Dolores Umbridge 39 страница

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moved in silence, Harry’s gaze fixed upon the swinging beam of the wand held in his fist.

At last the tunnel began to slope upward and Harry saw a sliver of light ahead. Hermione tugged at his ankle.

“The Cloak! ” she whispered. “Put the Cloak on! ” He groped behind him and she forced the bundle of slippery cloth into his free hand. With difficulty he dragged it over himself,

murmured, “Nox, ” extinguishing his wandlight, and continued on

his hands and knees, as silently as possible, all his senses straining, expecting every second to be discovered, to hear a cold clear voice, see a flash of green light.

And then he heard voices coming from the room directly ahead of them, only slightly muffled by the fact that the opening at the end of the tunnel had been blocked up by what looked like an old crate. Hardly daring to breathe, Harry edged right up to the opening and peered through a tiny gap left between crate and wall.

The room beyond was dimly lit, but he could see Nagini, swirling and coiling like a serpent underwater, safe in her enchanted, starry sphere, which floated unsupported in midair. He could see the edge of a table, and a long-fingered white hand toying with a wand. Then Snape spoke, and Harry’s heart lurched: Snape was inches away from where he crouched, hidden.

“. . . my Lord, their resistance is crumbling —” “— and it is doing so without your help, ” said Voldemort in his high, clear voice. “Skilled wizard though you are, Severus, I do not think you will make much difference now. We are almost there. . . almost. ”

“Let me find the boy. Let me bring you Potter. I know I can find him, my Lord. Please. ”

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Snape strode past the gap, and Harry drew back a little, keeping his eyes fixed upon Nagini, wondering whether there was any spell that might penetrate the protection surrounding her, but he could not think of anything. One failed attempt, and he would give away his position. . . .

Voldemort stood up. Harry could see him now, see the red eyes, the flattened, serpentine face, the pallor of him gleaming slightly in the semidarkness.

“I have a problem, Severus, ” said Voldemort softly. “My Lord? ” said Snape.

Voldemort raised the Elder Wand, holding it as delicately and precisely as a conductor’s baton.

“Why doesn’t it work for me, Severus? ”

In the silence Harry imagined he could hear the snake hissing slightly as it coiled and uncoiled — or was it Voldemort’s sibilant sigh lingering on the air?

“My — my Lord? ” said Snape blankly. “I do not understand. You — you have performed extraordinary magic with that wand. ” “No, ” said Voldemort. “I have performed my usual magic. I am extraordinary, but this wand. . . no. It has not revealed the wonders it has promised. I feel no difference between this wand and the one I procured from Ollivander all those years ago. ”

Voldemort’s tone was musing, calm, but Harry’s scar had begun to throb and pulse: Pain was building in his forehead, and he could feel that controlled sense of fury building inside Voldemort.

“No difference, ” said Voldemort again.

Snape did not speak. Harry could not see his face: He wondered whether Snape sensed danger, was trying to find the right words to reassure his master.

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Voldemort started to move around the room: Harry lost sight of him for seconds as he prowled, speaking in that same measured voice, while the pain and fury mounted in Harry.

“I have thought long and hard, Severus. . . . Do you know why I have called you back from the battle? ”

And for a moment Harry saw Snape’s profile: His eyes were fixed upon the coiling snake in its enchanted cage.

“No, my Lord, but I beg you will let me return. Let me find Potter. ”

“You sound like Lucius. Neither of you understands Potter as I do. He does not need finding. Potter will come to me. I know his weakness, you see, his one great flaw. He will hate watching the others struck down around him, knowing that it is for him that it happens. He will want to stop it at any cost. He will come. ”

“But my Lord, he might be killed accidentally by one other than yourself —”

“My instructions to my Death Eaters have been perfectly clear. Capture Potter. Kill his friends — the more, the better — but do not kill him.

