Chapter 8: The Ghost, the Monster, and the Mother
"Hurricane" by 30 Seconds to Mars.
"Knockturn Alley?!"
Mrs. Weasley was beside herself in an early morning Order meeting. McGonagall had called the meeting when she saw that a new picture of Harry, Ron, and Hermione covered the front page of the Daily Prophet.
"And Death Eaters sighted in the area?!" Mrs. Weasley continued venting her outrage. "First they're found outside Azkaban, and now this?! What are they doing, Minerva?!"
"Your guess remains as good as mine, Molly," McGonagall answered as calmly as she could, "or any of ours."
"Their hideouts really weren't so illogical," Remus chimed in, earning a startled, disapproving look from Mrs. Weasley. "Those places were the last places anyone would have expected to find them. It's just bad luck that the Death Eaters did."
"Bad luck?!" Mrs. Weasley repeated. "Bad luck?! How much 'bad luck' can three children have?"
"They're not children, Molly," Remus said. "They're the same age we were when we started forming the Order."
"They formed Dumbledore's Army two years ago!" Ginny interjected vehemently, "Harry was hit with his first Unforgivable at age one! I was possessed at eleven! Hermione was petrified at twelve! Harry, Ron, and Hermione have nearly been killed more times than most others their age have attempteda Patronus!"
"Ginny!" Mr. Weasley pulled his daughter to him, holding her tightly. "It's okay, Ginny. It'll be okay…"
"No it won't," Ginny sobbed weakly. "Even if they aren't killed, their lives are already ruined… The pain… The death… The fighting… Even if they survive, what will they have left?" Mr. Weasley stared down at his daughter as though he'd never seen her clearly before. His youngest child in so much pain, and there was little he could do about it.
"They'll have us, Ginny," he whispered. "They'll always have all of us." Remus stared at Ginny and her father with stinging eyes. He remembered when Arthur Weasley had said those same words to Molly, when James and Lily went into hiding from Voldemort.
"Ron, let's stop down here," Harry said. "We need to rest. Hermione's going to fall of the broom soon." Ron looked from Harry to Hermione and nodded. They descended slowly, landing on a quiet residential street and promptly storing the brooms back in their bags.
"We'll need to find a place where we can change clothes, before we get much more daylight," Harry said quietly.
"Turn right at the end of the block," Hermione mumbled groggily. Harry glanced back at her.
"How do you—"
"We're near my house," Hermione answered the unfinished question. "My parents are staying with friends of theirs, out of town."
"A real house?" Ron asked longingly, "With furniture, and food, and water? Getting chased out of Knockturn Alley was worth it!" Harry couldn't help but laugh. He had to agree.
The Grangers' house was clean and cozy, with a faint smell of vanilla in the air from scented candles placed throughout the house. Hermione put various wards and Locking Spells on all the doors and windows while Ron and Harry helped themselves to the various sugar-free snacks, fruits, and biscuits in the kitchen. They brought their findings back to the living room, where they all climbed on a long, comfortable couch together. They didn't actually eat much of the food. They all fell asleep too fast.
"Why didn't they just come here to begin with?" The dark-eyed cloaked man grumbled. "If she knew her parents weren't here—"
"Then they wouldn't have already destroyed two Horcruxes, and attempted a third," the light-eyed cloaked man said brightly, his cheery attitude offending his companion more than his actual statement.
"Do you know when her parents are coming back?" The dark-eyed man inquired.
"Oh, not for quite some time," the light-eyed man answered. "I advised them to lie low after Harry told Hermione and Ron about the Horcruxes. After all, being muggles, they couldn't very well defend themselves."
"So you know where they are?" The dark-eyed man prodded.
"No, and neither does she," the light-eyed man answered more briskly.
"I suppose the least she and her parents know of each other, the better," the dark-eyed man conceded.
"No need to create more worry than necessary," the light-eyed man said. "She'll be fine once we speak with her." The dark-eyed man laughed darkly.
"Do you remember what it was like back then?" He asked.
"I can't know for sure if I do, nor can you," the light-eyed man replied. "No one should truly remember until she returns."
"If she gets there," the dark-eyed man said coolly.
"She was there," the light-eyed man said, smiling. "I only hope to see your face when you remember her." The dark-eyed man said nothing. "She put up strong wards," the light-eyed man said, looking back at the Grangers' house. "We'd better start disarming them."
The late-afternoon sun reflected off Hermione's slightly damp hair. She, Harry, and Ron were finally clean and dressed after their flight from Knockturn Alley, and happily dining on their first good, balanced meal since they fled Bill and Fleur's wedding reception. The three of them were throwing around ideas of how to break into the Department of Mysteries again when a sudden chill spread through the room. Harry drew his wand within the second.
