more than one. It won't let you tell us anything – anything of value," she put her hands to her mouth and looked at the ceiling for a moment like someone doing arithmetic in their head. Then she leapt up and dashed out of the room, crying, "Just hold on for a moment!"

"What?" Frank said, watching the faces of the other children, who looked just as confused as he felt. "What's she talking about?"

Percy straightened his glasses. "It must be mighty complex," he said sullenly. "To differentiate between useful information and ordinary speech. We've never learned anything that complex at school."

"What, you mean you can't cast it, Perce?" one the twins said sarcastically. "Fancy that! It must be fabulous if soon-to-be-Head-Boy Percy can't!"

"No," Hermione's voice cut off the argument before it could begin. She had come back into the room carrying a heavy book with the title displayed in spidery writing.

"That's my NEWT level Defence book!" Percy said indignantly.

"Yes, I got it from your room." Hermione waved him off without taking her eyes away from the book. "It must be a whole layer of jinxes," Hermione muttered to the room in general. "To keep you from revealing Harry's location. As long as you're under the jinx, you won't be able to describe the location or give directions to it."

"Jinx?" Frank repeated, "What is this nonsense?"

"You mean there's no way for him to tell us anything?" Ron said in horror overtop of Frank.

"It's not infallible," Hermione shook her head and sat down at the table with the book. She also pulled out a notepad and poised her pencil over it. Fred and George leaned over to read the open spell-book while Percy peered over their shoulders to make sure it was being treated properly. Hermione pointed to the paragraph she was reading from. "It says here that the simplest way to get around such jinxes is to talk to someone who isn't under the jinx but who will know the information without realising it is important. They mean, Mr Bryce, that you direct us to someone who knows the name of the…town, I assume is what you were trying to say before…but isn't under the jinx. Anyone who lives there would suffice. But…" she trailed off, thinking to herself.

Frank was totally lost. He remembered all the times Harry had spouted rubbish about magic and curses. So these children believed in the same things?

"Right, then!" Fred stood up. "This is simple enough. He can show us to the village."

"I'll go get the car," added George, also getting to his feet.

"No!" Hermione cried, so anxiously that the twins sat down together with a bump. "Because he's bound to be enchanted with that curse that makes you forget where you're going – don't you remember the one Professor Lupin told us about at the start of the year, Ron?" she asked.

Ron shook his head blankly.

"As soon as Mr Bryce tries to lead anyone back to the location in the curse – in this case, wherever Harry is – he'll forget where it is!" Hermione explained.

"Then we have to take that risk," Ron shrugged. "There's a chance he's not under the curse, isn't there?"

"Ron, do you really think the Death Eaters won't have done something to keep him from leading people back to Harry?" Hermione said in exasperation. "Professor Lupin said the curse would make a person forget permanently! So Mr Bryce won't be able to ever get back, and of course the Death Eaters will know there's been a breach of their security and that will only make things worse for Harry – whatever we do we have to make sure they don't get an inkling that Mr Bryce has gone searching for help. He'll have to go back to Harry alone, before anyone gets suspicious…all we can do is work around the jinxes to find out where he is…oh, this is going to be difficult…"

"Slow down. You were talking about a Professor Lupin?" asked Frank suddenly. Everything returned their attention to him. Hermione nodded hurriedly.

Frank scratched his chin. "Not a Professor Remus Lupin?"

"Yeah…you know him?" Ron said eagerly.

"Professor Remus Lupin, the statistician?"

The red-haired children remained blank, but Hermione gave out a trilling laugh. "He's not a statistician, he's a wiz… I mean, a schoolteacher," she said. "A statistician is like a muggle mathematician," she explained to the confused Weasleys. "He deals with statistics, you see?" But none of them seemed to know what this word meant.

"I'd be bloody surprised if there were two Professor Remus Lupins," Fred said, wrinkling his nose. "Not exactly a common combination of names, is it?"

"Was he youngish?" Hermione asked Frank. "Brownish, greying hair? Soft-spoken?"

"Thoroughly in need of a good anti-aging potion?" George added.

Frank nodded to Hermione. "That sounds like the bloke. He was living in the local motel for a couple of weeks in June. I met him buying groceries. The rest of the town didn't really trust him – being an outsider, and all – and I'm, er, not too friendly with them myself, so we got to talking. He said he was taking statistics on local schools. It all sounded rather boring but I remember him because of the funny name. I imagine he would know everything you need, if he is the fellow you are talking about."

