The Phoenix's Signal
A lifetime of unideal circumstances had made Harry quite adept at stealing away moments of happiness and peace for himself whenever he could. So that, for the first little while in his new home he was able to just enjoy where he was and what he had. He spent the majority of his time outdoors playing two-aside Quidditch with Ron, Hermione, and Ginny. Or else he was exploring the outskirts of the village with Sirius, who seemed so transformed now that the truth of his innocence had finally been acknowledged that it was hard to remember him as the depressed man who had found it nearly impossible to get out of bed last year.
It was only in the period before falling asleep that Harry allowed his mind to dwell upon the stories of disappearances, odd accidents, even of deaths that appeared almost daily in the Prophet. Snape was gone most of the time, as was Lupin, and Harry tried to keep from speculating too much about what they were encountering because he knew it wouldn’t do any good. They both always brought home news of more pain and destruction when they returned, and when it was finally arranged for Harry to visit Diagon Alley, he couldn’t distract himself from the ramifications of Voldemort’s reign any longer.
“What are people going to do for wands?” Ginny asked in alarm, as their group all paused outside Ollivander’s shop in Diagon Alley to take in the startling scene left behind, of smashed windows and a broken down door. The wand maker had been officially declared ‘missing’ last Saturday, with the Dark Mark being cast above the building leaving no singular doubt as to who was responsible.
“They’ll make do with other wand makers,” Mr. Weasley said gravely, “but Ollivander was the best. It certainly isn’t good for our side if the Death Eaters have him.”
Mrs. Weasley hiccuped nervously as she consulted the crossed out list she had been checking items off on methodically while they did their shopping. They were all carrying heavy bags of books from Flourish & Blotts, which Ginny and her parents had collected for them all while Sirius and Tonks had escorted Harry, Ron, and Hermione to buy new school robes. Then they had met up at the Magical Menagerie, where Ron and Harry had slipped inside to purchase owl treats for Pigwidgeon and Hedwig, while Hermione had run across the cobblestone street to stock up on potion ingredients from the Apothecary.
“I guess we have everything,” Mrs. Weasley informed them, slipping her note back inside her purse before giving Ollivander’s shop a final mournful stare. “Let’s keep moving, shall we? Best not to be standing out here in the open like this.”
“Weasleys Wizard Wheezes, right this way then,” Sirius said brightly, rubbing his hands together excitedly.
He was reminding Harry quite a bit of himself during his first visit to Diagon Alley with Hagrid after learning he was a wizard. As Sirius led them down the street to the far end, he was craning his neck in every which way to take it all in. Though the sunny storefronts and cheery crowds of shoppers that had been the norm before Voldemort’s return were long gone.
Many of the shops and eateries had been boarded up and appeared abandoned. The barman, Tom, of The Leaky Cauldron, had looked extremely disappointed when they hadn’t stopped for lunch in his empty dining room. The fearful climate had made Diagon Alley cease to be a place where witches and wizards would come for pleasure anymore. Everyone was living in terror and most barely left their houses aside for the essentials.
Indeed, Harry was hit with a fresh wave of horror as he came to a sudden halt outside Florean Fortescue’s Ice Cream Parlour, which had been vandalized almost beyond recognition. “He was dragged off sometime last night,” Tonks explained somberly.
“Oh, that’s horrible,” Hermione said sadly.
“Yeah, Fortescue was a great man,” Tonks agreed.
“What could You-Know-Who want with a man who makes a living from selling ice-cream?” Ron asked incredulously, but it was another harsh reminder that nobody was safe. That the country was at war and it didn’t matter much who you were anymore. Innocent muggles and wizards alike were being attacked for sport or for the simple offence of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
“Well, c’mon,” Mrs. Weasley urged them along frazedly, nudging Ron with a swing of her handbag towards the entrance of Fred and George’s shop. “Just a quick look inside and then we can all go home.”
“Florean Fortescue used to give me free sundaes all the time,” Harry said, coming over to Sirius who was admiring the display in the store front window. Despite the scene of a crime they had just passed by, Sirius was grinning. “That summer when I ran away from the Dursleys - when you came as a dog to check on me - do you remember that?”
