Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (61 page)

He nodded; here was a ready-made excuse not to talk to any of the others, which was precisely what he wanted, so when she opened the front door he hurried straight past the troll’s-leg umbrella stand, up the stairs and into his and Ron’s bedroom.

Here, he began to pace up and down, past the two beds and Phineas Nigellus’s empty picture frame, his brain teeming and seething with questions and ever more dreadful ideas.

How had he become a snake? Perhaps he was an Animagus … no, he couldn’t be, he would know … perhaps
Voldemort
was an Animagus … yes, thought Harry, that would fit, he
would
turn into a snake of course … and when he’s possessing me, then we both transform … that still doesn’t explain how I got to London and back to my bed in the space of about five minutes … but then Voldemort’s about the most powerful wizard in the world, apart from Dumbledore, it’s probably no problem at all to him to transport people like that.

And then, with a terrible stab of panic, he thought,
but this is insane – if Voldemort’s possessing me, I’m giving him a clear view into the Headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix right now! He’ll know who’s in the Order and where Sirius is … and I’ve heard loads of stuff I shouldn’t have, everything Sirius told me the first night I was here
…

There was only one thing for it: he would have to leave Grimmauld Place straightaway. He would spend Christmas at Hogwarts without the others, which would keep them safe over the holidays at least … but no, that wouldn’t do, there were still plenty of people at Hogwarts to maim and injure. What if it was Seamus, Dean or Neville next time? He stopped his pacing and stood staring at Phineas Nigellus’s empty frame. A leaden sensation was settling in the pit of his stomach. He had no alternative: he was going to have to return to Privet Drive, cut himself off from other wizards entirely.

Well, if he had to do it, he thought, there was no point hanging around. Trying with all his might not to think how the Dursleys were going to react when they found him on their doorstep six months earlier than they had expected, he strode over to his trunk, slammed the lid shut and locked it, then glanced around automatically for Hedwig before remembering that she was still at Hogwarts – well, her cage would be one less thing to carry – he seized one end of his trunk and had dragged it halfway towards the door when a snide voice said, ‘Running away, are we?’

He looked around. Phineas Nigellus had appeared on the canvas of his portrait and was leaning against the frame, watching Harry with an amused expression on his face.

‘Not running away, no,’ said Harry shortly, dragging his trunk a few more feet across the room.

‘I thought,’ said Phineas Nigellus, stroking his pointed beard, ‘that to belong in Gryffindor house you were supposed to be
brave
? It looks to me as though you would have been better off in my own house. We Slytherins are brave, yes, but not stupid. For instance, given the choice, we will always choose to save our own necks.’

‘It’s not my own neck I’m saving,’ said Harry tersely, tugging the trunk over a patch of particularly uneven, moth-eaten carpet right in front of the door.

‘Oh, I
see
,’ said Phineas Nigellus, still stroking his beard, ‘this is no cowardly flight – you are being
noble
.’

Harry ignored him. His hand was on the doorknob when Phineas Nigellus said lazily, ‘I have a message for you from Albus Dumbledore.’

Harry spun round.

‘What is it?’

‘“Stay where you are.”’

‘I haven’t moved!’ said Harry, his hand still upon the doorknob. ‘So what’s the message?’

‘I have just given it to you, dolt,’ said Phineas Nigellus smoothly. ‘Dumbledore says, “
Stay where you are
.”’

‘Why?’ said Harry eagerly, dropping the end of his trunk. ‘Why does he want me to stay? What else did he say?’

‘Nothing whatsoever,’ said Phineas Nigellus, raising a thin black eyebrow as though he found Harry impertinent.

Harry’s temper rose to the surface like a snake rearing from long grass. He was exhausted, he was confused beyond measure, he had experienced terror, relief, then terror again in the last twelve hours, and still Dumbledore did not want to talk to him!

‘So that’s it, is it?’ he said loudly. ‘“
Stay where you are
”? That’s all anyone could tell me after I got attacked by those Dementors, too! Just stay put while the grown-ups sort it out, Harry! We won’t bother telling you anything, though, because your tiny little brain might not be able to cope with it!’

‘You know,’ said Phineas Nigellus, even more loudly than Harry, ‘this is precisely why I
loathed
being a teacher! Young people are so infernally convinced that they are absolutely right about everything. Has it not occurred to you, my poor puffed-up popinjay, that there might be an excellent reason why the Headmaster of Hogwarts is not confiding every tiny detail of his plans to you? Have you never paused, while feeling hard-done-by, to note that following Dumbledore’s orders has never yet led you into harm? No. No, like all young people, you are quite sure that you alone feel and think, you alone recognise danger, you alone are the only one clever enough to realise what the Dark Lord may be planning –’

‘He
is
planning something to do with me, then?’ said Harry swiftly.

