The two didn't get far before Coral suddenly tightened her grip on Silver's fist "Silver, stop" "What's wrong?" "There's someone there. Someone watching us. I can tell. There, over by the bushes". They stood quite still, holding on to each other, gazing at the dense black boundary of the graveyard. Silver could not see anything "Are you sure?" "I saw something move, I could have sworn I did". She made a move for her Flute but Silver stopped her "We're wolves right now. Muggle Wolves" "Muggle Wolves who've just been laying flowers on your parents' grave! Silver, I'm sure there's someone over there!". The two watched cautiously when after a moment a Chao ran out. Silver gave a sigh of relief "Come on. Let's get out of sight". They glanced back repeatedly as they made their way out of the graveyard. Silver, who did not feel as sanguine as he had pretended when reassuring Coral, was glad to reach the gate and the slippery pavement. They passed the pub which was fuller than before. Many voices inside it were now singing the carol that they had heard as they approached the church. For a moment Silver considered suggesting they take refuge inside it, but before he could say anything Coral murmured "Let's go this way" and pulled him down the dark street leading out of the village in the opposite direction from which they had entered. Once out of sight they used the Emerald to turn invisible and then continued their journey. Silver could make out the point where the cottages ended and the lane turned into open country again.
They walked as quickly as they dared, past more windows sparkling with multi-coloured lights, the outlines of Christmas trees dark through the curtains "How are we going to find Siwa-Ra's house?" asked Coral who was shivering a little and kept glancing back over her shoulder "Silver? What do you think? Silver?". She tugged at his arm, but Silver was not paying attention. He was looking toward the dark mass that stood at the very end of this row of houses. Next moment he had sped up, dragging Coral along with him; she slipped a little on the ice. "Silver…" "Look at it, Coral" "Look at…Oh!". He could see it; the Fidelius Charm must have died with Shadow and Tikal. The hedge had grown wild in the sixteen years since Big had taken Silver from the rubble that lay scattered amongst the waist-high grass. Most of the cottage was still standing, though entirely covered in dark ivy and snow, but the right side of the top floor had been blown apart; that, Silver was sure, was where the curse had backfired. He and Coral stood at the gate, gazing up at the wreck of what must once have been a cottage just like those that flanked it "I wonder why nobody's ever rebuilt it?" whispered Coral. Silver reached out and grasped the snowy and thickly rusted gate, not wishing to open it, but simply to hold some part of the house "You're not going to go inside? It looks unsafe, it might-Oh, Silver, look!". His touch on the gate seemed to have done it. A sign had risen out of the ground in front of them, up through the tangles of nettles and weeds, like some bizarre, fast-growing flower, and in golden letters upon the wood it said
On this spot, on the night of 31 October 1981, Shadow the Hedgehog and Tikal the Echidna lost their lives. Their son, Silver, remains the only wizard ever to have survived the Killing Curse. This house, invisible to Muggles, has been left in its ruined state as a monument to them and as a reminder of the violence that tore apart their family.
And all around these neatly lettered words, scribbles had been added by other witches and wizards who had come to see the place where the Boy Who Lived had escaped. Some had merely signed their names in Everlasting Ink; others had carved their initials into the wood, still others had left messages. The most recent of these, shining brightly over sixteen years' worth of magical graffiti, all said similar things "Good luck, Silver, wherever you are" "If you read this, Silver, we're all behind you!" "Long live Silver the Hedgehog". "They shouldn't have written on the sign!" said Coral indignant. But Silver beamed at her "It's brilliant. I'm glad they did. I…". He broke off. A heavily muffled figure was hobbling up the lane toward them, silhouetted by the bright lights in the distant square. Silver thought, though it was hard to judge, that the figure was a woman. She was moving slowly, possibly frightened of slipping on the snowy ground. Her stoop, her stoutness, her shuffling gait all gave an impression of extreme age. They watched in silence as she drew nearer. Silver was waiting to see whether she would turn into any of the cottages she was passing, but he knew instinctively that she would not. At last she came to a halt a few yards from them and simply stood there in the middle of the frozen road, facing them. He did not need Coral's pinch to his arm. There was next to no chance that this woman was a Muggle. She was standing there gazing at a house that ought to have been completely invisible to her, if she was not a witch. Even assuming that she was a witch, however, it was odd behaviour to come out on a night this cold, simply to look at an old ruin. By all the rules of normal magic, meanwhile, she ought not to be able to see Coral and him at all.
