The group didn't rejoin until they were deep into the station, and soon they were all on the train heading to central London. While everyone else breathed a sigh of relief that they had escaped the quarantine zone, Faraday frowned and checked his smartphone.
"No articles, nowhere," Finally looking up, Faraday said. "They're kicking this many people out of their homes because of a toxic spill, and none of the media is talking about it."
"Well, at least they learned one thing about our world," said Scorpius bitterly. "How to hide the truth. . . . We wizards have lived here for a very long time, but very few Muggles know it, don't they?"
"Exactly, and they're probably hiding all of this by erasing or manipulating the memories of witnesses, just like the Ministry did," said Harry thoughtfully. "By the time everyone knows what's going on, it'll be after every wizard and witch in Britain has been locked up in the Factory . . . "
At the mention of the Wizarding Factory, Scorpius's face went white, having been trapped there for almost half a year and suffering all sorts of hardships. Sensing this, Albus patted his friend on the shoulder. Finally, they got off the train at a station in the middle of London, through a busy platform and onto an escalator. Once above ground, they were greeted by a large, busy street lined with shops on both sides. Even though it was the middle of the day, the streets were already crowded with foreign tourists doing their shopping. After walking for a while, they came to a large but dilapidated red brick department store that stood out among the clean, remodeled buildings, its dusty doors bearing large signs that read CLOSED FOR REFURBISHMENT. Its display cases were cobwebbed and dusty, with broken dummies dressed in worn-out clothes that would have been fashionable half a century ago.
"I haven't been here in a long time either," said Faraday. "I suppose the way in is the same?"
"Exactly," Neville replied. He walked over and stood before the most ugly dummy, dressed in a green nylon apron dress with false eyelashes falling and dangling from her eyes, and after a moment's hesitation, he said, "Hello. I'm here to see Mr. and Mrs. Longbottom."
Harry waited for the dummy to react, aware of the stares around him. Fortunately, the tourists passing by with their shopping bags full of new clothes didn't pay much attention to the shabby department store that had gone out of business. Finally, the dummy made a creaking sound and nodded its head noncommittally, then moved its rusty, jointed finger to gesture inward. Neville stepped through the glass first, taking Albus and Scorpius by the hand. The three of them disappeared through it as if it had never existed. Harry, left alone with Faraday, glanced around to make sure no one was watching them before following them into the showcase.
Feeling a chill run through his body as if he were walking under a waterfall, he emerged on the other side. The reception area of St. Mungo's Hospital looked like a violent storm had swept through, with worn wooden chairs knocked to the floor and torn copies of Witch Weekly strewn about.
"This place is a mess . . . " said Harry. "Is anything different from when you left here before, Neville?"
"I don't think so," said Neville. But there wasn't much conviction in his voice. "When me and the Healers were taking the patients out of the closed ward, some of them made a mess. . . . D'you reckon anyone came here after that, Harry?"
"We can't be sure," said Harry weakly. "Eisenbein has always been one step ahead of us, trying to set us up, and there's no reason to think he'll be any different this time. . . ."
"Then let's see if anyone else is here besides us . . . " Neville drew his wand and raised it into the air. "Homenum revelio."
They waited, listening to the silence, but nothing happened.
"Looks like we're the only ones alive," Albus said, relieved. "Maybe Eisenbein made a mistake for once."
"Let's hope so," said Harry. Still, the inexplicable unease he felt at the sight of the deserted reception area didn't go away.
"Visitors' tearoom is on the fifth floor. We can take the stairs straight up," suggested Neville.
They approached a large door to the stairwell, with a sign for each floor beside it. Neville, in the lead, had just opened it when Harry heard a faint creaking sound from somewhere in the distance. . . . It was accompanied by the softest of footsteps, which then stopped.
"Did you just hear that?" asked Harry, whirling around to face Faraday and the children, "I heard a sound downstairs . . . "
"A sound? What sound?" echoed Neville, who had just pushed open the door, confused. "I didn't hear anything . . . "
"I heard something too, Mr. Potter," said Scorpius quietly. "It sounded like footsteps, didn't it?"
"Yes. It was very small, but it definitely sounded like someone opening a door and walking around."