‘Did I say that?’ said Phineas Nigellus, idly examining his silk gloves. ‘Now, if you will excuse me, I have better things to do than listen to adolescent agonising … good-day to you.’

And he strolled to the edge of his frame and out of sight.

‘Fine, go then!’ Harry bellowed at the empty frame
.
‘And tell Dumbledore thanks for nothing!’

The empty canvas remained silent. Fuming, Harry dragged his trunk back to the foot of his bed, then threw himself face down on the moth-eaten covers, his eyes shut, his body heavy and aching.

He felt as though he had journeyed for miles and miles … it seemed impossible that less than twenty-four hours ago Cho Chang had been approaching him under the mistletoe … he was so tired … he was scared to sleep … yet he did not know how long he could fight it … Dumbledore had told him to stay … that must mean he was allowed to sleep … but he was scared … what if it happened again?

He was sinking into shadows …

It was as though a film in his head had been waiting to start. He was walking down a deserted corridor towards a plain black door, past rough stone walls, torches, and an open doorway on to a flight of stone steps leading downstairs on the left …

He reached the black door but could not open it … he stood gazing at it, desperate for entry … something he wanted with all his heart lay beyond … a prize beyond his dreams … if only his scar would stop prickling … then he would be able to think more clearly …

‘Harry,’ said Ron’s voice, from far, far away, ‘Mum says dinner’s ready, but she’ll save you something if you want to stay in bed.’

Harry opened his eyes, but Ron had already left the room.

He doesn’t want to be on his own with me
, Harry thought.
Not after what he heard Moody say.

He supposed none of them would want him there any more, now that they knew what was inside him.

He would not go down to dinner; he would not inflict his company on them. He turned over on to his other side and, after a while, dropped back off to sleep. He woke much later, in the early hours of the morning, his insides aching with hunger and Ron snoring in the next bed. Squinting around the room, he saw the dark outline of Phineas Nigellus standing again in his portrait and it occurred to Harry that Dumbledore had probably sent Phineas Nigellus to watch over him, in case he attacked somebody else.

The feeling of being unclean intensified. He half-wished he had not obeyed Dumbledore … if this was how life was going to be for him in Grimmauld Place from now on, maybe he would be better off in Privet Drive after all.

*

Everybody else spent the following morning putting up Christmas decorations. Harry could not remember Sirius ever being in such a good mood; he was actually singing carols, apparently delighted that he was to have company over Christmas. Harry could hear his voice echoing up through the floor in the cold drawing room where he was sitting alone, watching the sky growing whiter outside the windows, threatening snow, all the time feeling a savage pleasure that he was giving the others the opportunity to keep talking about him, as they were bound to be doing. When he heard Mrs Weasley calling his name softly up the stairs around lunchtime, he retreated further upstairs and ignored her.

Around six o’clock in the evening the doorbell rang and Mrs Black started screaming again. Assuming that Mundungus or some other Order member had come to call, Harry merely settled himself more comfortably against the wall of Buckbeak’s room where he was hiding, trying to ignore how hungry he felt as he fed dead rats to the Hippogriff. It came as a slight shock when somebody hammered hard on the door a few minutes later.

‘I know you’re in there,’ said Hermione’s voice. ‘Will you please come out? I want to talk to you.’

‘What are
you
doing here?’ Harry asked her, pulling open the door as Buckbeak resumed his scratching at the straw-strewn floor for any fragments of rat he may have dropped. ‘I thought you were skiing with your mum and dad?’

‘Well, to tell the truth, skiing’s not
really
my thing,’ said Hermione. ‘So, I’ve come here for Christmas.’ There was snow in her hair and her face was pink with cold. ‘But don’t tell Ron. I told him skiing’s really good because he kept laughing so much. Mum and Dad are a bit disappointed, but I’ve told them that everyone who is serious about the exams is staying at Hogwarts to study. They want me to do well, they’ll understand. Anyway,’ she said briskly, ‘let’s go to your bedroom, Ron’s mum has lit a fire in there and she’s sent up sandwiches.’

Harry followed her back to the second floor. When he entered the bedroom, he was rather surprised to see both Ron and Ginny waiting for them, sitting on Ron’s bed.

