Dolores Umbridge 34 страница

“And my father went after the bastards that did it, ” said Aber- forth, “and attacked them. And they locked him up in Azkaban for it. He never said why he’d done it, because if the Ministry had known what Ariana had become, she’d have been locked up in St. Mungo’s for good. They’d have seen her as a serious threat to the International Statute of Secrecy, unbalanced like she was, with magic exploding out of her at moments when she couldn’t keep it in any longer.

“We had to keep her safe and quiet. We moved house, put it about

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she was ill, and my mother looked after her, and tried to keep her calm and happy.

“ I was her favorite, ” he said, and as he said it, a grubby schoolboy

seemed to look out through Aberforth’s wrinkles and tangled beard. “Not Albus, he was always up in his bedroom when he was home, reading his books and counting his prizes, keeping up with his correspondence with ‘the most notable magical names of the day, ’”

Aberforth sneered. “ He didn’t want to be bothered with her. She

liked me best. I could get her to eat when she wouldn’t do it for my mother, I could get her to calm down when she was in one of her rages, and when she was quiet, she used to help me feed the goats. “Then, when she was fourteen. . . See, I wasn’t there, ” said Ab- erforth. “If I’d been there, I could have calmed her down. She had one of her rages, and my mother wasn’t as young as she was, and. . . it was an accident. Ariana couldn’t control it. But my mother was killed. ”

Harry felt a horrible mixture of pity and repulsion; he did not want to hear any more, but Aberforth kept talking, and Harry won- dered how long it had been since he had spoken about this; whether, in fact, he had ever spoken about it.

“So that put paid to Albus’s trip round the world with little Doge. The pair of ’em came home for my mother’s funeral and then Doge went off on his own, and Albus settled down as head of the fam- ily. Ha! ”

Aberforth spat into the fire.

“I’d have looked after her, I told him so, I didn’t care about school, I’d have stayed home and done it. He told me I had to finish my

education and he’d take over from my mother. Bit of a comedown

for Mr. Brilliant, there’s no prizes for looking after your half-mad

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sister, stopping her blowing up the house every other day. But he did all right for a few weeks. . . till he came. ”

And now a positively dangerous look crept over Aberforth’s face.

“Grindelwald. And at last, my brother had an equal to talk to,

someone just as bright and talented as he was. And looking after

Ariana took a backseat then, while they were hatching all their plans

for a new Wizarding order, and looking for Hallows, and whatever

else it was they were so interested in. Grand plans for the benefit of all Wizardkind, and if one young girl got neglected, what did that

matter, when Albus was working for the greater good?

“But after a few weeks of it, I’d had enough, I had. It was nearly time for me to go back to Hogwarts, so I told ’em, both of ’em, face-to-face, like I am to you, now, ” and Aberforth looked down at Harry, and it took little imagination to see him as a teenager, wiry and angry, confronting his elder brother. “I told him, you’d better give it up now. You can’t move her, she’s in no fit state, you can’t take her with you, wherever it is you’re planning to go, when you’re making your clever speeches, trying to whip yourselves up a follow- ing. He didn’t like that, ” said Aberforth, and his eyes were briefly occluded by the firelight on the lenses of his glasses: They shone white and blind again. “Grindelwald didn’t like that at all. He got angry. He told me what a stupid little boy I was, trying to stand in

the way of him and my brilliant brother. . . . Didn’t I understand,

my poor sister wouldn’t have to be hidden once they’d changed the

world, and led the wizards out of hiding, and taught the Muggles their place?

“And there was an argument. . . and I pulled out my wand, and he pulled out his, and I had the Cruciatus Curse used on me by my brother’s best friend — and Albus was trying to stop him, and then

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all three of us were dueling, and the flashing lights and the bangs set her off, she couldn’t stand it —”

The color was draining from Aberforth’s face as though he had suffered a mortal wound.

“— and I think she wanted to help, but she didn’t really know what she was doing, and I don’t know which of us did it, it could have been any of us — and she was dead. ”

His voice broke on the last word and he dropped down into the nearest chair. Hermione’s face was wet with tears, and Ron was almost as pale as Aberforth. Harry felt nothing but revulsion: He wished he had not heard it, wished he could wash his mind clean of it.

