“Morning, Harry,” he said, stifling a yawn.
“Morning, Mr. Weasley,” Harry yawned back. “Anything interesting this morning?”
Mr. Weasley unrolled the paper and laid it out on the table. One quick glance at the front page headline made his eyes widen in shock.
“What is it?” Harry asked him, coming around behind Mr. Weasley’s shoulder. He peered over his shoulder and checked the headline as well.
Unspeakables from the Department of Mysteries have found a way to pass through the veil in the Death Room without dying themselves. “We’ve been searching for a way to pass through the veil and live for so long,” one Unspeakable commented. “This breakthrough is the first we’ve had in almost half a century when we developed the first Time-Turner.” When asked more about their breakthrough, another Unspeakable enlightened this reporter. “We discovered if the person passing through the veil is wearing or carrying something belonging to someone they love very much, they are allowed to spend one day beyond the veil before coming back,” she explained. “Essentially, people can visit those who have already gone through the veil to settle unfinished business if they carry something of someone worth living for.” Upon being pressed for more details, the Unspeakables refused anymore questions and then threatened this reporter with a one-way passage past the veil.
“Are you working today, Mr. Weasley?” Harry asked casually.
“No, but if you get dressed quickly, I’ll take you to the Department of Mysteries before Molly wakes up. It says at the bottom of the page that Unspeakables are escorting people down to the Death Room,” he sighed.
Harry ran upstairs and dressed at top speed, being careful not to wake Ron, and went back down. He stopped on a landing, part of the way down and eased the door open silently. He crept into Ginny’s room and found a picture she had of the two of them sitting under the beech tree by the lake, laying on her dresser. After picking it up, he backed out of her room noiselessly and shut the door. Once he was safely on the landing, he dug out the false Horcrux from his pocket and opened it. He removed the note and slid it in his pocket, and placed the picture inside the lid and shut the locket. He threw the chain around his neck and tucked it beneath his shirt, before continuing down to the kitchen.
“I’m ready,” Harry announced.
“Good,” Mr. Weasley said. “Now, we’ll just step outside and Apparate to the visitor’s entrance.
They exited the kitchen through the back door and stepped outside into the early morning sun. Harry took one more look at the place he had considered a second home after Hogwarts and thought he saw a face peek out of one of the windows upstairs. He looked at Mr. Weasley and nodded to show he was ready to go. They turned on the spot and disappeared.
They reappeared in the alley near the visitor’s entrance to the Ministry of Magic and piled into the phone booth. After they had punched in the code and were delivered to the Atrium, Harry got his wand checked quickly and entered one of the lifts, which jangled noisily all the way down. Unlike his last visit to the Ministry with Mr. Weasley, no memos or other Ministry workers got on, allowing them an uninterrupted trip downstairs.
“Level nine, Department of Mysteries,” the cool female voice announced as the golden grilles slid apart.
As Harry approached the entrance to the Department of Mysteries, a man who looked to be in his fifties was standing beside the door with a clipboard and a quill. He looked half-asleep and didn’t look up completely when they stopped in front of him.
“Names?” he inquired sleepily.
“I’m not going in,” Mr. Weasley said quickly. “Just escorting him here.”
“Name?” he grunted at Harry.
“Harry Potter,” he told the wizard.
The wizard looked at him interestedly before turning back to the clipboard.
“Relation to the person you’re visiting?” he asked.
“He was my godfather,” Harry answered.
“Name?” the Unspeakable asked.
“I already told you, it’s Har-” Harry began.
“Your godfather’s name,” he clarified.
“Sirius Black,” Harry replied promptly.
“Alright, follow me,” the wizard told him, before looking up at Mr. Weasley and saying, “Good bye, Arthur.”
“Good bye, Isaac,” Mr. Weasley said. Then he turned back to the lift as the door Harry and Isaac passed through swung shut behind them.
As soon as it was shut, the room began to spin. Instead of looking around in confusion and testing all the doors as Harry and his friends had done a year ago, Isaac called out, “the Death Room,” and a door to his immediate left opened. He went in, Harry following close behind.
“Do you have an item belonging to someone you love, someone worth living for?” Isaac queried.
“Yes,” Harry answered.
“You have one day with them, but that measures out to an hour or two by our calculations,” he informed Harry.
“Thanks.”
Harry walked down the stone steps, memories of his last venture here flooding through him in torrents. He lifted the fake Horcrux over his clothes as he stood in front of the veil. He clutched it in his hand and thought of the picture. He raised his free hand and fingered the veil for a few seconds. Then, he pulled it aside. A bright light blinded him as he stepped through the archway and beyond the veil. Then….
“Harry? Is- is that you?” an achingly familiar voice called out.
Harry’s eyes flew open. He was still in the Death Room, but he could see so many people now. One man in particular stood out. He was dashing down the steps and when he reached Harry, standing on the dais, he wrapped him in a giant hug. Upon his release, Harry noticed the changes that had overcome his godfather. All effects the dementors had had on him after twelve years in Azkaban, had been erased. His feature were young and handsome once more.
“Harry,” Sirius began, now looking concerned. “Are you…dead?”
“No,” Harry told him. “The Unspeakables found a way for people to visit those who went through the veil. It was in this morning’s Prophet. I can stay for the day, but apparently that’s only an hour or two here.”
“We have a lot to talk about, and so little time to do it in,” Sirius put in. “Anything big happen since I died?”
“Well, I’ve started looking for Voldemort’s Horcruxes, which make him immortal as long as he has one that is safe; Snape killed Dumbledore two months ago; and I left the Dursleys on my birthday, and now I’m staying at the Burrow,” Harry told him.