“But it is of you that I wished to speak, Severus, not Harry Potter. You have been very valuable to me. Very valuable. ”

“My Lord knows I seek only to serve him. But — let me go and find the boy, my Lord. Let me bring him to you. I know I can —”

“I have told you, no! ” said Voldemort, and Harry caught the glint of red in his eyes as he turned again, and the swishing of his cloak was like the slithering of a snake, and he felt Voldemort’s impatience in his burning scar. “My concern at the moment, Severus, is what will happen when I finally meet the boy! ”

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“My Lord, there can be no question, surely —? ”

“— but there is a question, Severus. There is. ”

Voldemort halted, and Harry could see him plainly again as he slid the Elder Wand through his white fingers, staring at Snape. “Why did both the wands I have used fail when directed at Harry Potter? ”

“I — I cannot answer that, my Lord. ”

“Can’t you? ”

The stab of rage felt like a spike driven through Harry’s head: He forced his own fist into his mouth to stop himself from crying out in pain. He closed his eyes, and suddenly he was Voldemort, look- ing into Snape’s pale face.

“My wand of yew did everything of which I asked it, Severus, except to kill Harry Potter. Twice it failed. Ollivander told me under torture of the twin cores, told me to take another’s wand. I did so, but Lucius’s wand shattered upon meeting Potter’s. ”

“I — I have no explanation, my Lord. ”

Snape was not looking at Voldemort now. His dark eyes were still fixed upon the coiling serpent in its protective sphere.

“I sought a third wand, Severus. The Elder Wand, the Wand of Destiny, the Deathstick. I took it from its previous master. I took it from the grave of Albus Dumbledore. ”

And now Snape looked at Voldemort, and Snape’s face was like a death mask. It was marble white and so still that when he spoke, it was a shock to see that anyone lived behind the blank eyes.

“My Lord — let me go to the boy —”

“All this long night, when I am on the brink of victory, I have sat here, ” said Voldemort, his voice barely louder than a whisper, “wondering, wondering, why the Elder Wand refuses to be what it

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ought to be, refuses to perform as legend says it must perform for its rightful owner. . . and I think I have the answer. ”

Snape did not speak.

“Perhaps you already know it? You are a clever man, after all, Severus. You have been a good and faithful servant, and I regret what must happen. ”

“My Lord —”

“The Elder Wand cannot serve me properly, Severus, because I am not its true master. The Elder Wand belongs to the wizard who killed its last owner. You killed Albus Dumbledore. While you live, Severus, the Elder Wand cannot be truly mine. ”

“My Lord! ” Snape protested, raising his wand. “It cannot be any other way, ” said Voldemort. “I must master the wand, Severus. Master the wand, and I master Potter at last. ” And Voldemort swiped the air with the Elder Wand. It did noth- ing to Snape, who for a split second seemed to think he had been reprieved: But then Voldemort’s intention became clear. The snake’s cage was rolling through the air, and before Snape could do any- thing more than yell, it had encased him, head and shoulders, and Voldemort spoke in Parseltongue.

“ Kill. ”

There was a terrible scream. Harry saw Snape’s face losing the little color it had left; it whitened as his black eyes widened, as the snake’s fangs pierced his neck, as he failed to push the enchanted cage off himself, as his knees gave way and he fell to the floor.

“I regret it, ” said Voldemort coldly.

He turned away; there was no sadness in him, no remorse. It was time to leave this shack and take charge, with a wand that would

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now do his full bidding. He pointed it at the starry cage holding the snake, which drifted upward, off Snape, who fell sideways onto the floor, blood gushing from the wounds in his neck. Voldemort swept from the room without a backward glance, and the great serpent floated after him in its huge protective sphere.

Back in the tunnel and his own mind, Harry opened his eyes: He had drawn blood biting down on his knuckles in the effort not to shout out. Now he was looking through the tiny crack between crate and wall, watching a foot in a black boot trembling on the floor. “Harry! ” breathed Hermione behind him, but he had already pointed his wand at the crate blocking his view. It lifted an inch into the air and drifted sideways silently. As quietly as he could, he pulled himself up into the room.

