"Scratch that, this is not a moment it's the movement." - My Shot, Hamilton
As August wears on, the square of unkempt grass in the middle of Grimmauld PLace shrivels in the sun until it is brittle and brown. The inhabitants of nunber twelve are never seen by anybody in the surrounding houses, and nor is number twelve itself. The Muggles who live in Grimmauld Place have long since accepted the amusing mistake in the numbering that had caused number eleven to sit beside nunber thirteen.
And yet the square is now attracting visitors who seem to find the anomaly most intriguing. Barely a day apsses without one or two people arriving in Grimmauld Place with no other purpose, or so it seems, than to lean against the railings facing nubers eleven and thirteen, watching the join between the two houses. The lurkers are never the same two days running, although they all seem to share a dislike for normal clothing. Most of the Londoners who pass them are used to eccentric dressers and take little notice, though occasionally one of them most glance back, wondering why anyone would wear such long cloaks in this heat.
The watchers seem to be gleaning little satisifaction from their vigil. Occasionaly one of the starts forward excitedly, as if they've seen something interesting at last, only to fall back looking disappointed.
On the first day of September there are more people lurking in the square than ever before. Half a dozen men in long cloaks stand silent and watchful, gazing as ever at houses eleven and thirteen, but the thing for which they are waiting still appears elusive. Meanwhile, within number twelve, Ron, Hermione, and I are flitting through various hand sketched maps, loudly discussing our next course of action. Dad and Sirius are on one of their regular trips to the Burrow, as to not arouse suspicion.
The kitchen is almost unrecognizable. Every surface now shines: Copper pots and pans have been burnished to a rosy glow; the wooden tabletop gleams; the goblets and plates already laid for dinner glint int he light from a merrily blazing fire, on which a cauldron is simmering. Nothing in the rom, however, is more dramatically changed than the house-elf, Kreacher.
As I scan one of the maps, we hear the low drawl of"Severus Snape?" from above, signalling Harry's return. A few moments later he appears in the kitchen, and calls out. "I'ved got news, and you won't like it."
Kreacher comes hurrying towards him before anyone can respond, dressed in a snowy-white towel, his ear hair as clean and fluffy as cotton wool, Regulus' locket bounding on his thin chest.
"Shoes off, if you please, Master Harry, and hands watched before dinner," he croaks, seizing the Invisbility Claok and slouching off to hang it on a hook on the wall, beside a number of old-fashioned robes that have been freshly laundered.
"What's happened?" Ron asks apprehensively. Harry strides towards us and throws down a newspaper beside the chessboard, where the picture of a familar, hook-nosed, black-haired man stares up at us all, beneath a headline which reads:
SEVERUS SNAPE CONFIRMED AS HOGWARTS HEADMASTER
"No!" We all cry loudly, outraged.
Hermione is the quickest; she snatches up the newspaper and begins to read the accompanying story out loud.
"'Severus Snape, long-standing Potions master as Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, was today appointed headmaster in the most important of several staffing changes made at the ancient school. Following the resignation of the previous Muggle Studies teacer, Alecto Carroe will take over the post while her brother, Amycus, fills the position of Defense Against the Dark Arts professor.
"'I welcome the oppurtunity to uphold our finest wizarding traditions ands values --' Like committing murder and cutting off people's ears, I suppose! Snape, headmaster! Snape in Dumbledore's study -- Merlin's pants!" she shrieks, making us all jump. She leaps from the table and hurtles from the room, shouting as she goes, "I'll be back in a minute!"
"'Merlins' pants?'" Ron repeats, looking amused. "She must be upset." He pulls the newspaper towards him and puruses the article about Snape.
"The other teachers won't stand for this. McGonagall and Flitch and Sprout all know the truth, they know how Dumbledore died. They won't accept Snape as headmaster. And who are these Carrows?"