"Oh!" Ginny squeaked, flapping her hands in excitement. "Dad said that Professor Lupin had been spying for the Order-"

"The group," Percy corrected her.

"-and he was pretending to work for Fenrir Greyback! Dad says that Professor Lupin told him he was living with muggles to find out about large groups of muggle children!" her voice faded a little. "You know…because Mr Greyback was planning to attack the orphanage…"

Hermione had been scribbling in her notepad every few moments, and now her head shot up. She was grinning. "Then we can easily get around the jinx! Professor Lupin will know what the name of the town is – and he won't be under any enchantment! We can tell the Order – I mean the group, Percy – as soon as your mum gets home!"

The atmosphere in the room was crackling with excitement. Ginny was clinging to George's arm and beaming at Frank. Fred flashed Percy a grin and punched him teasingly, and even Percy had to return a triumphant smile. Ron thumped Hermione on the back, winding her on the edge of the table.

"The Aurors will be able to rescue him, just as soon as they know where he is," Hermione said once she had recovered her breath and brushed off Ron's apology.

"I can't wait to meet him for real, with you guys always talking about him," Ginny said wistfully.

And I would like to see this adventure done and finished, Frank thought to himself.

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A large bag of shopping lay abandoned by the door. Outside, a few stars were pricking the azure evening sky. Molly Weasley, still wrapped up in her well-worn travelling cloak and with a home-knitted scarf draped around her neck, was sitting at the kitchen table. In her hand was a yellowed piece of paper, torn, wrinkled, brittle, and covered in a rough scrawl in a blotchy dark brown. Molly's hand holding the letter was trembling, and her other hand was raised as if she had meant to cup her mouth and forgotten halfway through the action.

"Mum, you should go and tell the Order right now!" Ron stood behind his mother, his face still bright and rosy with excitement. Hermione was leaning on the table beside him. "We'll ask Professor Lupin where he's been in June and they can rescue Harry at once – the Death Eaters won't suspect a thing…"

His mother gave a tiny gasp like a hiccough and closed her eyes.

"Mrs Weasley?" Hermione asked, frowning in concern. "What is it?"

Molly Weasley's empty hand went to her chest and closed over her heart. Ron looked startled and rubbed her shoulder, asking her if she was ill. His mother shook her head, placed the letter on the table, and told them the news that she had only that day procured. That Professor Lupin was dead.

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Hermione was sleeping in a room with Ginny, but her bed was empty and Ron found her sitting on the stairs up to the attic with her knees drawn right up to her nose. It was nearly midnight, and the rest of the children had gone to bed, but Hermione was still wearing her daywear. In the candlelight her hair looked limp and dusty like clothes that had not been worn for many years, and her eyes were dulled and unfocused.

"Mum's taking the letter to Harry's Godfather," Ron said, uncertain as to whether or not Hermione had even noticed he was there. "And the Order is going to check the destinations of all the muggle bus routes that go past our village. She said they're hopeful…they've got a lot of new clues to go on, I mean…"

Hermione didn't move. Ron held out a dressing gown, feeling hopeless. She didn't take it.

But after a moment she spoke. "I really thought he was coming home. We messed up, didn't we?" she whispered.

Ron let his arm drop to his side where the dressing gown pooled on the wooden floorboards. He looked over Hermione's head at the dark attic stairs and swallowed audibly. "Yeah," he said, his voice cracking at the end. "I think we did."

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Harry looked out the window every evening before he went to bed, waiting to see smoke drifting from the chimney of Frank's cottage. It was such a stone-age signal, smoke. An ancient wind-borne messenger, with such a medley of meanings originating from fire. To Harry, the smoke meant only that Frank was back, and to him that meant everything.

When he saw the light in Frank's window and the smoke in the air on the evening of the fifth day since the old gardener had left, he tried to rush out and visit him at once. It wasn't until he nearly ran smack into the brick wall blocking the stairwell that he realised the sensible option if he did not wish to rouse Wormtail's suspicions was to stay put until the morning. He could barely sleep that night.

Frank had risen early and was pottering around the old wattle tree with its cleft trunk when the boy came rushing out to find him. Harry peered between the two diverging arms of the tree and called to Frank. The old man was not as deaf as he often pretended to be, and he looked up at once.