“I’m so. . . I’m so sorry, ” Hermione whispered. “Gone, ” croaked Aberforth. “Gone forever. ”

He wiped his nose on his cuff and cleared his throat. “’Course, Grindelwald scarpered. He had a bit of a track record already, back in his own country, and he didn’t want Ariana set to his account too. And Albus was free, wasn’t he? Free of the burden of his sister, free to become the greatest wizard of the —”

“He was never free, ” said Harry.

“I beg your pardon? ” said Aberforth.

“Never, ” said Harry. “The night that your brother died, he drank a potion that drove him out of his mind. He started screaming, plead- ing with someone who wasn’t there. ‘Don’t hurt them, please. . . hurt me instead. ’”

Ron and Hermione were staring at Harry. He had never gone into details about what had happened on the island on the lake: The events that had taken place after he and Dumbledore had returned to Hogwarts had eclipsed it so thoroughly.

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“He thought he was back there with you and Grindelwald, I know he did, ” said Harry, remembering Dumbledore whimpering, pleading. “He thought he was watching Grindelwald hurting you and Ariana. . . . It was torture to him, if you’d seen him then, you wouldn’t say he was free. ”

Aberforth seemed lost in contemplation of his own knotted and veined hands. After a long pause he said, “How can you be sure, Potter, that my brother wasn’t more interested in the greater good than in you? How can you be sure you aren’t dispensable, just like my little sister? ”

A shard of ice seemed to pierce Harry’s heart.

“I don’t believe it. Dumbledore loved Harry, ” said Hermione. “Why didn’t he tell him to hide, then? ” shot back Aberforth. “Why didn’t he say to him, ‘Take care of yourself, here’s how to survive’? ”

“Because, ” said Harry before Hermione could answer, “sometimes

you’ve got to think about more than your own safety! Sometimes

you’ve got to think about the greater good! This is war! ”

“You’re seventeen, boy! ”

“I’m of age, and I’m going to keep fighting even if you’ve given up! ”

“Who says I’ve given up? ”

“‘The Order of the Phoenix is finished, ’” Harry repeated. “‘You- Know-Who’s won, it’s over, and anyone who’s pretending different’s kidding themselves. ’”

“I don’t say I like it, but it’s the truth! ”

“No, it isn’t, ” said Harry. “Your brother knew how to finish You- Know-Who and he passed the knowledge on to me. I’m going to

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keep going until I succeed — or I die. Don’t think I don’t know how this might end. I’ve known it for years. ”

He waited for Aberforth to jeer or to argue, but he did not. He merely scowled.

“We need to get into Hogwarts, ” said Harry again. “If you can’t help us, we’ll wait till daybreak, leave you in peace, and try to find

a way in ourselves. If you can help us — well, now would be a great

time to mention it. ”

Aberforth remained fixed in his chair, gazing at Harry with the eyes that were so extraordinarily like his brother’s. At last he cleared his throat, got to his feet, walked around the little table, and ap- proached the portrait of Ariana.

“You know what to do, ” he said.

She smiled, turned, and walked away, not as people in portraits usually did, out of the sides of their frames, but along what seemed to be a long tunnel painted behind her. They watched her slight figure retreating until finally she was swallowed by the darkness. “Er — what —? ” began Ron.

“There’s only one way in now, ” said Aberforth. “You must know they’ve got all the old secret passageways covered at both ends, de- mentors all around the boundary walls, regular patrols inside the school from what my sources tell me. The place has never been so heavily guarded. How you expect to do anything once you get inside it, with Snape in charge and the Carrows as his deputies. . . well, that’s your lookout, isn’t it? You say you’re prepared to die. ”

“But what. . . ? ” said Hermione, frowning at Ariana’s picture. A tiny white dot had reappeared at the end of the painted tunnel, and now Ariana was walking back toward them, growing bigger