"Death Eaters," I say. "There are pictures of them inside. They were at the top of the tower when Dumbledore died, so it's all friends together. And," I go on bitterly, as Harry pulls up a chair, "I can't see that the others teachers have got much of a choice but to stay. If the Ministry and Voldemort are behind Snape it'll be a choice between staying and teaching, or a nice few years in Azkaban -- and that's if they're lucky. I reckon they'll stay to try and protect the students."
Kreacher comes bustling to the table with a large tureen in his hands, and ladles out some coup into pristine bowls, whistling between his teeth as he does so.
"Thanks, Kreacher," Harry says, as I flip over the Prophet so as not to have to look at Snape's face any longer. "Well, at least we know where Snape is now."
I begin to spoon soup inot my mouth: The quality of Kreacher's cooking has improved dramatically ever since he was given Regulus' locket: Today's French onion is as good as I've ever tasted."
"There are still a load of Death Eaters watching the house," Harry tells us as we eat, "more than usual. It's like they're hoping we'll march out carrying our school trunks and head off for the Hogwarts Express."
Ron glances at his watch.
"I've been thinking about that all day. It left nearly six hours ago. Weird, not being on it, isn't it?"
In my mind's eye I seem to see the scarlet steam engine as Ron, Harry, and I had once followed it in th air, shimmering between fields and hills, a rippling scarlet caterpiller. I'm sure Ginny, Neville, and Luna are sitting together at this moment, perhaps wondering where we are, or debating how best to undermine Snape's new regime. The vision changes, and I see Draco, Blaise, Pansy, Crabbe, and Goyle in their compartment, preparing for a year which will surely be breezy for them.
"They nearly saw me coming back in just now," Harry says. "I landed badly on the top step and the Cloak slipped."
"I do that every time. Oh, here she is," Ron adds, craning around in his seat to watch Hermione reenetering the kitchen. "And what in the name of Merlin's most baggy Y Fronts was that about?"
"I remembered this," Hermione pants.
She is carrying a large, framed picture, which she now lowers to the floor before seizing her small, beaded bag from the kitchen sideboard. Opening it, she proceeds to force the painting inside, and despite the fact that it is patently too large to fit inside the tiny bag, within a few seconds it has vanished, like so much else, into the bag's capacious depths.
"Phineas Nigellus," Hermione explains, as she throws the bag into the kitchen table with the usual, sonorous, clanking crash.
"Sorry?" asks Ron, but the rest of us seem to understand. The painted image of Phineas Nigellus Black is able to flit between his portrait in Grimmauld PLace and the one that hangs in the headmaster's office at Hogwarts: the circular tower-trop room where Snape is no doubt sitting right now, in triumphant possession of Dumbledore's treasures.
"Great thinking, Hermione," Ron says, looking impressed.
"Thank you," Hermione smiles, pulling her soup towards her. "So, Harry, what else happened today?"
"Nothing," says Harry. "Watched the Ministry entrance for seven hours. No sign of her. Saw your dad, though, Ron. He looks fine."
Ron nods in appreciation of this news. We've agreed that it is far too dangerous to try and commincate with Mr Weasley while he walks in and out of the Ministry, because he is always surrounded by other Ministry workers. It is, however, reassuring to catch glimpses of him, even if he did look very strained and anxious.
"Dad always told us most Ministry people use the Floo Network to get to work," Ron says. "That's why we haven't seen Umbridge, she'd never walk, she'd think she's too important."
"And what about that funny old witch and that little wizard in the navy robes?" I ask.
"Oh yeah, the bloke from Magical Maintenance" says Ron.
"How do you know he works for Magical Maintenace?" Hermione asks, her soupspoon suspended in midair.
"Dad said everyone from Magical Maintenance wears navy blue robes."
"But you never told us that!"
Hermione drops her spoon and pulls towards her the sheaf of maps and notes she was examining earlier.
"There's nothing in here about navy blue robes, nothing!" she says, flipping feverishly through the pages.
"Well, does it really matter?"
