Chapter 18. A Letter from a Friend
A drop of water on his cheek woke Harry, who slowly opened his dazed eyes. As he looked up at the high stone ceiling, dimly lit with green light, another thin stream of water ran down his chin. It took him a while to remember why he was lying in such a dark, gloomy and cold place. Then suddenly, everything that had just happened flooded into his mind, as if a dam had been broken and the river had burst through.
Harry hoped that the memory of fighting Eisenbein was nothing more than a vivid nightmare due to his extreme exhaustion. However, fragments of broken columns and shattered basilisk bones littered the stone floor — obvious evidence of the fierce battle that had just taken place. The taste of blood on his lips was a bitter reminder of the Elder Wand that had been taken from him. He came here to protect the Deathly Hallows, but instead he fell into a trap and lost one of them.
Harry got up and went back the way he had come, cautious of his surroundings, but Eisenbein had vanished without a trace, having already achieved his goal. Halfway through the tunnel, Ron, crouched against the wall near the green skin of the basilisk, lifted his head weakly. He looked passably well, except for a very pale face.
"You're a mess, Harry," Ron said, holding Harry's hand as he stumbled to his feet. The bandages on his legs had come off, revealing the reddened skin underneath. By now the swelling had almost gone down and fortunately nothing seemed to be seriously wrong. "I just woke up — what happened to you?"
"Ron, he got me . . . it was all a trap."
In depressed tone, Harry recounted Eisenbein's elaborate plan to gain the Elder Wand's allegiance, from the disturbance in the kitchen of the Bulgarian hotel to their duel in the Chamber of Secrets. When Harry finally revealed that he had been Stunned by the stolen Elder Wand, Ron's face grew paler than before, his freckles glowing faintly even in the dark.
"But Harry, why didn't he just kill us?" Ron broke the long silence. "We were both unconscious. . . . He could've easily finished us off."
"He's got another Deathly Hallow to go," said Harry, who had been thinking the same thing. "Maybe Eisenbein's trying to use us to find it, like he did with the Elder Wand."
"He's already got two Hallows, Harry!" A desperate look crossed Ron's face as he shouted. "We're finished if he gets the Resurrection Stone!"
"Don't worry about it. I'm the last person to have seen the stone, and even I don't know where it is," Harry said, unconvincingly confident. "And there's still work to be done at Hogwarts. . . . While we were fighting, I learned information that would somehow help me defeat Eisenbein."
Once they had passed through the debris and traversed the tunnel, the room finally opened up at the mouth of the pipe. In the middle of the floor was a long, dark pipe covered with a sticky substance that they had used earlier to get down here.
"How are we going to get back up this time?" asked Harry. During their last visit, Fawkes the Phoenix had offered to help them, but that was no longer possible. "Ah yes, Ron — you and Hermione got into the Chamber of Secrets during the Battle of Hogwarts. How did you get out the last time?"
Ron, who had been staring blankly at the small, faint light far above them, came to his sensess when he heard these words. "Right, we came here to get the basilisk fangs. . . . We rode a broom back then." Taking a moment to think, Ron pointed to the shaded area next to the pipe. "I think I left the spare broom over there. . . . Let's check it out."
They indeed found an old school broom nearby — a Shooting Star for public use. The two of them climbed onto the broomstick together and flew toward the distant dim light. Though the Shooting Star was slow and sometimes jerky, it still managed to keep Harry and Ron flying up the water pipes. Harry's despair and helplessness faded as he approached the light, replaced by determination and fighting spirit.
"Mate, did you find out anything about Eisenbein?" asked Ron.
"According to him, Eisenbein was struck by something called the Fourth Curse . . . his face looks ghostly and smoky 'cause that curse has erased his physical body," Harry said, going on to explain why Eisenbein needed the Cloak of Invisibility.
"So now we're going to —"
"That's right, Ron. We're going to McGonagall's office," said Harry. "If Eisenbein was telling the truth, Dumbledore's portrait could reveal his true identity and tell us about the Fourth Curse."
"I never imagined there was such a thing — a curse even more terrible than the Killing Curse . . ." Ron trembled, and their broomstick vibrated in its lazy ascent. "Death scares me the most, and now he says the Fourth Curse can make a person less than a ghost. Do you really think Professor Dumbledore would've used such a curse? It doesn't make any sense . . ."