"The sign here doesn't say anything about the basement," Albus said, reading the floor plan.
"But there are facilities in the cellar," said Neville darkly. "There's a morgue down there."
A frosty silence fell over them. Harry felt his heart pounding and listened to the air, hoping to hear another noise. But the silence remained.
"Maybe you heard it wrong," Faraday said as calmly as he could. "Yeah, it was probably a rat running around."
They walked through the large doors and down the corridor. The last time Harry had been here, portraits of famous Healers had hung on the walls on either side, but strangely, there were no paintings in the hallway now. Neville seemed to notice the oddity as well.
"Something feels wrong. . . . I thought there were portraits here before," Neville murmured, then scratched his head. "Still, my memory isn't that reliable, you know. . . . Maybe the Healers took them down before they left."
The corridor was dark, as the crystal bubbles of candles hanging from the ceiling, which would normally have provided a bright light, were dead, giving off only the pale glow of fluorescent mushrooms. As they passed through the next door, a foul smell wafted through the air. Harry looked back at his feet and saw a puddle of yellow gas in the dusty hallway.
"They used to store hazardous medical waste in there." Faraday pointed to a red steel door that looked dangerous even at first glance. It was slightly ajar, allowing a trickle of yellow gas to escape through the gap. "Looks like your wizards have screwed up the job, as usual. . . . We'd better get through here quickly."
The corridor finally ended and a worn wooden staircase appeared. The door leading down was firmly closed, which meant the morgue was there. Harry strained his ears in case he heard something else, but fortunately there was nothing. As they stepped onto the landing to go up, the creaking echoed unusually loud in the otherwise silent hospital. The others who had followed Harry held their breath and climbed the stairs cautiously, as though they were about to collapse. Finally, they were almost on the third floor.
"Well, we'll just have to keep going," Harry said, pausing at the landing to catch his breath. They'd only been up two flights of stairs and he was already feeling tired from the constant strain. "Everyone be quiet and —"
The step he was on creaked and gave way, sending the stairs tumbling like dominoes and sending Harry flying through the air. His flailing arms hit something hard, and he clung desperately to it. Below, Albus and Scorpius's screams echoed in the dusty air. Harry struggled not to slip and stood up on the ledge he was clinging to, seeing that the ground floor was below him and that he was the only one who had fallen to the first floor above.
"Is everyone all right?" he called to the ground floor, which was covered in thick dust.
"Yes, Harry. Scorpius cast the Cushioning Charm just in time, so we're all fine," Neville's voice came from below. "There's a fire escape on the other side. . . . Wait there and we'll go up and get you."
"Okay."
Harry covered his nose and mouth with the hem of his cloak and waited for the dust to settle. Now that his vision was a little clearer, he could see the gaping hole to his right, caused by the collapse of the stairs. The broken and splintered remains of the stairs littered the ground floor below, and the stairs to the upper floor were broken in half and dangling limply above them. They would have to find another way up, just like Neville had said.
Harry stood up and opened the large door in front of him, revealing a completely dark room. He pulled out his smartphone to flash the light, revealing a deserted hallway with no pictures on the walls, much like the floor below. As he debated whether to wait here or move on, he suddenly heard creaky footsteps coming from somewhere down the hall.
"Neville, are you coming?" Harry called into the corridor. Instead of an answer, he heard more creaking coming from the darkness. They seemed to be coming from the second door from the right. Harry used one hand to keep the light from his phone shining down the narrow corridor and the other to pull out his plastic wand for self-defense. It was better than nothing, but he couldn't use any magic with it, so it wasn't very reassuring. Once again he heard a rustling sound, followed by the sound of shuffling footsteps.
Harry stood outside the ward and read the plaque on the door. "DANGEROUS" DAI LLEWELLYN WARD: SERIOUS BITES, it read, and the floor was littered with broken crystals that had once served as lights. Harry grabbed the doorknob and pushed it open slowly, very carefully. There was no way Neville could be in here. . . . The small room was dimly lit by sunlight streaming in from a small window high in the opposite wall, and the oak planks that made up the walls gleamed faintly in the light. Harry pushed the door open a little further and stuck his head in to get a better look inside. The beds were all empty. . . . No, not one. An old woman in a white robe was sitting on the bed in the far corner. She had waxy, pale skin and wispy hair.