“I’ll never forget,” Sirius replied, reaching over to unburden Harry of the bags he was carrying, leaving his arms free. “Very first thing I did was go catch a glimpse of you.”
His smile slowly transfigured into a more serious expression and he shook his head. “I don’t know what the Death Eaters would have against a man like Fortescue, but it's just the way they operate. They don’t actually need a good reason to hurt anyone. Maybe Voldemort thought Fortescue was giving muggle-borns too generous of scoops or maybe he banned the Malfoy family from entering once before."
“You’d think Voldemort would have bigger things to worry about,” Harry said dryly.
“Oh I think somewhere down inside him he’s probably more worried than anyone,” Sirius replied, pointing a finger through the window to draw Harry’s attention to a sign Fred and George had posted.
~ Why are you worrying about You-Know-Who, when you should be worrying about U-No-Poo? The constipation sensation that’s gripping the nation! ~
“See, they have the right idea,” Sirius said, once he and Harry had finished laughing. “We’ve still got to find the humour in things and a bit of normalcy for ourselves. We all know it - that’s why they’re doing so great here when half the alleyway is out of business.”
The noise and activity once they stepped inside the joke shop confirmed exactly what Sirius meant. Harry didn’t know what to look at first. The place was packed with people, all smiling and teasing their friends as they dug into bins and rummaged on shelves for all the merchandise that Fred and George had spent the majority of their years at Hogwarts developing. Harry hurried past a fountain of love potions, but paused by a stand labelled for Peruvian Instant Darkness Powder.
“We’re importing it,” Fred explained, having somehow spotted Harry in the crowd and come over to pat him on the back in welcome. “Listen, help yourself. Your money's no good here.”
“I’ll pay,” Harry insisted.
But Fred shook his head. “George and I are never going to forget that you made this possible for us - but that will be five galleons for you,” he added sternly to Ron, who had just appeared on Harry’s other side to add a sample of the Peruvian Instant Darkness Powder to the assortment of items he was carrying in his arms.
“I’m your brother,” Ron said in outrage.
“Then that will be ten galleons,” Fred muttered, just as Sirius and George walked over to join them.
“Ron, Harry - both of you just pick out whatever you want because I’m treating everyone,” Sirius told them, putting a halt to the brothers’ argument before it truly began. Sirius was looking enthusiastically around himself like a kid in a candy shop and the basket he was carrying already held a few things he had selected for himself.
“I think everyone deserves a reward for getting through OWL year - not to mention making Quidditch captain,” he winked at Harry. “Just like James. Have I mentioned how proud I am of you lately?”
“At least twice since this morning,” Harry smiled, who had received his captaincy badge from Professor McGonagall, along with his OWL results, only yesterday at breakfast.
He was reasonably pleased with how he had done. Failing only History of Magic and Divination, which he had never expected or cared about passing anyway. The only disappointment he was forced to contend with was that he had not made the necessary Potions score, achieving Exceeds Expectations when Snape never accepted students into his advanced classes who hadn’t gotten an Outstanding OWL. This put to ruin Harry’s ambition to become an auror, the only career after Hogwarts he had ever seriously considered so far.
“Have you boys considered opening up a branch in Hogsmeade?” Sirius asked the twins, while holding out the shopper’s basket for Ron to dump him armful into.
“Thinking about it,” George replied, “but until then we’re going to operate a mail ordering business in and out of Hogwarts.”
“Ron and I are going this way,” Harry told Sirius, but he was slightly annoyed that he hadn’t taken more than three steps away from his godfather before Tonks came to take Sirius’s place. Harry wasn’t allowed to go anywhere without a guard and had been able to feel them all watching him like a hawk since they had gotten out of the Ministry cars that had driven them here.
“Look how adorable those are!” Tonks exclaimed, pointing at a pen full of tiny Pygmy Puffs that Ginny, Hermione, and Mrs. Weasley were examining together. “Oops -”
She had accidentally knocked over a container of what appeared to be black spiky balls. “I’m sorry,” she said apologetically, taking out her wand to right the mess.
“No worries,” Fred assured her, as he, George, and Sirius came over to rejoin them. “They're walking off the shelves so fast that they would have been picked up by customers soon enough anyway. Decoy Detonators - perfect if you want to create a diversion!”
