MEMORY VIAL 26: THE MOST DANGEROUS HEIST IN HOGWARTS HISTORY (YEAR 5)
Harry woke to a parcel sitting on his trunk on Valentine's Day. An owl could not have delivered it as far as he knew, so he suspected that the Hogwarts house-elves had received it with instructions to deliver it directly into his dorm. A curious bouquet of flowers was attached with twine to the outside of it. They looked like the summer-colored snapdragons his Aunt Petunia planted every year in the back garden, except these were a deep scarlet, adorned with ruscus leaves.
The flowerheads reared up on thorny stems and growled kittenishly, snapping their petals at the empty air.
Figuring that flower-bites couldn't possibly cause that much damage, Harry detached the bouquet from the parcel and set it aside. After ripping the parcel's brown wrapping off, he held up a box of Fluttering Sweets, along with a small crimson vial and a tightly folded note.
Harry grimaced when he realized the Fluttering Sweets were made of dark chocolate.
"Is that from Cho?" Ron appeared at Harry's side, half-dressed and looking curious. "You hate the dark chocolate ones, I thought. And I can't believe she sent you flowers. It's usually the bloke who's supposed to do that, isn't it? Did you send her anything?"
Harry ignored these buzzing inquiries at first, then brushed Ron off grumpily when Ron tried to peer over his shoulder while he unfolded the note. "I think Cho would want me to read this alone," he said irately. While he suspected she was not the one who had sent the Valentine's gift, it was true that she likely would have wanted any notes between them to stay private.
"Sorry, mate. Hermione keeps making comments about you two. It's starting to rub off on me, I guess." Trudging back to his side of the room, Ron finished buttoning up the bottom half of his shirt, while Dean and Neville roused slowly from their beds.
"Well, I'd prefer if she kept her nose out of my business," Harry mumbled, even though Hermione's meddling had been invaluable to him last year, and he did not really mean what he was saying, but he was just trying to vent his annoyance with Ron in whatever way he could.
Harry opened the note, praying it was from who he thought it was from, but the parchment was much smaller than it had been in previous years. He began to read it, stomach twisting with anxiety, because—what if it was from Cho? He wasn't thrilled at the idea, and he felt guilty for not having prepared something in return.
The note was only a few sentences long.
"If God is real, then you are his love letter to me. Happy Valentine's Day, Skrewt-Face. Enjoy the Dragonsnap Blooms. And don't worry about touching them. They're harmless, except the thorns."
Harry flipped the note over, since he had seen something else scrawled on the back of it. It said:
"Meet me at the bottom of the Astronomy Tower, half past midnight. Dress warm and bring the vial with you.
With Love, Your Love"
Harry was mildly depressed that he had not gotten a long letter like in previous years, but he imagined Draco was as overwhelmed with studying and homework as much as he was, to say nothing about Draco's Quidditch practice and prefect duties.
Harry turned the red vial over in his hand.
"So after that, he tried a lust potion on me," Draco had once said, "because the love ones that he made with his female colleagues wouldn't work…"
"Think it's a love potion?" Ron suggested slyly, having sidled over while throwing on his robes.
Harry wrinkled his forehead dubiously. "Even if it was, why would I drink something that's not marked? Besides, the person who sent this wouldn't need to sneak me a love potion."
"You don't say?" Ron smiled crookedly at Harry. "You like her that much?"
Harry said nothing and reread the first part of the note.
Realizing he apparently wasn't wanted, Ron said, "Guess I'll meet you down in the common room once you get dressed. I'm curious if Hermione got anything suspicious delivered to her also. Might have to wrangle with a few perverts if she did." Ron pivoted on his heel and left the dormitory with a muttered "Good morning" to Dean, Neville, and Seamus.
Harry looked at the bouquet and brushed his fingers through the lush heads of snapping blooms. Their waxy little mouths felt odd against his fingertips, and he supposed he ought to fetch them a vase of water before heading down for breakfast. Setting them carefully on his bed, he opened his trunk and pulled out his robes. He was scheduled to have his first date with Cho in Hogsmeade today, and while Draco had insisted that he did not mind—that Harry should find a girlfriend for the sake of appearances, if nothing else—his stomach was already churning with a mixture of conflicting emotions.