Nevertheless, Silver had the strangest feeling that she knew that they were there, and also who they were. Just as he had reached this uneasy conclusion, she raised a gloved hand and beckoned. Coral moved closer to him "How does she know?". He shook his head. The woman beckoned again, more vigorously. Silver could think of many reasons not to obey the summons, and yet his suspicions about her identity were growing stronger every moment that they stood facing each other in the deserted street. Was it possible that she had been waiting for them all these long months? That Locke had told her to wait, and that Silver would come in the end? Was it not likely that it was she who had moved in the shadows in the graveyard and had followed them to this spot? Even her ability to sense them suggested some Locke-ish power that he had never encountered before. Finally Silver spoke, causing Coral to gasp and jump "Are you Siwa-Ra?". The muffled figure nodded and beckoned again. They stepped toward the woman and, at once, she turned and hobbled off back the way they had come. Leading them past several houses, she turned in at a gate. They followed her up the front path through a garden nearly as overgrown as the one they had just left. She fumbled for a moment with a key at the front door, then opened it and stepped back to let them pass. She smelled bad, or perhaps it was her house. Silver wrinkled his nose as they sidled past her and he put the Emerald away allowing them to appear. Siwa-Ra closed the door behind them, her knuckles blue and mottled against the peeling paint, then turned and peered into Silver's face.
Her eyes were thick with cataracts and sunken, and a lot of the fur around her face seemed to be falling out. He wondered whether she could make him out at all; even if she could, it was the wolf whose identity he had stolen that she would see. The odor of old age, of dust, of unwashed clothes and stale food intensified as she unwound a moth-eaten black shawl, revealing an echidna although it took Silver a moment to recognise her as an echidna because her dreadlocks were all gone "Siwa-Ra?" Silver repeated. She nodded again. Silver became aware of the locket against his skin; the thing inside it that sometimes ticked or beat had woken; he could feel it pulsing through the cold gold. Did it know, could it sense, that the thing that would destroy it was near? Siwa-Ra shuffled past them, pushing Coral aside as though she had not seen her, and vanished into what seemed to be a sitting room. Coral was breathing heavily "I'm not sure about this" "Look at her; I think we could overpower her if we had to" "Come!" called Siwa-Ra from the next room. Coral jumped and clutched Silver's arm. "It's okay" said Silver reassuringly, and he led the way into the sitting room. Siwa-Ra was tottering around the place lighting candles, but it was still very dark, not to mention extremely dirty. Thick dust crunched beneath their feet, and Silver's nose detected, underneath the dank and mildewed smell, something worse, like meat gone bad.
He wondered when was the last time anyone had been inside Siwa-Ra's house to check whether she was coping. She seemed to have forgotten that she could do magic, too, for she lit the candles clumsily by hand, her trailing lace cuff in constant danger of catching fire "Let me do that" offered Silver, and he took the matches from her. She stood watching him as he finished lighting the candle stubs that stood on saucers around the room, perched precariously on stacks of books and on side tables crammed with cracked and mouldy cups. The last surface on which Silver spotted a candle was a bow fronted chest of drawers on which there stood a large number of photographs. When the flame danced into life, its reflection wavered on their dusty glass and silver. He saw a few tiny movements from the pictures. As Siwa-Ra fumbled with logs for the fire, he muttered "Tergeo". The dust vanished from the photographs, and he saw at once that half a dozen were missing from the largest and most ornate frames. He wondered whether Siwa-Ra or somebody else had removed them. Then the sight of a photograph near the back of the collection caught his eye, and he snatched it up. It was the thief, the young black Hedgehog who had perched on Madden's windowsill, smiling lazily up at Silver out of the silver frame. And it came to Silver instantly where he had seen the boy before, in The Life and Lies of Locke the Echidna, arm in arm with the teenage Locke, and that must be where all the missing photographs were, in Breezie's book. Silver's voice was shaking now "Mrs-Ms Ra? Who is this?".
