Disclaimer: I (still) don't own Harry Potter.

Chapter 2

Green in the face, Hagrid stepped gingerly from the cart, muttering something about being "too old fer this."

Griphook held up one finger. "No need," he told Hagrid as he stepped up to the door of the vault. Vault 713. "Hogwarts business," Hagrid had said. Harry wondered what he could mean . . . But even though Griphook had discouraged him, Hagrid was already standing by the door, and Harry had stepped up to try peering around Hagrid's bulk of a body.

"Only a goblin can do this," Griphook bragged. Then he added warningly, "If a human tries, he gets sucked in. Stuck forever." He cackled grimly.

"How do you know if someone gets stuck inside?" Harry asked nervously.

Griphook grinned evilly. "We don't."

"Then how do they get out?"

"They don't."

"Oh," Harry said softly. Griphook, rather intimidating, grinned even wider, then turned back to the door. He stroked it carefully with his long index finger, and the door swung open. Inside, they saw a vault: stone and high-ceilinged. But this one was empty.

Harry shot Hagrid a confused glance, but Hagrid nodded at Griphook, saying, "Yeah, that's it."

Peering back into the vault, now Harry noticed a tiny, grubby package lying alone on the floor. His eyes widened, and he took another step towards the package. It lured him closer and closer until he stood in the doorway of the vault, blocking Griphook's way out.

"I want the package," he said in a voice totally unlike his own.

"You are not the withdrawer," Griphook informed him calmly. "You would be stealing if you were to take this. And you saw the warning."

In the same strange, raspy voice, Harry said, "I suppose I'm a thief, then." And he snatched the package out of Griphook's unsuspecting hands.

Harry bolted. He sprinted up the steep, narrow track for the carts, breathing heavily and trying to tear open the little package as he evaded Griphook. Goblins could run impressively quickly. Harry sped up, and Hagrid was left alone, deep inside Gringotts, with the empty, open vault.

Suddenly there was noise. Sirens. Different from the Muggle variety Harry knew, but certainly sirens. A voice shouted over the speakers - or was it magic? Harry wondered randomly - but Harry did not have time to listen. All he could identify was his own name. Repeating. Over and over.

But that didn't matter, because now the paper covering the little package was gone, and in Harry's hand was a shiny, red stone. It flickered in the light of the torches that lit the passageways of Gringotts.

Harry ducked into an archway, a deep one that narrowed to a tiny, goblin-sized door. Admiring the stone, he turned it over and over in his hands. He wondered what it was, why he - and everyone else, apparently - had wanted it so much, and how it had lured him into stealing it . . .

Footsteps, pounding on the stone, plus the rattling sound of the cart on its track, echoed around Harry. Eyes wide, heart pounding, his mind raced - how to keep the stone?

Moments later, a cart containing four goblins, Griphook included, rounded the corner. Hagrid, with his heavy, clumsy gait, was not far behind. Harry stood out in the open by his archway-hiding place, his head bowed.

"Here's the thief!" cried Griphook, leaping out of his cart at Harry.

"No, no!" Hagrid was sobbing between pants. "He's on'y a kid! He's on'y eleven!"

Harry was silent.

Griphook asked Hagrid coldly, "Why, then, did he steal the Sor - thing?" He seemed to have thought better of saying something; his eyes darted over to Harry for a second. Harry perked up, curious, but still said nothing.

Hagrid shouted something back about some Imperial Curse or something. It was then that Harry realized just how much he did not know. He had no money, no wand, and no knowledge. He couldn't even be sure he had magic. He blushed, his face turning red as other goblins handcuffed him, and Hagrid and Griphook argued.

But Harry was still silent.

Goblins were pushing him, and Harry wanted to complain, but he didn't dare. He let them shove him into the cart. Apparently Griphook had won the argument, or at least reached a compromise, because he climbed calmly in after Harry. Hagrid was left to follow along in a separate cart that had arrived for him of its own accord.

"Summon Dumbledore," Griphook commanded another goblin emotionlessly.

A/N: Hope this chapter was better. Reviews are much appreciated! :)