"I think so too, but it's better to listen to Dumbledore himself than to guess between ourselves." They had reached the beginning of the water pipe by the time Harry finished speaking. "I need to contact Minerva first . . . Expecto Patronum!"
A silver stag slipped from the tip of his wand and dashed forward to deliver the message. Through the corridor and up the stairs, they followed Harry's Patronus, which was already far ahead of them. The silent walls of the castle echoed with their footsteps late at night. Both Harry and Ron were out of breath by the time they reached the seventh floor.
"Harry, was it like this before?" said Ron as the gargoyle statue guarding the headmistress's office caught their attention. The gargoyle was lying on its side, snoring loudly, and the wall behind it had opened to reveal the spiral staircase. He reached for the stairs with his foot, possessed by an ominous premonition.
"Don't be stupid, Harry — you wanna bounce off like me?" said Ron. But Harry's foot reached the stairs without being interrupted by anything. It was obvious that there was no longer a protective charm. Harry let the stairs take him up, and Ron followed close behind. While climbing the tower, his vision dimmed as if he were going blind, and the air smelled of something acrid, similar to gunpowder.
"Wait — I think I know what this is. . . . Our shop used to sell Instant Darkness Powder from Peru that smelled just like this," said Ron anxiously, sniffing the air. "D'you reckon Eisenbein broke in here already?"
Instead of answering, Harry hurried up the stairs. It never occurred to him that Professor McGonagall could have been hurt by his lack of vigilance.
"Professor McGonagall! Minerva — are you there?"
There was no response from above when Harry called out. He climbed the stairs to the top of the tower and found it completely dark, as though he had just entered a closed room with no lights. He almost fell several times because of the escalating stairs beneath his feet, but he managed to get his feet on the hard floor by desperately leaning against the wall. Harry pulled out his wand and whispered "Lumos," but the thick darkness persisted.
"There's no spell that works against Darkness Powder, not even that one," Ron's voice whispered behind him. "No matter what you do, you can't dispel the darkness until the powder loses its effectiveness. . . . That is a lesson Malfoy taught me in my sixth year with his evil schemes."
After a moment's struggle, Harry found the brass knocker in the dark and slowly pushed it. Unlocked, the door creaked open without any resistance.
"Is anyone there?" said a familiar voice from the pitch-black room.
"This is Harry Potter, Professor Black." The old headmasters and mistresses murmured in relief when Harry answered. "Where is Professor McGonagall? Can you tell me what's going on?"
"That's exactly what I want to know," Phineas Nigellus hissed sulkily into the darkness. "As usual, I was dozing off in my frame when suddenly the door over there opened and the room went into this cavernous state. . . . Something sounded like it was ripping and cracking, but there was nothing visible."
"Dumbledore — are you there?" asked a woman's voice this time. "If you haven't seen anything, then I'm sure no one has."
But Dumbledore remained silent. The ominous feeling of foreboding he had felt since he had seen the collapsed statue in the corridor downstairs pounded painfully in Harry's head. Stumbling across the office, Harry traced the wall with his hand.
"Ouch! That's my face!" a male voice yelled from the side he had just reached.
"Sorry, sir."
Harry's fingertip finally touched the smooth surface of the glass he had been looking for. He pushed the window open and blew the air out of the room with his wand, creating a strong wind. The total darkness in the headmistress's office receded as the Darkness Powder drained away like an open water tank, and light began to seep into the room. A few candles that had lost their power due to the powder began to flicker faintly, and now the field of vision was clear enough to look around.
"No — Dumbledore!" cried a witch, and portraits everywhere screamed or gasped in shock. In a flash, Harry saw the portrait of Albus Dumbledore behind the desk and his heart sank. The picture in the frame, broken on one side, was torn to shreds and pieces of paper littered the floor. With shaking hands, Harry unfolded one of them. The crumpled paper showed vertical stripes of thin white lines from Dumbledore's long, white beard. Harry stood speechless in front of the mutilated portrait of Albus Dumbledore. Ron came over and looked at it with him in a similar way. While the office brightened as the Darkness Powder was mostly removed, Harry's mind grew darker, like his insides had been infected by the powder instead.
"Reparo!" Ron shouted angrily, waving his wand at the frame. The painting, however, remained motionless in its torn state.
"Did you ever take your Transfiguration lessons seriously, Weasley? The damage to the artwork is too great for it to be restored!" Phineas Nigellus pointed out pompously.