Siwa-Ra was standing in the middle of the room watching Coral light the fire for her "Miss Ra?" Silver repeated, and he advanced with the picture in his hands as the flames burst into life in the fireplace. Siwa-Ra looked up at his voice, and the Core Shard beat faster upon his chest "Who is this person?" Silver asked her, pushing the picture forward. She peered at it solemnly, then up at Silver "Do you know who this is? This man? Do you know him? What's he called?". Siwa-Ra merely looked vague. Silver felt an awful frustration. How had Breezie unlocked Siwa-Ra's memories "Who is this man?" he repeated loudly. Coral made him step back "What are you doing?" "This picture, Coral, it's the thief, the thief who stole from Madden! Please! Who is this?" he said back to Siwa-Ra. But she only stared at him "Why did you ask us to come with you, Ms Ra" asked Coral, raising her own voice. Giving no sign that she had heard Coral, Siwa-Ra now shuffled a few steps closer to Silver. With a little jerk of her head she looked back into the hall "You want us to leave?" he asked. She repeated the gesture, this time pointing firstly at him, then at herself, then at the ceiling "Oh, right. Coral, I think she wants me to go upstairs with her" "All right. Let's go". But when Coral moved, Siwa-Ra shook her head with surprising vigour, once more pointing first at Silver, then to herself "She wants me to go with her, alone" "Why?" asked Coral, and her voice rang out sharp and clear in the candlelit room; the old lady shook her head a little at the loud noise. Silver shrugged "Maybe Locke told her to give the sword to me, and only to me?" "Do you really think she knows who you are?" "Yeah, I think she does". Coral looked tense "Well, okay then, but be quick, Silver" "Lead the way" Silver told Siwa-Ra.
She seemed to understand, because she shuffled around him toward the door. Silver glanced back at Coral with a reassuring smile, but he was not sure she had seen it; she stood hugging herself in the midst of the candlelit squalor, looking toward the bookcase. As Silver walked out of the room, unseen by both Coral and Siwa-Ra, he slipped the silver-framed photograph of the unknown thief inside his poncho. The stairs were steep and narrow. Silver took a few steps behind Siwa-Ra to ensure that she did not topple over backward on top of him, which seemed only too likely. Slowly, wheezing a little, she climbed to the upper landing, turned immediately right, and led him into a low-ceilinged bedroom. It was pitch-black and smelled horrible. Silver had just made out a chamber pot protruding from under the bed before Siwa-Ra closed the door and even that was swallowed by the darkness "Lumos" said Silver, and his glove ignited. He gave a start, Siwa-Ra had moved close to him in those few seconds of darkness, and he had not heard her approach "You are Silver?" she whispered. Silver slowly nodded "Yes, I am". She nodded slowly, solemnly. Silver felt the Shard beating fast, faster than his own heart. It was an unpleasant, agitating sensation "Have you got anything for me?" Silver asked, but she seemed distracted by his lit hand. "Have you got anything for me?" he repeated. Then she closed her eyes and several things happened at once. Silver's head prickled painfully; the Locket twitched so that the front of his poncho actually moved; the dark, fetid room dissolved momentarily. He felt a leap of joy and spoke in a high, cold voice "Hold him!". Silver swayed where he stood. The dark, foul-smelling room seemed to close around him again; he did not know what had just happened. "Have you got anything for me?" he asked for a third time, much louder. "Over here" she whispered, pointing to the corner. Silver raised his hand and saw the outline of a cluttered dressing table beneath the curtained window. This time she did not lead him. Silver edged between her and the unmade bed.
He did not want to look away from her "What is it?" he asked as he reached the dressing table, which was heaped high with what looked and smelled like dirty laundry. "There" she said, pointing at the shapeless mass. And in the instant that he looked away, his eyes raking the tangled mess for a golden sword. She moved weirdly. He saw it out of the corner of his eye; panic made him turn and horror paralyzed him as he saw the old body collapsing and Ifrit clawing out of the skin. It struck him with its stinger. He fell backward onto the dressing table, into the mound of filthy clothing. He rolled sideways, narrowly avoiding the stinger. From below he heard Coral call, "Silver?". He could not get enough breath into his lungs to call back. Then Ifrit crawled over him and wrapped it's many legs around him "No!" "Yes. Yesss…Hold you…Hold you" he heard the Ifrit whispered. It's grip was so tight that Silver couldn't utter a spell. The Locket was pressing hard into his chest, a circle of ice that throbbed with life, inches from his own frantic heart, and his brain was flooding with cold, white light, all thought obliterated, his own breath drowned, distant footsteps, everything going. A metal heart was banging outside his chest, and now he was flying, flying with triumph in his heart, without need of board or a Dark Arm. He was abruptly awake in the sour-smelling darkness; Ifrit had released him. He scrambled up and saw it outlined against the landing light. It struck, and Coral dived aside with a shriek; her deflected curse hit the curtained window, which shattered. Frozen air filled the room as Silver ducked to avoid another shower of broken glass. Ifrit charged at him. Coral was nowhere to be seen and for a moment Silver thought the worst, but then there was a loud bang and a flash of red light, and the Ifrit flew into the air, smacking Silver hard in the face as it went.
