Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (100 page)

‘So, you smashed my prophecy?’ said Voldemort softly, staring at Harry with those pitiless red eyes. ‘No, Bella, he is not lying … I see the truth looking at me from within his worthless mind … months of preparation, months of effort … and my Death Eaters have let Harry Potter thwart me again …’

‘Master, I am sorry, I knew not, I was fighting the Animagus Black!’ sobbed Bellatrix, flinging herself down at Voldemort’s feet as he paced slowly nearer. ‘Master, you should know –’

‘Be quiet, Bella,’ said Voldemort dangerously. ‘I shall deal with you in a moment. Do you think I have entered the Ministry of Magic to hear your snivelling apologies?’

‘But Master – he is here – he is below –’

Voldemort paid no attention.

‘I have nothing more to say to you, Potter,’ he said quietly. ‘You have irked me too often, for too long.
AVADA KEDAVRA!
’

Harry had not even opened his mouth to resist; his mind was blank, his wand pointing uselessly at the floor.

But the headless golden statue of the wizard in the fountain had sprung alive, leaping from its plinth to land with a crash on the floor between Harry and Voldemort. The spell merely glanced off its chest as the statue flung out its arms to protect Harry.

‘What –?’ cried Voldemort, staring around. And then he breathed,
‘Dumbledore!’

Harry looked behind him, his heart pounding. Dumbledore was standing in front of the golden gates.

Voldemort raised his wand and another jet of green light streaked at Dumbledore, who turned and was gone in a whirling of his cloak. Next second, he had reappeared behind Voldemort and waved his wand towards the remnants of the fountain. The other statues sprang to life. The statue of the witch ran at Bellatrix, who screamed and sent spells streaming uselessly off its chest, before it dived at her, pinning her to the floor. Meanwhile, the goblin and the house-elf scuttled towards the fireplaces set along the wall and the one-armed centaur galloped at Voldemort, who vanished and reappeared beside the pool. The headless statue thrust Harry backwards, away from the fight, as Dumbledore advanced on Voldemort and the golden centaur cantered around them both.

‘It was foolish to come here tonight, Tom,’ said Dumbledore calmly. ‘The Aurors are on their way –’

‘By which time I shall be gone, and you will be dead!’ spat Voldemort. He sent another killing curse at Dumbledore but missed, instead hitting the security guard’s desk, which burst into flame.

Dumbledore flicked his own wand: the force of the spell that emanated from it was such that Harry, though shielded by his golden guard, felt his hair stand on end as it passed and this time Voldemort was forced to conjure a shining silver shield out of thin air to deflect it. The spell, whatever it was, caused no visible damage to the shield, though a deep, gong-like note reverberated from it – an oddly chilling sound.

‘You do not seek to kill me, Dumbledore?’ called Voldemort, his scarlet eyes narrowed over the top of the shield. ‘Above such brutality, are you?’

‘We both know that there are other ways of destroying a man, Tom,’ Dumbledore said calmly, continuing to walk towards Voldemort as though he had not a fear in the world, as though nothing had happened to interrupt his stroll up the hall. ‘Merely taking your life would not satisfy me, I admit –’

‘There is nothing worse than death, Dumbledore!’ snarled Voldemort.

‘You are quite wrong,’ said Dumbledore, still closing in upon Voldemort and speaking as lightly as though they were discussing the matter over drinks. Harry felt scared to see him walking along, undefended, shieldless; he wanted to cry out a warning, but his headless guard kept shunting him backwards towards the wall, blocking his every attempt to get out from behind it. ‘Indeed, your failure to understand that there are things much worse than death has always been your greatest weakness –’

Another jet of green light flew from behind the silver shield. This time it was the one-armed centaur, galloping in front of Dumbledore, that took the blast and shattered into a hundred pieces, but before the fragments had even hit the floor, Dumbledore had drawn back his wand and waved it as though brandishing a whip. A long thin flame flew from the tip; it wrapped itself around Voldemort, shield and all. For a moment, it seemed Dumbledore had won, but then the fiery rope became a serpent, which relinquished its hold on Voldemort at once and turned, hissing furiously, to face Dumbledore.

Voldemort vanished; the snake reared from the floor, ready to strike –

There was a burst of flame in midair above Dumbledore just as Voldemort reappeared, standing on the plinth in the middle of the pool where so recently the five statues had stood.