"Shut up before I do the same to you!" Ron growled, and Phineas muttered some words involving "manners" and "rude" under his breath, looking extremely sour. Then Harry heard the door behind them creak open and Minerva McGonagall entered. She strode up to them with a tired look on her face.
"My apologies for being late, Potter — Weasley — some golden butterflies had attacked students in the dormitory, and I was dealing with them along with other professors. . . . So, what brought you back to my —"
Her eyes were drawn to the wall behind Harry and Ron as she gasped. Her mouth fell open in astonishment, deepening the lines on her face.
"What — Professor Dumbledore! How on earth has this come about?"
To calm McGonagall, Harry sat her down at the desk and gave her a cup of hot tea. In turn, he told the story of the reopening of the Chamber of Secrets, the snatching of the Elder Wand, and the damaged picture of Dumbledore he had just encountered in her office. With no hope of uncovering the truth about Eisenbein through Dumbledore's portrait, he felt even more depressed than when he had been in the underground tunnel with Ron. Tears welled up in the corners of McGonagall's wrinkled eyes when she had finished hearing Harry's words.
"Throughout my life, Albus has been my teacher, colleague and friend. He has always given me sincere advice whenever I have had concerns about the running of Hogwarts . . ."
The true meaning of Dumbledore's loss only hit Harry when McGonagall pulled out a handkerchief and wiped away her tears. The utter grief of losing Professor Dumbledore atop Astronomy Tower resurfaced. Despite his death, the portrait of Albus Dumbledore had helped Harry find the Horcruxes through Snape, and when Harry had succeeded in defeating Voldemort, he had congratulated him most happily. Not so long ago, Dumbledore had also advised Harry when he was having problems with his son Albus, who bore his name. But now, as of today, Dumbledore's personality had been lost forever — Harry would never be able to talk to him again.
"But the stairs had my defensive spell . . ." McGonagall stared at the destroyed portrait in disbelief. "How did he even get here?"
"It doesn't work against Eisenbein — something he calls the Fourth Curse took his physical body away from him. . . . Your charm didn't stop him from stealing my Invisibility Cloak from my cousin's house a few months ago, Professor," said Harry. "At least one thing is clear: Eisenbein's weakness must be the Fourth Curse, or he wouldn't have come all the way here to silence Professor Dumbledore."
The former headmasters and headmistresses, who had been listening intently to Harry in their portraits, nodded their heads in agreement.
"Now there's no way to find out what the curse is, Harry," Ron said, looking crestfallen. "Hermione may have put her hopes in the library, but no book could hold information about such a secret curse."
"Minerva, did Professor Dumbledore leave any personal writings?" asked Harry desperately. "It could be a letter, a diary, or even a memo — anything."
"Let me think. . . . As deputy headmistress, I have disposed of some of his belongings at Hogwarts in accordance with his wishes." Before looking at Harry again, McGonagall thought for a few minutes. "Yes — now I remember. All of his personal writings and letters were left to his brother. So those things are now in Aberforth's possession, if they exist at all."
Ten minutes later, Harry and Ron were flying through the clear night sky on the Shooting Stars they had borrowed from Hogwarts. Overhead, the velvety blackness was dotted with twinkling stars, and the full moon peeked out from behind the clouds, casting its pale light over the surrounding mountains and fields. It was a seemingly peaceful night, but Harry's heart was anything but. Though he wanted to stay by McGonagall's side and comfort her in grief and loss, Eisenbein would gain the upper hand as time went on. To prevent further loss of life, it was necessary to learn the secrets of the Fourth Curse and stop his crimes.
Landing on the High Street in Hogsmeade, the two dismounted their broomsticks. There were only a few streetlights and candles peeking out from the upper floors of closed shops to light the quiet street. As Harry headed straight for the Hog's Head Inn, Ron followed in silence. Passing the post office with its owls swirling in the sky, they entered a narrow side street and stood in front of a small doorway. Above it was a sign with the severed head of a wild boar creaking in the wind. Harry knocked three times on the door. When he raised his hand to knock again after a long wait, a sleepy and annoyed voice spoke from inside.
"Dunno who you are, but we're closed."
"It's me — Harry Potter."
There was a clang of bolts and the door opened.