He did not know why he was doing it, why he was approaching the dying man: He did not know what he felt as he saw Snape’s white face, and the fingers trying to staunch the bloody wound at his neck. Harry took off the Invisibility Cloak and looked down upon the man he hated, whose widening black eyes found Harry as he tried to speak. Harry bent over him, and Snape seized the front of his robes and pulled him close.

A terrible rasping, gurgling noise issued from Snape’s throat. “Take. . . it. . . . Take. . . it. . . . ”

Something more than blood was leaking from Snape. Silvery blue, neither gas nor liquid, it gushed from his mouth and his ears and his eyes, and Harry knew what it was, but did not know what to do —

A flask, conjured from thin air, was thrust into his shaking hands by Hermione. Harry lifted the silvery substance into it with his

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wand. When the flask was full to the brim, and Snape looked as though there was no blood left in him, his grip on Harry’s robes slackened.

“Look. . . at. . . me. . . . ” he whispered.

The green eyes found the black, but after a second, something in the depths of the dark pair seemed to vanish, leaving them fixed, blank, and empty. The hand holding Harry thudded to the floor, and Snape moved no more.

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arry remained kneeling at Snape’s side, simply staring

down at him, until quite suddenly a high, cold voice spoke

so close to them that Harry jumped to his feet, the flask gripped tightly in his hands, thinking that Voldemort had reentered the room. Voldemort’s voice reverberated from the walls and floor, and Harry realized that he was talking to Hogwarts and to all the sur- rounding area, that the residents of Hogsmeade and all those still fighting in the castle would hear him as clearly as if he stood beside them, his breath on the back of their necks, a deathblow away. “You have fought, ” said the high, cold voice, “valiantly. Lord Vol- demort knows how to value bravery.

“Yet you have sustained heavy losses. If you continue to resist me, you will all die, one by one. I do not wish this to happen. Every drop of magical blood spilled is a loss and a waste.

“Lord Voldemort is merciful. I command my forces to retreat immediately.

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“You have one hour. Dispose of your dead with dignity. Treat your injured.

“I speak now, Harry Potter, directly to you. You have permitted your friends to die for you rather than face me yourself. I shall wait for one hour in the Forbidden Forest. If, at the end of that hour, you have not come to me, have not given yourself up, then battle recommences. This time, I shall enter the fray myself, Harry Potter, and I shall find you, and I shall punish every last man, woman, and child who has tried to conceal you from me. One hour. ”

Both Ron and Hermione shook their heads frantically, looking at Harry.

“Don’t listen to him, ” said Ron.

“It’ll be all right, ” said Hermione wildly. “Let’s — let’s get back to the castle, if he’s gone to the forest we’ll need to think of a new plan —”

She glanced at Snape’s body, then hurried back to the tunnel en- trance. Ron followed her. Harry gathered up the Invisibility Cloak, then looked down at Snape. He did not know what to feel, except shock at the way Snape had been killed, and the reason for which it had been done. . . .

They crawled back through the tunnel, none of them talking, and Harry wondered whether Ron and Hermione could still hear Voldemort ringing in their heads, as he could.

You have permitted your friends to die for you rather than face me

yourself. I shall wait for one hour in the Forbidden Forest. . . . One

hour. . . .

Small bundles seemed to litter the lawn at the front of the castle. It could only be an hour or so from dawn, yet it was pitch-black. The three of them hurried toward the stone steps. A lone clog, the

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size of a small boat, lay abandoned in front of them. There was no other sign of Grawp or of his attacker.

The castle was unnaturally silent. There were no flashes of light now, no bangs or screams or shouts. The flagstones of the deserted entrance hall were stained with blood. Emeralds were still scattered all over the floor, along with pieces of marble and splintered wood. Part of the banisters had been blown away.

“Where is everyone? ” whispered Hermione.

Ron led the way to the Great Hall. Harry stopped in the doorway.

