The Mirror of Erised

by Pitry

The only way to be certain you can defeat ultimate evil is when you've already done it before. AU.

3. 1:3 Prisoners of Azkaban

Part 1, Chapter 3: Prisoners of Azkaban

25th December, 2010, 10:45 p.m. X' removed to S'':

"Your Neville's already dead, so that's one down, I guess," Hermione said in a somewhat apologetic voice.

Dumbledore awarded her a sharp look, but said nothing. Instead, he went back to studying the list.

The diadem. The diary. The ring. The goblet. The locket. The snake.

"Some of these are easier to find than others," she said again, trying to be helpful. He shot a look at the diadem. Ron nudged her to stay quiet. "Some may be harder," she added anyway, when she saw his eyes freezing at the end of the list.

"We can't know that the list is accurate," Dumbledore said softly.

"Well, the diadem's here, isn't it? It was exactly where we thought it'd be, and it was what we thought it'd be. I don't know where the differences between your memories and ours come from, but that's not one of them!"

"Hermione, calm down," Ron said next to her. "Dumbledore's only trying to, I dunno, make sure not to get everyone's hopes up, I guess. They're our friends."

"Are they?" she glared at Dumbledore, then at the rest of them.

"Let's assume, for the moment, that we are," Dumbledore said in a lighthearted tone, then put the list down. "Which item will be next, Ms Granger?"

Now she hesitated. She knew which item she would go for next - in her memories, it was simple. But even if the list was accurate... she thought of what they had said when they met her. The Hermione Granger they remembered had died, twelve years old, by the hands of a troll. Because, and that was the crux of the matter, there was no Harry to save her.

And she wasn't the only one Harry had saved as a boy.

"Headmaster," she started hesitantly, "has the... has the Chamber of Secrets been opened? About twenty years ago?"

From the look on Dumbledore's face, she knew she was right. So far, it would seem, everything matched.

"What happened?" she asked softly.

"Well," he said, recovering quickly from the shock, "I assume you know who had opened it the first time." She nodded, and he continued. "We never learned how he managed to do it a second time, I'm afraid. A few children were attacked, but none killed - all petrified. And then, one day... the attacks just stopped."

Ron gaped at her. "You don't think - "

"Yes, I do. That settles it, in a way, doesn't it? The diary was here."

"But the attacks stopped! Whoever was using the diary - "

She shook her head. "Not whoever, Ron. You know who it was."

"But - " he protested. "It stopped! It can't have been Ginny, because..."

"She threw the diary away, don't you remember?" It was Harry who spoke now. "It did all stop."

Hermione's hand went flying to her mouth. "You're right," she said. "I forgot." And to Dumbledore, she said, "We need to talk to Ginny Weasley."

Ron was reluctant to talk to Ginny about the diary. What was the point? he asked. If everything was so similar, they already knew where it was, didn't they?

But Hermione wanted to check, just in case, and Dumbledore was quick to agree with her. And so, despite Ron's protests, Remus was sent to bring Ginny to Dumbledore's office. They sat in silence until the two of them entered the room, Remus with an expression of mild confusion on his face, Ginny radiant with happiness.

"Hey, you," she smiled at Ron, then thumped him on the shoulder. "George's getting better, Mum said maybe we should go home."

She didn't pay much attention to anyone else in the room. She nodded to Hermione as she walked in. She did save Ginny's life, after all, and it should be obvious to Ginny that she was close to Ron. But that was all. She didn't know Hermione. And she completely ignored Harry.

Hermione wondered to herself how could Ginny have missed it - how Harry went pale every time she walked into the room, how his eyes were following her everywhere. But then, she had never met him. She didn't know who he was. Hermione wasn't sure Ron noticed it, either.

"Listen, Ginny," Ron said now, slightly uncomfortable. "We need to talk."

"Let's talk over dinner tomorrow. Mum's already planning what to cook and - " Ginny paused. "What is it?"

Ron exchanged glances with Hermione. She could see what he was asking - please, have this conversation instead of me. For a moment, she resented that request. Ron got it all anyway - his family was alive, and they knew him and loved him and missed him. Why should she be the one to bring up the bad things? But then she sighed. In a way, that made his reasoning so much stronger.

"Ginny... we need to ask you about a diary you had. When you started Hogwarts."

Ginny's smile was wiped off her face. Another confirmation, but not a pleasant one.

"It held the memories of a boy, didn't it? Tom Riddle?"

"How do you know?" Ginny whispered.

"We need to know what you've done with it."

"It was evil! It was... it's not - you don't want that diary!"

"I'm afraid we do, Ginny," said Dumbledore.

Perhaps it was the Headmaster taking a more active role in the discussion that had convinced her, Hermione wasn't sure. But Ginny stopped protesting, and told them how she threw the diary back in Moaning Myrtle's bathroom. "I don't want to go there," she said when she stopped.

"You don't have to," Hermione said gently. "I know where it is."

Myrtle's bathroom turned out to be abandoned. Perhaps, Hermione mused, she was hiding in her U-bend. Or swimming in the lake. Or spying on the people who were taking a shower, somewhere. With Myrtle, one could never know.

She didn't want to know. She shook the thoughts of Myrtle's creepy tendencies away, and started looking around the bathroom. No one ever went there - that much was a given. That was why Ginny had chosen it in the first place, she said. It wasn't just a toilet where any other girl could walk in and meet Tom Riddle. It was one no girl would. And it had apparently worked - no sign of Slytherin's monster since. Which meant the diary must still have been there - somewhere.

Her eyes caught sight of it before she realised what it was she was seeing. But there it was - a thin black book, in the far corner of the room, lying in the middle a water puddle. Hermione shook her head in wonder. Twenty years it had been lying there, and no one had ever noticed. She picked the diary gingerly and rushed back to the Headmaster's office.