Silver raised his hand, but as he did so, his head seared more painfully, more powerfully than it had done in years "He's coming! Coral, he's coming!". As he yelled Ifirt fell, hissing wildly. Everything was chaos. It smashed shelves from the wall, and splintered china flew everywhere as Silver jumped over the bed and seized the dark shape he knew to be Coral. She shrieked with pain as he pulled her back across the bed. Ifrit reared again, but Silver knew that worse than it was coming, was perhaps already at the gate, his head was going to split open with the pain. Ifrit lunged as he took a running leap, dragging Coral with him; as it struck, Coral screamed, "Confringo!" and her spell flew around the room, exploding the wardrobe mirror and ricocheting back at them, bouncing from floor to ceiling; Silver felt the heat of it sear the back of his hand. Glass cut his cheek as, pulling Coral with him, he leapt from bed to broken dressing table and then straight out of the smashed window into nothingness, her scream reverberating through the night as they twisted in midair. And then his head burst open and he was Finitevus and he was running across the fetid bedroom, his gauntleted hands clutching at the windowsill as he glimpsed the bald man and the little woman twist and vanish, and he screamed with rage, a scream that mingled with the girl's, that echoed across the dark gardens over the church bells ringing in Christmas Day. And his scream was Silver's scream, his pain was Silver's pain. That it could happen here, where it had happened before. Here, within sight of that house where he had come so close to knowing what it was to die. The pain was so terrible, ripped from his body.
The night wet and windy, two children dressed as pumpkins waddling across the square, and the shop windows covered in paper spiders, all the tawdry Muggle trappings of a world in which they did not believe. And he was gliding along, that sense of purpose and power and rightness in him that he always knew on these occasions. Not anger, that was for weaker souls than he, but triumph, yes. He had waited for this, he had hoped for it "Nice costume, mister!". A small fox ran up to the figure smiling and admiring the echidna's look. He stared coldly down at the boy who's smile quickly faltered. Then the child turned and ran away. The figure's right hand twitched its fingers. One simple movement and the child would never reach his mother but unnecessary, quite unnecessary. And along a new and darker street he moved, and now his destination was in sight at last, the Fidelius Charm broken, though they did not know it yet. And he made less noise than the dead leaves slithering along the pavement as he drew level with the dark hedge, and stared over it. They had not drawn the curtains; he saw them quite clearly in their little sitting room, the tall black hedgehog, making puffs of coloured smoke erupt from his hands for the amusement of the small silver hedgehog in his blue pyjamas. The child was laughing and trying to catch the smoke, to grab it in his small fist. A door opened and the mother entered, saying words he could not hear, her long orange quills falling over her face. Now the father scooped up the son and handed him to the mother. He removed his rings and cuffs from his wrists and yawned.
The gate creaked a little as he pushed it open, but Shadow the Hedgehog did not hear. The figure raised his hand and pointed it at the door, which burst open. He was over the threshold as Shadow came sprinting into the hall. It was easy, too easy, he didn't even have his Talismans "Kal, take Silver and go! It's him! Go! Run! I'll hold him off!". Hold him off, without his Talismans!? Shadow stood before him blocking his way. He laughed before casting the curse "Avada Kedavra!". The black shape filled the cramped hallway and Shadow fell like a marionette whose strings were cut. He could hear her screaming from the upper floor, trapped, but as long as she was sensible, she, at least, had nothing to fear. He climbed the steps, listening with faint amusement to her attempts to barricade herself in. She didn't have her Talismans either. How stupid they were, and how trusting, thinking that their safety lay in friends, that weapons could be discarded even for moments. He forced the door open, cast aside the chair and boxes hastily piled against it with one lazy wave of his hand and there she stood, the child in her arms.
At the sight of him, she dropped her son into the crib behind her and threw her arms wide, as if this would help, as if in shielding him from sight she hoped to be chosen instead "NOT SILVER, NOT SILVER, PLEASE NOT SILVER!" "Stand aside, you stupid girl. Stand aside, now!" "NOT SILVER, PLEASE NO, TAKE ME, KILL ME INSTEAD". He raised his hand "This is my last warning!" "NOT SILVER! PLEASE…HAVE MERCY…HAVE MERCY. PLEASE, I'LL DO ANYTHING". He could have forced her away from the crib, but it seemed more prudent to finish them all. The black shape flashed around the room and she dropped like her husband. The child had not cried all this time. He could stand, clutching the bars of his crib, and he looked up into the intruder's face with a kind of bright interest, perhaps thinking that it was his father who had just entered the room, making more pretty lights, and his mother would pop up any moment, laughing. He raised his hand very carefully into the boy's face. He stared at the child. What was so special about him? What was it about this child that made him such a danger? No matter, it was irrelevant now. The child began to cry, it had seen that he was not his father. He did not like it crying, he had never been able to stomach the small ones whining in the orphanage "Avada Kedavra!". And then he broke, he was nothing, nothing but pain and terror, and he must hide himself, not here in the rubble of the ruined house, where the child was trapped and screaming, but far away.