The House tables were gone and the room was crowded. The survivors stood in groups, their arms around each other’s necks. The injured were being treated upon the raised platform by Madam Pomfrey and a group of helpers. Firenze was amongst the injured; his flank poured blood and he shook where he lay, unable to stand. The dead lay in a row in the middle of the Hall. Harry could not see Fred’s body, because his family surrounded him. George was kneeling at his head; Mrs. Weasley was lying across Fred’s chest, her body shaking, Mr. Weasley stroking her hair while tears cascaded down his cheeks.

Without a word to Harry, Ron and Hermione walked away. Harry saw Hermione approach Ginny, whose face was swollen and blotchy, and hug her. Ron joined Bill, Fleur, and Percy, who flung an arm around Ron’s shoulders. As Ginny and Hermione moved closer to the rest of the family, Harry had a clear view of the bodies lying next to Fred: Remus and Tonks, pale and still and peaceful-looking, apparently asleep beneath the dark, enchanted ceiling.

The Great Hall seemed to fly away, become smaller, shrink, as Harry reeled backward from the doorway. He could not draw

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breath. He could not bear to look at any of the other bodies, to see who else had died for him. He could not bear to join the Weasleys, could not look into their eyes, when if he had given himself up in the first place, Fred might never have died. . . .

He turned away and ran up the marble staircase. Lupin, Tonks. . . He yearned not to feel. . . . He wished he could rip out his heart, his innards, everything that was screaming inside him. . . .

The castle was completely empty; even the ghosts seemed to have joined the mass mourning in the Great Hall. Harry ran without stopping, clutching the crystal flask of Snape’s last thoughts, and he did not slow down until he reached the stone gargoyle guarding the headmaster’s office.

“Password? ”

“Dumbledore! ” said Harry without thinking, because it was he whom he yearned to see, and to his surprise the gargoyle slid aside, revealing the spiral staircase behind.

But when Harry burst into the circular office he found a change. The portraits that hung all around the walls were empty. Not a single headmaster or headmistress remained to see him; all, it seemed, had flitted away, charging through the paintings that lined the castle, so that they could have a clear view of what was going on.

Harry glanced hopelessly at Dumbledore’s deserted frame, which hung directly behind the headmaster’s chair, then turned his back on it. The stone Pensieve lay in the cabinet where it had always been: Harry heaved it onto the desk and poured Snape’s memories into the wide basin with its runic markings around the edge. To escape into someone else’s head would be a blessed relief. . . . Nothing that even Snape had left him could be worse than his own thoughts. The memories swirled, silver white and strange, and without hesitating,

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with a feeling of reckless abandonment, as though this would as- suage his torturing grief, Harry dived.

He fell headlong into sunlight, and his feet found warm ground. When he straightened up, he saw that he was in a nearly deserted playground. A single huge chimney dominated the distant skyline. Two girls were swinging backward and forward, and a skinny boy was watching them from behind a clump of bushes. His black hair was overlong and his clothes were so mismatched that it looked deliberate: too short jeans, a shabby, overlarge coat that might have belonged to a grown man, an odd smocklike shirt.

Harry moved closer to the boy. Snape looked no more than nine or ten years old, sallow, small, stringy. There was undisguised greed in his thin face as he watched the younger of the two girls swinging higher and higher than her sister.

“Lily, don’t do it! ” shrieked the elder of the two. But the girl had let go of the swing at the very height of its arc and flown into the air, quite literally flown, launched herself sky- ward with a great shout of laughter, and instead of crumpling on the playground asphalt, she soared like a trapeze artist through the air, staying up far too long, landing far too lightly.

“Mummy told you not to! ”

Petunia stopped her swing by dragging the heels of her sandals on the ground, making a crunching, grinding sound, then leapt up, hands on hips.

“Mummy said you weren’t allowed, Lily! ”

“But I’m fine, ” said Lily, still giggling. “Tuney, look at this. Watch what I can do. ”

Petunia glanced around. The playground was deserted apart from themselves and, though the girls did not know it, Snape. Lily had

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picked up a fallen flower from the bush behind which Snape lurked. Petunia advanced, evidently torn between curiosity and disapproval. Lily waited until Petunia was near enough to have a clear view, then held out her palm. The flower sat there, opening and closing its pet- als, like some bizarre, many-lipped oyster.

