Chapter 4: the Rented Room
Harry goes off on his quest. Alone. But right off the bat, something truly horrific happens.
Harry drifted off into a fitful sleep, and began to dream. In one dream, Hermione and Dobby were getting married. In another, Cho Chang was standing naked on the owlery roof, singing "God Save the Queen".
But then came a more sinister dream. Harry found himself in the House of Black, arguing with Kreacher, the house elf. "Your mistress is not to be told of this, do you understand?" Kreacher bowed obsequeously. "Yes, Lord, I do understand, but.. but.. Please, sir, I am sworn to tell her everything. I cannot bear to keep such a secret. Please don't make me!" "Very well.", Harry heard himself, and yet not quite himself, say. "Obliviate!".
With Kreacher lying unconcious on the floor, his memory of the last few minutes erased, Harry then saw ahead of him what for all appearances was a blank wall, which he tapped with his wand. A small opening appeared, into which Harry-and-yet-not-Harry placed a gold ring, into which was set an emerald. As he backed away from the wall, the opening vanished. He then turned and walked out the front door, and into the glare of the morning sun, and there ended the dream.
Harry awoke groggily, in a bed near a window with the morning sun streaming in. And for a few dismal moments, he forgot where he was. For a few dismal moments, he thought he was still at the Dursley's. Cursing the glare, he rolled over, sure that at any moment his fat uncle would be bellowing at him to do some stupid menial task. Down the hall, muffled by the closed door, he could hear the sounds of people talking. What horrid nonsense could they be babbling on about now? Who cares? They probably have company over, that sounds like... like? Wait a minute? GINNY! WOOHOO!
Harry staggered to his feet, and opened the door. The smells of breakfast hit him square in the face, and led him eagerly down to the kitchen, where the rest of the household already was.
Soon he was stuffing himself with green eggs and ham, mildly-exploding mint chocolates, and barnacleberry cobbler. He was glad to be with his friends again, and soon conversation turned to quidditch and joke spells.
But before breakfast was over, his mood had already begun once again to darken. He knew he would have to go. His path was a dark and lonely road that lead only to death. Harry's or Voldemort's. Or both. The thought of endangering the others was, well, unthinkable. Harry could feel a distance forming; he was beginning to pull away, emotionally, that is, from his friends. He looked around the room, trying to see them all as just people. People he would have to leave behind.
He found himself staring at Ginny, and remembering their brief relationship. Seeing her as he came down the stairs, he had felt a warm light of happiness. But knowing he would be going away soon, that light was quickly turning into something else. Sadness. Horrible dark empty sadness. With that thought weighing on his mind, the sight of the beautiful Ginny Weasley, standing there munching on a mint, made him want to cry. By now, Ginny had noticed that he was staring at her. She looked deep into his wet green eyes and she knew. She knew he was on the verge of tears, and she knew why. Harry saw his own sadness echoed in Ginny's eyes, and that just opened the floodgates. Not wanting to go to pieces in front of everyone, Harry slipped quietly out the door.
But Ginny followed him. "I won't pretend to know what you're going through, Harry. But is there anything we can do?" Harry turned around, his face sick with worry. "Just be careful, ok? If I survive, I'll come back... someday. I know I'll be in danger. That's necessary. But I don't want to get you killed." By that time, Ron and Hermione were watching, listening, from the doorway. "We do have a few days left, right?", Ron called out to him. "May as well enjoy them, mate." Harry agreed.
That afternoon, as the lot of them played a leisurely game of air-croquet in the treetops, Harry thought about that weird dream, and wondered if he should tell his friends. He decided not to. Since this was his quest, there seemed no sense in burdening them with such things. He spent the next few days enjoying the company of Ron, Hermione, and especially Ginny, playing exploding snap, careening wildly about on their brooms, and gabbing about all sorts of things; thinking of anything but his dismal destiny.
But during the nights he was packing to go.
And late one night, with his invisibility cloak on and his trunk charmed to weigh nothing, he hopped on his broom and took off into the dark night sky. He had written them a goodbye note: "I could not bear a long goodbye. I have an enemy to kill, and I'll count myself lucky if I live to see you again. Love, Harry."
The first thing he did was rent a room on Diagon Alley. A room with a fireplace. He was going to need that for his research. That, a crystal cauldron, and some floo powder, which he bought the next morning. His next trip was to ChimneyCom, for a subscription to the World Floo Library. They handed him a potion.
Back in his room, Harry opened the potion from ChimneyCom, and followed the instructions. "Pour the orange potion into your mouth, gargle it, then spit it into your crystal cauldron. This will enable you to connect to the World Floo Library via ChimneyCom. To use the WFL, gently heat the cauldron, and add a small amount of floo powder to the potion. This connection will consume approximately three grains of floo powder per minute, and whenever the potion turns orange again, you'll need to add some more floo powder."
