Harry remembered as soon as he awoke that today he would be near his parents again. Indeed, the knowledge that he was going to Godric’s Hollow had never really left him all night. Glancing out of the window, he saw that it was still very early; the cold raw light of dawn illuminated the dingy road, over which starved-looking cat wandered forlornly. Harry looked over at Ron. He was still deeply asleep, and so got dressed as silently as possible so as not to wake him.
At this early hour, Harry had not expected anyone to be up yet and so was surprised when he entered the kitchen to see Lupin sat alone at the table, drinking a cup of black coffee and thoughtfully studying the Daily Prophet. Lupin looked up as Harry came through the door, and smiled.
“You’re up early,” he said, rising and picking up the kettle. “Tea? Coffee?”
“Er”yeah, tea would be good,” said Harry, and Lupin tapped the kettle with his wand; it immediately started to boil.
“Thanks,” said Harry when Lupin handed him the teacup, and they sat down at the table together.
“There’s been a breakout from Azkaban,” said Lupin, gesturing at the front page of the newspaper.
“Has there?” said Harry, though he wasn’t too surprised; since the Dementors had left there had been several isolated escapes. But when he looked over at the paper, Harry choked on his tea. Even upside down, he had no problem recognising Lucius Malfoy, father of Draco Malfoy, Harry’s schoolfellow and enemy.
“Oh, great,” said Harry, scowling. “Now Malfoy’s got his daddy back and Voldemort one of his slimiest followers. Bet it won’t take him long to find someone to murder.”
Lupin sighed, but said nothing, and the two of them lapsed into silence, reading the article and sipping their drinks. At least, thought Harry, Voldemort might still be angry with Lucius for failing to deliver to him the prophecy he wanted, that predicted what was to become of him and Harry. The last Harry had heard, Voldemort had not been happy with Lucius at all.
Together they sat until the first real light of morning began shining through the kitchen window and Hermione and Ginny came downstairs, a tousle-haired, yawning Ron slouching behind her.
“When are we going?” Hermione asked Harry as she buttered herself some toast.
Harry started to answer when the kitchen door creaked opened again, and Neville wandered in looking as though he barely knew where he was. Last night’s sleep didn’t appear to have done him much good; if anything, the dark circles around his eyes appeared to have deepened.
“Hi, Neville,” said Harry, pulling him out a chair. “Toast?”
“I don’t mind, whatever you’ve got”are you going to your mum and dad’s house now?”
Harry was surprised that Neville had remembered last night’s conversation.
“Yeah, we are, why, do”d’you want to come?” he asked awkwardly. He didn’t see why Neville would be interested, but felt it would look unfriendly to deliberately not include him.
But Neville just murmured, “No, I’ll stay here ... Auntie Enid sent over some of Gran’s things they found in the ruins, I think I’ll have a look through them.” His voice was very quiet, and a few minutes later he wandered out of the kitchen and back upstairs, leaving his uneaten toast on his plate.
Hermione gazed sympathetically in the direction Neville had just left.
“He’ll be all right,” Ginny assured her. “He can’t go around like this forever.”
“He was lucky not to have been killed,” said Harry. “Lucky that someone raised the alarm before they could finish him off.”
“Well, maybe …” said Hermione thoughtfully, and she picked up her toast and began eating it mechanically, her eyes vague.
When Mrs Weasley came downstairs in a flowery purple dressing-gown ten minutes later, she looked surprised to see them all getting up, ready to leave.
“Are you going somewhere?” she asked them anxiously, as Hermione cleared the table of the dirty breakfast plates.
“Professor Lupin’s taking us to my mum and dad’s house,” said Harry, surreptitiously checking that his wand and the Invisibility Cloak he had inherited from his father were in his pocket.
“Oh”he is?” said Mrs Weasley, looking bewildered.
“We’ll be back by lunch,” said Ron.
“Oh,” she said again. “Well, take care … ”
“They’ll be fine,” Lupin assured her, smiling.
“We’re only going to Godric’s Hollow, Mum”don’t be so paranoid,” said Ginny as she gripped Harry’s arm, ready to be Apparated.
