‘You and Tonks are related?’ Harry asked, surprised.
‘Oh, yeah, her mother Andromeda was my favourite cousin,’ said Sirius, examining the tapestry carefully. ‘No, Andromeda’s not on here either, look –’
He pointed to another small round burn mark between two names, Bellatrix and Narcissa.
‘Andromeda’s sisters are still here because they made lovely, respectable pure-blood marriages, but Andromeda married a Muggle-born, Ted Tonks, so –’
Sirius mimed blasting the tapestry with a wand and laughed sourly. Harry, however, did not laugh; he was too busy staring at the names to the right of Andromeda’s burn mark. A double line of gold embroidery linked Narcissa Black with Lucius Malfoy and a single vertical gold line from their names led to the name Draco.
‘You’re related to the Malfoys!’
‘The pure-blood families are all interrelated,’ said Sirius. ‘If you’re only going to let your sons and daughters marry pure-bloods your choice is very limited; there are hardly any of us left. Molly and I are cousins by marriage and Arthur’s something like my second cousin once removed. But there’s no point looking for them on here – if ever a family was a bunch of blood traitors it’s the Weasleys.’
But Harry was now looking at the name to the left of Andromeda’s burn: Bellatrix Black, which was connected by a double line to Rodolphus Lestrange.
‘Lestrange …’ Harry said aloud. The name had stirred something in his memory; he knew it from somewhere, but for a moment he couldn’t think where, though it gave him an odd, creeping sensation in the pit of his stomach.
‘They’re in Azkaban,’ said Sirius shortly.
Harry looked at him curiously.
‘Bellatrix and her husband Rodolphus came in with Barty Crouch junior,’ said Sirius, in the same brusque voice. ‘Rodolphus’s brother Rabastan was with them, too.’
Then Harry remembered. He had seen Bellatrix Lestrange inside Dumbledore’s Pensieve, the strange device in which thoughts and memories could be stored: a tall dark woman with heavy-lidded eyes, who had stood at her trial and proclaimed her continuing allegiance to Lord Voldemort, her pride that she had tried to find him after his downfall and her conviction that she would one day be rewarded for her loyalty.
‘You never said she was your –’
‘Does it matter if she’s my cousin?’ snapped Sirius. ‘As far as I’m concerned, they’re not my family. She’s certainly not my family. I haven’t seen her since I was your age, unless you count a glimpse of her coming into Azkaban. D’you think I’m proud of having a relative like her?’
‘Sorry,’ said Harry quickly, ‘I didn’t mean – I was just surprised, that’s all –’
‘It doesn’t matter, don’t apologise,’ Sirius mumbled. He turned away from the tapestry, his hands deep in his pockets. ‘I don’t like being back here,’ he said, staring across the drawing room. ‘I never thought I’d be stuck in this house again.’
Harry understood completely. He knew how he would feel, when he was grown up and thought he was free of the place for ever, to return and live at number four, Privet Drive.
‘It’s ideal for Headquarters, of course,’ Sirius said. ‘My father put every security measure known to wizardkind on it when he lived here. It’s unplottable, so Muggles could never come and call – as if they’d ever have wanted to – and now Dumbledore’s added his protection, you’d be hard put to find a safer house anywhere. Dumbledore is Secret Keeper for the Order, you know – nobody can find Headquarters unless he tells them personally where it is – that note Moody showed you last night, that was from Dumbledore …’ Sirius gave a short, bark-like laugh. ‘If my parents could see the use their house was being put to now … well, my mother’s portrait should give you some idea …’
He scowled for a moment, then sighed.
‘I wouldn’t mind if I could just get out occasionally and do something useful. I’ve asked Dumbledore whether I can escort you to your hearing – as Snuffles, obviously – so I can give you a bit of moral support, what d’you think?’
Harry felt as though his stomach had sunk through the dusty carpet. He had not thought about the hearing once since dinner the previous evening; in the excitement of being back with the people he liked best, and hearing everything that was going on, it had completely flown his mind. At Sirius’s words, however, the crushing sense of dread returned to him. He stared at Hermione and the Weasleys, all tucking into their sandwiches, and thought how he would feel if they went back to Hogwarts without him.
