Chapter 40
eriseD straeH
Harry glanced at his watch. It was a quarter-past six. He looked up at the staff table and found Professor Grendelhall. They made eye contact and she nodded, giving the signal to begin. Harry nodded back, slowly put his fork down (he hadn’t really eaten anything) and nudged Ron.
“Let’s go.”
Ron nodded, slightly nervous, and gulped down one last bite of potato. He glanced anxiously at Hermione.
“Good luck,” she whispered to both of them, though her eyes were mostly on Ron.
They rose from their seats and walked away from the Gryffindor table.
“Where are they going?” Harry heard Seamus ask Hermione as they left. He didn’t turn around, but kept his gaze on their destination.
They walked along the back of the Great Hall, opposite the staff table. Grendelhall had instructed them to act like something important had just happened, so Harry decided to lean in towards Ron and act like they were deep in conversation about some mysterious event. He had just begun to speak when he noticed Ron looking around the Great Hall, being anything but subtle.
“Ron…what are you doing?” Harry hissed. “Don’t look around the room, look at me!” Ron quickly turned to Harry, his face turning red.
“Sorry.”
“Don’t look for the spy, just act like we’re in a hurry”the spy should follow us,” he said in a low whisper as they passed the Ravenclaw table. Ron nodded and put his head down, determinedly not looking at anyone.
“Er…act like you’re talking to me, like we just found out something important.”
“What should I say?”
“It doesn’t matter. Anything. Just tell me about”” Harry’s mind raced. This clearly wasn’t going very well so far. “”about…your last Quidditch practice. How’d it go?”
“Er…ok, I guess,” Ron shrugged, then frowned suddenly. “Oh yeah, Ginny won’t let me ride the Firebolt. She says I have to get permission from you first,” he said indignantly. “Honestly, like you’d let her ride it and not me…”
Harry cringed. Ron was helpless.
“…so is it ok if I…”
“Yes, yes”whatever,” Harry said, exasperated. They had just exited the Great Hall and came into the Entry Hall. Harry shook his head. Between Ron openly looking for the spy and asking Harry if he could borrow the Firebolt right in front of the Slytherin table (the group Harry thought most likely to have a spy in their ranks), they couldn’t have done much worse.
“Ron, that was horrible. Don’t ever think about starting a career as an actor, because you’re terrible mate.”
“Well we did it, didn’t we?” replied Ron, still red. “Let’s just keep going.”
They walked straight towards the dungeons and made their way down the first staircase. Grendelhall’s plan was to lure the spy out of the Great Hall by acting like something big had just come up and them leaving the Great Hall in a hurry during dinner. The next step was to walk quickly down into the dungeons and pretend like they were searching for something on the way. They were to wander about the dungeons until Grendelhall found them, hopefully giving her enough time to confirm the identity of the spy. The plan for the moment wasn’t to catch the spy, but just to find out who it was in order to learn how they communicated with Bellatrix Lestrange. She had specifically told them to walk down the hallway that the Slytherin common room was located on, suggesting to Harry that her suspicions about the identity of the spy matched his own. It was a simple plan, but effective.
“You know who I saw watching us?” said Ron dramatically to Harry as they walked. “That Ravenclaw bloke Dunston Marlowe. I think he might be the spy.”
“Look, we don’t need to worry about who it is, we just need to get them out of there so Grendelhall can track them. And don’t talk about the spy, what if he hears us? Come on. Let’s go down here.”
They walked through the dungeons for some time, twisting and turning through the endless passages, doubling back on themselves, walking up and down staircases. They never encountered anyone, however, and it soon became rather dull. To keep entertained they began peering into random rooms, most of which were empty though some held interesting contents. In one room they found what looked like the skeleton of a small dragon. Another held piles and piles of sinister looking, black-bound books. Perhaps most interesting of all, however, was the room hidden behind an old, faded tapestry that had a small couch, a wireless, and posters of the Weird Sisters plastered all over its walls, looking more like the bedroom of a teenage girl than one of the dungeon rooms at Hogwarts.
“I bet this is where Snape comes to unwind after classes are over,” dead-panned Ron, causing Harry to laugh.
They wandered around for another thirty minutes or so. The temperature in the dungeons was considerably lower than in the rest of the castle, and Harry was starting to get cold. He had just begun to wonder how much longer they would have to walk around when he heard footsteps coming down the corridor behind them.
They whirled around, Harry removing his wand. They could see a shadow in the torchlight coming towards them. Harry whispered for Ron to squeeze against the side of the corridor, in case it was the spy. The figure had just come to a bend in the hallway when it stopped. Harry held his breath.
“Potter, Weasley!”
It was the raspy old voice of Professor Grendelhall. Harry and Ron put their wands away and quickly walked up to her.
“Ah, there you are,” she said as they rounded the corner. “Merlin’s beard, lad! When I told you to go into the dungeons, I didn’t mean for you to descend all the way to Hades,” she cackled. Harry noticed there was a happy, satisfied expression on her face.
“Did you find him? Did you catch the spy?” he asked anxiously.