"Potter — Weasley? What are you doing here so late?" Aberforth Dumbledore's face appeared through the half-open door, his voice sounding cautious now that it had lost its earlier sleepiness. Though he bore a striking resemblance to Albus Dumbledore, he had wire-gray hair and a beard, and unlike his late brother, his nose was unbroken.
"Sorry to wake you, Aberforth. Ron and I are tracking a Dark wizard named Eisenbein, and I think the records Professor Dumbledore left behind may help us."
Aberforth stared intently at Harry, his piercing blue eyes hidden behind dusty glasses.
"What animal is my Patronus?" asked Aberforth quietly.
"A goat. Let us in now, this is urgent," said Ron impatiently.
"You also told the Death Eaters in this alley that the Patronus they saw was a goat, not a stag," added Harry. As if their answers were enough to confirm their identities, Aberforth opened the door wide for them to enter.
"Come in. I had to check — you know, there's a lot of ugly stuff going on these days . . ."
Only one candle lit the untidy bar, and Aberforth led Harry and Ron behind the counter. Their footsteps made a rustling sound on the sawdust-covered floor, and dust particles exposed by the faint candlelight danced in the air at the sudden disturbance in the stale air. They followed the rickety wooden steps to the door behind the counter and entered a sitting room with a worn carpet and a small fireplace.
"You said you needed my brother's writings? It seems Albus didn't keep a diary, but I have some of his letters. . . . Please wait.
Aberforth began to take things out of a wooden chest he had opened on one side of the room. Meanwhile, Harry glanced at the only picture in the room, a large oil painting of a blonde girl hanging above the fireplace. In the frame, Ariana Dumbledore — the younger sister of Albus and Aberforth — was smiling kindly at him with a blank expression on her face.
"Ah, here you go." Aberforth placed the wooden box in his arms on a small table facing the fire. "I read about Eisenbein in the papers. . . . He seems to be causing a lot of trouble, though I don't know how you're going to get any help from this box, unless you plan to put dust from it into his mouth."
"Eisenbein doesn't have a body, Aberforth, let alone a mouth," Harry said, unlocking the box. "The fourth of the Unforgivable Curses is to blame, he said. Have you ever heard of such a curse?"
"Not at all. I certainly have no desire to be struck by that thing, though," said Aberforth gruffly. "Let me guess — did Eisenbein say that my brother shot the curse?"
"That's right. Is there anyone you know who might be Eisenbein?" said Ron, his eyes twinkling, but Aberforth shook his head firmly.
"There is none. My brother gets a lower and more truthful assessment from me than the public, but Albus would never have attempted such a terrible curse on purpose."
"By accident, then?"
In response to Harry's question, Aberforth's gaze shifted to his sister in the oil painting.
"I doubt it, but I cannot be certain. In his youth, Albus would dare to cross the line for what he called the greater good . . ." The wooden box was revealed to be filled with folded parchment when Aberforth opened it. "These are the evidence. Here are mostly letters to him from me and his acquaintances, but underneath are ones from the close friend from his youth. . . ."
As Harry took the old, yellowish letters out of the box, he checked the return address on each one. While some of the letters were personal correspondence with Elphias Doge, Nicolas Flamel, Bathilda Bagshot, Adalbert Waffling, and Aberforth, others were from the former Minister of Magic, Cornelius Fudge, seeking Dumbledore's advice.
With the box emptied of its contents, Harry had to be careful not to tear the weakened parchment envelope. As he pulled out the letters at the bottom, Harry noticed that Ron, sitting next to him, gasped in surprise. A triangular eye, symbolizing the Deathly Hallows, was drawn between two initials G on the letters he was holding, the mark of the infamous Dark wizard Gellert Grindelwald.
"It is in letters like these that you will find the information you need, if there is any. Grindelwald's letters must contain details of countless curses," said Aberforth darkly. "My brother used to have secret conversations with that brat when we lived in Godric's Hollow. . . . The slightest bit of the Dark Arts they were studying back then could easily have blown up the entire village."
"So we need to find a letter that mentions the Fourth Curse, Harry?" said Ron, picking up some letters from the pile and sitting down. "I'll help you find it."
"Then I'll help too. . . . I don't think I can fall asleep right now." Aberforth grabbed a bundle of letters and sat down in the empty chair beside him.
They read the contents of the frayed envelope over and over, relying on the flickering candlelight. Having read the first three letters, Aberforth took a large swig of mead and yawned.