‘Don’t worry,’ Sirius said. Harry looked up and realised that Sirius had been watching him. ‘I’m sure they’ll clear you, there’s definitely something in the International Statute of Secrecy about being allowed to use magic to save your own life.’
‘But if they do expel me,’ said Harry quietly, ‘can I come back here and live with you?’
Sirius smiled sadly.
‘We’ll see.’
‘I’d feel a lot better about the hearing if I knew I didn’t have to go back to the Dursleys’,’ Harry pressed him.
‘They must be bad if you prefer this place,’ said Sirius gloomily.
‘Hurry up, you two, or there won’t be any food left,’ Mrs Weasley called.
Sirius heaved another great sigh, cast a dark look at the tapestry, then he and Harry went to join the others.
Harry tried his best not to think about the hearing while they emptied the glass-fronted cabinets that afternoon. Fortunately for him, it was a job that required a lot of concentration, as many of the objects in there seemed very reluctant to leave their dusty shelves. Sirius sustained a bad bite from a silver snuffbox; within seconds his bitten hand had developed an unpleasant crusty covering like a tough brown glove.
‘It’s OK,’ he said, examining the hand with interest before tapping it lightly with his wand and restoring its skin to normal, ‘must be Wartcap powder in there.’
He threw the box aside into the sack where they were depositing the debris from the cabinets; Harry saw George wrap his own hand carefully in a cloth moments later and sneak the box into his already Doxy-filled pocket.
They found an unpleasant-looking silver instrument, something like a many-legged pair of tweezers, which scuttled up Harry’s arm like a spider when he picked it up, and attempted to puncture his skin. Sirius seized it and smashed it with a heavy book entitled Nature’s Nobility: A Wizarding Genealogy. There was a musical box that emitted a faintly sinister, tinkling tune when wound, and they all found themselves becoming curiously weak and sleepy, until Ginny had the sense to slam the lid shut; a heavy locket that none of them could open; a number of ancient seals; and, in a dusty box, an Order of Merlin, First Class, that had been awarded to Sirius’s grandfather for ‘services to the Ministry’.
‘It means he gave them a load of gold,’ said Sirius contemptuously, throwing the medal into the rubbish sack.
Several times Kreacher sidled into the room and attempted to smuggle things away under his loincloth, muttering horrible curses every time they caught him at it. When Sirius wrested a large golden ring bearing the Black crest from his grip, Kreacher actually burst into furious tears and left the room sobbing under his breath and calling Sirius names Harry had never heard before.
‘It was my father’s,’ said Sirius, throwing the ring into the sack. ‘Kreacher wasn’t quite as devoted to him as to my mother, but I still caught him snogging a pair of my father’s old trousers last week.’
*
Mrs Weasley kept them all working very hard over the next few days. The drawing room took three days to decontaminate. Finally, the only undesirable things left in it were the tapestry of the Black family tree, which resisted all their attempts to remove it from the wall, and the rattling writing desk. Moody had not dropped by Headquarters yet, so they could not be sure what was inside it.
They moved from the drawing room to a dining room on the ground floor where they found spiders as large as saucers lurking in the dress
er (Ron left the room hurriedly to make a cup of tea and did not return for an hour and a half). The china, which bore the Black crest and motto, was all thrown unceremoniously into a sack by Sirius, and the same fate met a set of old photographs in tarnished silver frames, all of whose occupants squealed shrilly as the glass covering them smashed.
Snape might refer to their work as ‘cleaning’, but in Harry’s opinion they were really waging war on the house, which was putting up a very good fight, aided and abetted by Kreacher. The house-elf kept appearing wherever they were congregated, his muttering becoming more and more offensive as he attempted to remove anything he could from the rubbish sacks. Sirius went as far as to threaten him with clothes, but Kreacher fixed him with a watery stare and said, ‘Master must do as Master wishes,’ before turning away and muttering very loudly, ‘but Master will not turn Kreacher away, no, because Kreacher knows what they are up to, oh yes, he is plotting against the Dark Lord, yes, with these Mudbloods and traitors and scum …’
At which Sirius, ignoring Hermione’s protests, seized Kreacher by the back of his loincloth and threw him bodily from the room.