Part of him knew Cho would be hurt if she knew he was already sneaking around the castle with someone else. But another selfish part of him still wanted her and had even begun to persuade the scrupulous parts of himself that Draco's way of handling girls was reasonable given the circumstances.
Would Cho send him something over breakfast, he wondered? Did he have time to send her something, also? Like these horrible dark chocolates?
She would probably never forgive him if he gave her those…
Who in the world ate dark chocolate except old people and snobby little rich boys?
"Honestly, Malfoy. You and your 'cultivated palate', or whatever you call it. Gag me."
Ginny certainly wouldn't be giving Harry anything this year, not now that she was going with Michael Corner, and it was just as well. While Ginny was pretty, Harry just wasn't into her, not with a gorgeous girl like Cho blocking his view.
Should've gotten her something, Harry reproved himself. Why didn't I think of that? Cho will be expecting it, just like she expected everything else I was too stupid to pick up on.
Hedwig was already scheduled to deliver Draco a Happy Valentine's from him, a letter that was far too long compared to what he had received. Of course, he could use one of the school's barn owls for Cho if he bothered to scribble a quick note to her, but his mind was stuck on Draco the whole time that he got dressed, and the anxiety he felt about his date with Cho hit him full on in the face only when he left the room.
I should be spending the day with him, he thought vehemently. But she and I might have some fun this time around.
LATER THAT SAME DAY…
It was nearly midnight. Draco had been planning the heist with Crabbe and Goyle for the last several weeks, having sold the plan to them as a surefire way of getting Harry into trouble with Professor Umbridge once again.
"He's gone too long without a detention," Draco had said when he first suggested the idea to them.
"But what if we get caught?" Goyle had asked, since he was afraid of getting on Umbridge's bad side.
"We'll tell Professor Umbridge that Potter was planning on stealing his Firebolt back. We heard about it from his friends and meant to stop him."
"Good idea," Crabbe had said.
"As always," Goyle had put in. "So… how do we do it?"
Draco knew there were holes in the story he had sold them, since he did not mean to get Harry into trouble at all. And while Crabbe and Goyle were slower than the average Slytherin, neither of them were as stupid as they looked and would have been able to pick up on the flaws in Draco's plan if they had thought about it long and hard enough. But Crabbe and Goyle trusted him implicitly. Draco relied on that, and he was never so thankful for their deference as much as he was now.
Presently, Crabbe and Goyle followed Draco out of the Slytherin common room and up the stairs out of the dungeons. The Gumshoeing Charm that Draco had cast on all of them dampened their footsteps, which would have otherwise echoed noisily from Crabbe's and Goyle's clumsy gaits. When they made it to Umbridge's office, Crabbe tested the doorknob first, to make sure it wasn't stuck, before casting an Unlocking Charm, since Draco insisted on knowing for sure if he needed to magically relock the door on his way out.
"But why does it matter if it's locked?" Goyle had asked during the planning phase, his forehead puckered with confusion. "Supposing that Potter was the one who broke in, why would he bother relocking it when the whole point is to steal?"
"Don't think about it too much," Draco had told him repressively, knowing full well that it mattered a lot, since he would be returning the broom later the same night and did not want Umbridge thinking that anyone had been there. "I have my reasons, Goyle. Don't you trust me? It's a small thing, so I really hope that I can count on you."
"Oh, you can always count on me, mate. I didn't mean to question you."
"Then what did you mean?"
After being posed such a harsh question, Goyle offered no more pushback but obeyed Draco without hesitation. And so, here they were, in front of the High Inquisitor's office door, watching and waiting while Crabbe jerked and jiggled the door handle before finally casting the Unlocking Charm.
The door creaked open after Crabbe gave it a push. There was silence as they waited to hear anything from within.