Most of Grindelwald's letters argued that it was in the best interests of Muggles, as well as themselves, for wizards to be the ruling class. His writings were filled with concrete examples of the problems of their time, such as the massacres among Muggles and the wide gap between rich and poor. Reading only these coherent and intelligent passages, it was difficult to predict that Grindelwald would later be reborn as a cruel and heartless Dark wizard. A wave of excitement swept over Harry, who had been reading the letters with somber eyes, as he opened the letter containing the history of the Deathly Hallows.
"The Elder Wand is the only Hallow whose trace can be deduced from historical records," Grindelwald said in his letter to Albus Dumbledore, "and it is here that we must begin our grand plan. I am currently investigating Emeric the Evil, who once possessed the wand in the medieval times. I'd like to know if you find anything new as well."
Dumbledore and Grindelwald seem to have begun their search for the Deathly Hallows around the time this letter arrived. Grindelwald also included historical information about the wizards who possessed the Elder Wand in two subsequent letters.
"I think there's something here, Harry," said Ron abruptly, pushing the letter he had been studying into the middle of the table. The three of them began to silently examine it together, which read:
Ablus —
I found some unexpected information while rummaging through Aunt Bathilda's library last night. As I've mentioned before, the whereabouts of the Elder Wand are unknown after Loxias's death, and I was at a loss. I read everything I could find in her library and came across an extremely old report. It was written by an investigator from the British Ministry of Magic who had visited Azkaban — one of the most notorious Wizard prisons in our world, you know.
The fortress of Azkaban had been built by Ekrizdis on an isolated rocky island; the Dark wizard's death had dispelled its protective magic, revealing its location. Most importantly, the wand he had possessed appeared to be the Elder Wand, according to the Ministry investigators who examined the island.
Guess what was even more surprising, Albus? Ekrizdis's body, presumed dead, was nowhere to be found, while his mad house-elf was laughing and giggling alone in the underground when the investigators visited, holding his master's wand among the dementors! Several Ministry employees were killed by the wand-wielding house-elf before the elf was sent to his death. An interesting note here is that the Elder Wand was once used by a house-elf, albeit briefly.
Another fact deserves our attention, my dear friend. It looks like Ekrizdis was trying to collect all three Deathly Hallows, just like us. Based on Ekrizdis's rambling journals, the investigation team concluded that he did so to control an ancient and terrible curse! The curse is only mentioned once in this report, as Curse IV. It will only be a matter of time before we achieve the greater good if we can wield such a powerful spell — another reason for us to seek out the Hallows.
P.S. Write the above curse on parchment — an amazing sight awaits you!
Picking up one of the blank envelopes on the desk, Harry used a quill to write the words "The Fourth Curse," as Grindelwald had suggested in his letter. A few seconds later, to his utter astonishment, all the ink had dissolved from the parchment, obliterating the words. Aberforth opened his mouth as Harry and Ron gaped at the blank parchment.
"It looks like there's an extremely powerful jinx at work here. . . . The Ministry of Magic must have put it there to prevent any record of the curse."
"No wonder no one knows about the Fourth Curse," muttered Harry. "There's very little information about the curse here. . . . Could Professor Dumbledore have known more about it?"
"I have no idea. Unfortunately, we couldn't locate many of the letters my brother sent to Grindelwald," said Aberforth thoughtfully. "In any case, I wouldn't be surprised if Albus knew about it — he was obviously very well read."
"Right now we only have one clue to the Fourth Curse," said Harry. "Azkaban. Ekrizdis may have left additional records there."
"Yes, that seems to be the case," said Aberforth reluctantly, his expression darkening at the mention of the prison. "Then good luck, Potter. I'll write to you if I find out anything useful."
The letter from Grindelwald was in Harry's pocket when he and Ron stepped out onto the High Street in Hogsmeade.
"Harry, we're leaving for Azkaban in the morning, aren't we?" said Ron cheerfully, but his face looked unusually pale in the moonlight, due to his exhaustion and the injuries he had sustained earlier.
"I will, but maybe you should get some rest first," said Harry. "I'll take Teddy this one. He's been to Azkaban many times, so he'll be fine."
Ron insisted on following them at first, only giving up when Harry mentioned that he was limping. The peaceful landscape of Hogsmeade was left behind as Harry and Ron turned on the spot to Disapparate and plunged into the darkness.