Harry only half heard Mrs Weasley snapping at Ginny for being cheeky; he was getting butterflies of excitement in his stomach again as he focused his mind on Godric’s Hollow. Soon he would see his parents’ last resting-place, and their old house!
“Let’s go,” muttered Lupin to them all, and together they turned on the spot.
Moments later, they had reached their destination.
Harry didn’t know what he had expected. Perhaps to feel a tingle of recognition, that he was finally coming home; but as he stared around, all he felt was an overwhelming sense of unfamiliarity. It was a pretty enough village from what he could see from where he had landed in the village-square, but it all felt new to him. He gazed around at the cluster of small, red-roofed houses with their little flower-filled front gardens and wondered where his parents had lived, and if they had been happy here.
“Um, Professor?” Harry heard Hermione whisper behind him. “I think that child saw us arrive.”
Harry followed the direction of her finger and saw the curious face of a boy, probably only five or six years old, peeking at them from his bedroom window.
Lupin glanced up at the boy for a second, then shrugged. “We can’t do anything. He’s probably a Muggle child, anyway. I highly doubt that his parents would believe him if he said he’d seen a group of people appear from thin air. Luckily, it’s still early,” he added, glancing round. “I don’t think anyone else saw us.”
“Can we go to the house, now?” Harry asked Lupin, who sighed.
“Don’t be surprised if there is nothing left, Harry,” he warned, as they began to walk in the direction he indicated.
They passed a row of small, cheerful-looking shops whose windows were mostly full of flower displays or had big jars of Muggle sweets against the glass. Harry noticed a tiny, insignificant little building on the end of the row which paraded rows of Chocolate Frogs, Fizzing Whizzbees, and several other wizarding sweets that Harry recognised instantly. He guessed that Muggles would not be able to see this particular sweet-shop.
Lupin led them up a little path through a bare field and Harry thought that they were aiming for the woods he saw beyond when Lupin came to a sudden stop.
“What’s the matter?” Hermione asked. “Why are we stopping?”
“This is it,” said Lupin sadly, gesturing around at the empty field. “This is where their house was.”
Hermione looked embarrassed and glanced over at Harry, who barely noticed.
“This is it?” Harry repeated, looking up at Lupin. “The house used to be here?”
Lupin nodded. Harry looked at the grass, the wild flowers, the blackbird pecking busily at a fallen apple. Nothing was here to even suggest James and Lily Potter had spent the few happy years of their marriage in this spot; nothing remained of the place where Harry had lived for the first year of his life.
“Did the Muggles have the ruins cleared away?” asked Hermione quietly.
“Probably,” said Lupin. Harry looked up and, seeing Lupin’s face, wished again that he had never asked him to come. But Lupin suddenly bent down to look at a few flowers tangled in the grass, a strange expression on his face.
“These aren’t wild flowers,” he said softly. “Your mother planted these when she first came here, Harry … and this, see”” He knelt beside a delicate white flower which stood tall still, bravely fighting the weeds threatening to choke it.
“It’s a lily … I remember James insisting she have them all over the garden. Lily said he was being stupid.” And he smiled.
“Ron, what are you doing?”
Hermione’s voice floated over to them. Harry, Ginny and Lupin all looked over to see Ron kneeling on the ground, tearing up great handfuls of grass. He looked up, a smudge of earth on his cheek.
“Here, see this,” he said, beckoning them over. “I just stood on it.”
They crowded round. In the space that he had cleared was a small, white stone slab, cracked down the centre by the weeds pushing up from below. Harry leant forward to read the faded, broken inscription.
Lily Potter
Here gave their lives
In the battle against Darkness
“They were standard Ministry markers,” said Lupin. “Laid wherever anyone died fighting Voldemort.”
Harry stared at the simple words on the worn stone, and felt a rush of gladness that the place where they had lived and died had not been completely forgotten. He brushed away the last of the dirt covering the stone with his fingers, and cleared away the weeds. As a last thought, he lifted the side of one stone and fitted it back into place. To his surprise, the crack suddenly disappeared; the stone was whole. It wasn’t until he saw Hermione tucking her wand back into his robes that he realised she had repaired it.