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and bigger as she came. But there was somebody else with her now, someone taller than she was, who was limping along, looking ex- cited. His hair was longer than Harry had ever seen it: He appeared to have suffered several gashes to his face and his clothes were ripped and torn. Larger and larger the two figures grew, until only their heads and shoulders filled the portrait. Then the whole thing swung forward on the wall like a little door, and the entrance to a real tun- nel was revealed. And out of it, his hair overgrown, his face cut, his robes ripped, clambered the real Neville Longbottom, who gave a roar of delight, leapt down from the mantelpiece, and yelled, “I

knew you’d come! I knew it, Harry! ”

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THE LOST DIADEM

eville — what the — how —? ”

But Neville had spotted Ron and Hermione, and with

yells of delight was hugging them too. The longer Harry looked at Neville, the worse he appeared: One of his eyes was swollen yellow and purple, there were gouge marks on his face, and his general air of unkemptness suggested that he had been living rough. Nevertheless, his battered visage shone with happiness as he let go of Hermione and said again, “I knew you’d come! Kept telling Seamus it was a matter of time! ”

“Neville, what’s happened to you? ”

“What? This? ” Neville dismissed his injuries with a shake of the head. “This is nothing. Seamus is worse. You’ll see. Shall we get go- ing then? Oh, ” he turned to Aberforth, “Ab, there might be a couple more people on the way. ”

“Couple more? ” repeated Aberforth ominously. “What d’you

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mean, a couple more, Longbottom? There’s a curfew and a Cater- wauling Charm on the whole village! ”

“I know, that’s why they’ll be Apparating directly into the bar, ” said Neville. “Just send them down the passage when they get here, will you? Thanks a lot. ”

Neville held out his hand to Hermione and helped her to climb up onto the mantelpiece and into the tunnel; Ron followed, then Neville. Harry addressed Aberforth.

“I don’t know how to thank you. You’ve saved our lives twice. ” “Look after ’em, then, ” said Aberforth gruffly. “I might not be able to save ’em a third time. ”

Harry clambered up onto the mantelpiece and through the hole behind Ariana’s portrait. There were smooth stone steps on the other side: It looked as though the passageway had been there for years. Brass lamps hung from the walls and the earthy floor was worn and smooth; as they walked, their shadows rippled, fanlike, across the wall.

“How long’s this been here? ” Ron asked as they set off. “It isn’t on the Marauder’s Map, is it, Harry? I thought there were only seven passages in and out of school? ”

“They sealed off all of those before the start of the year, ” said Neville. “There’s no chance of getting through any of them now, not with curses over the entrances and Death Eaters and demen- tors waiting at the exits. ” He started walking backward, beaming, drinking them in. “Never mind that stuff. . . . Is it true? Did you break into Gringotts? Did you escape on a dragon? It’s everywhere, everyone’s talking about it, Terry Boot got beaten up by Carrow for yelling about it in the Great Hall at dinner! ”

“Yeah, it’s true, ” said Harry.

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Neville laughed gleefully.

“What did you do with the dragon? ”

“Released it into the wild, ” said Ron. “Hermione was all for keep- ing it as a pet —”

“Don’t exaggerate, Ron —”

“But what have you been doing? People have been saying you’ve just been on the run, Harry, but I don’t think so. I think you’ve been up to something. ”

“You’re right, ” said Harry, “but tell us about Hogwarts, Neville, we haven’t heard anything. ”

“It’s been. . . well, it’s not really like Hogwarts anymore, ” said Neville, the smile fading from his face as he spoke. “Do you know about the Carrows? ”

“Those two Death Eaters who teach here? ”

“They do more than teach, ” said Neville. “They’re in charge of all discipline. They like punishment, the Carrows. ”

“Like Umbridge? ”

“Nah, they make her look tame. The other teachers are all sup- posed to refer us to the Carrows if we do anything wrong. They don’t, though, if they can avoid it. You can tell they all hate them as much as we do.

“Amycus, the bloke, he teaches what used to be Defense Against the Dark Arts, except now it’s just the Dark Arts. We’re sup- posed to practice the Cruciatus Curse on people who’ve earned detentions —”

“ What? ”

Harry, Ron, and Hermione’s united voices echoed up and down the passage.