“What do you think, Tonks?” said Sirus, as Harry and Ron both added a handful of them to the basket. “You reckon the Auror department could put stuff like that to good use?”
“Funny you say that,” said George, “because the Ministry just bought five hundred shield hats from us! You wouldn’t believe how many people who work at the Ministry can’t do a decent Shield Charm.”
“Yes, I can,” Sirius replied matter-of-factly. “Considering that nearly half of the people who work there are useless dung beetles.”
“Not nice,” Tonks said reproachfully, though she was laughing quite as much as the rest of them. She walked over to look at the Pygmy Puffs and picked up an adorable pink one that matched her hair. “You know, I think I’m going to bring you home for myself,” she told it. “What are you calling yours, Ginny?”
“Arnold,” Ginny replied, who was carrying her own Pygmy Puff on her shoulder. Tonks attempted to do the same, but after hers nearly toppled off when she moved too quickly to look back at Harry, she resorted back to holding it in her hands.
“Right, well I really think it’s time to get going before it gets dark out,” Mrs. Weasley said briskly. “Harry, dear, are you sure you got everything you needed?"
"I'm sure, Mrs. Weasley," Harry smiled, knowing that it had bothered her somewhat to relinquish responsibility to Sirius when she had helped Harry buy all his school supplies many times before.
"Okay then," she said fondly, patting his cheek affectionately, before glancing around at all the others to evidently do a head count. "Now where's Arthur got to?"
“He went to look at the muggle magic tricks in the back,” said Hermione.
“Not a big earner, but we designed that line for muggle-loving nutters just like Dad,” George told them all.
“Oh, well I guess we can wait for him down at the front,” Mrs. Weasley said, pausing to kiss Fred and George both before they returned to work. “Listen to me - be safe, both of you,” she told them warningly. “And for Merlin’s sake, take down that awful U-No-Poo poster in the window before you’re murdered in your beds!”
“Whatever you say, Mum,” Fred said innocently, while Harry and Sirius exchanged amused looks behind Mrs. Weasley’s back.
It was time to head home and as much as the change of scenery had done him well, Harry was grateful to be going back to the place where nothing bad seemed like it could touch them. The Ministry cars dropped them off at The Burrow, and once Ron had run upstairs to dump his school supplies and Weasley Wizard Wheezes merchandise in his bedroom, he and Harry both took off into the setting sun on their broomsticks.
"We better not come over for dinner, Sirius," Mrs Weasley said apologetically, for the two households had taken to swapping where they were eating most nights. She pursed her lips before adding, "Bill said he was bringing Fleur by tonight."
However, Hermione and Tonks both accompanied Sirius back on the walk through the trail that they'd made to link the two properties, while Harry and Ron swooped down and around above them. They weren’t in any hurry to go inside and the two friends enjoyed racing once another over the treetops until the sky darkened too much for them to even be able to see each other, let alone where they were going.
"Are you getting used to Fleur, now that she's around all the time?" Harry asked from the sky, as they prepared to descend in the direction of his house that was well lit from the glow of candles and the fireplace.
"Kind of," Ron admitted sheepishly. "So long as she doesn't sneak up on me."
Harry’s feet sunk into the thick grass as he landed in the field beside the house and he had only just dismounted his Firebolt when the Hippogriff came cantering over to greet him as always. “Hello, Buckbeak,” Harry said fondly, petting his beak once they had bowed to one another.
“You won’t have any gnomes taking over here with him on patrol,” Ron said, rubbing Buckbeak on the head. Snape had been able to enforce some sort of invisible barrier that would keep Buckbeak from leaving the property, by ground or sky, which kept him from needing to be tethered. The Hippogriff was relishing in his own freedom after a year of indoor confinement in a single room at Grimmauld Place. He lived in a barn Sirius had configured to suit him quite happily, and Sirius and Buckbeak often went on moonlight flights by themselves. They had really been through it all together.
