Chapter 16. the chaos of the phoenix
Dumbledor cottage, Hogsmeade, August 1st 1995
Albus Dumbledor fell heavily on his bed, not even bothering to take off his robes. Truth be told, for the whole month by now he felt too tired in the evenings to care about clothes, or too wary in the mornings to crawl through the insanity of another day. Ever since the end of a disaster called Triwizard tournament, things started making no sense to the old wizard. Voldemort was back, according to the aurors of the graveyard investigation team (an enormous discharge of magic in a muggle sight as well as remnants of ritual cauldron and potion spoke by themselves), but no one had seen head nor tail of him. No summons to meetings, no darkening of Dark marks, no new recruitment, no raids or mysterious disappearances – nothing to confirm the rumors circulating amongst ministry workers and common folks alike. Instead, several of the Dark lord's lower ranking followers reported being cleansed by a patronus (different one for each person) upon entering the ministry mere days after the tournament. Everyone told the same story: a spirit guardian would approach them in the atrium, rub its head on their left arm and erase the Dark mark. At first Dumbledor believed none of that, but seeing bare arms of not one, not two but a whole bunch of known death eaters changed his opinion. If it was so easy, why not try it on his own spy (assistant!) also, if Voldemort had really returned, gathering the old good Order of the phoenix would be necessary… Those and similar thoughts forced Albus too many duties Dumbledor to send a patronus message to who he presumed to be Sirius that morning, summon Severus Snape and head to number 12 Grimmauld place, Sirius' new old house. little did he know how wrong he was (about the order at least)…
everything started so swimmingly that even the old wizard didn't believe his success: Regulus' falcon came back with a positive reply minutes after he sent his own phoenix, in spite the early hour. In no time Albus was standing in the street where the house was supposed to be, Snape behind him. Except that number 12 had disappeared. A quick wandless scan showed it to hide under a Fidelius charm, however impossible it may sound. The old Secret keeper, Arcturus Black, died years ago; to add, Albus had checked up on the house days ago from a far and seen it clearly – back then it lacked even a basic muggle repelling ward, let alone a Fidelius. The two wizards had no choice but to wait for someone stepping outside, for when the door opens, the building would become visible for a moment. This could take minutes or even hours, and neither of them were satisfied with that. Luckily, a hasty notice-me-not charm saved them from unwanted attention, but just standing around was such a waste of precious time… if Dumbledor somewhat accepted that and remained silent, Snape didn't hesitate to voice his opinion: "I would rather brew something useful than play your games, Albus…" the opening door cut his complaints short; a familiar yet so different house elf clad in buttler's uniform peaked outside, eyeing the two arrivals with suspition. "is something being wrong, sirs?" "is Sirius home?" – Dumbledor decided to cut to the chase. "master no Sirius is being home, sir. Master is waiting yous. Kreacher be letting yous into secret." To the utmost shock of both wizards, the elf pulled a slip of parchment from somewhere and thrust it towards them. "Blacks' safe house is located at number 12, Grimmauld place". The paper burst into flames immediately after both people read it, and a building sprung in front of their very eyes. Yet it wasn't the same dilapidated house they remembered from years ago: bricks seemed newly painted, windows sparkling, doors repaired, locks changed, roof patched, surroundings cleaned. A few potted plants dotted the windowcil, bright lights indicated the inhabited rooms. The strangest though was the elf: if Dumbledors memory served him right, Kreacher had to be a hundred years old, hunched, pale, constantly injured poor soul who's sole purpose was enduring insults of Walberga Black's portrait. The servant in the doorway seemed at most half of a century old, wore clothes, and was a secret keeper for the house of all things. By now both wizards were hesitant to step inside (what strangeness wiats in there?) but had no other choice, just to follow Kreacher.
If from outside the place looked recently renovated, possibly without magic no less, the enterior left both newcomers speechless. New carpets covered the floor, new pictures in sterdy wooden frames lined the walls, glittering crystal lamps illuminated the entryway, the air smelled of fresh flowers and food. Beside the ordinary coatrack stood another, elf-sized, holding three travelling cloaks. Whistling and explosions could be heard from somewhere below, and laughter intermixed with ranting came from the kitchen. Out of a sudden a silvery falcon floated towards the newcomers, briefely passing through Dumbledor (luckily he was too lost in thought to notice his phoenix whistle glow red for a moment, then settle back to golden) and rushed to Snape. The bird rubbed its head on the professors left arm, the spot of his robes where the mark was glowed hot white for a while, the man swayed in tiredness or pain, but everything settled back to normal as soon as the (scan? Treatment?) ended. "w-what was that?" – Snape stammered, looking at his arm in disbelief. "a patronus scan, sir", replied Kreacher, shrugging off the invisibility spell. "follow me. Master no Sirius is waiting yous." Making a mental note to research the weird procedure later, the two wizards stepped into the kitchen.
