Athena Dumbledore (A Harry Potter Love Story)

Kreacher

ATHENA POV:

I wake up really early to find the others are still sleeping. I shuffle quietly out of the room and just wander around aimlessley, looking for something to do. I pass Sirius' room and the a room that has the initials R.A.B. Wait.....R.A.B.! The initials on the locket! I run back to the room quickly.

"Harry, Hermione, Ron! Wake up!" They all sit up, groaning.

"What?" Ron asks grumpily.

"I know who R.A.B. is!" They all look at me and follow me out of the room to Regulas Black's room.

"Regulas Artucus Black," Hermione reads aloud then smiles. "Athena, you're a genius!" I smile at her and then we debate for a little while on what our next move should be.

"I say we look around the house for any clues on what he might've done with the real one," Ron suggests.

"Yeah, maybe he hid it here," I say and the others shrug. "But first let's get something to eat, I'm starving!"

Hermione and I make breakfast for the others. Ron can't cook so we left him out of it, and even though Harry can, we decided to give him a break.

"Here you go," I say, handing the boys their plates of food and kissing Harry on top of the head. I can imagine later if this war ends that I'd help Harry make breakfast every morning...that is, if we both surivive and if this war ever ends. We all eat in silence, all too busy in our own thoughts and food to bother making conversation. I'm interrupted by a light thumping sound coming from the closet.  

THUMP THUMP 

We all exchange a glance and Harry puts a finger to his lips, singnaling us to be quiet. The sound comes again. I pull out my wand as we all walk over to the closet, careful not to let whatever is in there know we're here. Harry goes up to it and flings the door opened. I don't see what's in there at first until he brings it out by the back of it's pillow case. It's none other than the house elf Kreacher.

"Master Potter!" He squeals as Harry drags him to the kitchen. Even though Harry's technically his master now, I can tell that he doesn't like him. They don't really like each other after all.

"Kreacher, do you know anything about a locket?" Harry asks, and with much interrogation, Kreacher comes clean.

"Master Regulus gave it to Kreacher....told Kreacher to destroy it. Kreacher tried everything, but Kreacher still couldn't destroy the locket..." He pauses.

"So where is the locket exactly?" Hermione asks and Kreacher scowls at her.

"Filthy mudblood," he says under his breath, and I have to hold Ron back from strangling him. For some reason Ron was more sensitive to Hermione being called a mudblood than Hermione herself is.

"Kreacher, where is the locket?" Harry asks sternly.

"Kreacher hid the locket, but strange man came to house. He stole many of Kreacher's things, including the locket. Kreacher doesn't know where the locket is." I meantally groan.

"Who took it Kreacher?" Harry asks. "Who took the locket?"

"A man named Mundungus Fletcher."

"Dobby, we need you to go and find Mundungus Fletcher and bring him here," I tell Dobby while he nods fiercly. Ever since Harry had freed him from Lucius Malfoy, he'd do anything and everything to repay us. So he and Kreacher apparate out to find Mundungus.

About half an hour later they come back with him. Harry and Ron grab Mundungus by his shoulder and throw him in a chair, their wands still pointed at him. Hermione and I just kind of stand back and watch.

"Where is the locket?" Harry demands.

"Locket?" Mundungus asks, still very freaked out about being captured by a couple of house elves.

"The locket, yes. We need that locket." Then Mundungus tells the story of how he sold it to some lady from the Ministry wearing all pink. My eyes land on the Daily Prophet from this month. Umbridge is on the cover. Pink. Woman: Umbridge.

"Was it this woman?" I interrupt, showing Mundungus the Daily Prophet.

"Yes, that's her!" He says, taking the newspaper. "I sold it to her." We say goodbye to Mundungus and have the house elves take him away.

"So what's our next move then?" We all look to Harry.

"Well, we have to get the locket...so..." He trails off.  

"You can't be serious, Harry," Hermione says nervously.  

"What other choice have we got, Hermione?" Harry asks and I gulp. "We're going to have to sneak into the Ministry and steal it..." Silence falls over us.  

"Hermione, have you got that any of that Polyjuice Potion left?" I ask and Hermione nods. We look to Harry again to see he's in deep thought.  

"Alright," he says finally, "here's the plan..."