"What was that?" Ron asked no one in particular, drawing his own wand. Hermione also drew her wand as she, Harry, and Ron stood and looked around the room. A moment later, all three of their wands ripped free from their hands and flew across the room. Harry made a dive for his own wand, but found he couldn't move. His feet were rooted on the spot. He looked over at Ron and Hermione and saw they seemed to share the same problem. That is, until their stomachs all dropped as one when a ghost walked into the room.
"I'm sorry I had to do that," Albus Dumbledore said as he removed his long hooded cloak and adjusted his half-moon spectacles over his light eyes, "but the way you three have been fighting lately, I dared not spark such chaos as I would have, had I entered otherwise." It was hard to tell if Harry, Ron, or Hermione took in a word he said. They were all three blinking at him, as though willing a hallucination to disappear. After a moment, they were blinking back tears.
"I watched you die," Harry said softly. "I watched you fall off the Astronomy Tower. Everyone saw you, dead, at the bottom. We were at your funeral."
"I cannot apologize enough for what I had to put you all through," Dumbledore said solemnly. "But I can explain why I had to, and why Severus had to—"
"Snape killed you!" Harry snapped, angry at whoever this imposter was for daring to pose as Dumbledore.
"That's what you all had to think, Harry," Dumbledore said, though his own eyes glistened for the pain in the three young faces before him. "We planned all along to explain the plan to you three, but we had to wait for the right time. That's why we've been following you since you left the wedding. We were there outside Azkaban. We sent you the note about R.A.B.—"
"We?" Harry interrupted. A moment later, Hermione uttered a small scream. Snape had emerged from a room beside her, removing his own hooded cloak and looking at them all with his dark eyes sharp and alert.
"YOU MONSTER," Hermione shrieked soon afterwards. "I TRUSTED YOU! I DEFENDED YOU! WHEN NO ONE ELSE BELIEVED IN YOU, I DID! YOU TREATED US LIKE GARBAGE, BUT I RESPECTED YOU! YOU COWARDLY, MANIPULATIVE MONSTER!"
When Hermione stopped to catch her breath, Dumbledore addressed her carefully. "Now, Hermione, if Severus had done what you believe he did, and I was an imposter, don't you think you would be receiving a very different response?" Hermione glared at him at first, but she visibly calmed before she responded.
"From the first time Harry followed the notes written in that potions book, by the Half-Blood Prince, I knew something wasn't right," she said. "While Harry and Ron were enjoying using some of the notes and spells, I was trying to figure out who he was. I found and article about Eileen Prince, but couldn't find anything more. Then there was that incident with the Sectumsempra Curse. That kind of dark magic, written amongst other notes that had seemed so harmless, even helpful…"
"Hermione," Dumbledore began, "that—"
"I set fire to your robes in first year," Hermione suddenly confessed, turning to Snape, who stared back at her intensely. "I thought you were the one jinxing Harry's broom, not Quirrel. In second year, I was the one who broke into your stores to make Polyjuice Potion, so we could get inside the Slytherin common room, to find out more about the Chamber. In third year, I figured out the truth about Remus, after I was the only one to do your werewolf essay, but I kept his secret. I used the time-turner I'd been using to take extra classes to go back in time with Harry, to save Buckbeak and Sirius. So, I lost you the Order of Merlin. In fifth year, I convinced Umbridge to take Harry and me into the forest, where we could get the centaurs to take her away from us." Snape stared at Hermione with a strange look in his eyes that made both Ron and Harry shift uneasily. Hermione stared up at him defiantly.
"Is that enough for you?" She asked coldly, "Enough to kill me now?" Harry could've sworn he saw the slightest flicker of a smile across Snape's face before Snape's stare moved from Hermione to Dumbledore.
"Perhaps she can handle it," he conceded, crisply and calmly as ever. Dumbledore definitely smiled.
"Ron," he said. "If you have nothing else to vent, as your friends have, we have quite a lot to discuss in a very short time."
Though they were still unarmed, Harry, Ron, and Hermione were at least free of the spell that had initially bound them, and they were sitting tensely on the Grangers' couch in the living room. Dumbledore was seated in an armchair across from them. Snape was standing against the wall behind the chair. Dumbledore had been explaining his actions before the night of the Hogwarts attack to his three students, and he had just come to the part before he called Harry to his office, before they went after the Horcrux.
"How could you have survived that night?" Harry asked plainly.
"Because that wasn't me," Dumbledore answered. The trio gaped at him.
