Chapter Twelve: Diagon Alley

Ron's heart leapt at the thought of seeing Bill again. He kept his hood lowered close to his face as he followed Andromeda through Diagon Alley. It had taken some convincing before he was allowed to go, but he was the only one without any wanted posters hanging around. From every street corner he could see drawings of James, Sirius, and Lupin watching ominously. Diagon Alley was very different there. It looked like all the color had been sucked out of the shops, several were boarded up, including Ollivander's wand shop. It was bad enough that Ollivander now haunted his nightmares every night, but what about all the students that needed to get their wands?

"Let's see, a clove of hemlock, exploding mangoes, hippogriff milk, a new copy of Gilderoy Lockhart's book to keep Cissy happy—" Andromeda read off her shopping list. "Are you sure there's nothing you want, Ron? We could stop and get ice cream."

"No ma'am," Ron tried to be polite. Why did she insist on treating him like a child? The streets were lined with students in school robes, it was a Saturday. Ron wistfully thought back to his own visits to Hogsmeade village, maybe if he was lucky he'd see Hermione out here—

No, he had to push that thought away. Besides, even if she was miraculously allowed to leave on the weekend, seeing her would just make things worse, he couldn't risk them trying to torture her. Andromeda went into the potions shop, Ron waited outside, on the other side of the street was the pet shop.

He could see owls and bats in their cages, while a small pen of pink rats danced in the window. A bushy orange-red tail brushed past the cage. Ron was sprinting to the other side of the street before he realized what he was doing. He opened the door to the shop. A great orange cat with a face that looked like a smashed pumpkin meowed in greeting to him. Crookshanks brushed against Ron's pant leg.

"Excuse me—" Ron said breathlessly to the cloaked witch behind the counter. "How much is the cat?"

"Not for sale," the witch said, "we've got tabbies, sphinxes, and black cats in the other room—"

"Please, he's important to a friend of mine." Ron's eyes darted around the room, looking for a snowy owl or a mental scoop owl. Neither of them were there. "I'll give you ten galleons." He didn't have ten galleons, nor had he ever in his life. The witch seemed to realize this and laughed.

"I've had Crookshanks for well over twenty years now." The shop witch said. "Seems like you've only got pocket change for a rat—" The witch's voice trailed off as she watched two people walk past the window outside. Ron didn't catch a good glimpse at them.

"Get out." The shop witch snapped, and Ron obliged. Crookshanks followed him dutifully to the door before settling down on his haunches. It was clear he had no intention of going anywhere.

Ron walked further from the shop, past the turn into Kockturn Alley.

"You should have told me it was getting worse—" Ron froze at the familiar voice of Draco Malfoy.

"I didn't want you to worry." Harry sounded concerned. Ron peaked his head around the corner, sure enough his worst suspicion was confirmed. Malfoy seemed to be wearing school robes, and Harry wore a long dark jacket over his jeans and shirt.

"Oh really?" Malfoy hissed. "Hm, maybe think about that next time before you disappear for a whole month, and show up at my dorm at 3 a.m. shouting about some diadem—"

"Draco, sshh!" Harry quieted Malfoy as a group of Bulgarian witches walked by, chatting amicably.

"Look at you," Malfoy growled. "When's the last time you slept? Or ate something? It's not healthy. I still think you should talk to Snape."

"I'm getting closer—"

"I am worried about you, Harry," Malfoy blurted out. "You said you'd talk to you father about the visions, it didn't work. You said the Hogwarts mission would fix things, it didn't! What makes you think this will work? It's completely mad."

Harry muttered something that Ron couldn't hear, and Malfoy sighed. Ron poked his head around the corner and saw the two embrace, Malfoy was resting his head on top of Harry's, and Ron saw that Harry was shaking slightly.

"You're going to get me killed," Malfoy gave a shaky laugh, Ron heard Harry start sobbing louder. "No! I'm sorry, that was a bad joke. Can I take you home at least?"

"No, I'm—I'm fine." Harry straightened up. "I'll go talk to Snape, Nagini's finishing up with her … meeting … with Fletcher. I'd rather not catch the tail end of it."

"Okay, I'll go with you." Malfoy said, "just to make sure you actually go, you git."