“Yep!” she replied happily. “Caught them, more like. And didn’t catch so much as tagged them. We don’t want them to know that we know, remember.”
“Who is it?” Harry asked anxiously. Grendelhall shook her head.
“Can’t tell you that, Potter, sorry. The most important thing now is to keep acting like we don’t know anything. If you knew who it was you’d act different around them, get ‘em suspicious. Don’t want that, do we? If we play our cards right the spy may lead us to a Death Eater or two, possibly that old hag Lestrange herself. Wouldn’t mind having a minute alone with her…”
Harry noticed Grendelhall’s unusually bright and alert eyes glint dangerously as she said this last part. Apparently she had a grunge against Lestrange as well.
“Anyways, good work you two, twenty points for Gryffindor. I’ve got to report to Dumbledore, so I’ll leave you to find your way out of here alone. Think you can make it?”
Harry nodded, trying desperately to think of a good reason for her to tell them who the spy was as he did so. Unfortunately, he couldn’t.
“Smashing. Very well then, see you at the next DA!” she said cheerfully. She whirled around, tripping over the hem of her robes, and made her way out of the dungeons, leaving Harry and Ron alone once more.
“I can’t believe that! She just uses us for bait then doesn’t bother telling us who the spies are? What’s she playing at?” said Ron incredulously.
“Well, I guess she does have a good point”it’s probably better that we don’t know. Besides, I have a pretty good idea who it is,” replied Harry.
“Really? Who?”
Harry sighed. “Use your imagination.”
They began making their way back out of the dungeons, taking their time, peering through random doors as they went. Harry realized that ever since their sixth-year had started, he and Ron hadn’t spent too much time together”he had always had the DA and Voldemort to worry about while Ron had Hermione and “prefect duties””and it was fun to be alone once again. They were in a long, seldom-traveled corridor just below Dungeon five when Ron motioned excitedly at him.
“Hey! Hey Harry. Come look at this…” he called from across the hall. He stood in an open doorway and gazed intently inside. Harry walked over next to him and looked into the room.
At first he didn’t know what he was supposed to be looking at. The room was full of various pieces of furniture and strange artifacts, and there were plenty of things that attracted his attention. For instance, the giant black wardrobe sitting against the wall in front of them, its drawers slowly moving back and forth on their own accord. Or an ancient-looking grand piano that was playing silently to itself, the keys moving up and down yet not making a noise. But as his eyes rested on a tall, slender, and somewhat familiar looking object in the back of the room, he knew it was what Ron was talking about. It was a large, oval shape”several feet taller than he or Ron, and had a sparkling, golden frame with words etched into it. Within the frame was a smooth, reflective surface.
“Is that...?” Ron gasped incredulously.
“I dunno, it kind of looks like…”
They entered the room and walked towards the object to get a better look. The room was full of cobwebs and dust, and more than once they had to climb over the various items that had been stored there to get to the back of the room.
Once they were within a few feet of the object, they stopped (careful not to step in front of it) and gazed at it in wonder.
“The Mirror of Erised,” said Harry.
The last time they had seen the mirror had been in their first year when Harry happened upon it quite by accident. Etched into the woodwork above the mirror were the words, ‘I show not your face but the desires of your heart.’ True to its word, the mirror showed whoever looked into it the thing they most desired. When he had first looked into it, Harry had seen his dead parents and his ancestors beaming back at him, smiling warmly. Ron had seen himself holding the Quidditch Cup, the House Cup, and the head-boy badge pinned onto his robes.
While it was a great feeling to see yourself enjoying the desire of your heart, the mirror was very dangerous. Dumbledore had warned him that the mirror didn’t have any truth to it, that many people had wasted their entire lives staring into it. It was with great effort that he forced himself to stop visiting the mirror at nighttime. Dumbledore soon moved the mirror in an effort to secure the Philosopher’s Stone and Harry had figured it was gone forever.
Yet here it was, standing in front of them.
“What’s it doing here? I always figured Dumbledore had gotten rid of it after everything that happened with Quirrel,” said Ron.
“I dunno. Maybe this is where he stores stuff that he may need later,” replied Harry quietly. There was a dangerous, forbidden feeling in the room”Dumbledore had warned him about the dangers of the mirror”but he felt drawn to it just the same.
“Remember the first time we found it?” said Ron. “We almost had a row about whose turn it was to look in it.”
“Yeah. I didn’t think we’d ever see it again.”
“Me neither.”
They were silent a few moments more, gazing into its smooth, blank surface. Harry couldn’t help but wonder what he would see if he looked into now. Apparently Ron was thinking the same thing.
“What if…what if we each took a turn looking in it again?” he asked in a tentative, almost ashamed voice.
“Er…I don’t know. It was hard enough to tear myself away from last time…”
“Yeah, you’re right,” said Ron in disappointment. He was silent for a few moments more, then turned suddenly to Harry.
“Wait…What if we took turns? One of us can look into the mirror while the other times him. After, say, one minute, the other person will tell them time’s up and make them stop. If we aren’t able to look away, the other person will make them! What d’you think?”
