Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (72 page)

He was sorry to hear she had shed even more tears over it, but very glad they were on speaking terms again, and even more pleased when she gave him a swift kiss on the cheek and hurried off again. And unbelievably, no sooner had he arrived outside Transfiguration than something just as good happened: Seamus stepped out of the queue to face him.

‘I just wanted to say,’ he mumbled, squinting at Harry’s left knee, ‘I believe you. And I’ve sent a copy of that magazine to me mam.’

If anything more was needed to complete Harry’s happiness, it was the reaction he got from Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle. He saw them with their heads together later that afternoon in the library; they were with a weedy-looking boy Hermione whispered was called Theodore Nott. They looked round at Harry as he browsed the shelves for the book he needed on Partial Vanishment: Goyle cracked his knuckles threateningly and Malfoy whispered something undoubtedly malevolent to Crabbe. Harry knew perfectly well why they were acting like this: he had named all of their fathers as Death Eaters.

‘And the best bit,’ whispered Hermione gleefully, as they left the library, ‘is they can’t contradict you, because they can’t admit they’ve read the article!’

To cap it all, Luna told him over dinner that no issue of
The Quibbler
had ever sold out faster.

‘Dad’s reprinting!’ she told Harry, her eyes popping excitedly. ‘He can’t believe it, he says people seem even more interested in this than the Crumple-Horned Snorkacks!’

Harry was a hero in the Gryffindor common room that night. Daringly, Fred and George had put an Enlargement Charm on the front cover of
The Quibbler
and hung it on the wall, so that Harry’s giant head gazed down upon the proceedings, occasionally saying things like ‘THE MINISTRY ARE MORONS’ and ‘EAT DUNG, UMBRIDGE’ in a booming voice. Hermione did not find this very amusing; she said it interfered with her concentration, and she ended up going to bed early out of irritation. Harry had to admit that the poster was not quite as funny after an hour or two, especially when the talking spell had started to wear off, so that it merely shouted disconnected words like ‘DUNG’ and ‘UMBRIDGE’ at more and more frequent intervals in a progressively higher voice. In fact, it started to make his head ache and his scar began prickling uncomfortably again. To disappointed moans from the many people who were sitting around him, asking him to relive his interview for the umpteenth time, he announced that he too needed an early night.

The dormitory was empty when he reached it. He rested his forehead for a moment against the cool glass of the window beside his bed; it felt soothing against his scar. Then he undressed and got into bed, wishing his headache would go away. He also felt slightly sick. He rolled over on to his side, closed his eyes, and fell asleep almost at once …

He was standing in a dark, curtained room lit by a single branch of candles. His hands were clenched on the back of a chair in front of him. They were long-fingered and white as though they had not seen sunlight for years and looked like large, pale spiders against the dark velvet of the chair.

Beyond the chair, in a pool of light cast upon the floor by the candles, knelt a man in black robes.

‘I have been badly advised, it seems,’ said Harry, in a high, cold voice that pulsed with anger.

‘Master, I crave your pardon,’ croaked the man kneeling on the floor. The back of his head glimmered in the candlelight. He seemed to be trembling.

‘I do not blame you, Rookwood,’ said Harry in that cold, cruel voice.

He relinquished his grip on the chair and walked around it, closer to the man cowering on the floor, until he stood directly over him in the darkness, looking down from a far greater height than usual.

‘You are sure of your facts, Rookwood?’ asked Harry.

‘Yes, My Lord, yes … I used to work in the Department after – after all …’

‘Avery told me Bode would be able to remove it.’

‘Bode could never have taken it, Master … Bode would have known he could not … undoubtedly, that is why he fought so hard against Malfoy’s Imperius Curse …’

‘Stand up, Rookwood,’ whispered Harry.

The kneeling man almost fell over in his haste to obey. His face was pockmarked; the scars were thrown into relief by the candlelight. He remained a little stooped when standing, as though halfway through a bow, and he darted terrified looks up at Harry’s face.

‘You have done well to tell me this,’ said Harry. ‘Very well … I have wasted months on fruitless schemes, it seems … but no matter … we begin again, from now. You have Lord Voldemort’s gratitude, Rookwood …’

‘My Lord … yes, My Lord,’ gasped Rookwood, his voice hoarse with relief.

‘I shall need your help. I shall need all the information you can give me.’

‘Of course, My Lord, of course … anything …’

‘Very well … you may go. Send Avery to me.’