Sirius had shown up while she was gone, and was now joking with Remus, looking much happier than he did before. Even Remus's spirits had lifted. "Hello," she greeted them enthusiastically.

"Why, it's the mysterious Ms Granger," Sirius said. Remus rolled his eyes.

"What got you in such a good mood?" Ron demanded.

"You're alive, we're going to defeat Voldemort, why not be in a good mood?" was Sirius's response.

"Well, it's a long way yet before we manage to defeat Voldemort," Hermione said, and earned a muffled but distinct "Spoilsport" from Sirius. She ignored him, and handed over the diary to Dumbledore, who took it without a word. "Exactly where Ginny said it'd be," she said.

"Unfortunately, that's also the last of the easy Horcruxes. This is where things get complicated."

"Oh?" Sirius asked, refusing to let his spirit dampen.

"Yes. The diadem was hidden at Hogwarts from the beginning, and the dairy was given to Lucius Malfoy, who thought to use it for his own ends," she snorted, "but the snake is by Voldemort's side at all times, and the defences and spells surrounding the ring and the locket are extremely dangerous."

Dumbledore consulted the list. "And the cup?" he asked pleasantly.

"That one's in Bellatrix Lestrange's Gringotts vault," Hermione said darkly. "We had a very hard time breaking into Gringotts the first time round, and we only managed that because - well, it was complicated. I don't see how we can pull that one off again, not if no one's ever heard of Harry - what?" she finally noticed the shocked way Sirius, Remus and, yes, even Dumbledore were looking at her. "What did I say?"

"Bellatrix Lestrange's vault?" Remus asked carefully.

"Yes. That's where it's hidden." Dumbledore grabbed the edges of his seat, as if afraid he'd fall off, completely dumbfounded. Sirius and Remus just looked at each other, not saying a word. "Why?" she asked.

In response, Sirius just roared with laughed.

26th December, 2010, 12:22 a.m. X removed to S':

It was one thing to fight dark wizards when the power of the entire Ministry was behind them, when their reputation preceded them, and when the dark wizards in question were disorganised and alone. It was another thing entirely when they were the ones on the run.

Padma was talking quietly about the time she had spent as a prisoner in the Ministry, after she and Parvati had helped Dean escape. Harry rubbed his eyes. It had been going on like that the entire night - Parvati explained about the camps they were all put in at the beginning of the war; Anthony told them how he had helped Neville and his underground secretly; Luna told him about Hermione and Ron, who had escaped Hogwarts at the very last moment, and how they had started their little rebellion. Dean was mostly quiet. He only offered information about the last two years - ever since he had joined the rebellion, after Parvati and Padma broke him out. Harry couldn't help but hold on to the photographs of his family, smiling and waving at him from the world they had built in the last twelve years. It was the only link to reality anymore, the only link to the world that made any sense at all. That - and Ron who sat next to him and listened to the stories together with him, horrified.

"I don't get it," he said finally, got up and stared at the group of people he had thought he knew. "Ron and Hermione knew about the Horcruxes. Neville, too - I told him about the snake. He killed the snake! How could this happen? How could you let this happen?"

Dean rose from his chair. "We didn't let anything happen, mate," he said angrily. "We lost the war. Why didn't Ron and Hermione do anything about that, if they knew how? Well, ask your pal over there, why don't you," he jerked his head in Ron's direction.

They stood there, facing each other for a few seconds more, until Harry averted his gaze. "You're right. I'm sorry. It's just..." he rubbed his eyes again. "I don't know what this place is. I don't know how we even got here. We were chasing some dark wizards who broke into the Ministry and all of a sudden we're in a cell and Malfoy's Minister and it's like my worst nightmares all coming true."

"Malfoy got Neville three days ago," Anthony said quietly from his own corner. "He made a big announcement about that, rebels caught, blah blah blah. He was going to execute him." Horrified, Harry sat down again. "Ron and Hermione and Harry - the Ron and Harry we remember, anyway - they went to rescue them on Christmas eve. We were the backup. We haven't heard from them since, so we figured they were caught as well. Except we found you in the cells instead."

"Could be time travel," Ron said all of a sudden. "Maybe someone's got a hold of a time-turner, and I don't know, did something to let Voldemort win."

Harry shook his head. "Why are we the only ones who remember it, then? Why is everyone else convinced this world is right? And my photographs - and where are Hermione and Neville, then?'

Padma let out a small, miserable sigh. Parvati immediately rushed to her. "They haven't been executed," she said encouragingly. "Malfoy would have said something."

"Let's assume, for the moment, it's not time travel," Harry said. "What else."

"Does it matter?" Dean asked darkly.

"Yes, it matters! I want to go home. Back to reality as I remember it. I don't want to be stuck in this nightmare!" Harry burst, then shook his head. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to take it all out on you. It's..." he flailed his hands in frustration. He didn't even have words enough to describe what it was.

"Harry," Ron said now quietly, "he's right. It doesn't matter. Not as long as we're hiding in this house from Malfoy and his Death Eaters. There's no way we can figure out what happened and how to undo it when we're on the run."

"So we take down Malfoy," Harry said.

Luna laughed. Dean snorted. Padma made a noise something between a sigh and a sob, he wasn't quite sure. Even Anthony cracked a smile. "Yeah, Potter, real easy," he said. "How on earth didn't we think about that one before?"

Harry laughed too. "Okay, so I'm an arse," he said. "Doesn't mean Malfoy can't be beaten. Don't take it the wrong way, Goldstein - but maybe you lot have been on the run for so long, you just don't know how to win anymore."

"And you do?"