The doorbell rang several times a day, which was the cue for Sirius’s mother to start shrieking again, and for Harry and the others to attempt to eavesdrop on the visitor, though they gleaned very little from the brief glimpses and snatches of conversation they were able to sneak before Mrs Weasley recalled them to their tasks. Snape flitted in and out of the house several times more, though to Harry’s relief they never came face to face; Harry also caught sight of his Transfiguration teacher Professor McGonagall, looking very odd in a Muggle dress and coat, and she also seemed too busy to linger. Sometimes, however, the visitors stayed to help. Tonks joined them for a memorable afternoon in which they found a murderous old ghoul lurking in an upstairs toilet, and Lupin, who was staying in the house with Sirius but who left it for long periods to do mysterious work for the Order, helped them repair a grandfather clock that had developed the unpleasant habit of shooting heavy bolts at passers-by. Mundungus redeemed himself slightly in Mrs Weasley’s eyes by rescuing Ron from an ancient set of purple robes that had tried to strangle him when he removed them from their wardrobe.
Despite the fact that he was still sleeping badly, still having dreams about corridors and locked doors that made his scar prickle, Harry was managing to have fun for the first time all summer. As long as he was busy he was happy; when the action abated, however, whenever he dropped his guard, or lay exhausted in bed watching blurred shadows move across the ceiling, the thought of the looming Ministry hearing returned to him. Fear jabbed at his insides like needles as he wondered what was going to happen to him if he was expelled. The idea was so terrible that he did not dare voice it aloud, not even to Ron and Hermione, who, though he often saw them whispering together and casting anxious looks in his direction, followed his lead in not mentioning it. Sometimes, he could not prevent his imagination showing him a faceless Ministry official who was snapping his wand in two and ordering him back to the Dursleys’ … but he would not go. He was determined on that. He would come back here to Grimmauld Place and live with Sirius.
He felt as though a brick had dropped into his stomach when Mrs Weasley turned to him during dinner on Wednesday evening and said quietly, ‘I’ve ironed your best clothes for tomorrow morning, Harry, and I want you to wash your hair tonight, too. A good first impression can work wonders.’
Ron, Hermione, Fred, George and Ginny all stopped talking and looked over at him. Harry nodded and tried to keep eating his chop, but his mouth had become so dry he could not chew.
‘How am I getting there?’ he asked Mrs Weasley, trying to sound unconcerned.
‘Arthur’s taking you to work with him,’ said Mrs Weasley gently. Mr Weasley smiled encouragingly at Harry across the table.
‘You can wait in my office until it’s time for the hearing,’ he said.
Harry looked over at Sirius, but before he could ask the question, Mrs Weasley had answered it. ‘Professor Dumbledore doesn’t think it’s a good idea for Sirius to go with you, and I must say I –’
‘– think he’s quite right,’ said Sirius through clenched teeth.
Mrs Weasley pursed her lips.
‘When did Dumbledore tell you that?’ Harry said, staring at Sirius.
‘He came last night, when you were in bed,’ said Mr Weasley.
Sirius stabbed moodily at a potato with his fork. Harry lowered his own eyes to his plate. The thought that Dumbledore had been in the house on the eve of his hearing and not asked to see him made him feel, if it were possible, even worse.
— CHAPTER SEVEN —
The Ministry of Magic
Harry awoke at half past five the next morning as abruptly and completely as if somebody had yelled in his ear. For a few moments he lay immobile as the prospect of the disciplinary hearing filled every tiny particle of his brain, then, unable to bear it, he leapt out of bed and put on his glasses. Mrs Weasley had laid out his freshly laundered jeans and T-shirt at the foot of his bed. Harry scrambled into them. The blank picture on the wall sniggered.
Ron was lying sprawled on his back with his mouth wide open, fast asleep. He did not stir as Harry crossed the room, stepped out on to the landing and closed the door softly behind him. Trying not to think of the next time he would see Ron, when they might no longer be fellow students at Hogwarts, Harry walked quietly down the stairs, past the heads of Kreacher’s ancestors, and down into the kitchen.
