Percy was eating breakfast with Ron and Hermione when Harry came.
"Morning," He said brightly to Percy, Ron, and Hermione, joining them at the Gryffindor table in the Great Hall.
"What are you looking so pleased about?" said Ron, eyeing Harry in surprise.
"Erm . . . Quidditch later," said Harry happily, pulling a large platter of bacon and eggs toward him.
"Oh . . . yeah . . ." said Ron. He put down the bit of toast he was eating and took a large swig of pumpkin juice. Then he said, "Listen. . . you both don't fancy going out a bit earlier with me, do you? Just to —er — give me some practice before training? So I can, you know, get my eye in a bit . . ."
"Sorry, Ron got homework." Percy apologised with bags under his eyes. He shouldn't have made those elf socks.
"Yeah, okay," said Harry.
"Look, I don't think you should," said Hermione seriously, "you're both really behind on homework as it —"
But she broke off; the morning post was arriving and, as usual, theDaily Prophet was soaring toward her in the beak of a screech owl. Hermione pushed a Knut into its leather pouch, took the newspaper, and scanned the front page critically as the owl took off again.
"Anything interesting?" said Ron; Percy smiled — he knew Ron was keen to get her off the subject of homework.
"No," she sighed, "just some guff about the bass player in theWeird Sisters getting married. . . ."She opened the paper and disappeared behind it. Ron was staring up at the high windows, looking slightly preoccupied and Percy was feeding his Kneazle Kelpy.
"Wait a moment," said Hermione suddenly. "Oh no . . . Sirius!"
"What's happened?" said Harry, and he snatched at the paper so violently that it ripped down the middle so that he and Hermione were holding half each.
" 'The Ministry of Magic has received a tip-off from a reliable source that Sirius Black, notorious mass murderer . . . blah blah blah . . . is currently hiding in London!' " Hermione read from her half.
"Lucius Malfoy, I'll bet anything," said Harry in a low, furious voice. "He did recognize Sirius on the platform. . . ."
"What?" said Ron, looking alarmed. "You didn't say —"
"Shh!" said the other three. ". . . 'Ministry warns Wizarding community that Black is very dangerous . . . killed thirteen people . . . broke out of Azkaban . . .' the usual rubbish," Hermione concluded, laying down her half of the paper and looking fearfully at Percy, Harry and Ron. "Well, he just won't be able to leave the house again, that's all," she whispered. "Dumbledore did warn him not to."
Harry looked down glumly at the bit of the Prophet he had torn off.
"Hey!" he said, flattening it down so Hermione and Ron's could both see it. "Look at this!"
"I've got all the robes I want," said Ron.
"No," said Harry, "look . . . this little piece here . . ."
Percy, Ron and Hermione bent closer to read it; the item was barely an inch long and placed right at the bottom of a column. It was headlined
TRESPASS AT MINISTRY
Sturgis Podmore, 38, of number two, LaburnumGardens, Clapham, has appeared in front of theWizengamot charged with trespass and attempted robbery at the Ministry of Magic on 31st August. Podmore was arrested by Ministry of Magic watch wizard Eric Munch, who found him attempting to force his way through a top-security door at one o'clock in the morning. Podmore, who refused to speak in his own defence, was convicted on both charges and sentenced to six months in Azkaban.
"Sturgis Podmore?" said Ron slowly, "but he's that bloke who looks like his head's been thatched, isn't he? He's one of the Ord —"
"Shut up Ron!" Percy whispered
"Six months in Azkaban!" whispered Harry, shocked. "Just for trying to get through a door!"
"Don't be silly, it wasn't just for trying to get through a door —what on earth was he doing at the Ministry of Magic at one o'clock in the morning?" breathed Hermione.
"D'you reckon he was doing something for the Order?" Ron muttered.
"Wait a moment. . . ." said Harry slowly.
"Sturgis was supposed to come and see us off, remember?"The others looked at him. Percy realized.
"Yeah, he was supposed to be part of our guard going to King'sCross, remember? And Moody was all annoyed because he didn't turn up, so that doesn't seem like he was supposed to be on a job for them, does it?"
"Well, maybe they didn't expect him to get caught," said Hermione.