At first she didn't react. But when Harry opened the door and entered the ward, she slowly turned her stiff neck to face him. Her eyes, sunken as if she hadn't eaten in weeks, were blank, devoid of emotion. . . . Harry suddenly remembered that Albus had just told him that there was no one else alive in this building but her. What was in front of him now was not a living person. . . . It was an Inferius — the pale, walking corpse he had seen in the cave with Dumbledore decades ago.
Inferius staggered to her feet and gave a grim, lifeless smile. It moved toward him as if only stopping Harry's breathing could fulfill its evil intentions. . . . Harry pressed the button on his wand and fired the Taser. The projectile flew out and lodged in the corpse's neck, sending a high-pressure surge of electricity that made the muscles in her shoulders and arms twitch violently. But Inferius didn't falter at all, jerking and twitching, continuing to walk toward Harry at a steady pace. . . .
Harry quickly threw open the door to the room and ran out. But what greeted him in the hallway was the stuff of nightmares: a dozen corpses, adults and children, men and women, of all ages, had crawled up the wall from the side where the stairs had collapsed and were coming at him. The Inferi were all dressed in white robes, their skin equally pale. A stocky man, his face green and disfigured with bruises, walked quickly over and grabbed Harry's arm. His grip was chillingly cold and he yanked him backwards. Harry lost his balance and fell, the Inferius climbing on top of him and strangling him. The skin of his throat was freezing where Inferius's hand touched it, but he felt a burning sensation in his airways where the air had been choked out. Harry whimpered and struggled, but he couldn't break free. . . . The corpses that surrounded him, as though welcoming him to be as dead as they were, looked down on the scene with sinister expressions. . . .
"Petrificus Totalus!"
Inferius's grip on his throat stiffened for a moment and he fell to Harry's side with a thud like a log. Harry pushed the body away and got to his feet. Albus and Scorpius were pointing wands in his direction.
"Dad, come here! Petrificus Totalus!" At Albus's shout, another Inferius, who had been trying to grab Harry, went stiff and fell to the ground.
Harry shook off the cold hands and ran down the narrow corridor to join them. He looked back to see that there were still many Inferi with evil grins on their faces.
"Petrificus Totalus!" yelled Scorpius, firing a spell at the first dead man in front of him, causing its body to stiffen and fall to the floor with a crash. But the other Inferi were undeterred, stepping over their fallen companion to reach them.
"Use the flames!" shouted Harry. "That's their weakness!"
"Incendio!" cried Scorpius, and with an explosion, an intense orange flame swept across the hallway, engulfing the bodies. The white robes of the Inferi caught fire, and one by one they fell, arms flailing in the air. But as the narrow corridor became engulfed in the acrid smoke of the soaring blaze, he could now hardly breath.
"Let's get out of here. Are there any stairs nearby?" said Harry.
"This way!" Albus shouted.
Harry followed the two boys and ran down the corridor, passing through open doors and around a few corners. That's when he felt a sudden cold sensation from above his head. He looked up to see a raging stream of water spewing from the crystal bubbles hanging from the ceiling. They seemed to have detected fires and were acting as sprinklers in the Muggle world.
"Where are Neville and Faraday?" said Harry, shaking his damp hair from his face.
"We went looking for the stairs together and got separated when those corpses attacked," said Albus. "We got up here somehow, but those two are probably still down there."
"Ah, someone must have come . . . " said a male voice suddenly. "Why would you come to a place where only the dead are left, when the only thing waiting for you is death?"
The unidentified voice seemed to come from the walls in all directions. Harry suddenly realized that the voice belonged to Jimmy Roberts, one of the leading officers of the Dawn Breakers. Roberts had led Dumbledore's Army into a trap before, causing them to lose their headquarters and two members. He was a Muggle, but his ability to devise clever schemes was never to be underestimated.
"Did he know we were coming?" asked Scorpius in horror.
"No, I don't think so," Harry said, pretending to be calm. "But I suppose they set a trap just in case. . . . The Dawn Breakers have always been cunning."
"Well, if you're here to die, you might as well get your wish," the mocking voice of Roberts came again. "You'll never lack for friends. . . . Rest in peace, then."