"Ron, it all matters! If we're going to get into the Ministry and not give ourselves away when they're bound to be on the lookout for intruders, every little detail matters! We've been over and over this, I mean, what's the point of all thse reconnaissance trips if you aren't even bothering to tell us --"
"Blimey, Hermione, I forgot one little thing -"
"You do realize, don't you, that there's probably no more dangerous place in the whole world for us to be right now than the Ministry of --"
"I think we should do it tomorrow," I say.
Hermione stops dead, her jaw hanging: Ron chokes on his soup.
"Tomorrow?" Hermione repeats. "You aren't serious, Haylee?"
"No, I agree," Harry says, nodding. "I don't think we're going to be much better prepared than we are now even if we skulk around the Ministry entrance for another month. The longer we put it off, the farther away that locket could be. There's already a good chance Umbridge has chucked it away; the thing doesn't open."
"Unless," says Ron, "she's found a way of opening it and she's now possessed."
"Wouldn't matter," I say dismissively, "she's already evil."
Hermione is biting her lip, deep in thought.
"We know everything important," I continue, addressing Hermione. "We know they've stopped Apparition in and out of the Ministry. We know only the most senior Ministry members are allowed to connect their homes to the Floo Network now, because Ron heard those two Unspeakables complaining about it. And we know roughly where Umbridge's office is, because of what you heard that bearded bloke saying to his mate --"
"'I'll be up on level one, Delores wants to see me,'" Hermione recites immediately.
"Exactly," says Harry. "And we know you get in using those funny coins, or tokens, or whatever they are, because I saw that witch borrowing one from her friend --"
"But we haven't got any!"
"If the plan works, we will have," Harry continues calmly.
"I don't know, Harry and Haylee, I don't know...There are an awful lot of things that could go weong, so much relies on chance..."
"That'll be true even if we spend another three months preparing," I say. "It's time to act."
I can from their faces that they're all scared; I'm not particularly confident myself, but I'm sure the time has come to put our plan into operation.
We've spent the previous four weeks taking it in turns to don the Invisibility Cloak and spy on the official entrance to the Ministry, which Ron, thanks to Mr Weasley, has known about since childhood. We've tailed Ministry workers on their way in, eavesdropped on their conversations, and learned by carefuly observation which of them can be relied upon to appear, alone, at the same time everyday. Occasionally there was a chance to sneak a Daily Prophet out of someone's briefcase. Slowly, we've built up sketchy maps and notes now stacked in front of Hermione.
"All right," says Ron slowly, "let's say we go for it tomorrow...I think it should just be me, Harry, and Haylee."
"Oh, don't start that again!" Hermione sighs."I thought we'd settled this."
"It's one thing hanging around the entrances under the Cloak, but this is different, Hermione." Ron gabs a finger at a copy of the Daily Prophet dated ten days ago. "You're on the list of Muggle-borns who didn't present themselves for interrogation!"
"And you're supposed to be dying of spattergroit at the Burrow! If anyone shouldn't go, it's Harry and Haylee, they've got a ten-thousand-Galleon price on their heads --"
"Oh yeah, we'll stay here," I stay. "Let us know if you ever defeat Voldemort, won't you?"
As Ron and Hermione laugh, pain shoots through the scar on my forehead. I resist the urge to flinch, but across the table I see Harry's hand jump to his head, and then Hermione's eyes narrow. He tries to pass off the movement by brushing his hair aside, but I can tell she's not convinced.
"Well, if all three of us go, we'll have to Disapparate separately," Ron is saying. "We can't all fit under the Cloak anymore."
My scar is becoming more and more painful. Across the table, Harry stands up. At once, Kreacher hurries forward.
"Master has not finished his soup, would Master prefer the savory strew, or else the treacle tart to which Master is so partial?"
"Thanks, Kreacher, but I'll be back in a minute -- er -- bathroom."
Harry hurries up the stairs, followed by Hermione's suspisious gaze: suddenly feeling nausous from the pain, I too rise. "Harry said he felt sick earlier, I'lll just got an - um - check on him."