"We defeated Voldemort. We defeated his Death Eaters. I've been head of the Auror Office for three years. I know how to deal with the bad guys."

"Our knight in shining armour," Luna mused.

"If that's what it takes to get me back to Ginny and my kids, yeah."

Padma shrugged. "I'm game," she said. "What have we got to lose?"

"Neville and Hermione," Anthony said sharply.

"Let's assume they ended up where - where we're supposed to be," Harry said. "Why not? We still have our memories, and the photographs, makes sense that... I don't know, world or something, reality - makes sense it didn't get erased, it's still there somewhere. So if we can go from there to here - why can't they do it, too?"

Someone started protesting, but Harry insisted. "Look. It's Hermione and Neville. Two of my best friends. Ron's wife, damn it. Do you really think we'd be rushing to abandon them if there was the slightest chance they were in danger? If there's a chance they're in those cells and are about to be executed, this whole discussion is mute. You were the ones who said they weren't there. If you've changed your mind, if you want to check a second time, fine - but I'm trusting your word on that."

The room was silent.

"I know I searched the cells properly," Padma said at last. "They're not in the Ministry."

"They could be in Azkaban," Parvati said quietly.

"No chance they're in one of those camps you told us about?" Ron frowned.

Parvati shook her head and exchanged a look with Padma.

"Malfoy closed down the camps when he took over." Luna said in a whisper that brought chills down Harry's back. His first instinct was to ask her to elaborate. His next thought was that perhaps he didn't want to know.

"Azkaban then," Harry said now in a determined voice. "We can do that. We know Azkaban well enough. We're going to need wands, though."

As it turned out, the little band of rebels had plenty of spare wands. They took the wand of every wizard they overpowered, they said. They couldn't know when they would find themselves in dire need of a wand, and there was no way of getting wands made especially for them. Ron and Harry went through what felt like dozens of wands, until they found two that were a reasonable match. Harry couldn't help but miss his own wand - by now, the holly-and-phoenix wand felt as much a part of him as his arms or legs. But that had to take a lower priority. First, they had to break into Azkaban and then...

... And then maybe they'll find the time to figure out the rest.

To both Harry's and Ron's surprise, the little group had expected to embark immediately once Harry and Ron found a wand. "Don't you people have any concept of strategy?" Harry asked in a exasperation. Anthony answered him that there was no point in strategy - not when they were so outnumbered. Harry begged to differ, and they spent the next three hours examining everything Harry could remember about Azkaban, its defences - and the likely use of Dementors, as he'd been informed by the rest that the Dementors were very much at large and in charge of Azkaban.

"Brilliant," Ron sighed. "Just what we needed. More complications."

"No, it's good news," Harry pointed out. "Less unknown magic to deal with. Most of their defences will probably be the Dementors."

Dean snorted. "Yeah, and they're so easy to pass by."

"Yeah, they are. Cast your Patronus and they'll run away."

No one answered - they just stared at him. Goldstein shook his head and mumbled something. "What?" Harry demanded.

"Harry," Ron said quietly, "after everything we've heard... do you really think casting a Patronus is no big deal?"

Harry swore loudly.

26th December, 2010, 6:07 a.m.

What being imprisoned and tortured by Malfoy didn't do, what the stories and faces of their friends didn't tell, their excursion from the house and into the world outside made clear to Harry. The terrible danger they were in became so much more real when Harry found that he was risking his life just by setting foot into the world around him.

It happened perhaps five minutes after they left the house. They were slap bang in the middle of Muggle London. Far from the Ministry, far from other wizards. Harry had assumed that this part of their journey would be easy - after all, they were just another group of Muggles in a city of eight million people. No one was going to notice them.

The Muggle world looked just like Harry remembered it, in their own world. Her recognised the street immediately - it wasn't far off from Grimmauld Place. He had walked it a thousand times. There was the book shop, there was the university campus - and hell, they even had that odd 'To let - Apple Orchard' advert on one of the houses. It was exactly the same in every way.

In almost every way. This Ministry had agents in the Muggle world, and they had no qualms about attacking them in the middle of the street, right in front of the Muggles. He started to say something to Ron, when all of a sudden a curse smashed right on top of him.

"Duck!" he shouted, more out of instinct than out of any clear thought process. Next to him, Dean and Luna had already started sending curse after curse at the Death Eaters. They, too, had no problem with magical duels in the middle of a Muggle street.

"What - are - you - doing?" he hissed at Luna.

"There's no time to worry about secrecy, Harry!" she chided him. "It's us or them!"

When the next curse almost got him, he cursed the wizard back.

They got out of that encounter with the upper hand: none of them had suffered permanent damage, and all of the Death Eaters - or were they simply Ministry employees? - were on the ground, groaning. They were not completely unhurt - Luna had a bloody nose, Dean had acquired a nasty gash on his forehead, and Parvati winced every time she moved her arm. Harry looked at them for a moment, then returned his attention to the Death Eaters. He wanted to stick around, to question them, but Anthony grabbed him and pushed him forward. "We don't have time for that. Come on," he said roughly, and Harry followed.

They all rushed into a small back alley, away from prying eyes. Harry couldn't understand - surely they needed to Apparate right away from there? If they didn't do so soon, they would have the deal with the Muggle police as well as the Ministry, however the hell they managed to trace them in the first place.

He started saying so, but Padma shook her head. "You can't Apparate from within London," she said.

"What?"

"The Ministry. Things would have been so much easier if we could. Used to be just tracking, but these days, it's completely impossible, not unless you have some of the Ministry's special talismans." She looked at him for a moment, then sighed. "Sorry - we're used to it by now. We forgot you guys don't know."