Harry wiped the water from his drenched face as it stopped, then turned to look back. The torrent of water had caught the flames, and with the smoke from them thinning, his vision cleared. With it came a terrible sight: an Inferius staggered toward them. . . . He was clad in a blackened robe, his pale skin reddened by burns, but the murderous intent carved deep into Inferius's hollow head was not diminished in the least.
"GO, GO!" shouted Harry, shoving the two frightened, frozen boys away. They ran down the narrow corridor, avoiding the pursuit of the corpses. They passed through a door and rounded the last corner, only to come to a sudden dead end. Just as Harry was getting frustrated, Scorpius opened a door on the left, one that was hard to see because it was the same color as the wall.
"This way, sir!"
Harry ran into the pitch-black space with the children. They seemed to be standing on stairs, judging by the creaking beneath their feet.
"Lumos!" came Scorpius's voice, and soon the light from the tip of his wand pierced the darkness. They were standing on a flimsy staircase, even more so than the first, and one that looked as if it might collapse at any moment. It was so narrow that it seemed they could only go up one at a time.
"This is the fire escape," said Albus. "Professor Longbottom knew this place, so . . . "
"Argh!" yelled Scorpius, who was standing by the door. Harry whirled around to see that an Inferius had opened the door, grabbed him by the wrist and was dragging him out. Harry kicked the corpse in the chest with his foot, breaking its grip, and led Albus and Scorpius up the stairs.
Once his friend was safe, Albus pointed his wand at behind and tried to say, "Incendi —"
"Stop!" said Harry urgently. "If the stairs catch fire, it'll be out of control."
Meanwhile, more Inferi came through the door, and when the way was blocked, Harry ran down a few flights of stairs to lure them.
"Dad, no! Petrificus Totalus!" Albus's attack sent three Inferiuses crashing to the ground at once, but more bodies trampled their comrades into the stairwell. Harry pushed his way down the stairs, shaking off the cold hands that tried to grab him.
"You get to safety upstairs! I'll find Neville and go up the other way," said Harry. Albus shouted something in reply, but it was drowned out by the sound of Inferi dragging their feet and the creaking of the stairs. Still, Harry kept shouting, "Go to the closed ward on the fourth floor! The doors there are strong — you should be able to hold them off!"
Staggering down the stairs after him, an Inferius grabbed his wrist, causing Harry to lose his balance and nearly fall. The only thing more frightening than the unearthly strength, which was hard to imagine belonging to a dead man, was the biting cold. Holding on tightly to the railing, Harry kicked the corpse in the chest a few times with all his might, barely escaping its grasp, and then ran down the rest of the stairs without a second thought. He flung open the door and stepped out into the corridor on the ground floor. Fortunately, there were no Inferi in the hallway. His knee throbbed with every step he took, like he had just sprained it kicking the corpse. . . .
Harry kept looking over his shoulder as he passed through the doors, and he quickened his pace when he saw the Inferi spilling out into the corridor. The hallway seemed to get wider and wider, and then the door in front of him was pushed open to reveal the reception area. Harry was halfway through the seemingly empty room when he suddenly heard a familiar voice to his right.
"Potter, what are you doing here?"
Harry reflexively pulled out his plastic wand and pointed it in that direction. An elderly man was sitting at a desk marked INQUIRIES. At first Harry thought he was hallucinating and slowly made his way over to him. It was Aberforth Dumbledore calling to him. . . . He was dressed in a white robe, and his long, unkempt hair and beard, a mixture of gray and white, were the same as they had been the last time he had seen them, lying peacefully in the mortuary after his death a few months earlier.
"Aberforth?" Harry murmured, taking in the sight of him. Aberforth's skin was horribly pale, but his intense blue eyes, which seemed to pierce through his mind just like his brother's, were unchanged. "Aberforth, are you alive?"
Aberforth let out a sharp laugh that contained no joy.