I hurtle up the stairs after him to the hall and then to the first landing: the nearest bathroom is bolted shut, so I continue down the hallway, barely making it to the drawing room before I slump over in pain, squeesing my eyes shut.
I'm glidihng along a twilit street. The buildings on either side of me have high, timbered gables; they look like gingerbread houses.
I approach one of them, then see the whiteness of my own long-fingered hand against the door. I knocn. I feel a mounting excitement...
The door opens: A laughing woman stands there. Her face falls as she looks into my face: humour gone, terror replacing it....
"Gregorovitch?" says a high, cold voice.
She shakes her head: She is trying to close the door. A white hand holds it steady, preventing her shutting me out...
"I want Gregorovitch."
"Er wohnt hier nicht mehr!" she cries, shaking her head. "He no live here! He no live here! I know him not!"
Abandoning the attempt to close the door, she begins to back away down the dark hall, and I follow, gliding towards her, and my long-fingered hand has drawn my wand.
"Where is he?"
"Das weiß ich nicht! He move! I know not, I know not!"
I raise my wand. She screams. Two young children come running into the hall. She tries to sheild them with her arms There is a flash of green light --
"Harry! HARRY!"
I open my eyes: I've sunk to the floor. Down the hall, Hermione is pounding on the bathroom door, yelling at Harry to open up. He must have shouted out, I know it. Shaking, I pull myself up onto a chair and hold my head in my heads for a moment, vaguely hearing Harry, Hermione, and Ron bickering as their footsteps draw closer.
"See!" Hermione cries, as they burst into the drawing room. "Haylee's seen it, too! Don't insult our intelligence. We know your scars hurt, and you're both white as a sheet."
Harry sits down beside me.
"Fine. We've just seen Voldemort murdering a woman. By now he's probably killed her whole family. And he didn't need to. It was Cedric all over again, they were just there..."
"You aren't supposed to let this happen anymore!" Hermione cries. "Dumbledore wanted you to use Occlumency! He thought the connection was dangerous -- Voldemort can use it, Harry and Haylee! What good is it to watch him kill and torture, how can it help?"
"Because it means we know what he's doing?" Harry says.
"So you're not even going to try to shut him out?"
"Hermione, we can't. You know we're both shit at Occlumency, we never got the hang of it."
"You never really tried!" she says hotly. "I don't get it -- do you like having this special connection or relationship or -- "
"Like it?" I interject hotly. "Would you like it?"
"I -- no -- I'm sorry, Haylee, I didn't mean --"
"The connection got Taylor killed," I say, furious. "My boyfriend spent all of last year trying to exploit it, I hate it, Hermione. I hate the fact that he can get to us, that we have to watch him when he's most dangerous. But we're going to use it."
"Dumbledore --"
"Forget Dumbledore," Harry says. "This is our choice, nobody elses. We want to know why he's after Gregorovitch."
"Who?"
"He's a foreign wandmaker," Harry explains, for I'm still too angry to reply. "He made Krum's wand and Krum reckons he's brillant."
"But according to you," says Ron, "Voldemort's already got Ollivander locked up somewhere. If he's already got a wandmaker, what does he need another one for?"
"Maybe he agrees with Krum, maybe he thinks Gregorovitch is better...or else he thinks Gregorovitch will be able to explain what my wand did when he was chasing me, because Ollivander didn't know."
"Harry, you --"
"Just drop it," I say quickly. "Doesn't matter right now. If we're going to the Ministry tomorrow, don't you reckon we should go over the plan?"
Reluctantly, Hermione lets the matter rest, though I'm quite sure that she will attack again at the first oppurtunity. In the meantime, we return to the basement kitchen, where Kreacher serves ud all stew and treacle tart.
We do not get to bed until late, having spent hours going over and over our plan until we can recite it, word perfect, to each other. When we finally go to bed, I lay in my bed with my wandlight trained on the old photograph within the phoenix locket, watching the two young men aimlessly as I mutter the plan to myself for another ten minutes. As I extiniguish my wand, however, I'm not thinking of Polyjuice Potion, Puking Pastilles, or the navy blue robes of Magical Maintenance; I think of Gregorovitch the wandmaker, and how long Harry and I can hope to remain hidden while Voldemort seeks us to determindedly.