The two laughed half-heartedly, and Ron heard footsteps walking away. His heart was beating in his throat. They didn't seem to notice him, but should he say something to James? He didn't want him to worry more than he already was, what had Harry meant that things were worse? Ron let his feet take him where they wanted, he ended up leaning against the brick wall on the outside of the potions shop.

"All done," Andromeda came back out of the shop several minutes later. Her arms were laden with bags, "Kreacher!" There was a faint pop as the elderly house elf appeared in front of her.

"Kindly take this back to the house." Andromeda said to the elf, he bowed before grabbing the bags and disappearing with the sound of a gunshot. "Just to Flourish and Blotts then, and then we can drop by the bank and see if Bill recognizes you—"

"I'm not going." Ron said.

"Are you sure? That was the whole reason for our outing."

"No—I saw some people I recognize; I'm not going."

"Did they see you?" Andromeda paled; her eyes darted around the crowd near them. She quickly took Ron's arm in her own and started walking back towards the Leaky Cauldron. She tried to appear casual, but Ron could feel her shaking. "Who is it?"

"Your nephew and my … friend," Ron said, trying to keep up with her.

"I see." Andromeda slowed her pace slightly, but kept her eyes peeled at the other shoppers around.

The walk back to the house felt like a blur. Andromeda kept taking them down different streets away from the house. She tried to look unconcerned, but Ron saw her glance back over her shoulder occasionally. There was no separation now from the magical world and muggle London. Many of the shops on the main streets were closed, and far, far, beyond Ron could see an outline of barbed wire, closing off sections of the city like chicken pens … They took the hidden entrance back into the house. James and Sirius immediately rushed to help Ron as he pulled himself into the living room.

"Ron! Are you alright?" James helped pull him to his feet.

"What happened?" Sirius rounded back on Andromeda. Andromeda shook her head and pointed to Ron for an answer.

"Nothing, it's nothing—m'fine."

Which was worse, providing James with the exact excuse he wanted to burst into the ministry of magic and make a beeline for Riddle's office? Or not warning them that Nagini was in London, very close to where they currently stood? Eventually, Ron settled for a middle ground.

"I—almost ran into Harry, he was talking with Draco Malfoy. Said something about Nagini questioning someone today—they didn't see me though, they were distracted."

"What do you mean distracted?" James was practically shaking him by the shoulders. "What's that—"

"Christ, Prongs you're going to knock his brains out." Sirius yanked James back. "That's actually … that's helpful to know Nagini's in London. Means she's focusing on us, and not on the trail of the others yet so …" Sirius made a motion like he was strangling someone. He was taken aback by the look on Ron's face. "What? She's planning on doing the same to us."

"What was distracting them?" James asked Ron, calmly.

"I dunno, really, Harry kept talking about visions or something, he's looking for the diadem to," Ron cringed. "I didn't catch a lot of it, it sounded like he was crying." Well, there it was, the very thing he didn't want to tell James. James's posture immediately stiffened.

"Oh—well—hm …" James drummed his finger on the coffee table. "Right, Sirius get your cloak and find Remus. We're going to Diagon Alley tonight."

"No!" Ron stood up to stop them. "What if that's what they want you to do?"

"Ron, we've got to stop Nagini before she breeches our network." Sirius said, significantly more composed than James was. "If Regulus is exposed before we get all the pieces …" He took in a deep breath. "Look, she's brutal, more people could get killed if we just let her skip around."

"Then I want to come too!"

"No," James said. "Ron, I'm sorry but we've put you in enough danger already. We're not planning to stay out long, I promise."

Ron numbly watched as the two gathered their things and disappeared back through the trap door. From out in the foyer window, Ron saw the sky turn a pleasant shade of orange. It could be easy, in Regulus's neighborhood, to forget what was happening to the rest of the city. In the other room, Andromeda was attempting to get her sister to write a letter.

"Come now Cissy, you know Draco'd love to hear from you."

Ron remembered growing up and hearing stories about the first war, but he'd never imagined anything like this. Was this what his own world was destined to become? The very thought made his stomach curl. He'd always felt useless compared with Harry and Hermione. He didn't think he was brave or clever enough to solve things the way they did. But here, well he didn't know. Hermione was off somewhere, probably plotting her escape from the school. And Harry had already made it very clear he was more interested in self-preservation. The sky outside turned black, and Ron made his decision.