"How are we supposed to get to Scotland then?" he burst. What else had they forgotten to tell them? Maybe Azkaban was full of dragons, too?

"All we need to do is leave London, then we can start Apparating," Dean said grimly.

"And how are we supposed to do that?"

"Well, we were going to take the tube, but now the - "

"But now the Muggle police will have been alerted about us, too," Harry finished grimly.

"Yeah."

"We can't walk all that distance!"

"Hey, Harry," Ron said all of a sudden, "what if we go on a boat?"

"A boat?"

Ron was right, of course. The one good thing about their location - right at the centre of London - was how close to the Thames they were. If they could only get on board one of the many ships that crossed the river, they'd be able to get out of the London metropolitan area - and with it, outside of the area covered by the Ministry's anti-Apparition jinx - and continue on their way. And it was very unlikely they'd run into the Muggle police, too.

Getting on a boat, however, required moving around without being seen. After all, Harry pointed out, they couldn't just jump on any passing vehicle. That way, they were almost guaranteed an encounter with the Muggle police.

"What if we do run into the police, though?" Ron asked. "What difference does it make? It's not like we can't curse them and run for it."

Dean shook his head. "We tried that once. We almost... well, we nearly didn't make it. It's not just Muggle weapons - Malfoy's got people in the Muggle police, too."

Harry swore again. "He's got you boxed in from every direction," he said.

"Yeah," Dean said. There was no trace of emotion in his voice.

In the end, they came up with the most ridiculous plan. A few Disillusionment charms, some Muggle-repelling spells - which were, as Dean said anxiously, bound to be detected by the Ministry - and after forty five minutes' walk to the Thames, they ended up jumping from one of the bridges and onto the first ship that passed under them.

"Look at the bright side," Padma grumbled as she nursed her leg from a bad jump angle, "this is so mental, Malfoy would never believe we actually did that."

Dean's frantic shaking of the head caught her attention just in time. One of the ship's crew had passed by and stopped, undoubtedly confused about the source of the noise. Immediately, everyone stopped talking. The crewman didn't relent, though, and walked closer and closer to them.

"Confundo," Ron muttered next to Harry. The crewman paused, looked around, then continued with his duties, far away from them.

"Time for some more Muggle repelling charms, I think," Harry said. They set off to work.

The ship moved with maddening slowness up the river. Harry had hoped they would get out of the dangerous area soon, so that they could Apparate and leave the smelly ship and its exposed, freezing deck behind, but the buildings went on and on, on both banks of the river. Long after they had finished casting their protective spells, they found themselves standing on the ship's deck, looking at tiny human beings making their way in the slowly-awakening city.

"Look," Luna whispered. Harry thought she had pointed, too, but it was hard to tell, with her finger transparent under the influence of the Disillusionment charm. Still, he looked.

He didn't understand, at first, what he was looking at, until he saw them. A group of people, not in suits or other Muggle clothing, but in wizards' robes. They were walking steadily by the river bank, undisturbed by the Muggles, who did not seem to realise they were there. Their wands were in front of them, and they were casting spells at the ships nearby.

"You think they know?" Ron asked, and his voice started Harry, who hadn't realised he had joined them.

"I don't know," he said.

"We could check," Ron suggested, but Harry shook his head. "No. Too dangerous. Maybe they know we're somewhere here and all they need is for us to do magic so that they could locate us."

"What if they do? What can they do to us?"

"They can Apparate, remember?" Luna said.

By now, the rest had joined them. They were all looking at the group of wizards in dark robes, scanning the river with their wands.

"We wait," Harry said in answer to the unasked question. "There's nothing else we can do."

They waited. The tall buildings became smaller and smaller, the wind more piercing, more violent, whistling now in their ears. The weak drizzle became rain, then everything became colder, and the rain was replaced with small, white flakes.

"Ha," Harry said. "It's snowing in London on Christmas." No one else thought it was even remotely funny.

After a while, even the small houses disappeared, replaced by roads and vegetation. "Do you think we can Apparate now?" Harry asked then, but Padma said no, they should wait a bit longer. If they Apparated in the wrong place, she said, the Death Eater will immediately know where they are. So they went on.

By now everyone was shaking with the cold. The coats they had put on when they left the house provided little protection against the strong winds, especially when they were all soaking wet. Most of them went down, settled somewhere inside the ship to get warm, but Harry preferred to stay on the deck and look for the first definite sign they were outside of London.

"What are you thinking about?" he heard a voice next to him, and could feel, rather than see Luna under the Disillusionment charm.

"How do you know I'm thinking about something?" he said jokingly.

"I don't think you'll be standing here and insist on freezing if you weren't thinking about something important," she said.

"Yeah. I guess... I don't understand. Even with all you've been through, you're all so very alike the people I know."

"That sounds pretty reasonable," she pointed out.

"Then how did all this happen? How didn't everyone keep on fighting? Voldemort's end was so near."

"I think it was because of you," she said.

"Me? But I thought everyone thought I was dead."

"Yes. We got used to following you, I think. Even now, look how fast everyone does what you're telling them to do."

"I'm just making suggestions," Harry protested, but Luna ignored his protests.

"And then Voldemort said you were dead... we still fought, at first, but I guess we didn't think we could win anymore. We fought because we were going to lose either way."

"But Ron and Hermione knew! They knew how close we were to defeating him!"

"Yeah, but they were the one who needed to follow you most of all," she said softly.

Harry didn't answer.

"That's what happened even later, see? We found you, and all of a sudden we all thought we could defeat Voldemort after all, that there was still a chance."

"There was - you defeated him."