I dream of the blonde haired boys from the locket; one, with his twinkling blue eyes and famillar smile, and the other with a devlish, mysterious aura about him. Dawn seems to follow midnight with indecent haste.
"You look terrible," is Ron's greeting when he and Harry enter my room to wake me.
"I had the weirdest dream," I say, yawning. "I think Dumbledore was in it? Doesn't matter."
We find Hermione downstairs in the kitchen. She is being served coffee and hot rolls by Kreacher and wearing the slightly manic expression that I associate with exam review.
"Robes," she says under her breath, acknowleding our presence with a nervous nod and continug to poke around in her beaded bag, "Polyjuice Potion...Invisibility Cloak...Decoy Detonators...You should each take a couple just in case...Puking Pastilles, Nosebleed Nougat, Extendable Ears..."
"Dad and Sirius still aren't back?" I ask Kreacher, who shakes his head. "Good," I add, turning back to Harry and Ron. "You know they'd try to talk us out of it, and Hermione would probably listen."
We gulp down our breakfast, then set off upstairs, Kreacher bowing us out and promising to have a steak-and-kidney pie ready for us when we return.
"Bless him," says Ron fondly, "and whe you think I used to fanctasize about cutting his head off and sticking it on the wall."
We make our way onto the front step with immense caution: We can see a couple of puffy-eyed Death Eaters watching the house from across the misty square.
Hermione Disapparated with Ron first, then came back for Harry, and finally me.
After the usual brief spell of darkness and near suffocation, I find myself in the tiny alleyway where the first phase of our plan is scheduled to take place. It is as yet deserted, except for a couple of large bins; the first Ministry workers don't usually appear here until at least eight o'clock.
"Right then," says Hermione, checking her watch. "She ought to be here in about five minutes."
"Hermione, we know," says Ron sternly. "And I thought we were supposed to open the door before she got here?"
Hermione squeals.
"I nearly forgot! Stand back --"
She points her wand at the padlocked and heavily graffitied fire door beside us, which bursts open with a crash. The dark corridor behind it leads, as we know from our careful scouting trips, into an empty theater. Hermione pulls the door back towards her, to make it look as though it is still closed.
"And now," she says, turning back to face us, "we put on the Cloak again..."
"-- and we wait," Ron finishes, throwing it over Hermione's head like a blanket over a birdcage and rolling his eyes.
Little more than a minute later, there is a tiny pop and a little Ministry witch with flyaway gray hair Apparates feet from us, blinking a little in the sudden brightness; the sun has just come out from behind a cloud. She barely has time to enjoy the unexpected warmth, however, before Hermione's silent Stunning Spell hits her in the chest and she topples over.
"Nicely done, Hermione," says Ron, emerging from behind a bin beside the theater door as Harry takes off the Invisbility Cloak. Together they carry the little witch into the dark passageway that leads backstage. Hermione plucks a few hairs from the witches head and adds them to a flash of muddy Polyjuice Potion she's taken from the beaded bag. Ron is rummaging through the little witch's handbag.
"She's Mafalda Hopkirk," he says, reading a small card that idenitifes our vistim as an assistant in the Improper Use of Magic Office. "You'd better take this, Hermione, and here are the tokens."
He passes her seeral small golden coins, all embossed with the letters M.O.M, which he has taken from the witch's purse.
Hermione drinks the Polyjuice Potion, which is now a pleasant heliotrope colour, and within seconds stands before us the double of Mathalda Hopkirk. As she removes Mafalda's spectacles and puts them on, I check my watch.
"We're running late, Mr. Magical Maintenance will be here any second."
We hurry to close the door on the real Mafalda; Harry, Ron, and I throw the Invisibility Cloak over ourselves but Hermione remains in view, waiting. Seconds later there is another pop, and a small, ferrety-looking wizard appears before us.