“Yeah, ” said Neville. “That’s how I got this one, ” he pointed at a

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particularly deep gash in his cheek, “I refused to do it. Some people are into it, though; Crabbe and Goyle love it. First time they’ve ever been top in anything, I expect.

“Alecto, Amycus’s sister, teaches Muggle Studies, which is com- pulsory for everyone. We’ve all got to listen to her explain how Muggles are like animals, stupid and dirty, and how they drove wizards into hiding by being vicious toward them, and how the natural order is being reestablished. I got this one, ” he indicated another slash to his face, “for asking her how much Muggle blood she and her brother have got. ”

“Blimey, Neville, ” said Ron, “there’s a time and a place for get- ting a smart mouth. ”

“You didn’t hear her, ” said Neville. “You wouldn’t have stood it either. The thing is, it helps when people stand up to them, it gives everyone hope. I used to notice that when you did it, Harry. ”

“But they’ve used you as a knife sharpener, ” said Ron, wincing slightly as they passed a lamp and Neville’s injuries were thrown into even greater relief.

Neville shrugged.

“Doesn’t matter. They don’t want to spill too much pure blood, so they’ll torture us a bit if we’re mouthy but they won’t actually kill us. ”

Harry did not know what was worse, the things that Neville was saying or the matter-of-fact tone in which he said them.

“The only people in real danger are the ones whose friends and relatives on the outside are giving trouble. They get taken hos-

tage. Old Xeno Lovegood was getting a bit too outspoken in The

Quibbler, so they dragged Luna off the train on the way back for

Christmas. ”

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“Neville, she’s all right, we’ve seen her —”

“Yeah, I know, she managed to get a message to me. ” From his pocket he pulled a golden coin, and Harry recognized it as one of the fake Galleons that Dumbledore’s Army had used to send one another messages.

“These have been great, ” said Neville, beaming at Hermione. “The Carrows never rumbled how we were communicating, it drove them mad. We used to sneak out at night and put graffiti on the

walls: Dumbledore’s Army, Still Recruiting, stuff like that. Snape

hated it. ”

“You used to? ” said Harry, who had noticed the past tense.

“Well, it got more difficult as time went on, ” said Neville. “We lost Luna at Christmas, and Ginny never came back after Easter, and the three of us were sort of the leaders. The Carrows seemed to know I was behind a lot of it, so they started coming down on me hard, and then Michael Corner went and got caught releasing a first-year they’d chained up, and they tortured him pretty badly. That scared people off. ”

“No kidding, ” muttered Ron, as the passage began to slope upward.

“Yeah, well, I couldn’t ask people to go through what Michael did, so we dropped those kinds of stunts. But we were still fighting, doing underground stuff, right up until a couple of weeks ago. That’s when they decided there was only one way to stop me, I suppose, and they went for Gran. ”

“They what? ” said Harry, Ron, and Hermione together.

“Yeah, ” said Neville, panting a little now, because the passage was climbing so steeply, “well, you can see their thinking. It had worked really well, kidnapping kids to force their relatives to behave,

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I s’pose it was only a matter of time before they did it the other way around. Thing was, ” he faced them, and Harry was astonished to see that he was grinning, “they bit off a bit more than they could chew with Gran. Little old witch living alone, they probably thought they didn’t need to send anyone particularly powerful. Anyway, ” Neville laughed, “Dawlish is still in St. Mungo’s and Gran’s on the run. She sent me a letter, ” he clapped a hand to the breast pocket of his robes, “telling me she was proud of me, that I’m my parents’ son, and to keep it up. ”

“Cool, ” said Ron.