“Greyback is leading more and more of them straight to Voldemort -”
The mood in the house was serious when Harry and Ron let themselves inside. It was a surprise to see Lupin there - although he had been gone for three days it wasn’t unusual for him to be away even longer, living amongst other werewolves as a spy and a representative for Dumbledore. He was sitting at the table with a cup of tea in his hands and Tonks beside him with her legs crossed on her chair. Snape was there as well - his own schedule so unpredictable these days that Harry never knew when to expect him to turn up and had stopped wondering. Their eyes met briefly before Snape turned his focus back to Lupin.
“I think for most of them I’ve quite outworn my welcome,” Lupin was sharing, as Harry and Ron both took seats at the round table. Hermione was slicing up a loaf of bread at the counter while Sirius was putting the finishing touches on the spaghetti. Then he waved his wand and the bowl of spaghetti and basket of bread all flew over to land in the center of the table on either side of a tossed salad.
“Dig in everyone,” Sirius said, as he sat down and poured himself a glass of water.
“Where have you been?” Hermione hissed, pulling out the remaining chair next to Harry and flashing him and Ron a look of annoyance. “You could have helped us with supper, you know.”
“We’ll help tomorrow,” Ron said calmly, adding liberal amounts of butter to a slice of bread. “You can have the day off.”
Hermione huffed at him before spooning some salad onto her plate, but the adults were still discussing the werewolves which was far too interesting to ignore for the sake of their own argument.
“I’ll keep the relationships ongoing until I have the chance to discuss it with Dumbledore,” Lupin continued, accepting the dish of Spaghetti that Tonks had started passing around. “But the majority seem to regard me as a traitor to my kind.”
“That’s not new,” Snape said boredly. “Most of them are siding with the Dark Lord - and Greyback has been given nearly every honour aside from taking the mark. He’s become quite full of himself, in all honesty. Bellatrix Lestrange finds him particularly irksome.”
“The Ministry is desperate to catch Greyback,” Tonks told him. “I hear about him constantly.”
“That’ll never happen,” Snape said coolly. “Not now that he’s under the Dark Lord’s protection. They’ll only be able to get who he doesn’t care about saving - or people who aren’t actually guilty.”
“Anything to make it seem to the public like they’re doing something,” Sirius scoffed. His disdain for the Ministry had not wavered at all since he’d concluded his hearing, and nobody had had the nerve to reach out to him from there since. However, that hadn’t prevented Scrimgeour from owling Harry an invitation to meet, though Sirius had thrown the letter into the fire before they’d even finished reading it.
“Their incompetence can’t really be doubted when the only Death Eaters they’ve successfully apprehended so far were the ones who walked directly into the Ministry to essentially wait for capture,” Snape remarked. “Meanwhile the other side managed to track down and kill Karkaraff, despite his every effort to stay hidden.”
“Professor Karkaroff?” Hermione gasped, she was holding her fork midway to her mouth and hanging on every single word that had been travelling around the table. Igor Karkaroff had been the Headmaster of Durmstrang school, which Hogwarts had competed against during the Triwizard Tournament. He had fled the night of Voldemort’s return.
Snape nodded his head curtly. “The Carrows found him hiding in a shack in the far north.”
“Frankly, I’m surprised he lasted a year after deserting the Death Eaters,” Lupin remarked.
After Voldemort’s downfall, Karkaroff had struck a deal with the Ministry to have him released from Azkaban in exchange for giving up the names of other fellow Death Eaters still at large. Harry had actually witnessed the events of that hearing, sneaking a look inside Dumbledore’s pensieve one day when he’d found himself alone in the Headmaster’s study.
Harry remembered how Karkaroff had loudly insisted that Severus Snape was a Death Eater, and how Dumbledore had stood up to confirm that this had been the case until Snape had turned spy for them at great personal risk. “He is now no more a Death Eater than I am,” Dumbledore had told everyone in attendance. It had been the first insight Harry had been given into Snape’s complicated history, before everything had begun to make sense.
“Regulus only managed to stay alive a few days,” Sirius told them darkly.
It got quiet around the table after that. Everyone was eating in silence and Harry was trying to remember everything Siirus had ever told him about his younger brother, which wasn’t much. Harry knew that Regulus had been their pureblood fanatic parents’ favourite son. He had joined the Death Eaters after Hogwarts and then apparently tried to back out when he got cold feet about what he was being asked to do. So Voldemort had killed him.