They sat there in silence for nearly quarter of an hour, Harry gazing around at the bare field and his mother’s flowers and trying to imagine what this place would have been like sixteen years ago. After a while, Lupin’s voice broke into Harry’s thoughts.
“Do you wish to see James and Lily’s graves?”
At these words, Harry looked up, and nodded quickly.
“Where’s the church?” he asked, standing up and looking around.
“The church?” said Lupin. “Oh”they weren’t buried in a Muggle churchyard, Harry. No, they are in the woods.”
“The woods?” said Harry in surprise, looking over at the friendly cluster of trees at the end of the field.
“Yes, the Ministry arranged for them to be buried in a secluded clearing; so that they wouldn’t be disturbed by curious Muggles,” said Lupin, as he motioned at them to follow. “The Ministry also laid quite a complex web of Muggle-Repelling Charms at the time of the funeral; it is possible they are still in effect.”
The path they took through the trees was possibly just an animal track, for it was narrow, winding and overgrown with straggling plants. Several times they had to stop and push back the branches which blocked the way, and Harry was just wondering how long exactly this was going to take when the trees began to thin and he glimpsed a sun-dappled clearing through the branches. With a jolt, Harry realised that this must be it. The dead twigs under his feet crackled as he eagerly stepped towards his parents’ final resting place.
Harry’s initial reaction was one of indignation. The place bore a distinct air of neglect: why, one of the tombstones had fallen right over so the inscription was hidden and the other (his mother’s) was crumbling at the base. Harry sank to his knees in front of the graves and ran his fingers over the weather-worn stone.
“Mum,” he whispered. “Dad … ” It was strange and terrible to think that his parents were so close to him, and yet so unreachable. Harry stared at the long inscription, the delicate letters still startlingly vivid against the old stone.
Loved by all who knew her
Mother of the Boy Who Lived
Wife of James Potter
Who died beside her as they fought against evil
May their souls rest together for all eternity
To Harry’s sudden horror he realised that his eyes were wet, and he surreptitiously wiped them on his sleeve, hoping the others hadn’t noticed. But it seemed they were tactfully staying back at the trees, giving him some privacy.
A few moments later, Harry felt rather than saw Lupin kneel down behind him, and they sat there for a while, neither speaking. On an impulse, Harry reached over, broke the stems of a cluster of wild purple flowers close by, and laid them gently on his mother’s grave. There was little he could do for his father’s gravestone, which lay grey and broken across the grass.
It was Hermione’s sudden, terrified scream that alerted Harry to the fact that they were not as alone as he had thought. There was a sudden crashing of leaves behind him, and another scream, this time from Ginny. Harry stood up so fast that he twisted his ankle, staggered, and fell over.
“Ginny!” he yelled, as he struggled to his feet, furious with himself. A flash of white light seared through the air straight at him and Harry only just managed to get his wand out in time to shout “Protego!” The white light crashed into the shield he had created and it shattered. Harry was knocked to the ground again with the rushing force of the curse, whatever it was, and was jerked to his feet by a terrified-looking Hermione.
“What’s happening? Where’s Ginny?” Harry shouted at her. Seven or eight hooded, cloaked figures were suddenly emerging from the woods on all sides, closing in on them. With another surge of fury, Harry heard the familiar malevolent cackle of Bellatrix Lestrange, Sirius’ killer.
“Harry, get out of here!”
Lupin was gesturing frantically at Harry to leave, while locked in a duel with a huge Death Eater. The duel only lasted a few seconds: the Death Eater fell and Lupin sent a stunner at the back of another that Ron was attempting to take on by himself. The jet of red light hit the man directly between the shoulder-blades.
Harry just managed to deflect a curse which came shooting at him, and Ron came charging over to them, panting and ducking a jet of white light that passed over his head.
“Harry, let’s go, we can’t fight them all!” he yelled. Harry barely heard him; he had just identified a slim woman with thick, shining dark hair firing off stunners in all directions.