“Yeah, ” said Neville happily. “Only thing was, once they realized they had no hold over me, they decided Hogwarts could do without me after all. I don’t know whether they were planning to kill me or send me to Azkaban; either way, I knew it was time to disappear. ” “But, ” said Ron, looking thoroughly confused, “aren’t — aren’t we heading straight back into Hogwarts? ”

“’Course, ” said Neville. “You’ll see. We’re here. ” They turned a corner and there ahead of them was the end of the passage. Another short flight of steps led to a door just like the one hidden behind Ariana’s portrait. Neville pushed it open and climbed through. As Harry followed, he heard Neville call out to unseen people:

“Look who it is! Didn’t I tell you? ”

As Harry emerged into the room beyond the passage, there were several screams and yells: “HARRY! ” “It’s Potter, it’s POTTER! ”

“Ron! ” “ Hermione! ”

He had a confused impression of colored hangings, of lamps and many faces. The next moment, he, Ron, and Hermione were en- gulfed, hugged, pounded on the back, their hair ruffled, their hands

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shaken, by what seemed to be more than twenty people: They might just have won a Quidditch final.

“Okay, okay, calm down! ” Neville called, and as the crowd backed away, Harry was able to take in their surroundings.

He did not recognize the room at all. It was enormous, and looked rather like the interior of a particularly sumptuous tree house, or perhaps a gigantic ship’s cabin. Multicolored hammocks were strung from the ceiling and from a balcony that ran around the dark wood-paneled and windowless walls, which were covered in bright tapestry hangings: Harry saw the gold Gryffindor lion, emblazoned on scarlet; the black badger of Hufflepuff, set against yellow; and the bronze eagle of Ravenclaw, on blue. The silver and green of Slytherin alone were absent. There were bulging bookcases, a few broomsticks propped against the walls, and in the corner, a large wooden-cased wireless.

“Where are we? ”

“Room of Requirement, of course! ” said Neville. “Surpassed it- self, hasn’t it? The Carrows were chasing me, and I knew I had just one chance for a hideout: I managed to get through the door and this is what I found! Well, it wasn’t exactly like this when I arrived, it was a load smaller, there was only one hammock and just Gryf- findor hangings. But it’s expanded as more and more of the D. A. have arrived. ”

“And the Carrows can’t get in? ” asked Harry, looking around for the door.

“No, ” said Seamus Finnigan, whom Harry had not recognized until he spoke: Seamus’s face was bruised and puffy. “It’s a proper hideout, as long as one of us stays in here, they can’t get at us, the

door won’t open. It’s all down to Neville. He really gets this room.

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You’ve got to ask it for exactly what you need — like, ‘I don’t want

any Carrow supporters to be able to get in’ — and it’ll do it for you! You’ve just got to make sure you close the loopholes! Neville’s the man! ”

“It’s quite straightforward, really, ” said Neville modestly. “I’d been in here about a day and a half, and getting really hungry, and wishing I could get something to eat, and that’s when the passage to the Hog’s Head opened up. I went through it and met Aberforth. He’s been providing us with food, because for some reason, that’s the one thing the room doesn’t really do. ”

“Yeah, well, food’s one of the five exceptions to Gamp’s Law of Elemental Transfiguration, ” said Ron to general astonishment. “So we’ve been hiding out here for nearly two weeks, ” said Sea- mus, “and it just makes more hammocks every time we need them, and it even sprouted a pretty good bathroom once girls started turning up —”

“— and thought they’d quite like to wash, yes, ” supplied Lav- ender Brown, whom Harry had not noticed until that point. Now that he looked around properly, he recognized many familiar faces. Both Patil twins were there, as were Terry Boot, Ernie Macmillan, Anthony Goldstein, and Michael Corner.

“Tell us what you’ve been up to, though, ” said Ernie. “There’ve been so many rumors, we’ve been trying to keep up with you on

Potterwatch. ” He pointed at the wireless. “You didn’t break into

Gringotts? ”

“They did! ” said Neville. “And the dragon’s true too! ” There was a smattering of applause and a few whoops; Ron took a bow.

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“What were you after? ” asked Seamus eagerly.

Before any of them could parry the question with one of their own, Harry felt a terrible, scorching pain in the lightning scar. As he turned his back hastily on the curious and delighted faces, the Room of Requirement vanished, and he was standing inside a ru- ined stone shack, and the rotting floorboards were ripped apart at his feet, a disinterred golden box lay open and empty beside the hole, and Voldemort’s scream of fury vibrated inside his head.

With an enormous effort he pulled out of Voldemort’s mind again, back to where he stood, swaying, in the Room of Require- ment, sweat pouring from his face and Ron holding him up.