"It could be a frame-up!" Ron exclaimed excitedly. "No — listen!" he went on, dropping his voice at the threatening look on Hermione's face. "The Ministry suspects he's one of Dumbledore'slot so — I dunno — they lured him to the Ministry, and he Wasnt trying to get through a door at all! Maybe they've just made something up to get him!"
There was a pause while Harry and Hermione considered this. Harry thought it seemed far-fetched; Percy was sceptical and Hermione, on the other hand, looked rather impressed and said, "Do you know, I wouldn't be at all surprised if that were true."
She folded up her half of the newspaper thoughtfully. When Harry laid down his knife and fork she seemed to come out of a reverie.
"Right, well, I think we should tackle that essay for Sprout on Self Fertilizing Shrubs first, and if we're lucky we'll be able to start McGonagall's Inanimatus Conjurus before lunch. . . ."
Then after a couple of hours, he went to the Quidditch pitch for the real training session. All their teammates but Angelina were already in the changing room when they entered.
"All right, Ron?" said George, winking at him.
"Yeah," said Ron, who had become quieter and quieter all the way down to the pitch.
"Ready to show us all up, Ickle Perfect?" said Fred, emerging tousle-haired from the neck of his Quidditch robes, a slightly malicious grin on his face.
"Shut up," said Ron, stony-faced, pulling on his own team robes for the first time.
Something in her would-be casual voice made Percy guess he might know who the uninvited spectators were, and sure enough, when they left the changing room for the bright sunlight of the pitch it was to a storm of catcalls and jeers from the Slytherin Quidditch team and assorted hangers-on.
"What's that Weasley's riding?" Malfoy called in his sneering drawl."Why would anyone put a Flying Charm on a mouldy old log like that?"
Crabbe, Goyle, and Pansy Parkinson shrieked with laughter. Ron mounted his broom and kicked off from the ground and Harry followed him, watching his ears turn red from behind.
"Ignore them," he said, accelerating to catch up with Ron. "We'll see who's laughing after we play them. . . ."
"Exactly the attitude I want, Harry," said Angelina approvingly, soaring around them with the Quaffle under her arm and slowing to hover on the spot in front of her airborne team. "Okay everyone, we're going to start with some passes just to warm up, the whole team please —"
"Hey, Johnson, what's with that hairstyle anyway?" shrieked PansyParkinson from below. "Why would anyone want to look like they've got worms coming out of their head?"
Angelina swept her long braided hair out of her face and said calmly, "Spread out, then, and let's see what we can do. . . ."
Percy sped out near to the Slytherin stands. Angelina raised the Quaffle with one hand and threw it hard to Fred, who passed to George, who passed to Harry, who passed to Ron, who dropped it.
The Slytherins, led by Malfoy, roared and screamed with laughter. Ron, who had pelted toward the ground to catch the Quaffle before it landed, pulled out of the dive untidily, so that he slipped sideways on his broom, and returned to playing height, blushing.
"Pass it on, Ron," called Angelina, as though nothing had happened.
Ron threw the Quaffle to Percy, who passed back to Harry, who passed to George. . . .
"Hey, Potter, how's your scar feeling?" called Malfoy. "Sure you don't need a lie-down? It must be, what, a whole week since you were in the hospital wing, that's a record for you, isn't it?"
Fred passed to Angelina; she reverses passed to Harry, who had not been expecting it but caught it. He passed it quickly to Ron, who lunged for it and missed by inches.
"Come on now, Ron," said Angelina crossly, as Ron dived for theground again, chasing the Quaffle. "Pay attention."
Malfoy and the rest of the Slytherin team were howling with laughter. On his third attempt, Ron caught the Quaffle; perhaps out of relief he passed it on so enthusiastically that it soared straight through Katie's outstretched hands and hit her hard in the face.
"Sorry!" Ron groaned, zooming forward to see whether he had done any damage.
"Get back in position, she's fine!" barked Angelina. "But as you're passing to a teammate, do try not to knock her off her broom, won't? We've got Bludgers for that!"
"Can we use them now?" Percy asked hopefully.
Katie's nose was bleeding. Down below the Slytherins were stamping their feet and jeering. Fred and George converged on Katie."Here, take this," Fred told her, handing her something small and purple from out of his pocket. "It'll clear it up in no time."
"All right," called Angelina, "Fred, George, go and get your bats and a Bludger; Ron, get up to the goalposts, Harry, release the Snitchwhen I say so. We're going to aim for Ron's goal, obviously."