“Pyrashio!” Harry bellowed, aiming his wand at her. The Pyratus Charm was more powerful than he had ever imagined. An explosion of fire thundered out of the tip, crashing in licking, rolling waves towards Bellatrix, who screamed and fell, the Shield Charm she uttered barely protecting her. The backlash of the spell nearly caused Harry to fall again, and he would have done but was stopped by a slender but strong arm that caught him from behind.
“Ginny!” said Harry, relief flooding him. But there was no time to think, no time to say anything else, for at that moment Harry’s insides froze as he saw a tall figure step out from between the trees across the clearing, a figure with a face that had haunted his dreams for months: a chalk-white face, with slit-like nostrils and blood-red eyes.
Lord Voldemort did not waste words. He simply pointed his wand directly at Harry and let loose the Killing Curse. Harry threw himself to one side as the jet of red light flashed towards him and heard Voldemort’s angry scream; the curse had hit a Death Eater. Still amazed that he was actually alive and unhurt, Harry staggered once more to his feet and stood facing Voldemort.
“HARRY, WHAT ARE YOU DOING!” Hermione screamed at him wildly, while stopping with the Inertius Charm a curse thrown at her by Bellatrix, who seemed to have recovered though her hair and face were terribly burnt.
Voldemort raised his wand again.
“Avada”” but the words of the Killing Curse never finished leaving his lips. Lupin was suddenly in front of Harry, battling Voldemort on his own. Harry was horrified at what Lupin was doing”he was going to get himself killed if he tried to take on Voldemort alone! But at that moment Harry was distracted. A curse fired by one of the Death Eaters shot past him and smashed into Lily Potter’s gravestone. Another Death Eater from across the clearing for some reason started screaming in anger as the gravestone splintered into a crumbled mess. Though the voice was familiar, Harry barely heard it through the sudden rushing noise that filled his ears. White-hot fury was roaring in Harry’s chest and he turned on the Death Eater who had fired the spell. The man laughed.
“Oh, it seems I missed my target,” the Death Eater taunted. Harry recognised the voice of Amycus, whom he had met the night of Dumbledore’s murder, and didn’t stop to think.
“Sectum sempra!” Harry shouted, slashing his wand at the hooded figure, who screamed and crashed to his knees on the grass, clutching his face with suddenly bloodied hands. Harry felt a grim sense of satisfaction that he had partially made up for the gravestone being broken, when Hermione screamed into his ear.
“Harry, if you don’t get out of here this minute, we’re all going to be killed!”
“What about Lupin?” Harry yelled back, casting a hasty shield charm to prevent a curse aimed at him from blowing his head off. Ginny was fighting someone beside Harry, and Lupin was still locked in combat with a furious Voldemort. Though he was, amazingly, still standing, Harry was sure that Lupin couldn’t hold off the Dark Lord for much longer.
“If you go, Professor Lupin will go!” said Hermione desperately. “What do you think he’s doing? He’s holding off Voldemort so you can get out of here!”
In all the noise and confusion Harry was suddenly aware of another familiar voice (Narcissa Malfoy’s?) laughing and saying silkily, almost lovingly: “Crucio!”
Ginny screamed in pain and crashed to the ground beside Harry, yelling and thrashing her limbs around wildly.
“Stupefy!” Ron and Harry bellowed together, pointing their wands at Narcissa, who crumpled onto the grass, unconscious.
“Ginny!” said Harry desperately, throwing himself down beside her. But she was all right: her eyes flickered open after a few seconds and she started to struggle to her feet. It was this that brought Harry to his senses. What was he doing? If he didn’t leave now someone was going to die, and it would be his fault. He knew that the others wouldn’t leave until he was safe; they were too loyal to desert him now. Even now Ron was fighting off Death Eaters, letting loose another Pyratius Charm and in doing so giving Harry time to decide.
It was one of the hardest things Harry had ever done in his life. But he glanced at Hermione, who had a large gash across her cheek and blood running down her face, Ginny who was white and trembling from the Cruciatus Curse, and Lupin who had just thrown himself bodily to one side to avoid a Killing Curse from Voldemort. And Harry took a deep breath, turned on the spot, and Disapparated.