“Stop it! ” shrieked Petunia.

“It’s not hurting you, ” said Lily, but she closed her hand on the blossom and threw it back to the ground.

“It’s not right, ” said Petunia, but her eyes had followed the flower’s flight to the ground and lingered upon it. “How do you do it? ” she added, and there was definite longing in her voice.

“It’s obvious, isn’t it? ” Snape could no longer contain himself, but had jumped out from behind the bushes. Petunia shrieked and ran backward toward the swings, but Lily, though clearly startled, remained where she was. Snape seemed to regret his appearance. A dull flush of color mounted the sallow cheeks as he looked at Lily.

“What’s obvious? ” asked Lily.

Snape had an air of nervous excitement. With a glance at the dis- tant Petunia, now hovering beside the swings, he lowered his voice and said, “I know what you are. ”

“What do you mean? ”

“You’re. . . you’re a witch, ” whispered Snape.

She looked affronted.

“ That’s not a very nice thing to say to somebody! ”

She turned, nose in the air, and marched off toward her sister. “No! ” said Snape. He was highly colored now, and Harry won- dered why he did not take off the ridiculously large coat, unless it was because he did not want to reveal the smock beneath it. He

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flapped after the girls, looking ludicrously batlike, like his older self.

The sisters considered him, united in disapproval, both holding on to one of the swing poles as though it was the safe place in tag.

“You are, ” said Snape to Lily. “You are a witch. I’ve been watch-

ing you for a while. But there’s nothing wrong with that. My mum’s one, and I’m a wizard. ”

Petunia’s laugh was like cold water.

“Wizard! ” she shrieked, her courage returned now that she had

recovered from the shock of his unexpected appearance. “ I know

who you are. You’re that Snape boy! They live down Spinner’s End

by the river, ” she told Lily, and it was evident from her tone that she considered the address a poor recommendation. “Why have you been spying on us? ”

“Haven’t been spying, ” said Snape, hot and uncomfortable and

dirty-haired in the bright sunlight. “Wouldn’t spy on you, anyway, ”

he added spitefully, “ you’re a Muggle. ”

Though Petunia evidently did not understand the word, she could hardly mistake the tone.

“Lily, come on, we’re leaving! ” she said shrilly. Lily obeyed her sister at once, glaring at Snape as she left. He stood watching them as they marched through the playground gate, and Harry, the only one left to observe him, recognized Snape’s bitter disappointment, and understood that Snape had been planning this moment for a while, and that it had all gone wrong. . . .

The scene dissolved, and before Harry knew it, re-formed around him. He was now in a small thicket of trees. He could see a sunlit river glittering through their trunks. The shadows cast by the trees made a basin of cool green shade. Two children sat facing each other,

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cross-legged on the ground. Snape had removed his coat now; his odd smock looked less peculiar in the half light.

“. . . and the Ministry can punish you if you do magic outside school, you get letters. ”

“But I have done magic outside school! ”

“We’re all right. We haven’t got wands yet. They let you off when you’re a kid and you can’t help it. But once you’re eleven, ” he nod- ded importantly, “and they start training you, then you’ve got to go careful. ”

There was a little silence. Lily had picked up a fallen twig and twirled it in the air, and Harry knew that she was imagining sparks trailing from it. Then she dropped the twig, leaned in toward the

boy, and said, “It is real, isn’t it? It’s not a joke? Petunia says you’re

lying to me. Petunia says there isn’t a Hogwarts. It is real, isn’t

it? ”

“It’s real for us, ” said Snape. “Not for her. But we’ll get the letter, you and me. ”

“Really? ” whispered Lily.

“Definitely, ” said Snape, and even with his poorly cut hair and his odd clothes, he struck an oddly impressive figure sprawled in front of her, brimful of confidence in his destiny.