"Finally," Percy murmured.
They returned to the air. When Angelina blew her whistle, Harry released the Snitch, Fred and George let fly the Bludger and Percy flew with the quaffle. He passed it to Katie, her nose still bleeding. She went forward and tried to score but Ron saved it.
Then Angelina scored one. Then it continued with him and then Katie again. But her nose was bleeding so she dropped it and Percy caught it catching Ron unexpected and scoring.
. But too soon, the whistle brought him to a halt.
"Stop — stop – STOP!" screamed Angelina. "Ron — you're not covering your middle post!"
"Oh . . . sorry . . ." You keep shifting around while you're watching the Chasers!" said Angelina. "Either stay in centre position until you have to move to defend a hoop, or else circle the hoops, but don't drift vaguely off to one side, that's how you let in the last three goals!"
"Sorry . . ." Ron repeated, his red face shining like a beacon against the bright blue sky.
"And Katie, can't you do something about that nosebleed?"
"It's just getting worse!" said Katie thickly, attempting to stem the flow with her sleeve. Percy glanced around at Fred, who was looking anxious and checking his pockets. He saw Fred pull out something purple, examine it for a second, and then look around at Katie, evidently horrorstruck.
"what did they do?" Percy thought.
"Well, let's try again," said Angelina. She was ignoring the Slytherins, who had now set up a chant of "Gryffindor are losers, Gryffindorare losers,"
This time they had been flying for barely three minutes when Angelina's whistle sounded.
"What now?" he said impatiently to Percy, who was nearest.
"Katie," he said shortly and zoomed as fast as he could. Katie was now chalk-white and covered in blood. He checked her pulse. "She lost to much blood."
"She needs the hospital wing," said Angelina.
"We'll take her," said Fred. "Sheer — might have swallowed a blood Blisterpod by mistake —"
"I'll take her." Percy interrupted. "My broom is faster." He took Katie by the broom and zoomed towards the hospital wing. When he got to the hospital wing, he slowed down and by the arm, gently dropped her off to the wing.
Percy then went towards the changing room. It was quiet now. No Slytherins chanting. About twenty minutes later, he climbed through the portrait hole into the Gryffindor common room. It seems that he missed an argument because Ron stormed to the boys' dormitories and vanished from sight. Hermione turned to Harry.
"Was he lousy?"
"No," said Harry loyally. Hermione raised her eyebrows and turned to Percy.
"He wasn't bad," Percy said. "But he could've played better."
"Well, I suppose he could've played better," Harry muttered, "but it was only the first training session like you said. . . ."
Neither boys seemed to make a dent with their homework that night. Percy knew Ron was too preoccupied with how badly he had performed at Quidditch practice.
They spent the whole of Sunday in the common room, buried in their books while the room around them filled up, then emptied: It was another clear, fine day and most of their fellow Gryffindors spent the day out in the grounds, enjoying what might well be some of the last sunshine that year
"You know, we probably should try and get more homework done during the week," Harry muttered to Ron,
"Yeah," said Ron, rubbing slightly bloodshot eyes and throwing his fifth spoiled bit of parchment into the fire beside them. "Listen . . . shall we just ask Hermione if we can have a look at what she's done?"
Percy glanced over at her; she was sitting with Crookshanks on her lap and chatting merrily to Ginny as a pair of knitting needles flashed in midair in front of her, now knitting a pair of shapeless elf socks. "You can try. But I don't think that would be wise."
And so they worked on while Percy read his Defensive Magical Theory the sky outside the windows became steadily. At half-past eleven, Hermione wandered over to them, yawning.
"Nearly done?"
"No," said Ron shortly.
"Jupiter's biggest moon is Ganymede, not Callisto," she said, pointing over Ron's shoulder at a line in his Astronomy essay, "and it's Io that's got the volcanos."
"Thanks," snarled Ron, scratching out the offending sentences.
"Sorry, I only —"
"Yeah, well, if you've just come over here to criticize —"
"Ron —"
"I haven't got time to listen to a sermon, all right, Hermione, I'm up to my neck in it here —"
"No — look!"Hermione was pointing to the nearest window. Harry and Ron both looked over. A handsome screech owl was standing on the windowsill, gazing into the room at Ron.
"Isn't that Hermes?" said Hermione, sounding amazed. Percy checked the sky and there wasn't any rumbling of thunder.