Draco shoved Crabbe in the direction of the main stairway. "Good job, Crabbe. Now remember your roles. You keep watch for Mrs. Norris in that direction. And you, Goyle," Draco said, turning aside to his taller friend, "watch the other end of the passageway while I go in. You both know what to do if someone shows up, right?"
Together, they nodded. "Scream," Goyle said, "as if I'd been sleepwalking and whoever showed up scared me."
"Perfect. You both ready?"
They nodded again. "Ready as we'll ever be," said Crabbe.
At Draco's command, all three of them did an about-face and went to work on their individual assignments. Draco crept into the dark room, eyeing the Firebolt and pair of Weasley Clean-sweeps, which were chained and padlocked behind Umbridge's desk. Before beginning his work on the Firebolt, however, he approached the door to where Umbridge was sleeping and listened with his ear against one of the door panels. After a moment of dead silence, he cast an Imperturbable Charm—something Draco had been practicing ad nauseum with a seventh-year's help—over the whole door.
Draco retreated from the Imperturbed door towards the brooms and frowned at the chains that were secured around the Firebolt. There were no spells set into any of the padlocks, and so all Draco needed to do was wave his wand and—
"Alohomora."
There was a soft snicking sound. Draco snatched the Firebolt's padlock, removed it, then caught the chain just in time as it nearly rattled against the wall when the padlock snapped open. He gazed tensely at the ensorcelled door, praying that the Imperturbable Charm had worked, then cautiously dislodged the Firebolt from the wall, being mindful of the treacherous tinkling of the chain links.
When he was holding the Firebolt in the air free of its bonds, Draco whirled around and padded around the desk, crossed the room, and went out the door, his feet as quiet as a feline's paws. At the thought of felines, Draco froze outside the doorframe, his gaze darting nervously around the room from over his shoulder. He had not thought about the cats that were snoozing on the decorative plates covering the walls, but none of them seemed to have been roused—and chances were that none of them could communicate with Professor Umbridge like the paintings throughout the castle did.
Draco closed the door gingerly behind him, gave his wand a little flick and relocked it. He fetched Goyle from the east side of the corridor first, then led him back towards Crabbe. All three of them raced down the main staircase to the ground floor with the Firebolt in their possession.
"You two go on ahead," Draco told them, when they came to the upper landing of the stairs that would lead them underground. "Instead of taking it down there like we originally planned, I think it would be better if I hid it somewhere close to Gryffindor Tower. Sound good?"
Crabbe and Goyle saw no reason to argue with that. "Sounds good," Goyle answered with a shrug.
"Good. If I'm not back after twenty minutes or so, then I was probably caught, so don't come after me. It'll be easier to defend myself if you're not around."
Relieved that their services were no longer needed for the relocation of Harry's Firebolt, Crabbe and Goyle wished him good luck, then clambered in a would-be-noisy way down the stone steps on spell-muffled feet.
Draco let out a long-held breath.
He was not worried. If he was caught holding the broom, he would simply say that he had been chasing Peeves, whom he had seen come out of Umbridge's office with the Firebolt, and he had valiantly recovered the broom from the thieving poltergeist.
As for his reason for patrolling the corridors in the first place? A modified version of the story he had cooked up with Crabbe and Goyle would suffice: that Draco had gotten intelligence earlier that someone was planning to steal Harry's broom for him with Peeves' help.
Instead of heading up to Gryffindor Tower, Draco started in the direction of the Astronomy Tower. He had hidden his own Nimbus Two Thousand and One behind an armored knight a few hours prior to the heist. But after a couple of minutes pacing through the corridor near the tower, he started to think he had misplaced it, or that perhaps a house-elf had recovered it and thrown it in their pile of Lost-and-Found.
To Draco's relief, he found his Nimbus's slim black form reclined against the fourth knight that he passed. When he made it to the bottom of the Astronomy Tower with both brooms, however, Harry was nowhere to be seen.
Draco furrowed his brow, heart skipping worriedly. It was far enough past midnight; Harry should have been there by now.
"Potter?" Draco took a tentative step forward. "Are you under your Cloak…? I have another gift for you. Are you there?" There was silence, and not even a hint that a ghost or spying cat was anywhere nearby.