‘Look out!’
Harry yelled.

But even as he shouted, another jet of green light flew at Dumbledore from Voldemort’s wand and the snake struck –

Fawkes swooped down in front of Dumbledore, opened his beak wide and swallowed the jet of green light whole: he burst into flame and fell to the floor, small, wrinkled and flightless. At the same moment, Dumbledore brandished his wand in one long, fluid movement – the snake, which had been an instant from sinking its fangs into him, flew high into the air and vanished in a wisp of dark smoke; and the water in the pool rose up and covered Voldemort like a cocoon of molten glass.

For a few seconds Voldemort was visible only as a dark, rippling, faceless figure, shimmering and indistinct upon the plinth, clearly struggling to throw off the suffocating mass –

Then he was gone and the water fell with a crash back into its pool, slopping wildly over the sides, drenching the polished floor.

‘MASTER!’ screamed Bellatrix.

Sure it was over, sure Voldemort had decided to flee, Harry made to run out from behind his statue guard, but Dumbledore bellowed: ‘Stay where you are, Harry!’

For the first time, Dumbledore sounded frightened. Harry could not see why: the hall was quite empty but for themselves, the sobbing Bellatrix still trapped under the witch statue, and the baby phoenix Fawkes croaking feebly on the floor –

Then Harry’s scar burst open and he knew he was dead: it was pain beyond imagining, pain past endurance –

He was gone from the hall, he was locked in the coils of a creature with red eyes, so tightly bound that Harry did not know where his body ended and the creature’s began: they were fused together, bound by pain, and there was no escape –

And when the creature spoke, it used Harry’s mouth, so that in his agony he felt his jaw move …

‘Kill me now, Dumbledore …’

Blinded and dying, every part of him screaming for release, Harry felt the creature use him again …

‘If death is nothing, Dumbledore, kill the boy …’

Let the pain stop, thought Harry … let him kill us … end it, Dumbledore … death is nothing compared to this …

And I’ll see Sirius again …

And as Harry’s heart filled with emotion, the creature’s coils loosened, the pain was gone; Harry was lying face down on the floor, his glasses gone, shivering as though he lay upon ice, not wood …

And there were voices echoing through the hall, more voices than there should have been … Harry opened his eyes, saw his glasses lying by the heel of the headless statue that had been guarding him, but which now lay flat on its back, cracked and immobile. He put them on and raised his head a little to find Dumbledore’s crooked nose inches from his own.

‘Are you all right, Harry?’

‘Yes,’ said Harry, shaking so violently he could not hold his head up properly. ‘Yeah, I’m – where’s Voldemort, where – who are all these – what’s –’

The Atrium was full of people; the floor was reflecting the emerald green flames that had burst into life in all the fireplaces along one wall; and streams of witches and wizards were emerging from them. As Dumbledore pulled him back to his feet, Harry saw the tiny gold statues of the house-elf and the goblin, leading a stunned-looking Cornelius Fudge forward.

‘He was there!’ shouted a scarlet-robed man with a ponytail, who was pointing at a pile of golden rubble on the other side of the hall, where Bellatrix had lain trapped only moments before. ‘I saw him, Mr Fudge, I swear it was You-Know-Who, he grabbed a woman and Disapparated!’

‘I know, Williamson, I know, I saw him too!’ gibbered Fudge, who was wearing pyjamas under his pinstriped cloak and was gasping as though he had just run miles. ‘Merlin’s beard – here –
here!
– in the Ministry of Magic! – great heavens above – it doesn’t seem possible – my word – how can this be –?’

‘If you proceed downstairs into the Department of Mysteries, Cornelius,’ said Dumbledore – apparently satisfied that Harry was all right, and walking forwards so that the newcomers realised he was there for the first time (a few of them raised their wands; others simply looked amazed; the statues of the elf and goblin applauded and Fudge jumped so much that his slipper-clad feet left the floor) – ‘you will find several escaped Death Eaters contained in the Death Chamber, bound by an Anti-Disapparition Jinx and awaiting your decision as to what to do with them.’

‘Dumbledore!’ gasped Fudge, beside himself with amazement. ‘You – here – I – I –’

He looked wildly around at the Aurors he had brought with him and it could not have been clearer that he was in half a mind to cry, ‘Seize him!’