"Yeah," she said, "we did. But then Malfoy took over. He planned it that way, you see. He told us how to destroy Voldemort, but he was already planning what to do after we stopped Voldemort for him. We didn't realise that, of course, not at the time. We thought he was on our side. And Harry wasn't the way we'd thought he'd be, either." She seemed to consider that for a moment. "He isn't like you. It didn't feel like he could give us much hope."

"What's he like?" Harry asked out of an odd impulse. He had the feeling he wouldn't like the answer.

"He's very quiet," Luna answered.

"Unlike me," he laughed, and she joined him.

"It's like he's forgotten what it's like to be Harry."

Harry didn't answer. In front of them, he looked at the road and the trees - and the factories that had started popping up. He thought he recognised one of the grey buildings. "We're out of London," he said finally. "I'm sure. Get everyone, we're going."

26th December, 2010, 10:17 a.m.

Scotland, of course, proved even colder than London. Their final destination offered no respite - Azkaban was on an island in the middle of the North Sea. The only way to get there was through an old ferry, run by an equally old wizard.

The wizard looked at them all suspiciously. They had conjured up some fake credentials, to convince him to take them to the prison. They were with the Ministry, they claimed, going to interrogate prisoners.

"You look familiar," he said after long minutes of staring at their documents.

"We're with the Ministry," Dean said. "Of course we look familiar."

"No, not because of that," the man narrowed his eyes. He didn't linger long on Dean, though - no, it was Harry he had studied, time and again. "You look very familiar," he said at last.

Harry laughed his most convincing laughter, and hoped his nervousness was well hidden underneath it. "I get that a lot," he said.

"You sure I don't know you?" the man asked again. "What was your name again?"

"Stan Shunpike," he repeated hastily the name he had put into the document.

The old man grumbled. Harry grabbed the base of the wand - if the man was going to start causing trouble, they would need to curse him fast, before he got the chance to alert anyone. But the man just kept on grumbling, then shrugged and told them to go on the ferry. Harry breathed in relief.

"Funny how he didn't recognise you," Ron said when they were on their way.

"I've been thinking about that," Harry said. "It reminded me of something Malfoy said when he interrogated me."

"Oh?"

"He said I don't look like myself, I don't sound like myself..."

Ron raised an eyebrow.

"Luna said something similar, about me - not me, I guess. The Harry they know here. Man, this is odd," he paused for a moment. "Saying that. Anyway. She said it's like he's forgotten how to be me."

"He is you. You are you." Ron stopped for a moment. "This is confusing."

"You're telling me..."

"You or you?" Ron asked. Harry stared at him in confusion for a moment, then they both laughed. "Mental, this place," Ron shook his head.

"Yeah, but maybe we can use it in our favour," Harry said quietly. In front of them, Azkaban loomed, bringing with it the chill of hundreds of Dementors.

"We're going to need every little bit of help we can get," Ron answered.

The ferry slowly approached the island, until it docked on the small pier. They disembarked in silence. The ferryman didn't say a word - as far as he was concerned, if they were Ministry officials, they already knew where to go. He eyed them suspiciously, and Harry silently started walking through the prison's gates, grateful for the fact that, as head Auror, he had been down that road path times before and knew his way around. The ferryman would be given no reason to sound the alarm.

They didn't go to the cells, of course. It was impossible to gain access to them without the warden's knowledge. Oh, the cells themselves were guarded by Dementors, of course - but no one, not even this travesty of a Ministry, was foolish enough to let them run the place completely. If they did, there would have been no way of alerting the Ministry if something went wrong.

That was Fudge's mistake, all those years ago, Harry knew. No one was there to stop the Death Eaters from escaping. From the information the rest had given them, this was not the case under Voldemort, and neither was it the case under Malfoy.

There was one free human on the island - a warden, shut down in his room with the permanent presence of a Patronus, doing his best to ignore his surroundings. He was replaced every two weeks, the ferryman said on their way there, to make sure he didn't lose his mind. "I say he's gotta be already crazy to agree to be there in the first place," the old wizard laughed unpleasantly.

And he had something else with him, too. A way to call the Ministry to his aid, if anything should go wrong.

Before they started searching for Neville and Hermione, they had to stop him from using - whatever it was that he had.

They walked further and further into the prison. The walls not only loomed now, but seemed to block out the sky, as well. And yet Harry was shivering with the cold. It felt much colder than it did on the ferry.

This cold, unpleasant world... What if they didn't find out how to go back to their regular lives? he thought. What if from now on, this was his life? To the others - and especially to Ron - he pretended as if that wasn't even an option, but he knew better. It was the kind of puzzle that only Hermione could solve, but she wasn't with them. For all they knew, Padma didn't find her because Malfoy had already executed her. And he would be stuck here, in this life, life without Ginny, without James and Al and Lily, without Hermione and the Weasleys and...

"Harry," a hoarse whisper was heard behind him. He turned around. It was Ron. The rest were frozen in place, staring ahead, breathing hard. "They can't go on, not like that," Ron said.

The Dementors! Harry shivered again, and now he knew to recognise it for what it was - the Dementors, changing their perception, influencing their minds, sucking away every happy thought. He should have realised it before.

"We can't give up now," he said stubbornly.

"They can't go on," Ron repeated.

He was right - of course he was right. There was no question about it. In this nightmare world they were living in, none of them would be able to withstand the Dementors. "Unbelievable," Harry couldn't stop himself from saying, "a room full of people and I'm the one best suited to deal with Dementors."

Time for difficult decisions... "I'll go." So much for strategy, he thought with a sigh. Maybe Dean had a point.

"You're sure?" Ron sounded slightly concerned.

"Yeah. All we need to do is take out the guard, right? The Dementors we can deal with later. It's the human guard that's the problem."

Ron still looked at him with doubt. "You think you could handle that?"