"Oh, hello, Mafalda."
"Hello!" says Hermione in a quavery voice. "How are you today?"
"Not so good, actually," replies the little wizard, who looks thoroughly downcast.
As Hermione and the wizard head for the main road, Harry, Ron and I creep along behind them.
"I'm sorry to hear you're under the weather," says Hermione, talking firmly over the little wizard as he tries to expand upon his problems; it is essential to stop him from reaching the street. "Here, have a sweet?"
"Eh? Oh, no thanks --"
"I insist!" says Hermione aggressively, shaking the bag of pastilles in his face. Looking rather alarmed, the little wizard takes one.
The effect is instantaneous. The moment the pastille touches his tongue, the little wizard starts vomiting so hard that he does not even notice as Hermione yanks a handful of hairs from the top of his head.
"Oh dear!" she says, as he splatters the alley with sick. "Perhaps you'd better take the day off!"
"No -- no!" He chokes and retches, trying to continue on his way despite being unable to walk straight. "I must -- today -- must got --"
"But that's just silly!" says Hermione, alarmed. "You can't go to work in this state -- I think you ought to go to St. Mungo's and get them to sort you out!"
The wizard has collapsed, heaving, onto all fours, still trying to crawl toward the main street.
"You simply can't go to work like this!" Hermione cries.
At last he seems to accept the turht of her words. Using a repulsed Hermione to claw his way back into a standing position, he turns on the spot and vanishes, leaving nothing behind but the bag Ron had snatched from his hand as he went and some flying chunks of vomit.
"Urgh," says Hermione, holding up the skirts of her robe to avoid the puddles of sick. "It would have made much less mess to Stun him too."
"Yeah," says Ron, emerging from under the cloak holding the wizard's bag, "but I still think a whole pile of unconscious bodies would have drawn more attention. Keen on his job, though, isn't he? Chuck us the hair and the potion, then."
Within two minutes, Ron stands before us, as small andn ferrety as the sick wizard, and wearing the navy blue robes that had been folded in his bag.
"Weird he wasn't wearing them today, wasn't it, seeing how much he wanted to go? Anyway, I'm Reg Cattermole, according to the label in the back."
"You two stay under the Cloak," Hermione says, checking her watch once more. "She should be here any minute..."
Sure enough, less than a minute later there is another tiny pop and another Ministry witch appears before us, tall and clad in intimidating leader robes. Her blonde hair shines in the sun, and she smooths out her robes for a moment before her gaze falls upon Hermione and Ron; she looks them up and down.
"Oh, hello --"
Her words fade away as Hermione's silent Stunning Spell hits her in the chest and she too topples over.
"Nice," I say, emerging from the Cloak as Harry and Ron carry her into the dark passageway, placing her beside the Stunned body of Mafalda. While Hermione prepares the Polyjuice Potion, I rummage through her purse, pulling out her identification card.
I almost choke when I read this. "Fuck, this is Eurydice Jensen."
"Who?" Ron asks, screwing up his nose.
"Tessa's mother, I've never seen her before -- she's a Death Eater!"
"What do we do --?"
"Nothing," Hermione says quickly, shoving the Polyjuice Potion into my hand. "It's too late now."
Although I loath the thought of posing as a Death Eater, I drink the Potion, which is now a unfortunate purplish-black colour, and tastes horribly bitter. A few seconds later, I'm the double of Eurydice Jensen; taller than Reg Cattemole, with a stylish blonde bob, and piercing blue eyes. Worst of all, burned upon my forearm is the Dark Mark, reminding me horribly of my dream last year.
"We're running out of time," I say quickly, removing Jensen's leather cloak and putting it on. "Harry and I will stay here, you two go and grab some more hair."
We have to wait ten minutes, but it seems much longer for us; sulking in the sick-splattered alleyway beside the door concealing the Stunned Mafalda and Jense. Finally Ron ans Hermione reppaear.