“Are you all right, Harry? ” Neville was saying. “Want to sit down? I expect you’re tired, aren’t —? ”

“No, ” said Harry. He looked at Ron and Hermione, trying to tell them without words that Voldemort had just discovered the loss of one of the other Horcruxes. Time was running out fast: If Volde- mort chose to visit Hogwarts next, they would miss their chance. “We need to get going, ” he said, and their expressions told him that they understood.

“What are we going to do, then, Harry? ” asked Seamus. “What’s the plan? ”

“Plan? ” repeated Harry. He was exercising all his willpower to prevent himself succumbing again to Voldemort’s rage: His scar was still burning. “Well, there’s something we — Ron, Hermione, and I — need to do, and then we’ll get out of here. ”

Nobody was laughing or whooping anymore. Neville looked confused.

“What d’you mean, ‘get out of here’? ”

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“We haven’t come back to stay, ” said Harry, rubbing his scar, trying to soothe the pain. “There’s something important we need to do —”

“What is it? ”

“I — I can’t tell you. ”

There was a ripple of muttering at this: Neville’s brows contracted.

“Why can’t you tell us? It’s something to do with fighting You- Know-Who, right? ”

“Well, yeah —”

“Then we’ll help you. ”

The other members of Dumbledore’s Army were nodding, some enthusiastically, others solemnly. A couple of them rose from their chairs to demonstrate their willingness for immediate action.

“You don’t understand. ” Harry seemed to have said that a lot in the last few hours. “We — we can’t tell you. We’ve got to do it — alone. ”

“Why? ” asked Neville.

“Because. . . ” In his desperation to start looking for the miss- ing Horcrux, or at least to have a private discussion with Ron and Hermione about where they might commence their search, Harry found it difficult to gather his thoughts. His scar was still searing. “Dumbledore left the three of us a job, ” he said carefully, “and we weren’t supposed to tell — I mean, he wanted us to do it, just the three of us. ”

“We’re his army, ” said Neville. “Dumbledore’s Army. We were all in it together, we’ve been keeping it going while you three have been off on your own —”

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“It hasn’t exactly been a picnic, mate, ” said Ron. “I never said it had, but I don’t see why you can’t trust us. Every- one in this room’s been fighting and they’ve been driven in here because the Carrows were hunting them down. Everyone in here’s proven they’re loyal to Dumbledore — loyal to you. ”

“Look, ” Harry began, without knowing what he was going to say, but it did not matter: The tunnel door had just opened behind him.

“We got your message, Neville! Hello you three, I thought you must be here! ”

It was Luna and Dean. Seamus gave a great roar of delight and ran to hug his best friend.

“Hi, everyone! ” said Luna happily. “Oh, it’s great to be back! ” “Luna, ” said Harry distractedly, “what are you doing here? How did you —? ”

“I sent for her, ” said Neville, holding up the fake Galleon. “I promised her and Ginny that if you turned up I’d let them know. We all thought that if you came back, it would mean revolution. That we were going to overthrow Snape and the Carrows. ”

“Of course that’s what it means, ” said Luna brightly. “Isn’t it, Harry? We’re going to fight them out of Hogwarts? ”

“Listen, ” said Harry with a rising sense of panic, “I’m sorry, but that’s not what we came back for. There’s something we’ve got to do, and then —”

“You’re going to leave us in this mess? ” demanded Michael Corner.

“No! ” said Ron. “What we’re doing will benefit everyone in the end, it’s all about trying to get rid of You-Know-Who —”

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“Then let us help! ” said Neville angrily. “We want to be a part of it! ”

There was another noise behind them, and Harry turned. His heart seemed to fail: Ginny was now climbing through the hole in the wall, closely followed by Fred, George, and Lee Jordan. Ginny gave Harry a radiant smile: He had forgotten, or had never fully ap- preciated, how beautiful she was, but he had never been less pleased to see her.

“Aberforth’s getting a bit annoyed, ” said Fred, raising his hand in answer to several cries of greeting. “He wants a kip, and his bar’s turned into a railway station. ”