Rookwood scurried backwards, bowing, and disappeared through a door.

Left alone in the dark room, Harry turned towards the wall. A cracked, age-spotted mirror hung on the wall in the shadows. Harry moved towards it. His reflection grew larger and clearer in the darkness … a face whiter than a skull … red eyes with slits for pupils …

‘NOOOOOOOOO!’

‘What?’ yelled a voice nearby.

Harry flailed around madly, became entangled in the hangings and fell out of his bed. For a few seconds he did not know where he was; he was convinced he was about to see the white, skull-like face looming at him out of the dark again, then very near to him Ron’s voice spoke.

‘Will you stop acting like a maniac so I can get you out of here!’

Ron wrenched the hangings apart and Harry stared up at him in the moonlight, flat on his back, his scar searing with pain. Ron looked as though he had just been getting ready for bed; one arm was out of his robes.

‘Has someone been attacked again?’ asked Ron, pulling Harry roughly to his feet. ‘Is it Dad? Is it that snake?’

‘No – everyone’s fine –’ gasped Harry, whose forehead felt as though it were on fire. ‘Well … Avery isn’t … he’s in trouble … he gave him the wrong information … Voldemort’s really angry …’

Harry groaned and sank, shaking, on to his bed, rubbing his scar.

‘But Rookwood’s going to help him now … he’s on the right track again …’

‘What are you talking about?’ said Ron, sounding scared. ‘D’you mean … did you just see You-Know-Who?’

‘I
was
You-Know-Who,’ said Harry, and he stretched out his hands in the darkness and held them up to his face, to check that they were no longer deathly white and long-fingered. ‘He was with Rookwood, he’s one of the Death Eaters who escaped from Azkaban, remember? Rookwood’s just told him Bode couldn’t have done it.’

‘Done what?’

‘Remove something … he said Bode would have known he couldn’t have done it … Bode was under the Imperius Curse … I think he said Malfoy’s dad put it on him.’

‘Bode was bewitched to remove something?’ Ron said. ‘But – Harry, that’s got to be –’

‘The weapon,’ Harry finished the sentence for him. ‘I know.’

The dormitory door opened; Dean and Seamus came in. Harry swung his legs back into bed. He did not want to look as though anything odd had just happened, seeing as Seamus had only just stopped thinking Harry was a nutter.

‘Did you say,’ murmured Ron, putting his head close to Harry’s on the pretence of helping himself to water from the jug on his bedside table, ‘that you
were
You-Know-Who?’

‘Yeah,’ said Harry quietly.

Ron took an unnecessarily large gulp of water; Harry saw it spill over his chin on to his chest.

‘Harry,’ he said, as Dean and Seamus clattered around noisily, pulling off their robes and talking, ‘you’ve got to tell –’

‘I haven’t got to tell anyone,’ said Harry shortly. ‘I wouldn’t have seen it at all if I could do Occlumency. I’m supposed to have learned to shut this stuff out. That’s what they want.’

By ‘they’ he meant Dumbledore. He got back into bed and rolled over on to his side with his back to Ron and after a while he heard Ron’s mattress creak as he, too, lay back down. Harry’s scar began to burn; he bit hard on his pillow to stop himself making a noise. Somewhere, he knew, Avery was being punished.

*

Harry and Ron waited until break next morning to tell Hermione exactly what had happened; they wanted to be absolutely sure they could not be overheard. Standing in their usual corner of the cool and breezy courtyard, Harry told her every detail of the dream he could remember. When he had finished, she said nothing at all for a few moments, but stared with a kind of painful intensity at Fred and George, who were both headless and selling their magical hats from under their cloaks on the other side of the yard.

‘So that’s why they killed him,’ she said quietly, withdrawing her gaze from Fred and George at last. ‘When Bode tried to steal this weapon, something funny happened to him. I think there must be defensive spells on it, or around it, to stop people touching it. That’s why he was in St Mungo’s, his brain had gone all funny and he couldn’t talk. But remember what the Healer told us? He was recovering. And they couldn’t risk him getting better, could they? I mean, the shock of whatever happened when he touched that weapon probably made the Imperius Curse lift. Once he’d got his voice back, he’d explain what he’d been doing, wouldn’t he? They would have known he’d been sent to steal the weapon. Of course, it would have been easy for Lucius Malfoy to put the curse on him. Never out of the Ministry, is he?’