"We don't know who he is," says Hermione, passing Harry several curly black hairs, "but he's gone home with a dreadful nosebleed! Here, hes pretty tall, you'll need bigger robes..."
She pulls out a set of the old robes Kreacher laundered for us, and Harry retires to take the potion and change.
When he returns, he is more than six feet tall, and is powerfully built with well-muscled arms. He also has a beard.
"Blimey, that's scary," Ron says as we look up at him.
"Take one of Mafalda's tokens," Hermione tells him, "and let's go, it's nearly time."
We step out of the alleyway together. Fifty yards along the crowded pavement there is spiked black railings flanking two flights of steps, one labelled GENTLEMEN, and the other LADIES.
"See you in a moment, then," I say nervously, as Hermione and I totter off down the steps to LADIES. We join a number of oddly dressed women descending into what appears to be an ordinary underground public toilet, tiled in grimy black and white.
"Good morning, Maflada!" calls another young Witch, as she lets herself into a cuicle by inserting her golden token into a slot in the door. "Very troublesome all this, isn't it? Who're they expecting to show up, Harry and Haylee Potter?"
Hermione laughs nervously. "Silly, isn't it?"
And she and I let ourselves into adjoining cubicles.
To my left and right comes thr eounds of flushing. I crouch down and peer through the gap at the bottom of the cucicle, just in time to see a pair of booted feet climbing into the toilet next door. I look left and see Hermione staring at me.
"We have to flush ourselves in?" I whisper.
"Looks like it."
We both stand up. Feeling exceptionally foolish, I clamber into the toilet.
I know at once that I've done the right thing; though I appear to be standing water, my shoes, feet, and robes remain quite dry. I reach up, pull the chain, and the next moment I'm zooming down a short chute, emerging out of a fireplace into the Ministry of Magic.
I get up clumsily; there's a lot more of my body than I'm used to. The great Atrium seems darker than I remember it. Previously a golden fountain had filedthe center of the hall, casting shimmering spots of light over the polished woden floor and walls. Now a gigantic statue of black stone dominates the scene. It is rather frightening, this vast sculpture of a witch and a wizard sitting on ornately carved thrones, looking down at the Ministry workers toppling out of fireplaces below them. Engraced in foot-high letters at the base of the statue are the words MAGIC IS MIGHT.
I see a wispy little witch and the ferrety wizard from Magical Maintenance standing by the statue, and when I begin crossing the floor to reach them, witches and wizards begin virtually leaping out of my way: it seems ordinary Ministry workers are rightfully terrified of the Death Eaters.
"You got in all right?" Hermuone whispers, as Harry joins us.
"No, they're still stuck in the bog," says Ron.
"Oh, very funny...It's horrible, isn't it?" she adds, in reference to the statue. "Have you seen what they're sitting on?"
I look more closely and realize what what I thought was decoratively carved thrones are actually mounds of carved humans; hundreds and hundreds of naked bodies, men, women, and children, all with rather stupid, ugl faces, twisted, and pressed together to support thr weight of the handsomely robed wizards.
"Muggles," Hermione whispers. "In their rightful place. Come on, let's get going."
We join the stream of witches and wizards moving toward the golden gates at the end of the hall, looking around as surreptieously as possible, but there is no sign of the dinstinctive figure of Delores Umbridge. We pass through the gates and into a smaller hall, where queues are forming in front of twenty golden grilles housing as many lifts. We've barely joined the nearest one when a voice says, "Cattermole!"
We look around: my stomach turns over. One of the Death Eaters who had witnessed Dumbledore's death is striding towards us. The Ministry workers beside us fall silent, their eyes downcast; I can feel fear rippling through them. The man's scowling, slightly british face is somehow at odds with the magnificent, sweeping robes, which are embroidered with much gold thread. Someone in the crowd around the lifts sycophantically calls, "Morning, Yaxley!" Yaxley ignores them.
"I requested somebody from Magical Maintenance to sort out my office, Catermole. It's still raining in there."
Ron looks around as though hoping somebody else would intervene, but nobody speaks.