"Blimey, it is!" said Ron quietly, throwing down his quill and getting to his feet. "What's Percy writing to me for?"
He crossed to the window and opened it; Hermes flew inside, landed upon Ron's essay, and held out a leg to which a letter was attached. Ron took it off and the owl departed at once, leaving inky footprints across Ron's drawing of the moon Io.
"That's definitely Percy's handwriting," said Ron, sinking back into his chair and staring at the words on the outside of the scroll: Ronald Weasley, Gryffindor House, Hogwarts. He looked up at the other two. "What d'you reckon?"
"Open it!" said Hermione eagerly. Harry nodded.
Ron unrolled the scroll and began to read. The farther down the parchment his eyes travelled, the more pronounced became his scowl. When he had finished reading, he looked disgusted. He thrust the letter at Harry and Hermione, who leaned toward each other to read it aloud:
Dear Ron,
I have only just heard (from no less a person than the Minister of Magic himself, who has it from your new teacher, ProfessorUmbridge) that you have become a Hogwarts prefect. I was most pleasantly surprised when I heard this news and must firstly offer my congratulations. I must admit that I have always been afraid that you would take what we might call the"Fred and George" route, rather than following in my footsteps, so you can imagine my feelings on hearing you have stopped flouting authority and have decided to shoulder some real responsibility
But I want to give you more than congratulations, Ron, I want to give you some advice, which is why I am sending this at night rather than by the usual morning post. Hopefully, you will be able to read this away from prying eyes and avoid awkward questions.
From something the Minister let slip when telling me you are now a perfect, I gather that you are still seeing a lot of Harry Potter. I must tell you, Ron, that nothing could put you in danger of losing your badge more than continued fraternization with that boy. Yes, I am sure you are surprised to hear this — no doubt you will say that Potter has always been Dumbledore's favourite — but I feel bound to tell you that Dumbledore may not be in charge at Hogwarts much longer and the people who count have a very different — and probably more accurate — view of Potters behaviour. I shall say no more here, but if you look at the Daily Prophettomorrow you will get a good idea of the way the wind is blowing — and see if you can spot yours truly!
Seriously, Ron, you do not want to be tarred with the same brush as Potter, it could be very damaging to your prospects, and I am talking here about life after school too. As you must be aware, given that our father escorted him to court, Potter had a disciplinary hearing this summer in front of the wholeWizengamot and he did not come out of it looking too good. He got off on a mere technicality if you ask me and many of the people I've spoken to remain convinced of his guilt.
It may be that you are afraid to sever ties with Potter — Iknow that he can be unbalanced and, for all I know, violent —but if you have any worries about this, or have spotted anything else in Potter's behaviour that is troubling you, I urge you to speak to Dolores Umbridge, a really delightful woman, who I know will be only too happy to advise you.
This leads me to my other bit of advice. As I have hinted above, Dumbledore's regime at Hogwarts may soon be over. Your loyalty, Ron, should be not to him, but the school and the Ministry. I am very sorry to hear that so far Professor Umbridge is encountering very little cooperation from staff as she strives to make those necessary changes within Hogwarts that the Ministry so ardently desires (although she should find this easier from next week — again, see the Prophet tomorrow!). I shall say only this— a student who shows himself willing to help Professor Umbridge now may be very well placed for Head Boy in a couple of years!
I am sorry that I was unable to see more of you over the summer. It pains me to criticize our parents, but I am afraid I can no longer live under their roof while they remain mixed up with the dangerous crowd around Dumbledore (if you are writing t mother at any point, you might tell her that a certain SturgisPodmore, who is a great friend of Dumbledore's, has recently been sent to Azkaban for trespass at the Ministry. Perhaps that will open their eyes to the kind of petty criminals with whom they are currently rubbing shoulders). I count myself very lucky to have escaped the stigma of association with such people — the Minister really could not be more gracious to me — and I do hope, Ron, that you will not allow family ties to blind you to the misguided nature of our parents' beliefs and actions either. I sincerely hope that, in time, they will realize how mistaken they were and I shall, of course, be ready to accept a full apology when that day comes. Please think over what I have said most carefully, particularly the bit about Harry Potter, and congratulations again on becoming prefect.