‘Cornelius, I am ready to fight your men – and win, again!’ said Dumbledore in a thunderous voice. ‘But a few minutes ago you saw proof, with your own eyes, that I have been telling you the truth for a year. Lord Voldemort has returned, you have been chasing the wrong man for twelve months, and it is time you listened to sense!’

‘I – don’t – well –’ blustered Fudge, looking around as though hoping somebody was going to tell him what to do. When nobody did, he said, ‘Very well – Dawlish! Williamson! Go down to the Department of Mysteries and see … Dumbledore, you – you will need to tell me exactly – the Fountain of Magical Brethren – what happened?’ he added in a kind of whimper, staring around at the floor, where the remains of the statues of the witch, wizard and centaur now lay scattered.

‘We can discuss that after I have sent Harry back to Hogwarts,’ said Dumbledore.

‘Harry –
Harry Potter
?’

Fudge spun round and stared at Harry, who was still standing against the wall beside the fallen statue that had guarded him during Dumbledore and Voldemort’s duel.

‘He – here?’ said Fudge. ‘Why – what’s all this about?’

‘I shall explain everything,’ repeated Dumbledore, ‘when Harry is back at school.’

He walked away from the pool to the place where the golden wizard’s head lay on the floor. He pointed his wand at it and muttered, ‘
Portus
.’ The head glowed blue and trembled noisily against the wooden floor for a few seconds, then became still once more.

‘Now see here, Dumbledore!’ said Fudge, as Dumbledore picked up the head and walked back to Harry carrying it. ‘You haven’t got authorisation for that Portkey! You can’t do things like that right in front of the Minister for Magic, you – you –’

His voice faltered as Dumbledore surveyed him magisterially over his half-moon spectacles.

‘You will give the order to remove Dolores Umbridge from Hogwarts,’ said Dumbledore. ‘You will tell your Aurors to stop searching for my Care of Magical Creatures teacher so that he can return to work. I will give you …’ Dumbledore pulled a watch with twelve hands from his pocket and glanced at it ‘… half an hour of my time tonight, in which I think we shall be more than able to cover the important points of what has happened here. After that, I shall need to return to my school. If you need more help from me you are, of course, more than welcome to contact me at Hogwarts. Letters addressed to the Headmaster will find me.’

Fudge goggled worse than ever; his mouth was open and his round face grew pinker under his rumpled grey hair.

‘I – you –’

Dumbledore turned his back on him.

‘Take this Portkey, Harry.’

He held out the golden head of the statue and Harry placed his hand on it, past caring what he did next or where he went.

‘I shall see you in half an hour,’ said Dumbledore quietly. ‘One … two … three …’

Harry felt the familiar sensation of a hook being jerked behind his navel. The polished wooden floor was gone from beneath his feet; the Atrium, Fudge and Dumbledore had all disappeared and he was flying forwards in a whirlwind of colour and sound …

Harry’s feet hit solid ground; his knees buckled a little and the golden wizard’s head fell with a resounding
clunk
to the floor. He looked around and saw that he had arrived in Dumbledore’s office.

Everything seemed to have repaired itself during the Headmaster’s absence. The delicate silver instruments stood once more on the spindle-legged tables, puffing and whirring serenely. The portraits of the headmasters and headmistresses were snoozing in their frames, heads lolling back in armchairs or against the edge of the picture. Harry looked through the window. There was a cool line of pale green along the horizon: dawn was approaching.

The silence and the stillness, broken only by the occasional grunt or snuffle of a sleeping portrait, was unbearable to him. If his surroundings could have reflected the feelings inside him, the pictures would have been screaming in pain. He walked around the quiet, beautiful office, breathing quickly, trying not to think. But he had to think … there was no escape …

It was his fault Sirius had died; it was all his fault. If he, Harry, had not been stupid enough to fall for Voldemort’s trick, if he had not been so convinced that what he had seen in his dream was real, if he had only opened his mind to the possibility that Voldemort was, as Hermione had said, banking on Harry’s
love of playing the hero …

It was unbearable, he would not think about it, he could not stand it … there was a terrible hollow inside him he did not want to feel or examine, a dark hole where Sirius had been, where Sirius had vanished; he did not want to have to be alone with that great, silent space, he could not stand it –