"Hello, lad," he said simply. "They're on their way."

It felt as if something in his brain had snapped. He had to lean against the tree just to keep himself upright, his vision swimming for a moment as if a sheet of electricity had passed across his eyes. After almost a minute, in which Frank leaned against his spade and waited patiently, Harry spoke.

"Sirius?" he croaked. "Sirius is coming?"

"I didn't see your godfather," Frank amended hurriedly. "But I met your friends Mr Weasley and Miss Granger. They promised to pass on your letter. There was rather a hiccough on the way – I seem to be under a sort of hypnosis or something of the like, lad. Mrs Granger says everything's sorted out."

Harry nodded dumbly. Home…I'm going home…

A week passed, and then another. There was a new moon passing invisibly across the sky and the heat was making Frank's hand-watered lawns wither and become tipped with brown. Harry sat outside every day, even when he burned in the sun and his nose peeled. And no one came. No message. No Sirius.

"Perhaps something's happened," Harry said, more to himself than to Frank, though the two of them were side by side, weeding the marigolds. "You don't…think it was possible the Death Eaters followed you? They might have attacked the Burrow after you left…!"

Frank, still unsure of what a Death Eater was, said that he thought it was unlikely.

"You're sure they understood where I was? Perhaps there was a mix-up. Perhaps they don't really know at all."

Frank could not think of any way to alleviate these fears, so he just muttered something about thinking positively.

Harry tried. But all the fears he had were really just there to drown out one endless, resonating terror. Hermione and Ron would surely have given Sirius his letter, and Frank seemed sure they had known how to discover Harry's location. But still Sirius had not come. For nearly a year, Harry had managed to deny this one possibility that had grown and expanded over the months, and now it was almost to enormous to keep down. There were no more excuses.

His godfather was not coming for him.

It's not that he doesn't love you, Harry told himself firmly, but after all, he must have decided you were dead. He's gone on with his life. Harry briefly imagined Sirius married to a luminous blonde with three children and felt his stomach wriggle. When he heard you were alive he was probably just very shocked. Of course he still loves you, he just – he's moved on – it's to be expected, he told himself. Without you to look after, he's been able to get a real life. A job, a family. Be a real wizard again, and it's better this way. Harry squeezed his eyes shut for a moment to try and drive the thoughts out of his head, but they continued regardless. Don't worry, you can live at Hogwarts. You'll be happier there anyway – it's what you wanted, isn't it? To get away from Sirius and be with other wizards and witches your own age?

The thoughts went round and round in his head. Sirius has moved on with his life…it's what you wanted, isn't it? They were driving him mad. He stabbed at the hard, dry earth with a small digging fork, prying out a particularly deep-rooted weed. It's not that he doesn't love you…Harry roared in frustration, twisting the handle of the digging fork. With a crack, it broke and he was left with the useless bit of wood in his hand, his brain red with slow-burning rage.

Frank looked over at him, concerned.

"We have to finish the ladder," Harry declared firmly. "That's the only way out."

Frank nodded and handed him a trowel to replace the fork.

But it was easier said than done. The ladder of iron pots and pans was half-finished, but Frank had begged or borrowed all the spare cast-iron saucers in the whole village, and was having trouble finding more. The townspeople found his new collection very odd, but put it down to senility, which was lucky, because it meant Frank's strange new obsession with cookware did not reach the ears of Wormtail via the village grocer.

It took another week and a half of solid work to finish the ladder, not to mention a good dent out of Frank's savings. Harry was stunned to hear that it was ready, but his delight overrode his nervousness at the thought of actually using the now-complete ladder. By that time September had arrived, the moon was waxing again and Harry had to explain that it would be better if he climbed over the wall once it was on the wane. To prevent any accidents if he got stuck outside during the full moon, he said.

"What? You'll turn into a pumpkin after midnight?" Frank laughed.

"Something like that," Harry replied seriously. He was looking – and, truth-be-told, feeling – undeniably ill. The crushing disappointment of the undelivered rescue had put him off his food and left him acting jumpy and on edge. He wanted to take a risk, and he wanted to do it as soon as possible. Only a firm stand by his better sense – what Sirius had always called his mother's sensibilities – reminded him of what might happen if he was caught out, roaming alone, during the full moon.

And then the men in black cloaks came back.