"No!" he moaned. And now he stood at the broken window of Siwa-Ra's house, immersed in memories of his greatest loss, and at his feet the Ifrit slithered over broken china and glass. He looked down and saw something, something incredible. He stooped down and picked up the smashed photograph. There he was, the unknown thief, the thief he was seeking.
"NO!" Silver leapt up from as bed. He was back inside the tent. Coral ran up to him "Silver, it's okay! We're safe". Silver took a deep breath "We got away?" "Yes, I had to use a Hover Charm to get you into your bunk, I couldn't lift you. You've been. Well, you haven't been quite". There were purple shadows under her brown eyes and he noticed a small sponge in her hand. She had been wiping his face "You've been ill" "How long ago did we leave?" "Hours ago. It's nearly morning". Silver couldn't believe it. It felt like seconds ago "Was I knocked out?" "Not exactly. You've been shouting and moaning and things. I couldn't get the Locket off you. It was stuck, stuck to your chest. You've got a mark; I'm sorry, I had to use a Severing Charm to get it away. The Ifrit stung you too, but I've cleaned the wound and put some dittany on it". He pulled off his poncho and looked down. There was a charred oval in his fur and the skin below was red. He could also see the half-healed puncture marks to his forearm "Where've you put the Shard?" "In my bag. I think we should keep it off for a while". He lay back on his pillows and looked into her pinched grey face "We shouldn't have gone to Vigil's Hollow. It's my fault, it's all my fault, Coral, I'm sorry" "It's not your fault. I wanted to go too; I really thought Locke might have left the sword there for you. But what happened when she took you upstairs? Was Ifrit hiding somewhere? Did it just come out and kill her and attack you?". Silver shuddered as he remembered "No. She was Ifrit" "W-What?". He closed his eyes.
He could still smell Siwa-Ra's house on him "Siwa must've been dead a while. The Ifrit was…Was inside her. You-Know-Who put it there in Vigil's Hollow, to wait. You were right. He knew I'd go back" "It was inside her?". He opened his eyes again: Coral looked revolted "She didn't want to talk in front of you, because it was Parseltongue, all Parseltongue, and I didn't realize, but of course I could understand her. Once we were up in the room, it sent a message to You-Know-Who, I heard it happen inside my head, I felt him get excited, he said to keep me there and then…". He remembered Ifrit clawing out of Siwa-Ra's skin. Coral did not need to know the details. Silver looked down at the puncture marks. "It wasn't supposed to kill me, just keep me there till You-Know-Who came". If he had only managed to kill Ifrit, it would have been worth it, all of it. Sick at heart, he sat up and threw back the covers. "Silver, no, I'm sure you ought to rest!" "You're the one who needs sleep. No offense, but you look terrible. I'm fine. I'll keep watch for a while. Where's my gloves?". She did not answer, she merely looked at him, "Where's my gloves, Coral?". She was biting her lip, and tears swam in her eyes. She reached down beside the bed and held it out to him. His gloves were torn and burn, his bracelets were cracked. The Cyan glow no longer came from either of them. Silver took them into his hands as though it was a living thing that had suffered a terrible injury. He could not think properly. Everything was a blur of panic and fear. Then he held them out to Coral "Mend it. Please" "Silver, I don't think I can. When the source-" "Please, Coral, try!".
Coral played her flute "Reparo". The gloves and the bracelets repaired, they were as good as new. Silver smiled in relief not seeming to notice that they still didn't glow "Lumos!". A few feeble sparks came out of his hand. Silver's face fell. He stared down at his hands, aghast, unable to take in what he was seeing. The Talismans he had had for so long. Coral cried "Silver, I'm so, so sorry. I think it was me. As we were leaving, you know, the Ifrit was coming for us, and so I cast a Blasting Curse, and it rebounded everywhere, and it must have-Must have hit-" "It was an accident" said Silver mechanically. He felt empty, stunned "We'll-We'll find a way to repair it" "Silver, I don't think we're going to be able to. The source is damaged. Remember…Remember Razor? When he crashed the car? His old Talismans never the same again, he had to get a new one". Silver thought of Merlin, kidnapped and held hostage by Finitevus. Or Madden, who was dead. How was he supposed to find himself a new Talisman "Well, I'll just borrow yours for now, then. While I keep watch". Her face glazed with tears, Coral handed over her Flute and Turban, and he left her sitting beside his bed, desiring nothing more than to get away from her.