"Alive, am I? No, I'm a corpse, as you can see," said Aberforth casually. His voice was rough and harsh, devoid of emotion, as if his vocal cords were forced to move by some kind of mechanical device. "You know why this happened, Potter. . . . You got me killed. I trusted you and fought for my life and you let me die . . . "
"No! I-I'm not a wizard anymore . . . so I couldn't help you then —"
"It's too late for excuses," spat Aberforth coldly. He slowly rose to his feet, his knees creaking as he did so, revealing the sharp kitchen knife he held in his right hand. "Time for you to pay for your sins, and you shall die!"
Aberforth leapt over the desk and lunged at Harry with a swiftness unbefitting a dead man. Harry stumbled backwards, tripped over an old wooden chair just behind him, and fell backward with it. Aberforth tried to plunge his knife into the fallen Harry, but he rolled out of the way and lifted the fallen chair, narrowly blocking the knife. Aberforth's eyes were filled with hatred and madness, but his mouth wore a wicked grin, not unlike the other Inferi. It was then that Harry realized that it was not the real Aberforth who was trying to kill him, but merely an Inferius imitating him, though unlike the other corpses, he spoke.
Harry lifted the chair and aimed it at Aberforth's throat, knocking him down with all his might, ripping open his pure white flesh to reveal the pink flesh beneath, but no blood.
"You're still ungrateful even after my death, Potter," Aberforth muttered as he fell. "You've never been afraid of death and you don't have to be now!"
Harry left him alone and crossed the reception area to the large doors. Once inside, he slammed them shut, grabbed a nearby pole and rammed it into the doorknobs. Aberforth hit it and tried to open the door.
"POTTTER, OPEN THE DOOR! I'M NOT GONNA HURT YOU, OPEN THE DOOR!"
Harry forced himself to move, his body violently shaking with fear and shock, and ran down the hallway. It hadn't really been Aberforth who had tried to kill him a few moments ago, but the guilt of being responsible for his death still stung his heart. As he passed another door, nervously wondering where the hell Neville and Faraday were, he suddenly heard a voice calling out to him.
"Psst, this way!"
He turned to see yellow gas billowing from the slightly open door. Harry stepped inside without a second thought.
"Okay, now close the door and turn on the lights," Faraday's voice echoed through the foul-smelling darkness, followed by the wandlight, revealing the faces of Neville and Faraday, both with damp handkerchiefs covering their noses and mouths. "And take this, this yellow gas doesn't smell very nice."
Harry took the handkerchief from Faraday and covered his mouth like them.
"Did you see the children?" asked Neville worriedly. "They were moving with us and then suddenly those monsters attacked. . . ."
"Yes, they were with me for a while," said Harry. "We met on the first floor and went to the stairs together, but then we were separated by the Inferi. . . . I told them to stay in the closed ward on the fourth floor for now, so they're probably waiting there."
Harry wanted to say something about the talking Inferius he had just encountered in the reception area, but he held his tongue for fear of upsetting Neville, who had been very close to Aberforth.
"I guess we'll have to go to the fourth floor, then," said Faraday. "Fortunately, they won't find us here; the gas seems to mask our scent. I can't believe I have to fight zombies when I'm this old . . . "
"Those bodies aren't zombies," said Harry. "They're Inferi, puppets brought back to life by a Dark wizard's spell."
"Bodies brought back to life by a spell, that's the exact definition of a zombie," said Faraday stubbornly. "Why is this hospital filled with such animated corpses?"
"It's the work of the Dawn Breakers . . . I heard Roberts's voice," said Harry. "How are we supposed to get upstairs now that the only intact staircase we have left is flooded with Inferi?"
"We just made that plan," Neville said, pointing to a small pot on the floor. It contained a strange plant with long, wiggly tentacles. "Remember this, Harry? It's the plant that killed Broderick Bode in this hospital a long time ago, and they kept it here because it's so dangerous."
"It's Devil's Snare." Harry remembered being nearly strangled by the plant on his way to protect the Sorcerer's Stone in his first year. "What are you gonna do with it?"
"I've decided to call it Operation Jack and the Beanstalk," said Faraday cheerfully. "Turns out Mr. Longbottom has a knack for magical plants, doesn't he?"
"Neville is the Professor of Herbology at Hogwarts," Harry said, looking back at Neville. "So what exactly are you going to do?"
"We're going to go to the place where the stairs collapsed and make this plant grow," said Neville. "You see — it grows as soon as you touch it. So we'll hold on to its stem and let it carry us up."