He crept carefully towards the trap door, and closed it behind him. Andromeda was too busy with Narcissa to notice, it'd probably be another twenty minutes before she realized he was gone. Ron followed the twisting tunnels back out to the surface, and made his way towards Diagon Alley. He didn't have the invisibility cloak, nor did he know how to make a disillusionment charm. It struck Ron that even though it wasn't very late, the streets were abandoned save for a few Death Eaters marching in the distance. Was there some sort of city curfew?

He decided it was best to not push them. The streets of Diagon Alley were darkened, curtains pulled tight over the shop windows. In the distance, Ron heard the sound of two drunk wizards breaking bottles. He made his way towards Knockturn Alley. One of the very first shops was an antique store, Borgin and Burkes. Perfect, he could see if James and Sirius were around. Then they'd have to leave—

"N-no—please, I haven't seen it—" A man's voice quivered from the alley behind the store. Ron saw two figures in the alleyway, a crouched old man and a figure leering down.

"I believe you." Harry said quietly, releasing the figure.

Ron felt something brush against his feet. He looked down in horror to see a massive snake slithering by towards the two figures. The snake hissed, Ron was thankful for the cover of night. He didn't know exactly how to describe it, other than it seemed like she unfolded unto herself, and suddenly the snake was gone, replaced by the tall shape of a woman. Two sets of eyes locked in on Ron, abandoning their previous prey.

There was no time to think, no time to run—

A spell snaked around Ron's leg, latching onto him like a bear trap. The two circled Ron like a pair of vipers. He couldn't see the upper half of Nagini's face, just the smile beneath her black lipstick as she watched him. Harry's expression was impossible to read as well, he was wearing a set of goggles with green lenses that made his eyes look like a poisonous insect, and had the lower part of his face covered. Their steps fell uncannily in line with each other, silent as they slowly spiraled their way closer to Ron.

"Weren't you going to say hello, Ron?" Harry asked, and Ron heard Nagini laugh. Or at least … he thought it was a laugh. It was like the sound of metal on glass …

"N-no," his wand was in his back pocket, there's no way he'd be able to hex both of them at the same time.

"I wanted to introduce you to my older sister, you must've heard of Nagini where you're from." From behind him, Ron could hear the scrape of Nagini's sword as she dragged it across the brick wall.

"Hello," Nagini's voice was little more than a rasp. Ron felt his blood turn to ice as she spoke to him. It was hard to believe this was the same girl he'd seen in Regulus's memory a few days prior. He wanted to scream, but his voice died in his throat.

"That's rude, Ron, she said hello to you." Harry pulled the goggles back up onto his head and removed the lower part of his face covering. Malfoy was right, he looked terrible. It looked like Harry hadn't slept at all since the last time they met, Ron wasn't sure how he was still standing. But he didn't get to dwell on it long. From behind, Ron felt a thrill of terror as Nagini unhooked her mask.

Venomous yellow eyes leered down at him as she circled back around, her hair neatly braided into a plait down to her upper back. She couldn't have been older than her early twenties, but there was a weariness to her, her cheeks were sunken in and hollow like she'd been ill for a very long time. Ron could have sworn he saw the pupil of her right eye contract into a slit for a moment as she laughed again.

"What do you want?" Ron asked through gritted teeth. Harry seemed slightly taken aback by Ron's question.

"We only want the diadem returned," he said, spiraling ever closer still. "Tell me where it is, and we may just let you live …"

"I haven't got it." Ron felt a slight pressure digging into his eye. Regulus told him the best way to fight a legillimens attack was to sprinkle in snippets of the truth. Harry's expression did not change, but Ron heard Nagini let out her breath in an angry hiss.

"You lie …" she said, lingering long on each word.

"No, he isn't." Ron could see it, a flicker of desperation crossed Harry's face. "But if Weasley's here …"

The two made eye contact, as if they were sharing the exact same thought. Harry flicked his wand and Ron felt his own fly through the air and land in Nagini's outstretched fingertips. Ron felt her fingernails dig into his right arm, as she started dragging Ron with them down the street. From the corner of the pet shop, Ron could see the shopkeeper and Crookshanks watching through the slits in their blinds.

He didn't need either of them to say where they were going. They were headed for the ministry.

A/N: Thanks for reading! I don't have as much of a backlog of chapters now, so I'll be moving to weekly updates. Let me know what you think so far!