Harry knew it probably wasn’t a good idea “ he was only running the risk of getting hooked again “ but curiosity got the better of him.
“…Ok. Just one minute though, right?”
Ron nodded excitedly. “Yeah, just one minute. Then it’s the other person’s turn. Deal?”
“Deal. You go first.” Harry pulled back the sleeve of his robe so he could see his watch.
“Ok. Here I go.”
Ron glanced up at the mirror with something like excitement mixed with anxiety. Slowly he took a few steps around the side and positioned himself in front of it. He looked up. For the first two seconds, the expression on his face stayed the same. Then, all at once, his eyes grew extremely wide and his jaw fell open.
Chuckling to himself at the look on his friend’s face, Harry glanced down at his watch. Twenty seconds had passed. He looked back at Ron who still gazed, completely transfixed, into the mirror”a wistful, longing look on his face, like someone longing to capture a distant, familiar melody.
“What do you see?” Harry asked, not able to take it any longer.
Ron continued to stare into the mirror, ignoring Harry’s question. Harry looked at his watch, counted down the last fifteen seconds, then spoke again.
“Time’s up. No more looking.”
“Ok…” Ron replied absently, continuing to gaze into the mirror and not moving a muscle.
“TIME’S UP, Ron,” Harry said again, more forcefully.
“Yeah…ok…” replied Ron, not moving an inch.
Deciding he needed to do something drastic (and partly because he wanted his turn as well,) Harry stepped forward and gave Ron a giant shove. His arms flailed wildly as he fought to regain balance, then he glared angrily at Harry.
“What’d you do that for?”
“We said one minute, you prat. That was at least a minute and a half.”
“Oh…right,” Ron replied, still partially upset.
“So what’d you see?” Harry asked curiously.
Ron had just opened his mouth to reply when he suddenly closed it, looked searchingly at Harry for a moment, then said, “Er…same as last time, really. I was holding the Quidditch Cup. The House Cup. That’s all. Oh, and I was Head-Boy…”
He tried to look Harry in the eye as he said this, but wasn’t able to. Instead he looked at his feet and mumbled something incoherent. Whatever he had seen, he didn’t want to tell. Harry shrugged it off. He would get it out of him later.
“Ok, just one minute.” Harry handed Ron his watch. Ron quickly took it, apparently relieved that he wasn’t pursuing the subject. Harry took a deep breath and stepped in front of the mirror.
He had been pretty sure he knew what he would see when he looked into the mirror: himself standing victoriously over Voldemort’s dead body. It came as no small surprise, then, when he looked up to see something completely different. It was what he had seen the first time he looked into the mirror: his parents (their faces were a little more clearer this time) standing behind him with a hand on each of his shoulders, a warm smile on their faces, and a group of other, older people whom he didn’t know but gazed at him with the same warm, loving look as his parents.
But there were two people that hadn’t been there the last time. Harry felt a small tug at his heart.
The first was a tall, handsome man with sweeping black hair and a roguish smile. He stood just next to Harry’s father and looked happier than Harry had ever seen him while he had been living. Sirius.
He turned his attention to the other person, who was standing next to his mother with a bright, fun-loving smile on their face. It took a second to register who it was, but when it did his heart almost stopped.
How could it be…?
Harry watched, thunderstruck, as the person walked over to his reflection and slipped their hand into his. His hand closed reflexively. He couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Couldn’t believe that this person was in the mirror, looking back at him with a heart-numbing smile that made him feel light all over.
Though, as he stared into the mirror, he realized that he had expected to see this person all along. That something would have felt missing if they hadn’t been there…
“All right, time’s up!” Ron said suddenly.
Though he couldn’t believe it had already been a minute (he thought he deserved at least the minute and a half Ron had had), Harry quickly forced himself to look away. He still couldn’t believe what he had seen.
“What’d you see?” asked Ron, a large grin on his face. Harry realized the expression on his face had most likely been as telling as Ron’s had.
Harry’s mind raced to think up a lie. There was no way he was telling anyone what he had just seen. Especially Ron.
“Er…same as you,” he answered lamely. “I mean, I saw the same thing I did the first time. My family looking back at me.” He tried to look Ron in the eye as he said it, but found that he, too, had to look at his feet.
“Are you sure? You didn’t see anything else?” Ron probed, an accusatory tone to his voice that Harry found irritating. It wasn’t like Ron had told him what he had really seen.
“Yes. That’s all,” said Harry, somewhat indignant. Though he didn’t seem convinced, Ron shrugged and gave it up. He glanced again at Harry’s watch.
“Well, let’s get out of here. Filch’ll have our skins if we’re out much longer.”
Harry nodded silently and followed Ron out of the room. They walked back to Gryffindor Tower in silence, Harry still trying to process what he had just seen. He knew the mirror didn’t lie, that it showed exactly what you desired in your heart. So how had it taken him completely by surprise? How had he not expected what he had seen? Was his mind that detached from his heart?
Lily Potter was no longer the only girl with red hair he saw when he looked into the Mirror of Erised.