------------------------------------------------

They were in the hallway when Harry came down the stairs one morning. Four of them, two with their hoods pulled up and white masks covering their faces. They were speaking quickly with their shoulders almost touching, and had no inkling that they were being spied upon by anyone. Wormtail was nowhere in sight.

"Are you certain this is wise?" one of the unmasked men was saying. He had pale silvery hair, cold grey eyes and an austere expression. "Such a large gathering. Is it really safe?"

"You question the Dark Lord's bidding?" one of his masked companions replied sharply, and Harry realised it was a woman. He voice, heavy as rich wine, sounded familiar.

"Not at all, Bellatrix," the grey-eyed man replied smoothly. "I merely wonder if it is necessary for us all to be present. We still have no clue as to the spectacle we are to see tonight."

"The Dark Lord wishes us all to be present, and we obey," the other masked person said in a croaky voice. The grey-eyed man sneered for a moment but did not make any further objections. The conversation grew too low for Harry to hear any more. He crept backwards up the stairs until he was out of sight and then sped back to his room.

Pressing his face to the glass of his window, he saw that more strangers was coming up the driveway – this time, Harry recognised one of them. It was the burly, cruel-faced man with the hoarse voice who had been visiting the month before. Three ragged men and an equally ragged woman accompanied him. Harry pulled the curtains shut and tried to think what to do.

Something was happening. The secrets of the Riddle House were not going to remain secret much longer, not if there were people swarming over it, in plain sight of the house's prisoner. In that case, what was going to be done with Harry? Was he going to be moved to a new location? Away from Frank? But it had taken him so long just to get this far with his plans! They couldn't be ruined now!

Tonight. Whatever was happening, it was happening tonight, during the full moon.

Harry slipped back down the stairs as quietly as he could, but the hall was empty. He stepped lightly through the kitchen, which was likewise empty, but he could hear voices in the front hall. He went through into the dusty old side parlour, opened the door a crack, and peeped through.

Wormtail and at least six black-cloaked figures were in the hallway. Wormtail was opening the door, and the burly, cruel-faced man was standing on the threshold.

"You weren't summoned, Fenrir," someone behind Wormtail said angrily.

The man at the door grinned his ugly grin. "I'm tired of waiting. I've come for my due. Me and my boys will be your guests tonight. Don't worry, we won't get in your way."

Harry pulled the door shut just as the burly man pushed past Wormtail into the hall. He pressed himself against the wall behind the china cabinet as a moment later the door into the parlour opened and the whole group, black-cloaked figures and ragged, bad-smelling folk as well, marched through into the kitchen. Harry, hidden by the cabinet, remained hidden. He noticed Wormtail was not in the group and darted out of his hiding place and through into the front hall.

Wormtail was just shutting the door, looking ashen at his sudden profusion of visitors. Harry went straight up and demanded Wormtail let him outside. "All those people are scaring me," he said, which was true, even if it was not the real reason he needed to leave the house.

Wormtail did not have the heart to even try to protest. "Y-you're to knock when you want to come i-in," was the most authority he could manage. "I-I'm locking the door behind you."

As soon as Wormtail had closed the door behind him, Harry sprinted to Frank's cottage and hammered on the window. He kept at it until Frank appeared on he other side of the glass and threw it open, looking grim and frightened.

"What's going on?" the old man growled. "There's a load of bloody louts marching past my front door! I'm not coming out until they're gone!"

"You have to come out," Harry said, breathless and rubbing his knuckles. They'd been bruised from knocking on the window. "You have to help me with the iron ladder."

"What?"

"I'm leaving," Harry panted. "Now. And you better come with me, because there's going to be hell to pay when they find me gone."

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TBC

A/N: Sorry this chapter is so long in coming, school has started again and I have a bunch of small children to look after. Also I think I bankrupted my brain writing it. I've rarely liked a chapter less then this one. There are about a million things that I know are just not logical, they just don't make sense but it would nearly take a complete rewriting of the past five chapters to fix it…so think of this chapter as a draft…which means you're welcome to act as editors and tell me exactly where it's going so wrong.

And I know it seems like I've put in another pointless dead end with Hermione and Ron basing their rescue of information from Lupin. I make no excuse. I hope it will have some relevance in the finale, because everything is supposed to have some relevance by the time I wrap things up. And look! Things are happening! Things are really happening at last! Oh, joy and buttercakes.

My love to reviewers!

Cheers for today.