"Raining...in your office? That's -- that's not good, is it?"
Ron gives a nervous laugh. Yaxley's eyes widen.
"You think it's funny, Cattermole, do you?"
A pair of witches break away from the queue for the lift and bustle off.
"No," says Ron, "no, of course --"
"You realize that I am on my way downstairs to interrogate your wife, Cattermole? In fact, I'm quite suprised you're not down there holding her hand while she waits. Already given her up as a bad job, have you? Probably wise. Be sure and marry pureblood next time."
Hermione has let out a little squeak of horror. Yaxley looks at her. I chuckle, trying to disguise her.
"I -- I --" Ron stammers.
"But if my wife were accused of being a Mudblood," says Yaxley, "-- that that any woman I married would ever be mistaken for such filth -- and the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement needed a job doing, I would make it my prioirty to do that job, Cattermole. Do you understand me?"
"Yes," Ron whispers.
"Then attend to it, Cattermole, and if my office is not ocmpletely dry within an hour, your wife's Blood Status will be in even graver doubt than it is now."
The golden grille before us clatters open. With a nod and unpleassant smile to Harru and I, as we are evidently expected to appreciate this treatment of Cattermole, Yaxley sweeps towards another life. Harry, Ron, Hermione, and I enter ours, but nobody follows us; It is as if we're infectious. The grilles shut with a clang and the lift begins to move upward.
"What am I doing to do?" Ron asks us at once: he looks striken. "If I don't turn up, my wife -- I mean, Cattermole's wife --"
"We'll come with you, we should stick together --" begins Harry, but Ron shakes his head feverishly.
"That's mental, we haven't got much time. You three find Umbridge, I'll go and sort out Yaxley's office -- but how do I stop it raining?"
"Try Finite Incantatem," says Hermione at once, "that should stop the rain if it's a hex or a curse; if it doesn't, something's gone wrong with an Atmsopheric Charm, which will be more difficult to fix, so as an interim measure try Impervius to protect his belongs --"
"Say it again, slowly --" says Ron, searching his pockets desperatedly for a quill, but at this moment the lift judders to a halt.
A disembodied female voice says, "Level four, Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, incorporating Beast, Being, and Spirit Visions, Goblin Liaison Office, and Pest Advisroy Bureau," and thr grilles slide open again, admitting a couple of wizards and several pale violet paper airplances that flutter around the lamp in the ceiling of the lift.
"Morning, Albert," says a bushily whiskered man, smiling at Harry. Hermione is now whispering frantic instructions to Ron; the best we can do is distract the others from noticing. The wizard leans forward, leering, and mutters something slyly to Harry which I do not manage to hear.
When he pulls away, he winks: I get the impression that Albert is an indimidating figure; perhaps not a Death Eater, but nevertheless respected.
"Oh, I didn't see you there, Eurydice," the whiskered man then chimes, with another smile, "morning."
I flash a small smile and nod my head, trying my hardest to envision how Tessa's mother might act. "Good morning," I say coolly, in a voice which is not my own.
"I was terribly sorry to hear about your daughter," he adds. "How horrible."
"My daughter --?"
Hermione kicks my ankle from behind, and I stop, right as the lift stops once more, and the grilles open. "Level two, Department of Magical Law Enforcement, including the Improper Use of Magic Office, Auror Headquarters, and Wizengamot Adminstrative Services."
"Thank you," I say quickly, regaining my composure, as he leaves the lift with the other wizards: I see Hermione give Ron a little push, and he hurries after them.
The moment the golden door has closed, Hermione says, very fast, "Actually, Harry and Haylee, I think I'd better go after him, I don't think he knows what hes doing and if he gets caught the whole thing --"
"Level one, Minister of Magic and Support Staff."
The golden grilles slide apart and Hermione gasps. Four people stand before us, two of them in deep conversation; a long-haired wizard wearing magnificent robes of black and gold, and a squat, toadlike witch wearing a velvet bow in her short hair and clutching a clipboard to her chest.