‘He was even hanging around that day I had my hearing,’ said Harry. ‘In the – hang on …’ he said slowly. ‘He was in the Department of Mysteries corridor that day! Your dad said he was probably trying to sneak down and find out what happened in my hearing, but what if –’

‘Sturgis!’ gasped Hermione, looking thunderstruck.

‘Sorry?’ said Ron, looking bewildered.

‘Sturgis Podmore –’ said Hermione breathlessly, ‘arrested for trying to get through a door! Lucius Malfoy must have got him too! I bet he did it the day you saw him there, Harry. Sturgis had Moody’s Invisibility Cloak, right? So, what if he was standing guard by the door, invisible, and Malfoy heard him move – or guessed someone was there – or just did the Imperius Curse on the off-chance there’d be a guard there? So, when Sturgis next had an opportunity – probably when it was his turn on guard duty again – he tried to get into the Department to steal the weapon for Voldemort – Ron, be quiet – but he got caught and sent to Azkaban …’

She gazed at Harry.

‘And now Rookwood’s told Voldemort how to get the weapon?’

‘I didn’t hear all the conversation, but that’s what it sounded like,’ said Harry. ‘Rookwood used to work there … maybe Voldemort’ll send Rookwood to do it?’

Hermione nodded, apparently still lost in thought. Then, quite abruptly, she said, ‘But you shouldn’t have seen this at all, Harry.’

‘What?’ he said, taken aback.

‘You’re supposed to be learning how to close your mind to this sort of thing,’ said Hermione, suddenly stern.

‘I know I am,’ said Harry. ‘But –’

‘Well, I think we should just try and forget what you saw,’ said Hermione firmly. ‘And you ought to put in a bit more effort on your Occlumency from now on.’

The week did not improve as it progressed. Harry received two more ‘D’s in Potions; he was still on tenterhooks that Hagrid might get the sack; and he couldn’t stop himself dwelling on the dream in which he had been Voldemort – though he didn’t bring it up with Ron and Hermione again; he didn’t want another telling-off from Hermione. He wished very much that he could have talked to Sirius about it, but that was out of the question, so he tried to push the matter to the back of his mind.

Unfortunately, the back of his mind was no longer the secure place it had once been.

‘Get up, Potter.’

A couple of weeks after his dream of Rookwood, Harry was to be found, yet again, kneeling on the floor of Snape’s office, trying to clear his head. He had just been forced, yet again, to relive a stream of very early memories he had not even realised he still had, most of them concerning humiliations Dudley and his gang had inflicted upon him in primary school.

‘That last memory,’ said Snape. ‘What was it?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Harry, getting wearily to his feet. He was finding it increasingly difficult to disentangle separate memories from the rush of images and sound that Snape kept calling forth. ‘You mean the one where my cousin tried to make me stand in the toilet?’

‘No,’ said Snape softly. ‘I mean the one with a man kneeling in the middle of a darkened room …’

‘It’s … nothing,’ said Harry.

Snape’s dark eyes bored into Harry’s. Remembering what Snape had said about eye contact being crucial to Legilimency, Harry blinked and looked away.

‘How do that man and that room come to be inside your head, Potter?’ said Snape.

‘It –’ said Harry, looking everywhere but at Snape, ‘it was – just a dream I had.’

‘A dream?’ repeated Snape.

There was a pause during which Harry stared fixedly at a large dead frog suspended in a jar of purple liquid.

‘You do know why we are here, don’t you, Potter?’ said Snape, in a low, dangerous voice. ‘You do know why I am giving up my evenings to this tedious job?’

‘Yes,’ said Harry stiffly.

‘Remind me why we are here, Potter.’

‘So I can learn Occlumency,’ said Harry, now glaring at a dead eel.

‘Correct, Potter. And dim though you may be –’ Harry looked back at Snape, hating him ‘– I would have thought that after over two months of lessons you might have made some progress. How many other dreams about the Dark Lord have you had?’

‘Just that one,’ lied Harry.

‘Perhaps,’ said Snape, his dark, cold eyes narrowing slightly, ‘perhaps you actually enjoy having these visions and dreams, Potter. Maybe they make you feel special – important?’

‘No, they don’t,’ said Harry, his jaw set and his fingers clenched tightly around the handle of his wand.

‘That is just as well, Potter,’ said Snape coldly, ‘because you are neither special nor important, and it is not up to you to find out what the Dark Lord is saying to his Death Eaters.’