Hundreds of Dementors? Probably not. "Sure."

"Give us a signal as soon as you've taken out the guard, we'll come in," he said.

"Sure."

"And Harry?"

"Yeah?"

"Good luck."

Harry smiled. "Cheers."

He walked into the old stone building alone. Here, the influence of the Dementors was much stronger, and the little comfort he had drawn from the presence of his friends was lost. The Dementors' hoods turned after him, in a mockery of curious eyes. His hand twitched at his wand. He wanted nothing more than to cast a Patronus, right there and then. In his mind, familiar voices were starting to come up, voices from his childhood, the voice of Lord Voldemort.

He couldn't - not yet -

A Dementor was getting closer and closer to him, and with the Dementor, so did the voice of Lord Voldemort. Harry Potter... the boy who lived... Harry shook his head. He tried to concentrate on Ginny, on his family, but he couldn't remember their face. Don't let it get to you, he insisted to himself, but it didn't do any good. Bow, Harry. Bow to death...

The Dementor passed him by. He wasn't stopped from continuing up the stairs, wasn't stopped from getting away from the Dementors. There was still a chill in his heart as he climbed up. He had to force his legs to go up the next step, and the next, and the one after that. But the voice of Lord Voldemort was starting to subside. One more step, he can do it, one more step, that's it, and a little bit higher, a little bit higher...

He burst into the warden's room and immediately searched for a chair to collapse on.

"Blimey!" a voice greeted him. "You went all that way through the Dementors? You're out of your mind, mate!"

Harry was shaking so hard, he couldn't talk, couldn't answer.

"Here, I'll make you a cuppa. Good strong tea, with lots of sugar, yeah? That'll make you feel better. Blimey, you must be out of your mind."

There was something incredibly familiar about that voice. Harry tried to shake off the Dementors' influence, to be able to think properly - to figure out why he had the impression he knew who this man was. Before he managed to, however, the man shoved a cup of tea into his hand.

His heart rate was slowly going back to normal, his vision less blurry, and he could finally look around. It was a circular room, much like he had often seen in lighthouses. There was a Patronus, travelling around the room, making sure to keep the Dementors away. And here inside the room, the prison did not feel as cold anymore. It felt positively warm, after the ferry trip and the walk through the Dementors.

"There, that's better, innit?" said the man who had given him the tea. Harry drank thankfully from the cup, and was immediately filled with the warmth of the tea and the sweetness of the sugar. Normally, it would have been too much sugar for him - but now, it felt just right. He wished the man would have had some chocolate.

The man - now that he was regaining his cool, he could try to identify him.

"Hey, I know you, don't I?" the man chatted happily. He was out of sight, standing in a small makeshift kitchen, and making a cup of tea of his own.

"I don't think so," Harry said carefully. "I got this face, though, people always confuse me for someone else."

"I say," the man chuckled. "Could have sworn I've met you before. What's your name?"

"Stan," he repeated mindlessly the name on the fake certificate.

"That's funny," his entertainer said, "that's my name too. What did you say your surname was?"

Harry froze. Now he knew where he knew the man from. It was Stan Shunpike.

"What did you say, Stan?" Stan Shunpike called again from the kitchen. And then he walked out and looked at Harry.

The smile was erased from his face. "Hold on, I know you. You're not Stan, you're Ha - "

"Imperio," Harry cast the first spell that came to his mind. Stan stopped talking, and instead stood in his place, a stupid grin on his face.

Right. Harry sent the signal - red sparks - through the window of the circular room. Down below, he could hear Ron bellowing, Expecto Patronum!. Some other voice could be heard with Ron's. The Dementors started moving, flocking to the entrance. They had realised something was wrong. Harry looked around - there should be something there, something that could be used by Stan to alert the Ministry... but the room was a mess. Dirty cups of coffee and tea, books everywhere, a wet towel... he could search for it for days and still come up empty-handed.

Outside, his friends sounded as if they were in trouble.

"Stan!" he turned to the warden, still under his Imperius curse. "How do you contact the Ministry in case of emergency?"

"That stone," Stan said with the stupid grin on his face. Harry turned around, and found it - it was a small, innocent-looking pebble. He hadn't even noticed it until now.

"What does it do? Just helps you contact the Ministry? Surely there are other ways of doing that?"

"Not just contact the Ministry," Stan giggled. "You can't Apparate here, can you? But if you turn on the stone, you can. So the Ministry can send reinforcements right away. You turn this on, then a different stone on their end lights up. And they know they can come. If there's an - an - uprising."

"Right. Thank you." he said and picked up the stone. Stan giggled.

He rushed downstairs - and just in time, too. There was no sign of any of his friends' Patronuses. "Expecto Patronum!" he shouted, and thought of Ginny. The familiar stag Patronus came out of his wand, driving away the Dementors. A second later, he heard another call, and saw Ron's dog Patronus. Not much later, and there was Luna's hare - and an unfamiliar bird one. Good, Harry thought, as he watched the silvery creatures clearing their paths. They're getting over it.

The Dementors dispersed; the road was clear. Harry and the others started running from cell to cell, from tower to tower, opening the cells, looking for Hermione and Neville. They didn't find them - Hermione and Neville simply weren't there. They did find, however, two dozen other wizards and witches, all staring at them in shock, some in dismay, most looking as if they were sure they were dreaming.

"They're not here," Anthony repeated the obvious, angry, once they had all met again in the yard.

"Maybe they're - " Dean started, but Harry cut across him.

"No," he said. "They weren't in the Ministry. They're not here. I think the best bet is that they're gone - the same way we're here. Who knows, maybe they're in the normal world. We can't stay here. We need to go. The Ministry is going to be here soon."