He had expected it to be empty, but when he reached the door he heard the soft rumble of voices on the other side. He pushed it open and saw Mr and Mrs Weasley, Sirius, Lupin and Tonks sitting there almost as though they were waiting for him. All were fully dressed except Mrs Weasley, who was wearing a quilted purple dressing gown. She leapt to her feet the moment Harry entered.
‘Breakfast,’ she said as she pulled out her wand and hurried over to the fire.
‘M – m – morning, Harry,’ yawned Tonks. Her hair was blonde and curly this morning. ‘Sleep all right?’
‘Yeah,’ said Harry.
‘I’ve b – b – been up all night,’ she said, with another shuddering yawn. ‘Come and sit down …’
She drew out a chair, knocking over the one beside it in the process.
‘What do you want, Harry?’ Mrs Weasley called. ‘Porridge? Muffins? Kippers? Bacon and eggs? Toast?’
‘Just – just toast, thanks,’ said Harry.
Lupin glanced at Harry, then said to Tonks, ‘What were you saying about Scrimgeour?’
‘Oh … yeah … well, we need to be a bit more careful, he’s been asking Kingsley and me funny questions …’
Harry felt vaguely grateful that he was not required to join in the conversation. His insides were squirming. Mrs Weasley placed a couple of pieces of toast and marmalade in front of him; he tried to eat, but it was like chewing carpet. Mrs Weasley sat down on his other side and started fussing with his T-shirt, tucking in the label and smoothing out the creases across his shoulders. He wished she wouldn’t.
‘… and I’ll have to tell Dumbledore I can’t do night duty tomorrow, I’m just t – t – too tired,’ Tonks finished, yawning hugely again.
‘I’ll cover for you,’ said Mr Weasley. ‘I’m OK, I’ve got a report to finish anyway …’
Mr Weasley was not wearing wizards’ robes but a pair of pin-striped trousers and an old bomber jacket. He turned from Tonks to Harry.
‘How are you feeling?’
Harry shrugged.
‘It’ll all be over soon,’ Mr Weasley said bracingly. ‘In a few hours’ time you’ll be cleared.’
Harry said nothing.
‘The hearing’s on my floor, in Amelia Bones’s office. She’s Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, and the one who’ll be questioning you.’
‘Amelia Bones is OK, Harry,’ said Tonks earnestly. ‘She’s fair, she’ll hear you out.’
Harry nodded, still unable to th
ink of anything to say.
‘Don’t lose your temper,’ said Sirius abruptly. ‘Be polite and stick to the facts.’
Harry nodded again.
‘The law’s on your side,’ said Lupin quietly. ‘Even underage wizards are allowed to use magic in life-threatening situations.’
Something very cold trickled down the back of Harry’s neck; for a moment he thought someone was putting a Disillusionment Charm on him, then he realised that Mrs Weasley was attacking his hair with a wet comb. She pressed hard on the top of his head.
‘Doesn’t it ever lie flat?’ she said desperately.
Harry shook his head.
Mr Weasley checked his watch and looked up at Harry.
‘I think we’ll go now,’ he said. ‘We’re a bit early, but I think you’ll be better off at the Ministry than hanging around here.’
‘OK,’ said Harry automatically, dropping his toast and getting to his feet.
‘You’ll be all right, Harry,’ said Tonks, patting him on the arm.
‘Good luck,’ said Lupin. ‘I’m sure it will be fine.’
‘And if it’s not,’ said Sirius grimly, ‘I’ll see to Amelia Bones for you …’
Harry smiled weakly. Mrs Weasley hugged him.
‘We’ve all got our fingers crossed,’ she said.
‘Right,’ said Harry. ‘Well … see you later then.’
He followed Mr Weasley upstairs and along the hall. He could hear Sirius’s mother grunting in her sleep behind her curtains. Mr Weasley unbolted the door and they stepped out into the cold, grey dawn.
‘You don’t normally walk to work, do you?’ Harry asked him, as they set off briskly around the square.
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