Your brother, Percy
Harry looked up at Ron." Well," he said, trying to sound as though he found the whole thing a joke, "if you want to — er — what is it?" (He checked Percy'sletter.) "Oh yeah — 'sever ties' with me, I swear I won't get violent."
Percy laughed.
"Give it back," said Ron, holding out his hand. "He is —" Ron said jerkily, tearing the letter in half, "the world's" — he tore it into quarters — "biggest" — he tore it into eighths — "git." He threw the pieces into the fire.
"Come on, we've got to get this finished sometime before dawn," he said briskly to Harry, pulling Professor Sinistra's essay back toward him.
"Oh, give them here," she said abruptly.
"What?" said Ron.
"Give them to me, I'll look through them and correct them," she said.
"Are you serious? Ah, Hermione, you're a lifesaver," said Ron, "what can I — ?"
"What you can say is, 'We promise we'll never leave our homework this late again,' " she said, holding out both hands for their essays, but she looked slightly amused all the same. They looked at Percy expectantly. He rolled his eyes.
"Fine! But you won't expect anything for Christmas."
Thanks a million, guys," said Harry weakly, passing over his essay and sinking back into his armchair, rubbing his eyes. It was now past midnight and the common room was deserted but for the four of them and Crookshanks. Percy made corrections on Harry's while Hermione's did Ron's.
"Okay, write that down," Hermione said to Ron, pushing his essay and a sheet covered in her own writing back to Ron, "and then copy out this conclusion that I've written for you."
"Hermione, you are honestly the most wonderful person I've ever met," said Ron weakly, "and if I'm ever rude to you again —"
"— I'll know you're back to normal," said Hermione.
Percy chuckled and turned to Harry's essay. "Harry, yours is okay except for this bit at the end, I think you must have misheard Professor Sinistra, Europa's covered in ice, not mice — Harry?"
Harry had slid off his chair onto his knees and was now crouching on the singed and threadbare hearthrug, gazing into the flames.
"Er — Harry?" said Ron uncertainly. "Why are you down there?"
"Because I've just seen Sirius's head in the fire," said Harry.
"Sirius's head?" Hermione repeated. "You mean like when he wanted to talk to you during the Triwizard Tournament? But he wouldn't do that now, it would be too — Sirius!"
She gasped, gazing at the fire; Ron dropped his quill. There in the middle of the dancing flames sat Sirius's head, long dark hair falling around his grinning face.
"I was starting to think you'd go to bed before everyone else had disappeared," he said. "I've been checking every hour."
"You've been popping into the fire every hour?" Harry said, half-laughing.
"Just for a few seconds to check if the coast was clear yet."
"But what if you'd been seen?" said Hermione anxiously.
"Well, I think a girl — first year by the look of her — might've got a glimpse of me earlier, but don't worry," Sirius said hastily, as Hermione clapped a hand to her mouth. "I was gone the moment she looked back at me and I'll bet she just thought I was an oddly shaped log or something."
"But Sirius, this is taking an awful risk —" Hermione began.
"You sound like Molly," said Sirius. "This was the only way I could come up with of answering Harry's letter without resorting to a code — and codes are breakable."
At the mention of Harry's letter, Hermione and Ron had both turned to stare at him.
"You didn't say you'd written to Sirius!" said Percy accusingly.
"I forgot," said Harry "Don't look at me like that, Hermione, there was no way anyone would have got secret information out of it, was there, Sirius?"
"No, it was very good," said Sirius, smiling. "Anyway, we'd better be quick, just in case we're disturbed — your scar."
"What about — ?" Ron began, but Hermione said quickly,
"We'll tell you afterwards, go on, Sirius."
"Well, I know it can't be fun when it hurts, but we don't think its anything to really worry about. It kept aching all last year, didn't it?"
"Yeah, and Dumbledore said it happened whenever Voldemort was feeling a powerful emotion," said Harry, ignoring, as usual, Ron and Hermione's winces. "So maybe he was just, I dunno, really angry or something the night I had that detention."
"Well, now he's back it's bound to hurt more often," said Sirius.
"So you don't think it had anything to do with Umbridge touching me when I was in detention with her?" Harry asked.
"I doubt it," said Sirius. "I know her by reputation and I'm sure she's no Death Eater —"
"But she is a suitable candidate," Percy said and he was met with agreements.
"Yes, but the world isn't split into good people and Death Eaters," said Sirius with a wry smile. "I know she's a nasty piece of work, though — you should hear Remus talk about her."