"You can't leave us!" one of the wizards called - and Harry thought he knew him, thought he reminded him of Tom, the old barman from the Leaky Cauldron.

"We're not going to," he promised.

"Harry, we came here to find Neville and Hermione! We're going to go out of here with - with what, exactly?"

Harry looked at the many people around him - no wands, wearing rags, and gaping at him, unable to believe that it was real, that the Dementors were gone, that they were free. Then, he looked at Anthony again.

"With an army," he replied.

26th December, 2010, 12:00 p.m. X' removed to S'':

The vault was full of treasure. Mountains of gold coins. An abundance of jewels and trinkets. Enough goblets to open up a shop or two. Ron stood at the entrance, next to Sirius. Harry immediately walked inside and started looking at the various goblets.

Hermione wasn't with them. She had said there was no time to waste - she would go and look for the ring, while they went with Sirius to fetch the cup. He had agreed, but reluctantly - staying with his family was one thing, as they were almost the same as he remembered. Hanging around with Sirius, however, was something completely different. It wasn't Sirius, not really. Every once in a while, he'd say something, or do something, and Ron would know all of a sudden that it truly was the man he remembered, but the rest of the time... the rest of the time, it was someone else, the Sirius they could have known, had he not spent so much of his life in Azkaban.

Better not think about it, Ron thought and shifted uncomfortably. His eye spied Harry, walking around the vault and oblivious to the two of them, and Ron turned his gaze back to Sirius.

"And all of this was passed on to you?" he asked incredulously as he surveyed the vault's contents in amazement.

"It's yourself you should be thanking," Sirius said with a smile, and then his face darkened. "When you died... Who would have thought your death had meaning, after all?"

Ron shook his head. That conversation was too weird. Still, he couldn't help but ask, "What happened?"

"The Death Eaters tried to gain access to the Ministry. To the Department of Mysteries."

"To get the prophecy?"

"Prophecy?" Sirius looked at him, confused. "Of course not. What would they want with a prophecy? No, it was the Time Turners they wanted. We never quite learned why - Dumbledore guessed that Voldemort was, perhaps, trying to get supporters from the past, or, perhaps, get rid of Dumbledore himself."

"Kill him when he was a baby, that sort of thing?" Ron asked quietly.

"That sort of thing, yes. Anyway, we got there just in time to stop then. You - this is so weird," he said, then started again. "You were fighting Bellatrix, and you - well, you hit each other at the same time. You both died."

"But how did you end up with Bellatrix's vault? Wouldn't it have gone to her sisters?"

At this, and to Ron's obvious surprise, Sirius's smile grew wider. "I don't know if you know my cousin, Andromeda -"

"Oh, of course, Tonks's mother," he said, and Sirius nodded.

"Exactly. She married Ted Tonks, and he is Muggle-born. Her father... well, let's just say that in the Black family in those days, marrying a Muggle-born was the worst crime imaginable. I think my aunt and uncle would have preferred her to marry a werewolf before she married a Muggle-born," he laughed.

"I wouldn't be so sure," Harry said carefully. Ron could see Sirius was startled to hear his voice - he must have not realised Harry was listening to their conversation.

"Anyway," Sirius continued, "after that happened, her father decided he didn't want to risk his money getting into the hands of anyone who wasn't a pure-blood. He had already put a spell on the vault so the money couldn't go into a Muggle-born's hands, but he was afraid the spell would break with his death. Or that if anything happened to Bellatrix or Narcissa, the money would end up with Andromeda, or that Andromeda's children would be eligible to the inheritance."

"Paranoid git," Ron muttered.

"Exactly," Sirius nodded. "But we can't really complain now, can we? He added a spell that prevented the sisters from inheriting each other. Bella and Cissy didn't mind - they both assumed they would have children anyway. But Bellatrix never had any children. And then, with all the protective spells on the money, it ended up going to the closest family relative who was not married to a non pure-blood." Sirius chuckled. "What dear old Cygnus didn't think about was that I might not be married at all. Or that there are ways to oppose my family's obsession with purity of blood other than marrying Muggle-borns. So, I ended up with the money." He surveyed the vault for a moment. "I never even touched it until now. Never even thought about it. Good thing I haven't, too -" he added quickly. "I'd have probably sold the whole lot of it."

"And then we wouldn't be able to find - this!" Harry showed up with a small goblet, and handed it to Sirius.

Sirius looked at it carefully, and Ron checked it with him. Harry was right - he could see it now. There was a small badger on the golden cup. Helga Hufflepuff's.

"Incredible," Sirius muttered, and put it in his pocket. "Out of curiosity, how did you guys get it? Bellatrix, I take it, was still alive?"

"And not very keen on letting us rob her," Ron agreed. "We had to do it without her consent."

Sirius stared at him for a moment, speechless. "You broke into Gringotts?" he asked finally. "And lived to tell the tale?"

"Oh, yeah," Ron answered and laughed. Harry said nothing.

"Just the two of you? You and Hermione?" Sirius said and whistled in appreciation.

"The three of us," Ron corrected him. "Harry was with us."

"Right," Sirius looked at Harry uncomfortably for a moment. "How did you get out?" he asked eventually.

"On a dragon..." Ron started telling the tale, as they left the bank and started walking down Diagon Alley. Sirius laughed and laughed.

Once outside the bank, though, Ron's storytelling had become a lot less heartfelt. He couldn't help it - seeing Diagon Alley so bright, so full of people - and mostly, seeing it out in the open, as himself and not under the Invisibility Cloak or the guise of Polyjuice Potion... he missed all that. He didn't have the chance to walk so freely in the street and between other wizards for years. Since Voldemort took over, actually, he thought.