"Then who was it?" Ron asked.
"Narcissa Malfoy," Dumbledore answered.
"What?!" The trio spoke as one.
"But she initiated the Unbreakable Vow with Snape, to protect Draco," Harry said.
"And the vow was kept," Dumbledore said. "Not in the way she initially intended, but in a way she diverted to." Harry, Ron, and Hermione continued to stare at Dumbledore in a stunned silence. They all jumped when Snape picked up the story.
"I chose to engage Narcissa's request for the Unbreakable Vow because I knew she would word the vow carefully, especially with Bellatrix present. Narcissa and I understood each other. She knew the Dark Lord was using Draco to punish Lucius, and she knew Draco was no Death Eater. As much as he may seem like his father, he's not. Narcissa worded the vow in such a way as to shut her sister up, but leave me in control.
"She asked that, in the event that Draco couldn't carry out the Dark Lord's orders to commit murder, I take over the job. Bellatrix doesn't know Draco like his mother and I do. Narcissa and I knew then that Draco was no murderer, and thus couldn't follow the Dark Lord's orders. Most of my vow was upheld in that instant."
"There was one more hurdle, however," Dumbledore said. "I had to die. Harry, you heard the person you thought was me offer the Order's protection to Draco and, if possible, his parents. Severus had already passed that message to Narcissa, in secret. She went to Azkaban to confront Lucius, but he was furious with her for considering the offer."
"So she told Lucius that Draco felt the same way he did," Snape continued. "But she said she couldn't take it anymore. She told him she would run away and kill herself before the Dark Lord or another Death Eater could. Instead, she came back to me and told me she would sacrifice herself for our cause. To keep Draco safe, she would die in Albus' place."
"And so, to lead Voldemort to believe the greatest threat against him was gone," Dumbledore rounded off the explanation. "Voldemort didn't even know I knew about the Horcruxes, and he underestimates the three of you far too much. He assumed if I was gone that he would have no more trouble handling you and all the others. So, I let him believe Severus had killed me. The truth is, it was Narcissa Malfoy, under the effects of Polyjuice Potion—she was in my office when you came to meet me, Harry. It was Narcissa who went after the Horcrux with you. It was Narcissa on that tower with you."
"It was Narcissa that I killed," Snape said apathetically, though the expression on his face gave away a hint of remorse. "Then I took Draco and fled with the others. I told him later that his mother had committed suicide."
"To guarantee that Voldemort believed me to be dead, I had to let all of you believe the same," Dumbledore said, his eyes glistening with tears again. "You've no idea how painful it was for me to cause all of you so much pain, but it was necessary." Dumbledore looked at Harry, Ron, and Hermione with teary eyes that shone with pride.
"I knew you three wouldn't give up," he said. "I knew you would carry on with what we started, even if it meant going on alone. In truth, you were rarely alone. We followed you from the day you left the Order, separating when Severus had to return to Voldemort and the Death Eaters, or when we'd be too easily noticed, but staying as close as we could the whole time. It was I who showed you those visions of the Horcruxes, Harry. It was Legilimency. We helped you when necessary, but you really did most of the work yourselves. You've done brilliantly, you three."
"Up until you found out about Regulus," Snape said scathingly. "Then you hit a wall."
"Sorry we haven't yet broken into the Ministry for our second time," Hermione said with the unusual daring that Death Eaters seemed to bring out in her. "Besides, you have yet to explain how you know about me and Regulus to begin with."
"The same way you do," Snape answered evenly, seemingly unmoved by her challenging behavior, though clearly noticing it. "We saw the book and the note before you did."
"How?" Hermione continued pushing, on the edge of her seat. "Only Kreacher can open that door."
"But we can open Kreacher's mind," Snape retorted.
"You used Legilimency on a house elf?!" Hermione protested.
"Oh yes," Snape bit back. "I forgot you're the authority on house elf rights. Though, you didn't exactly treat Kreacher too kindly yourself, when you were recently at the manor."
"Severus, Hermione, that's quite enough," Dumbledore said firmly, but kindly. "Hermione, I don't know what's gotten into you lately, but practice controlling it. Fire has its uses, but it can be disastrous when allowed to run wild. You will want to be able to hold your ground in the time you're headed to, but be careful who you provoke, and how you do it. Severus, for one, is a student in that year who you'll want to be careful around. He had not yet turned spy for us." Hermione stared from Dumbledore to Snape and back again before she nodded.
"So you know how we can reach Garus' experiment? And how I can convince Regulus to help me, once back in the right time?" She asked.
"We have an idea," Dumbledore answered.