“Anything else?” Sirius questioned. “Anything you want to ask me?”
“Are my parents here?” Harry asked.
“I don’t know, I haven’t seen them here, so I’m guessing they moved on before I got here,” he answered.
Harry looked down at his feet, thinking of something else. Then, something came to him.
“I started going out with Ginny Weasley after the last match of the year, then I broke it off with her after Dumbledore’s funeral because I didn’t want Voldemort using her to get at me again,” Harry said. He studied Sirius’ face for a second before adding, “I did the right thing…right?”
Sirius looked at Harry, and contemplated what his godson had just told him.
“Voldemort could go after any of your friends, Harry,” Sirius explained wisely. “Like you said, he’s used Ginny before, even when you weren’t dating. Voldemort knows who you hang around with, and who you care for. He’s going to try to destroy you from the inside by taking those people away from you. But, I can’t make your decisions for you, you’re old enough to make up your own mind.”
Harry gripped at the locket and felt a slight warmth surge from it. Sirius looked at his hand curiously.
“What’s that you got there?” he asked, pointing to his godson’s hand clasped over the locket.
“The night Dumbledore died, he took me on a Horcrux hunt, but it turned out to be a fake,” Harry told his godfather, now extracting the old note from R.A.B. and giving it to Sirius. “I found this in the locket after Dumbledore’s body was thrown from the Astronomy tower when he was hit with the Killing Curse.”
Sirius was so absorbed by the note, Harry didn’t think he had heard the last part.
“Sirius, did you-“
“Yeah, I heard you,” Sirius interrupted. “I know who wrote this note, I’d know this handwriting anywhere.”
“Whose is it?” Harry asked him excitedly.
“You haven’t figured it out?” Sirius inquired. “You didn’t know my brother wrote this?”
“Regulus?” Harry asked, stunned. “He’s R.A.B.?”
“Yep, Regulus Alnath Black,” Sirius announced, nodding, handing the note back.
“Thanks so much, Sirius,” Harry said, putting it back in his pocket. He looked at his watch. “I think my hour here’s almost up.”
“It was nice to see you one more time, Harry,” he told him, squeezing his hand.
“It definitely was,” Harry agreed. “Shall I tell everyone you said hi?”
“Yeah, and could you tell Remus that my mirror is in Buckbeak’s old room?” he requested.
“I will,” he assured Sirius. “Any last minute advice or words of wisdom?”
“Yes,” he said. “Never doubt your intuition, always do what your heart says is right, and when you go to fight Voldemort for the last time, fight your hardest and remember everyone you ever loved.” Sirius shoved his hands in his robe pockets and then quickly dug something out of one of them.
“I want you to have this picture, it’s of all four Marauders from our sixth year, back when Peter was one of our best friends,” he added. “He wasn’t always the conniving rat he is now, he was a really good kid back then. Remember that, please, and good bye, Harry.”
“I will, and good bye, Sirius.”
Harry pocketed the picture and walked back toward the veil. Before he passed through, he turned and waved to his godfather one last time. Then, he pulled back the veil once more, and he was gone in flash of dazzling, white light.
Five minutes later, Harry was walking back into the Burrow. When he walked in, he was ambushed by Mrs. Weasley, Ron, Hermione, and Ginny, while Mr. Weasley gave him a little wave.
“Harry, where have you been? You’ve been gone for so long,” Mrs. Weasley cried, now hugging him tightly.
“Mrs. Weasley, I’m fine, really,” he assured her, as she relinquished her hold on him.
“Where did you go?” Ron asked, pushing past his mother. “When we all woke up, you had disappeared.”
“The Daily Prophet from this morning has the answer you’re looking for,” Harry replied. “I needed to have a talk with a close friend.”
The four of them found them found the paper still lying on the table and read the article. Harry noticed Mrs. Weasley grow pale and Mr. Weasley creep up the stairs. Hermione was clutching at Ron’s hand, and by the pained look on his face, her grip was tightening with each sentence she read. Ginny’s expression was unreadable, but he noticed her gaze travel over to him once in a while.
“You went beyond the veil, didn’t you?” Hermione queried in a hushed voice, now looking up at him. “You went to talk to Sirius, didn’t you Harry?”
Harry nodded slowly, “I had to, I just had to see him, talk to him one last time.”
“What did you take with you?” Ron inquired. “You know, the thing that belongs to someone worth living for?”
Harry saw Ron’s eyes dart over to Ginny before resting back on him. He lifted the locket off his neck and opened it, handing it to Ron. As Ron looked at the picture inside, Hermione leaned on his shoulder. When she saw the picture, she gave Harry a watery smile. Ginny looked at him suspiciously before sidling up to her brother’s other side. When she saw what Ron and Hermione saw, her eyes widened. Then, she slipped behind the two of them and her mother and passed through the back door. Through the window, Harry could see her walking in the garden and sit down next to a bush of deep, red roses.
“Did you get some good advice, Harry?” Ron asked, breaking the momentary silence as Mrs. Weasley walked upstairs.
“Yeah, and I think I’d better go act on some of it right now,” he answered.
Harry stepped by his two friends and out the back door, and began jogging over to the rose bush and Ginny. He was going to follow Sirius’ advice, and his heart was telling him that what he was going to do was right.
~*~
A/N: For anyone wondering why Sirius wasn’t surprised about Dumbledore’s death is because people could’ve passed through the veil between June and mid-August and relayed that news to everyone beyond the veil. Now that I’m done with my explanation, please review.