"You know," he told Sirius, "the last time I walked like this in Diagon Alley must have been before our sixth year at Hogwarts. Thirteen years, man. Thirteen years. Looks almost the same, though." He looked around. "Fred and George had a joke shop. I don't see it here, though."

"No," Sirius said. "They're working for Zonko's. Don't have the money for a joke shop of their own."

"Yeah, they got the money from - " He paused before starting the explanation. It would be too hard to explain. Another one of the ways in which his life had been affected by Harry. "I wonder what there is there instead of it - let's go look!"

Sirius wasn't very happy with the suggestion. "We're supposed to go back to Hogwarts," he said reluctantly.

"Oh, c'mon - we'll just get bored there. Hermione can't have come back already, she's facing much more complicated magic than what we had."

"Sure," Sirius grumbled, and Ron led the way to the premises on 93 Diagon Alley. It wasn't Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes, of course. Sirius had just said it wouldn't be. Still, Ron couldn't help but feel disappointed. Everything was so perfect, surely his brothers being financial wizards couldn't have been that much of a stretch?

But no, he figured, you can't have everything. His brothers' financial independence was a small price to pay for their lives and freedom. Maybe that was what the shop on 93 Diagon Alley was - a symbol for the price he was willing to pay.

Even if, instead of his brothers' shop, the premises around him proved to be a second shop for Borgin and Burke's.

"Not the best shop in town," Sirius commented dryly.

"Could have been worse," Ron said. "Could have been - " a shop where Death Eaters were hiding, right there in broad daylight.

He wasn't quite sure what drew his attention to the second floor windows. Or how he had made the split-second decision that they must be Death Eaters. Maybe he was already used to seeing Death Eaters wherever he went... whatever it was, as soon as he saw the movement, he knew they were in imminent danger. The Death Eaters spotted him and Sirius at the same time as he saw them.

"Down!" he shouted and ducked, finding cover behind a wall. Sirius did the same.

Where was Harry? Ron tried looking around for him, but was almost hit by a curse as soon as he brought his head up. He sent a curse up the window, in the Death Eaters' direction. Sirius did the same.

"Harry!" he called.

"Eurgh - here!" He heard the call from the other side of the street. A red jet of sparks came from it after another second - Harry was trying to get the Death Eaters, too. "Can't get to them!"

"Neither can I!"

"And now they can hear the two of you," Sirius grumbled and sent his own curse. He missed spectacularly. A green jet of light almost his him in response.

"Ron!" He heard Harry shouting from his hiding place, next to the walls of the small alley. "Can you distract them?"

"How?"

"I don't know - anything!"

Ron shook his head - but he knew Harry must have an idea. Distraction, distraction... what could he possibly do to draw their attention? If only he had one of Fred and George's old fireworks, he thought, and then realised - that was it. He had no fireworks, of course, but he knew the magic to recreate the effect.

He aimed his wand at the second floor's general direction and said the incantation - and immediately, red and white sparks ignited in the small alley.

"What the hell are you doing?" Sirius demanded next to him. Ron shrugged. "Providing a distraction," he said with a grin.

Sirius laughed and sent his own explosion. It took only a few seconds before half a dozen spells shattered around them. "Hope that's enough of a distraction," Sirius said grimly. Ron sent out another explosion.

From the corner of his eye, he could see Harry now. He was sneaking out of his hiding place, at the corner of the building, and slowly advancing towards number 93.

He was out of sight as soon as Ron returned to the safety, back to the cover of the wall. Another explosion and he got another glimpse of Harry - who was already climbing up the wall. Now Ron understood.

He wasn't the only one to notice him. Looking at the building again, Ron could see a Death Eater, leaning out the window, aiming his wand at the climbing man. Without a second though, Ron aimed his own wand at the man and called out "Avada Kedavra!" The Death Eater fell without a sound.

"What the hell are you doing?" Sirius screamed. Around them, spells were showered in every direction.

"Keep them going!" Ron warned him, and aimed his wand again, sending another explosion towards the shop. "It's okay, we've done this dozens of times. He's going to - " BOOM! - "sneak up on them, stop them in some way." He ducked at the very last second, as a curse cracked the wall exactly where his head had been a moment before. "Probably blow the whole thing up."

A huge explosion above them served as confirmation of what he had just said. They allowed themselves to peer outside the cover of the wall.

Where before a two-storey shop stood, there was now only rubble. Harry had blown up the upper floor, but his magic had caused the entire infrastructure of the shop to collapse. Ron wasn't surprised - it was not the first time this had happened when they used that particular technique. But Sirius was white and shocked.

"He blew the whole thing up," Sirius said weakly.

"Best way to make sure they don't come after us again," Ron pointed out.

"But - it's a shop! In the middle of Diagon Alley! He blew it all up!"

Ron couldn't understand what he was so upset about. "It's just Death Eaters, mate," he said. "Just Borgin and Burke's. No big deal."

Sirius stared at him for a moment longer, his expression deeply uncomfortable. Then he shook his head. "You wouldn't have guessed it, looking at your friend, that he could cause so much damage," he said. "I mean, with what he did to Snape's office, he doesn't look... I wouldn't have guessed it."

"Harry's got magic like the rest of us," Ron pointed out. It was odd, that he had to explain this to Sirius.

"He doesn't look like he could concentrate enough of it to do so much damage, though," Sirius said again.

"It's the adrenaline, I reckon," said another voice - Harry. He was limping, Ron could see, and bleeding from his arm. He must have fell from the blast - a risk they were all aware of, of course, and still, Ron was worried to see his wounds.

"The adrenaline?" Sirius looked at him as if he said something completely ridiculous.

Harry just shrugged. "Dunno. Let's get out of here before the Ministry shows up, alright?"