"Does Lupin know her?" asked Harry quickly
"No," said Sirius, "but she drafted a bit of anti-werewolf legislation two years ago that makes it almost impossible for him to get a job."
"She hates half breeds. To the core." Percy said
"What's she got against werewolves?" said Hermione angrily.
"Scared of them, I expect," said Sirius, smiling at her indignation."Apparently, as Percy just said, she loathes part-humans; she campaigned to have merpeople rounded up and tagged last year too. Imagine wasting your time and energy persecuting merpeople when there are little toerags like Kreacher on the loose —"
Ron laughed but Hermione looked upset.
"Sirius!" she said reproachfully. "Honestly, if you made a bit of an effort with Kreacher I'm sure he'd respond, after all, you are the only member of his family he's got left, and Professor Dumbledore said —"
"So what are Umbridge's lessons like?" Sirius interrupted. "Is she training you all to kill half-breeds?"
"No," said Harry, ignoring Hermione's affronted look at being cut off in her defence of Kreacher. "She's not letting us use magic at all!"
"All we do is read the stupid textbook," said Ron.
"And fall asleep in class," said Percy.
"That's exactly what he thinks you're doing," said Sirius, "or rather, that's exactly what he's afraid Dumbledore's doing — forming his own private army, with which he will be able to take on the Ministry of Magic."
There was a pause at this, then Ron said, "That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard, including all the stuff that Luna Lovegood comes out with."
"So we're being prevented from learning Defense Against the DarkArts because Fudge is scared we'll use spells against the Ministry?" said Hermione, looking furious.
"Yep," said Sirius. "Fudge thinks Dumbledore will stop at nothing to seize power. He's getting more paranoid about Dumbledore by the day. It's a matter of time before he has Dumbledore arrested on some trumped-up charge."
"D'you know if there's going to be anything about Dumbledore in the Daily Prophet tomorrow? Only Ron's brother Percy reckons there will be —"
"I don't know," said Sirius, "I haven't seen anyone from the Order all weekend, they're all busy. It's just been Kreacher and me here. . . ."
There was a note of bitterness in Sirius's voice.
"So you haven't had any news about Hagrid, either?"
"Ah . . ." said Sirius, "well, he was supposed to be back by now, no one's sure what's happened to him." Then, seeing their stricken faces, he added quickly, "But Dumbledore's not worried, so don't you three get yourselves in a state; I'm sure Hagrid's fine."
"But if he was supposed to be back by now . . ." said Hermione ina small, worried voice."Madame Maxime was with him, we've been in touch with her and she says they got separated on the journey home — but there's nothing to suggest he's hurt or — well, nothing to suggest he's not perfectly okay."
The four exchanged worried looks.
"Listen, don't go asking too many questions about Hagrid," said Sirius hastily, "it'll just draw even more attention to the fact that he's back, and I know Dumbledore doesn't want that. Hagrid's tough, he'll be okay." And when they did not appear cheered by this, Siriusadded, "When's your next Hogsmeade weekend anyway? I was thinking, we got away with the dog disguise at the station, didn't we? I thought I could —"
"NO!" said Harry and Hermione together, very loudly.
"Sirius, didn't you see the Daily Prophet?" said Hermione anxiously.
"Oh that," said Sirius, grinning, "they're always guessing where I am, they haven't really got a clue —"
"Yeah, but we think this time they have," said Harry. "SomethingMalfoy said on the train made us think he knew it was you, and his father was on the platform, Sirius — you know, Lucius Malfoy — so don't come up here, whatever you do, if Malfoy recognizes you again —"
"All right, all right, I've got the point," said Sirius. He looked most displeased. "Just an idea, thought you might like to get together —"
"I would, I just don't want you chucked back in Azkaban!" said harry. There was a pause in which Sirius looked out of the fire at Harry, a crease between his sunken eyes.
"You're less like your father than I thought," he said finally, a definite coolness in his voice. "The risk would've been what made it fun for James."
"Look —"
"Well, I'd better get going, I can hear Kreacher coming down the stairs," said Sirius, but Percy was sure he was lying. "I'll write to tell you a time I can make it back into the fire, then, shall I? If you can stand to risk it?"
There were a tiny pop and the place where Sirius's head had been was flickering flame once more.