"That's a simple plan. But what if it tries to strangle us?" said Harry warily, but Neville just grinned.
"Trust me, there's a way to stop it from doing that. . . . I have one in my house and I know how they work."
Harry examined the Devil's Snare with disgust as it wilted and wriggled helplessly on its vines. Needless to say, it was unnerving to have to trust his life to a creature that had once tried to take his. Harry tried to think of other ways to get through the collapsed staircase, even considering having Neville magically levitate him and Faraday, but gave up when he realized there was no wizard who could levitate Neville again. Neville, meanwhile, carefully cradling the potted plant in his arms, opened the door slightly and peered out.
"The corridor is clear now, come on!"
Harry and Faraday followed Neville out. The narrow passageway was as deserted as he'd been told, but Harry's breathing quickened, not knowing where Aberforth's Inferius might be hiding. They passed through a few more doors, large and small, muffling their footsteps, and finally a staircase — or rather, the remains of one — appeared before them. The iron gates to the basement were open, and around them were scattered rotting planks and pieces of wood, the ruins of the broken stairs.
"So the Inferi got out of their resting place," muttered Harry. "There could be more down there. . . . Let's get up there as soon as possible."
Looking up, he realized that the damage to the stairwell was worse than he had thought, with little left of the stairs leading up to the incredibly high ceiling. The air around them was still so thick with dust that Harry had to cover his cough with his hand. Neville carefully placed the Devil's Snare near the wall where the stairs had once been and pulled out his wand.
"Protego! Protego!" He cast a defensive spell against Harry and Faraday's necks, then did the same for his own.
"Er, are these all the precautions?" asked Faraday dubiously. "There must be a lot of ways to kill a human without strangling them . . . "
"Devil's Snares think differently, they mainly target the victim's throat," said Neville confidently. "It can still hurt other parts of the body, so you'd better be prepared . . . Now, on the count of three, everyone grab those tentacles!"
Harry followed Neville's lead and brought his reluctant hand to the tentacle.
"One, two, three!"
At Neville's command, they grabbed each of the drooping vines simultaneously. As soon as they touched, the tendrils sprouted, wrapping around their wrists, their arms, and then their entire bodies. The vines made desperate attempts to strangle Harry, but were thwarted by the invisible barrier Neville had put up on his neck. Still, the vile plant refused to give up, relentlessly sending out different tendrils, each aimed at his throat. Even as he fought the vines limb from limb, Harry felt his body rise as the plant continued to grow, trying to choke him. First floor, second floor, third floor. . . . Finally, they made it through three floors and reached the fourth.
"Now, Neville!" shouted Harry. The Devil's Snare was now wrapped around the three of them like a giant snake, making new attempts to strangle them.
Neville pointed his wand, which he had already drawn and gripped, at himself and shouted, "Relashio!"
With the sound of something breaking, the vines wrapped tightly around him snapped. Neville rolled and landed on the railing next to him, then fired the same spell at Harry and Faraday. The sudden loss of his grip on Harry's body knocked him off balance and he nearly fell, but the balance he had developed as an Auror allowed him to leap and land beside Neville. Faraday, much older than either of them, was about to fall when he grabbed Neville's outstretched hand and pulled himself up the corridor. Harry stuck his head out to look down and saw the Devil's Snare, having missed its prey, writhing furiously below.
"Dad, you're here!"
The doulbe doors at the beginning of the corridor opened and Albus and Scorpius ran out. Harry gave both boys a quick hug, then stepped into the corridor marked SPELL DAMAGE.
"This is the closed ward," Scorpius said, pointing to the solid iron door with a small glass panel which read: Janus Tiki Ward. "We hid in here after shooting flames down the corridor to scare the Inferi away, and luckily no one came."
"Not anymore," said Faraday glumly. "We just made a big ruckus, so the zombies will be here soon."
"You're right, let's get inside," Harry said and opened the door to the ward.
Once they were all inside, Neville pointed his wand and muttered, "Colloportus," and the door clicked shut. With a sigh of relief, Harry looked around the room. The bedside of the closest bed was covered with faded photographs of Lockhart smiling and waving, with a crude signature underneath. The two beds at the other end were surrounded by floral curtains, and Neville was staring at them with a mournful expression on his face. No wonder, since this was the room where his parents had spent most of their later lives, driven mad by the pain of the Cruciatus Curse.