‘I came on the Knight Bus,’ said Hermione airily, pulling off her jacket before Harry had time to speak. ‘Dumbledore told me what had happened yesterday morning, but I had to wait for term to end officially before setting off. Umbridge is already livid that you lot disappeared right under her nose, even though Dumbledore told her Mr Weasley was in St Mungo’s and he’d given you all permission to visit. So …’

She sat down next to Ginny, and the two girls and Ron all looked up at Harry.

‘How’re you feeling?’ asked Hermione.

‘Fine,’ said Harry stiffly.

‘Oh, don’t lie, Harry,’ she said impatiently. ‘Ron and Ginny say you’ve been hiding from everyone since you got back from St Mungo’s.’

‘They do, do they?’ said Harry, glaring at Ron and Ginny. Ron looked down at his feet but Ginny seemed quite unabashed.

‘Well, you have!’ she said. ‘And you won’t look at any of us!’

‘It’s you lot who won’t look at me!’ said Harry angrily.

‘Maybe you’re taking it in turns to look, and keep missing each other,’ suggested Hermione, the corners of her mouth twitching.

‘Very funny,’ snapped Harry, turning away.

‘Oh, stop feeling all misunderstood,’ said Hermione sharply. ‘Look, the others have told me what you overheard last night on the Extendable Ears –’

‘Yeah?’ growled Harry, his hands deep in his pockets as he watched the snow now falling thickly outside. ‘All been talking about me, have you? Well, I’m getting used to it.’

‘We wanted to talk
to you
, Harry,’ said Ginny, ‘but as you’ve been hiding ever since we got back –’

‘I didn’t want anyone to talk to me,’ said Harry, who was feeling more and more nettled.

‘Well, that was a bit stupid of you,’ said Ginny angrily, ‘seeing as you don’t know anyone but me who’s been possessed by You-Know-Who, and I can tell you how it feels.’

Harry remained quite still as the impact of these words hit him. Then he turned on the spot to face her.

‘I forgot,’ he said.

‘Lucky you,’ said Ginny coolly.

‘I’m sorry,’ Harry said, and he meant it. ‘So … so, do you think I’m being possessed, then?’

‘Well, can you remember everything you’ve been doing?’ Ginny asked. ‘Are there big blank periods where you don’t know what you’ve been up to?’

Harry racked his brains.

‘No,’ he said.

‘Then You-Know-Who hasn’t ever possessed you,’ said Ginny simply. ‘When he did it to me, I couldn’t remember what I’d been doing for hours at a time. I’d find myself somewhere and not know how I got there.’

Harry hardly dared believe her, yet his heart was lightening almost in spite of himself.

‘That dream I had about your dad and the snake, though –’

‘Harry, you’ve had these dreams before,’ Hermione said. ‘You had flashes of what Voldemort was up to last year.’

‘This was different,’ said Harry, shaking his head. ‘I was
inside
that snake. It was like I
was
the snake … what if Voldemort somehow transported me to London –?’

‘One day,’ said Hermione, sounding thoroughly exasperated, ‘you’ll read
Hogwarts: A History
, and perhaps it will remind you that you can’t Apparate or Disapparate inside Hogwarts. Even Voldemort couldn’t just make you fly out of your dormitory, Harry.’

‘You didn’t leave your bed, mate,’ said Ron. ‘I saw you thrashing around in your sleep for at least a minute before we could wake you up.’

Harry started pacing up and down the room again, thinking. What they were all saying was not only comforting, it made sense … without really thinking, he took a sandwich from the plate on the bed and crammed it hungrily into his mouth.

I’m not the weapon after all
, thought Harry. His heart swelled with happiness and relief, and he felt like joining in as they heard

Sirius tramping past their door towards Buckbeak’s room, singing ‘God Rest Ye, Merry Hippogriffs’ at the top of his voice.

*

How could he have dreamed of returning to Privet Drive for Christmas? Sirius’s delight at having the house full again, and especially at having Harry back, was infectious. He was no longer their sullen host of the summer; now he seemed determined that everyone should enjoy themselves as much, if not more than they would have done at Hogwarts, and he worked tirelessly in the run-up to Christmas Day, cleaning and decorating with their help, so that by the time they all went to bed on Christmas Eve the house was barely recognisable. The tarnished chandeliers were no longer hung with cobwebs but with garlands of holly and gold and silver streamers; magical snow glittered in heaps over the threadbare carpets; a great Christmas tree, obtained by Mundungus and decorated with live fairies, blocked Sirius’s family tree from view, and even the stuffed elf-heads on the hall wall wore Father Christmas hats and beards.