Leaving the noise and blood of the battle behind, Harry reappeared in the kitchen of Grimmauld Place. It seemed curiously silent after the noise of the battle he had just been in. Within seconds the rest of them”Ron, Ginny clasping Hermione’s arm, and Lupin who had somehow survived the duel unhurt”had joined him with a series of popping sounds. Harry immediately felt worried; Ron and Ginny both looked furious.
“Took you long enough!” Ron hurled at Harry, who was taken aback.
“What on earth were you playing at?” said Ginny, who was still shaking, a tear sliding down her cheek. “Why didn’t you just leave straightaway?”
Harry felt a gnawing guilt begin to burn at his insides. “I was”I saw Bellatrix … and Amycus”and …” Harry heard his voice trail away. The reasons he had stayed for so long and risked the lives of his friends seemed pathetic now.
“Harry, we know you have reason to have a personal grudge against half of Voldemort’s followers,” said Hermione, who seemed to be trying to speak calmly. “But the important thing is to get rid of the Horcruxes and then”” she broke off suddenly in alarm, and glanced at Lupin, who raised his eyebrows. Harry looked daggers at Hermione, who covered her mouth with her fingertips.
Lupin looked from Harry to Hermione, one eyebrow raised, and sat down at the table. “Horcruxes, hm? I see … Now, do you wish me to know any more or shall we just pretend I never heard that?”
Harry didn’t know what to say. A while ago he had wanted Lupin to know, wanted his help. But now it seemed that more and more people were slowly hearing things about what he was doing: Mundungus Fletcher, possibly Rufus Scrimgeour, and soon Dumbledore’s brother Aberforth. Harry was becoming reluctant to let anyone else at all in on the secret.
Lupin sensed Harry’s indecision and smiled. “Harry, you don’t have to tell me anything. But if you ever need any help … well, I’m always here, you know.”
Harry nodded gratefully but before he could say anything they heard the sound of Mrs Weasley’s footsteps padding down the stairs. Lupin’s gaze suddenly flicked in alarm over them all”the blood, the gash on Hermione’s face, the dirt on their robes”and he stood up hastily.
“What have I been thinking!” he said, looking horrified, as with surprising speed he began healing their cuts and bruises, cleaning the blood, mud and grass off their clothes with a quick “Scourgify!” and motioning them all to sit down round the table. “Not a word to Molly, she’ll never let you out of the house again!” he added hurriedly.
They had all just managed to throw themselves into chairs and arrange their faces into suitably relaxed expressions when Mrs Weasley came through the door.
“Oh, you’re back!” she said, smiling. “How was it, Harry?” she added as she rummaged in the cupboard for some biscuits. Harry thought of his mother’s broken gravestone and the encounter with Lord Voldemort, and noticed Hermione concealing a nasty bruise on her hand with the sleeve of her robe.
“Er”it was”it was lovely,” he said, taking a Ginger Newt from the tin she offered him. Beside him, Ron coughed. Harry noticed Lupin shoot Ron a quick warning glance, and Ron shut up.
“Well, that’s good, Harry dear,” said Mrs Weasley. “Oh, I have a message for you from Tonks, Remus,” she added. Lupin looked over at her.
“She says that Harry might need your help, so she’ll get out of the way for a bit. She doesn’t want to harm Harry’s chances by taking up your time.”
Lupin looked surprised, then chuckled. “Tonks thinks I’ll be that useful, hm? Well, Harry, what do you think?”
Harry didn’t know what to say. If Tonks was going out of her way to allow Lupin to help him … and after all, Lupin had probably just saved all their lives by holding back Voldemort before he could kill Harry.
“I dunno,” said Harry awkwardly. “I mean, it would be great if you could help us, obviously, but”” The dangers were very great. Harry didn’t want to be the cause of Tonk’s becoming a widow, though he didn’t want to voice this aloud. Lupin seemed to guess what he was thinking, and sighed.