"One more floor to go, then," Faraday said, sitting on the bed. "Any other creative ways to get there?"
"We just need to get up here, so I think we should cut a hole in the ceiling and climb up," said Harry. He grabbed a quilt from Lockhart's old bed and rolled it into a rope. "We can use this. Now —"
BANG!
The sound from the entrance made everyone jump. Harry rushed over and peered through the small window in the door. The corridor outside the ward was already filled with Inferi, and a large corpse slammed into the door again.
"It's the Inferi!" shouted Harry. "Hurry, we have to get upstairs!"
"Deprimo!" cried Scorpius, raising his wand above his head, and the center of the ceiling exploded, tearing a gaping hole. Shattered stone and wood rained down, sending a cloud of dust into the room. Harry, Albus and Faraday then tied the blanket tightly around the chair legs like a rope. Scorpius pointed his wand at the back of the chair and said, "Epoximise!" and the backrest was instantly covered with a sticky liquid, like glue. "Now, I'm gonna put this on the upper level and hopefully it'll hold it in place. . . . Wingardium Leviosa!"
With a flick of his wand, the chair floated up, through the hole in the ceiling, and soon landed with a thud on the floor of the upper level. Harry tugged at the quilt that had been tied to the chair, and from the tautness of it, it seemed to be securely fastened and ready for a person to climb on.
"Climb up first. . . . Neville, come here!" Harry shouted. As Scorpius and Faraday climbed up the futon and Albus waited his turn, Harry turned around when Neville didn't come. He was standing in front of the door, looking out of the small pane of glass that was attached to it, mesmerized.
"Neville, what are you looking at? We've got to go upstairs —"
Harry's mouth fell open when he walked over and saw what Neville was looking at. There was no longer the hulking Inferius from earlier trying to break down the door. Instead, an old woman with a tired look and graying hair was staring at Neville with sad eyes. The sunken eyes and pale skin were not so different from the living woman Harry had seen before, and the slightly rounded features bore a vague resemblance to Neville's now. It was Alice Longbottom, Neville's dead mother.
"Neville, dear?" Alice said in a soft voice. "Mummy's here. Won't you open the door for me?"
"Mum?" said Neville, his voice shaking. Before he knew it, his hand was reaching for the doorknob. "Is that really you, Mum?"
Harry quickly grabbed Neville's wrist to stop his hand from reaching the door. "Neville, that's not your mother. . . . That's just an Inferius pretending to be her."
"But Inferi can't talk," Neville said quietly, his longing gaze fixed on his mother. "My mother never spoke to me until she died in this ward, but I know she would never try to hurt me . . . "
"Neville, you have to stay alert," said Harry desperately. "I didn't tell you before, but Aberforth's corpse attacked me just before I met you. . . . Even then he talked like he was really Aberforth, but he was just a puppet controlled by Eisenbein."
"Aberforth? But . . . but my Mum might be different," muttered Neville. "She wouldn't attack me, dead or alive — I just know that!"
"Eisenbein has the Resurrection Stone," Harry said, suddenly remembering something. "He must have used it to make the Inferi act more like humans. . . . I heard Grindelwald had a similar plan once. But plausible or not, it's another Inferius, and she'll try to kill us as soon as we open the door."
Neville's eyes blinked at the words, and for a moment the effort to get his hand to the doorknob grew stronger. It was as if he wanted to test Harry's words for himself. The next moment, however, Neville's arm dropped limply, and Alice Longbottom's sad face suddenly twisted into a ghastly grimace.
Then, in a high, shrill, unnerving voice, she cried, "NEVILLE! OPEN THE DOOR!" Neville jumped back in surprise, his round face as pale as the corpses outside the door. "NEVILLE, IT'S YOUR MOTHER! IT'S SO COLD OUT HERE, OPEN THE DOOR!"
Now she began to pound on the door with all her might, and with such force that each blow left a dent in the ironwork, and the hinges shook as if they might fall off at any moment.