"good morning Albus, severus. To what we ough the pleasure?" – Regulus seemed to notice his guests first. For some reason, Sirius sat in the seat farthest from the door, silent and glaring daggers at a house elf (mere elfling of about half a year old) flying around the table on… winged shoes? Alexa was present too, busying herself with dishes or something, barely controlling her fury. a goblet with remnants of olive green potion sat innocently in front of sulking wizard, but the man was too preoccupied with no one knew what. No one noticed how he drew his wand for silent summoning charm; quill and parchment came zooming from upstairs, narrowly missing the cup. Barely controlling his trembling hands, Sirius scribbled: "good morning Albus, severus. Apologies, I can't speak today." The elfling glanced at the writing and burst into laughter, catching Alexa's attention. The last two people Dumbledor and Snape wanted to meet, the Weasley twins, chose that exact moment to thunder up the stairs, covered head to toe in multicolored powder. "Hermes! What did you do to our lab?!" the creature landed at Fred's (or was it George?) side, holding his hands in a theatrical not guilty" gesture. "nothing at all, master pranksters, nothing at all. I'm grounded, you know." Then Sirius spoke, no, croked in unnaturally guttural voice:"grounded! Grounded, he is! Pay for this you will, all three of you!" everyone, including Dumbledor, burst into peels of hearty laughter; only Snape and Alexa shook their heads in annoyance, the former sending a murderous glare at his students, the latter hissing something in (gods, was it Parseltongue?) at her son. Kreacher silently popped into the room, glanced at the scene and just shrugged his straighter than ever shoulders: "Kreacher is being sorry sirs. Kreacher tried talk to Hermes. Hermes not listening, Weazies be pranking master no Sirius, Hermes be grounded. But Hermes not staying in basement, be pranking Weazies. Kreacher be cleaning this mess." The elf wordlessly showed the two guests to their seats, not willing to bare the shame Weasley twins and a young of his kind brought onto the house just that morning. Alexa, having somewhat calmed down, set preparing tea and snacks for the meeting (however it was possible with Sirius talking like a muggle character from a muggle film, and two redheads looking like rainbow cakes) to start.
The next couple of hours were so unusually confusing that, despite having other plans before coming, neither Dumbledor nor Snape paid any heed to the time. questions spilled from both mouths not unlike beans from a ripped sack, the house occupants struggling to keep up the pace. What on earth did Regulus' patronus do to Snape? Why did Sirius hide Grimmauld under Fidelius, with a house elf as secret keeper no less? Where did Harry Potter go, ignoring his own safety? What were Fred and George up to this morning? And why, however surprising it sounded, did Kreacher refer to Sirius as "Master no Sirius"? the answers shocked both men, more so Albus, for they told a story absolutely different from what everyone (well, maybe except the unspeakables) believed til now.
Even in the late hour of the evening, Albus too tired to be anything but confused Dumbledor could not cope with any of those answers. Voldemort was secure in a cage under the ministry. The unspeakables were rounding up death eaters and erasing their slave marks with only a patronus, and Regulus did just that to Snape. It was easy, just too easy to believe, but effective and painless – the only inconvenience Severus described afterwards was a sensation of coldfire touching the skin, too briefly to do any harm. Most unusual, because when the falcon passed through Dumbledor, he felt nothing. Only when he whistled to summon his phoenix after the meeting, the bird took more time than normal to come from Hogwarts. It seemed that the patronus erased the borderline dark compulsion spell on his whistle. On the other hand, it didn't matter at all; the old wizard just wanted to get away and never come back to that house. house with a Fidelius charm stronger than he, one and a half century old warlock, was capable of, and a house elf as secret keeper. House where each and every visitor would be scanned by patronus, because Regulus Black was more paranoid than Alastor Moody. House where Weasley twins saught refuge whenever their mother found out about their new inventions, what meant every day. In exchange for Harry Potter coming to the Burrow for a flying session with Ron, no doubt. House where said redheaded devils bribed Hermes, the immature if almost fully grown house elf, with winged shoes and a pre-loaded wand (they managed to achieve quite a realistic image of god Hermes, but serious wizard like Dumbledor couldn't admit it, could he now?) to prank Sirius. House where, ignoring his mother's scolding, said elf kept flying around everyone's heads while Sirius tried to overcome the effects of whatever potion the twins brewed for him. "modified Babel tower brew", - they proudly admitted. Where did they even learn about this restricted, let alone fiendishly complex concoction, was beyond even Snape, let alone old Dumbledor. "at least Black speaks only English and doesn't show symptoms of globe trotter syndrome", the potions master rushed to reassure. "if he was an ordinary person, each word of his would be in a different language, and finding an international portkey would be the least of his problems." Why? Did Severus notice something Albus didn't? Also, Kreacher referring to Sirius as he did was puzzling by itself, without Snape's vague remarks. "master no Sirius", the wisenned old wizard mumbled to himself, trying to unravel the obvious secret. Unfortunately, he could come up with only one explanation – Sirius Black was sharing a body with another, hence his supposed imunity to mind altering potions. Except that Black showed no signs of being possessed or otherwise controlled, such as fear, weight loss, stuttering or moodswings. Time travel incident was a possible scenario (Alexa fitted this theory more than perfectly, clothes and human level English and all), but how to determine what time in the future did he belong to? quite far perhaps, if habbits and knowledge passing to the Weasleys, as well as other suttle details were any indication. Only one thing was clear – the Order of the phoenix would be useless, and Dumbledor needed (no, was obliged to) support the stranger, whoever he appeared to be.
With that and similar thoughts, trying to come to terms with chaos of the phoenix" he was thrown into that morning, Albus Dumbledor fell asleep. No matter how many nightmares merciless Morfius had in store for him, the old wizard needed his rest to start enacting his plans the next day.