“Harry, I would have gone through anything with James if he had asked. I will help you if you wish it. Don’t worry for my safety; I am quite capable of looking after myself.” And he gave Harry a small smile. Harry hesitated, then nodded.
“Okay,” he said slowly. “If we need you ... ”
Lupin smiled, and rose. “Good good,” he said cheerfully, clapping his hands. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a little work to do for the Order. Call me if you need help with anything.” And he left the kitchen.
After a quick lunch, they went up to Harry and Ron’s bedroom. To their surprise, Neville was in the room, sitting on Harry’s bed and staring into space, listlessly twisting a silver Sickle between his fingers.
“Hi, Neville!” said Ron, plonking himself down on the bed.
“Hi, Ron. How was the trip?” Neville spoke as if only out of politeness.
“Uh, well it wasn’t too good, we got attacked by Death Eaters, but otherwise it was fine.” Neville didn’t look too disturbed by the news.
“Oh, right. But you weren’t hurt.” It was a statement, not a question, and they just nodded awkwardly. Harry didn’t know how to talk to Neville when he was like this, and he found himself thinking sadly of the cheerful, friendly round-faced boy he had known at Hogwarts. It was Voldemort who had done this, Harry thought bitterly. When was it all going to end?
Then Harry thought of something that might cheer Neville up.
“D’you want to have a DA session, Neville?” They needed to practise some more spells, one afternoon certainly wasn’t enough (though what they had learnt already had probably saved their lives that morning). Neville had loved the old defence class Harry had run in his fifth year, which they had named Dumbledore’s Army.
But Neville just shrugged. “If you like,” he said impassively.
So that afternoon they dragged out Hermione’s store of books and spent the hours happily jinxing each other and trying out some really weird spells. Not all were particularly useful, but in between the more serious stuff, they had fun watching each others’ faces turn pea-green or spurting bogey-coloured goo from their mouths.
That night Harry lay in bed, enjoying rereading Quidditch Through the Ages yet again and listening to Neville’s quiet snores in the room beside. And just as he got to one of his favourite parts, Hermione and Ginny walked in.
“I’ve written another letter,” said Hermione. Harry laid down the book slightly reluctantly and looked over at her.
“Who to?”
“Professor Dumbledore’s brother, Aberfoth,” said Hermione, handing it to him. “We need to find that locket as soon as possible.”
Harry took the letter and read it through quickly.
Dear Mr Dumbledore,
Sorry to bother you, but we’ve been told that you have an object which we’ve been looking for quite some time. I can’t be explicit here in case the owl is intercepted but it was something you bought from Mundungus Fletcher two years ago. Is there any chance we could come and have a talk about it? We also would like to ask you some questions about Professor Dumbledore, if you would be so kind as to help us.
Beneath Hermione and Ginny had signed their names and Hermione held out the quill for Harry. He signed the parchment thoughtfully. “What sort of questions did you want to ask Aberforth?” he said, handing the quill over to Ron, who scrawled his name untidily across the bottom of the letter.
“Oh, this and that,” said Hermione. “I don’t really know. But Professor Dumbledore might have told him some secrets, you never know.”
“Yeah, maybe,” agreed Harry, getting out of bed and going across to Hedwig’s cage. She blinked at him as he opened the door and she settled on his arm, claws digging into his flesh. Harry rolled up the parchment, sealed it with his wand and tied it to her leg.
“Take it to the Hog’s Head pub, okay?” he told her as he carried her over to the window. “To the barman, Aberforth.”
Hedwig hooted softly in understanding and glided out of the window, soaring over the rooftops of London like a silent white ghost until she disappeared into the inky darkness of the night.
“I hope he doesn’t mind us coming to see him,” said Hermione, sounding slightly nervous. “He didn’t look very friendly when he came here a few weeks ago.”
“Yeah, well we have to get the locket so we’ll be going over there whether he likes it or not,” shrugged Harry. “It’ll just be easier if he agrees.”
He swung himself back into bed, suddenly feeling tired. And when Hermione and Ginny had gone back to their own room and Ron extinguished their bedside lamp, Harry didn’t notice that the snoring noises which had been coming from Neville’s room had now ceased.