"Neville, even after my death . . . are you going to leave me like this?" said Inferius in a harsh, shrill voice that did not sound human. "OPEN THE DOOR! OPEN IT!"
With each blow of her fist, the door made more dents, and the gap began to widen.
"We have to go!" Harry urged him. "The door will break soon, and then —"
"You go first," Neville said, raising his own wand. His face was contorted with grief and shock, but his eyes were etched with cold determination. "I'll take care of them and follow you. . . . They'll keep coming if we let them."
Harry nodded to his old friend, then turned to go upstairs. Down at the bottom of the hole, Albus was still there, staring at him in horror.
"Come on up son."
"But Dad, what about Professor Longbottom?"
"Neville will be right behind us," said Harry reassuringly.
Albus went through the hole first, holding onto the quilt, and Harry looked back at the entrance one last time. Neville was pointing his wand forward, aiming it at the iron gate, which was taking a steady stream of blows and looked like it was going to break at any moment. Harry watched nervously as Albus struggled to climb up, clinging to the rope with both arms and legs. When his son finally disappeared into the hole in the ceiling, Harry grabbed the blanket and climbed after him.
Behind him, the sound of the Inferius pounding on the iron door grew louder and louder, mingled with the tiny sounds of fallen screws holding the door on its hinges. Finally, as Harry stepped through the hole in the ceiling that separated the fourth and the fifth floor, the door fell away with a loud bang from below. When he emerged, Scorpius and Albus grabbed his arms and pulled him up. Once on the fifth floor, Harry barely had time to catch his breath before he crouched down beside the hole and looked down. The room was already filled with pale-skinned Inferi and Neville was nowhere to be seen.
"Neville, where are you?" called Harry. If he were a wizard, he would have cast a proper spell instead of just watching. . . .
"Harry, get back!" came an urgent voice from below. Harry quickly backed away, taking the children and Faraday with him, and almost at the same time, flames erupted from the floor below. The hole Harry had just been standing next to erupted in heat and fire like the crater of a volcano, knocking the boys and Faraday down.
"Protego!" Scorpius shouted, and the flames that bounced off the ceiling were blocked by an invisible wall.
"Move!" shouted Harry. "We've got to get out of here!"
It turned out they were in a small pantry attached to the tea shop. All sorts of jars stacked on shelves burst open in the heat, sending shards of glass and sticky liquid flying through the air. Dodging the debris, Harry threw open the door and ran out.
"Protego!"
Albus shouted this time, pointing his wand at the door, and the thick smoke that had been billowing from inside was held back by magic, sealing them inside the pantry. Coughing, they sat down one by one and watched in silence as the black smoke trapped in the room swirled in a tornado of heat.
"What happened to Professor Longbottom?" said Scorpius, his voice filled with despair. "Will he be all right?"
Harry didn't answer, just stared at the burning room in silence.
"Dad, the woman who was just outside the door . . . did she know Professor Longbottom?" asked Albus quietly.
"Yes. That was Neville's mother," said Harry. "She spent the rest of her life here after she and her husband were tortured out of their minds by the Death Eaters when they were both young. She was kept in the morgue after she died not long ago."
"How could they do such a cruel thing?" said Albus, sobbing. "How can you use someone's dead body . . . to attack your own family?"
"That's what makes Eisenbein so dangerous," said Harry darkly. "Because unlike Voldemort, he believes in the power of love. . . . So he's using it to set a trap for us."
Just then, there was movement in the smoke. Harry and the children jumped and nervously pointed their wands. A human form appeared and walked slowly through the transparent barrier as if it didn't exist. It was Neville; his face and hair were streaked with ash and his arms were marked with angry red burns, but it was the look on his face that struck Harry more than anything else. His face was devoid of any emotion or intelligence, as if his soul had just been sucked out by a dementor.
"Neville, are you all right?" Harry said as he approached him. Neville looked surprised, almost like he had just noticed Harry for the first time.
"I-I'm fine." Neville stammered. Even though he didn't look fine at all, Harry didn't say anything, just patted his friend on the shoulder.
"Hey, I found a fireplace in here," Faraday's voice made them turn around. He had opened a door in the wall behind the long table and chairs in the tearoom, revealing a hidden chamber. Together they quickened their pace, heading for another terrible place.