Snape drained his goblet and then set it next to his cleared plate. “I picked up Potion textbooks for you two because you didn’t buy them today.”
Harry and Ron looked at him. “Because you said you wouldn’t let me into the class if I didn’t make an Outstanding on my OWL,” Harry told him, “which I didn’t.”
“Did you really, Severus?” Tonks asked him. “You know that’s very unfair.”
“No, it’s not,” Snape replied. “Who do you think would be blamed if some idiot student got themselves blown up during an assignment they’re unqualified to attempt? However, I’m not teaching that class next year, so it’s not really my problem anymore.”
“Did you make that rule on my account?” Tonks blinked at him innocently, the corners of her mouth twitching. “Because I only filled your classroom up with pink bubbles that one time in seventh year.”
“You did?” Sirius laughed.
“Accidentally!” Tonks insisted, holding her hands up in mock surrender as she smiled mischievously at Snape. “Other than that you loved teaching me - come on, admit it.”
“How are you still alive?” Ron blurted out.
“Excellent question,” Snape said. “I decided it would have meant far too much tedious paperwork to deal with if she’d died.”
“Well, when James and I blew up the potions lab it wasn’t nearly as pleasant as pink bubbles,” Sirius said brightly, and Lupin groaned in remembrance. “But we were only in our fifth year then. We dropped that class as fast as we could. It was very boring - I told old Slughorn that on my visit last week. For some reason he thought I was joking.”
“Whose Slughorn?” asked Hermione.
“Horace Slughorn was the Potions Master when we were in school,” Lupin answered. “Professor Dumbledore had asked Sirius to pay him a visit once the Order figured out his new location. Slughorn is going to be returning to Hogwarts this September.”
Harry frowned at Snape. “But what are you doing then?” he asked. “Are you still going to be at Hogwarts?” He could think of several reasons why that might not be the case, but none of them were good, and they all pertained to Voldemort.
“Unfortunately,” Snape replied, not elaborating.
“Remember when I had to go out last week?” Sirius said, before Harry could question Snape further. “That’s who I went to see. Dumbledore thinks it’s very important that Slughorn return to Hogwarts this year. He taught Voldemort, you know? We guess that’s why - anyway, Slughorn hated my guts as a student but now that I have this great story to tell, he was quite happy to see me. Slughorn is very attracted to fame. I think knowing he’d be teaching you, Harry, was one of the main draws to coming back for him.”
“That sounds horrible,” Harry said matter-of-factly, as he stood up to start gathering dishes for the wash. On nights when it was just himself and Sirius in the house they always used magic. However, Snape and Lupin both had similar attitudes to the Weasleys about doing things by hand sometimes to appreciate how hard muggles had it.
Harry had just walked over to the sink when he heard a low song from outside that sounded frantic and painful. It was too dark to see anything else, but Harry was sure he hadn’t imagined it. Coming over the wind, but not to be mistaken as the whistling in the trees. Harry had heard this distinctive cry before.
“Listen,” he said, and all the voices behind him at the table ceased immediately. “Do you hear that?” he asked, but there was no question that they all had.
The song had grown louder and Snape had gotten up from his chair and was walking to the front door with his wand out of his pocket.
“Fawkes?” he called softly, as he stepped out into the night.
There was a sudden loud scrape as everyone’s chairs pushed back at the same time. Harry rushed away from the sink and followed them all after Snape. Sirius, Lupin, and Tonks had lit their wands and held them out in front of them to see more clearly the great phoenix bird that was flapping its wings to remain stationary in the air. Fawkes’ face was very close to Snape’s, deep eye contact between them as though they were speaking an entirely silent language that they both understood. Everyone else seemed to be holding their breath, Harry certainly was, and then Snape nodded and Fawkes turned in the air to start flying slowly towards the road where the Fidelius Charm ended.
“Severus, do you want me to come with you?” Sirius offered. “Maybe I can be of some help -”
“He’s only asking for me,” Snape said curtly, not looking back at anyone.
Fawkes had begun his song again now that he knew that Snape was listening. As Snape suddenly gripped onto the Phoenix and in a shocking eruption of flame they were both gone. There was no doubt in Harry’s mind that Dumbledore had sent Fawkes to find Snape on purpose. And something was definitely very wrong.