“And will it really come by owl? ” Lily whispered. “Normally, ” said Snape. “But you’re Muggle-born, so someone from the school will have to come and explain to your parents. ” “Does it make a difference, being Muggle-born? ”

Snape hesitated. His black eyes, eager in the greenish gloom, moved over the pale face, the dark red hair.

“No, ” he said. “It doesn’t make any difference. ”

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“Good, ” said Lily, relaxing: It was clear that she had been worrying.

“You’ve got loads of magic, ” said Snape. “I saw that. All the time I was watching you. . . ”

His voice trailed away; she was not listening, but had stretched out on the leafy ground and was looking up at the canopy of leaves overhead. He watched her as greedily as he had watched her in the playground.

“How are things at your house? ” Lily asked.

A little crease appeared between his eyes.

“Fine, ” he said.

“They’re not arguing anymore? ”

“Oh yes, they’re arguing, ” said Snape. He picked up a fistful of leaves and began tearing them apart, apparently unaware of what he was doing. “But it won’t be that long and I’ll be gone. ” “Doesn’t your dad like magic? ”

“He doesn’t like anything, much, ” said Snape. “Severus? ”

A little smile twisted Snape’s mouth when she said his name. “Yeah? ”

“Tell me about the dementors again. ”

“What d’you want to know about them for? ”

“If I use magic outside school —”

“They wouldn’t give you to the dementors for that! Demen- tors are for people who do really bad stuff. They guard the wizard prison, Azkaban. You’re not going to end up in Azkaban, you’re too —”

He turned red again and shredded more leaves. Then a small

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rustling noise behind Harry made him turn: Petunia, hiding behind a tree, had lost her footing.

“Tuney! ” said Lily, surprise and welcome in her voice, but Snape had jumped to his feet.

“Who’s spying now? ” he shouted. “What d’you want? ” Petunia was breathless, alarmed at being caught. Harry could see her struggling for something hurtful to say.

“What is that you’re wearing, anyway? ” she said, pointing at Snape’s chest. “Your mum’s blouse? ”

There was a crack: A branch over Petunia’s head had fallen. Lily

screamed: The branch caught Petunia on the shoulder, and she stag- gered backward and burst into tears.

“Tuney! ”

But Petunia was running away. Lily rounded on Snape. “Did you make that happen? ”

“No. ” He looked both defiant and scared.

“You did! ” She was backing away from him. “You did! You hurt

her! ”

“No — no I didn’t! ”

But the lie did not convince Lily: After one last burning look, she ran from the little thicket, off after her sister, and Snape looked miserable and confused. . . .

And the scene re-formed. Harry looked around: He was on plat- form nine and three-quarters, and Snape stood beside him, slightly hunched, next to a thin, sallow-faced, sour-looking woman who greatly resembled him. Snape was staring at a family of four a short distance away. The two girls stood a little apart from their parents. Lily seemed to be pleading with her sister; Harry moved closer to listen.

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“. . . I’m sorry, Tuney, I’m sorry! Listen —” She caught her sister’s hand and held tight to it, even though Petunia tried to pull it away. “Maybe once I’m there — no, listen, Tuney! Maybe once I’m there, I’ll be able to go to Professor Dumbledore and persuade him to change his mind! ”

“I don’t — want — to — go! ” said Petunia, and she dragged her hand back out of her sister’s grasp. “You think I want to go to some stupid castle and learn to be a — a —”

Her pale eyes roved over the platform, over the cats mewling in their owners’ arms, over the owls fluttering and hooting at each other in cages, over the students, some already in their long black robes, loading trunks onto the scarlet steam engine or else greeting one another with glad cries after a summer apart.

“— you think I want to be a — a freak? ”

Lily’s eyes filled with tears as Petunia succeeded in tugging her hand away.

“I’m not a freak, ” said Lily. “That’s a horrible thing to say. ” “That’s where you’re going, ” said Petunia with relish. “A special school for freaks. You and that Snape boy. . . weirdos, that’s what you two are. It’s good you’re being separated from normal people. It’s for our safety. ”