"How was that wall opened?" Harry asked, as he thought of the wall in his dream, and gazed into the gently heated cauldron, which now hung from a swingbar over the fire. Within the now-clear potion there appeared nine floating images. Most were of merchants selling such things as see-thru-the-wall spells, and a few were for charmed disappearing doors. One that caught his eye, however, was a book labelled "Identifying hidden holes". Harry tapped the cauldron with his wand, pointing it at the book image. There then appeared a text, describing various ways of finding hidden openings in just about anything, and Harry spent the rest of the day reading it.
He was ready. Flying by night to the House of Black, Harry crept towards the spot where in his dream the ring had been stashed. In his mind, he pictured the ring, pictured that dreamed image of, um, someone placing it into the hole, and thought the words "Prior Orofacto!". And there it was. The brilliant emerald stone exuded a cool green glow. He reached right in and took it. Eventually, he expected, he would find out what it was for. If it was one of Voldemort's horcruxes, he wanted to know for sure. And then he would destroy it.
The next morning, as he sat in the Three Broomsticks eating breakfast, he heard murmurs from another table. Something about the Weasleys. Something bad, very bad. Something about a DEATH EATER ATTACK! Harry's heart leapt into his throat, and Harry leapt onto his broom.
He arrived at the Burrow to find aurors everywhere. In the front yard there was a horse-drawn wagon, and upon it were two coffins. Several corpses bearing the dark mark, dead death eaters, littered the yard. Hermione's wizard gown was burnt half off, and her hair was scorched. She was holding Ron's hand as he lay on the porch in bandages. Ginny was standing in the doorway, a look of absolute shock on her face.
Arthur and Molly were dead.
Harry stood there, unable to accept the scene before him. "I'm not seeing this, It's not real, it can't be, no... just a dream... wake up, Harry.. its not real, its not... NOOOOOoooooOO!" Harry let out a shreik of complete and utter horror, and fell to the ground, crying, cursing loudly, punching the ground with his fist. "Murderers! AAAAaaaaUUUUuuugh!"
An auror tried to lead him onto the porch. But halfway there, he looked up at his grieving friends, and turned away in guilt and self-loathing. Leaving them hadn't made them safer at all. How could he face them now? Harry sat back down on the ground in complete anguish, which was only interrupted when a wisp of smoke a few feet away turned suddenly into a blazing fire. Fawkes had been killed too (again!), but he was already flaming back to life. If only people could do that, Harry thought sadly. The horses began to walk, taking their lifeless passengers away. The survivors followed on foot, in silence.
After the funeral, back at the Burrow, after everyone else had gone inside, Harry sat alone on the porch steps, pondering a horrible conundrum. "I Can't do it, I just can't do it..", he began to mumble. "Can't do what, Harry?", a voice squawked behind him. "Can't leave, or can't stay?". It was Fawkes. Harry stared into space awhile before answering. "Either..."
The door swung open. It was Hermione. "We have sandwiches..." Harry slowly stumbled his way to the kitchen, where his friends were eating. Fawkes slowly pecked away at a slice of sesame-seed bread, waiting for someone to start the conversation, to say what needed to be said. But no one spoke up. They were going to need some prompting.
"Harry, I think the others have something to talk to you about", squawked the phoenix. He motioned first to Ron, who obligingly spoke up. "It looks like we're all going to be in this, whether you, whether we like it or not, so you might as well let us help." Hermione nodded. "You're going have a better chance with our help than without it."
Harry turned finally to face Ginny, who had gotten up from the table and was now standing toe-to-toe with Harry, her face an expression he could not quite read. "It wasn't your fault, you do know that, right?" Harry opened his mouth, but no words came out. So Ginny answered what Harry couldn't quite say. "They would have attacked us whether you were here or not, Harry." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "You didn't cause this."
"Ginny, I...", he stammered. "I don't even know how to say..." Silence fell. But once again, his silence hid nothing from Ginny. "You're here now, right?" Harry nodded in silence. "And we're all going to be fighting you-know-who, right? as a team?" He nodded more slowly this time, but it was still a nod. Harry glanced about at Ginny, Ron, Hermione, and Fawkes. "As a team. Together." And with that, the others moved in closer, and Harry found himself at the center of a group hug.
That night, no one went up to their rooms. No one wanted to be alone. Hermione teleported all their beds down to the living room, and set a bird perch on a nearby sidetable for Fawkes. They needed time. Time to sort through this awful tragedy. Time to mourn the loss of Molly and Arthur Weasley.
Unfortunately, they didn't have much time. All too soon, they would have to get going on their quest, even with this horrible grief still tearing at their hearts. Soon they would be hunting down the various fragments of Voldemort, and they would simply have to muddle through the rage and the tears. Together.
Review reply:
scyus: Thanks. I thought it would be neat if they were. (creatures of soul, that is) I guess with over 200,000 fanfics, some will inevitably have the same title. Good one you've got going, too.
Within Harry potter there is a deep dark secret. One even he himselfdoesn't know about. But he ought to know. He ought to have figured it out long ago. Certainly Hermione should have realized it. But she hasn't. No one has. But in Chapter 5, Fawkes will figure it out, after Harry shows him the emerald ring.
"Obsequeously? Kreacher?", gawked an incredulous Hermione. "He was never anything but rude to me!"
