Aurora | Harry Potter

chapter fifty-five

We all duck and try our best to hide behind the tables and chairs, spells being fired at all of us. "Stupefy!" I exclaim, just missing one of the men. After a minute of firing spells, we manage to knock both men out, one in front of the cupboard of pastries and one behind.

The waitress opens the door to the kitchen and sees all the destruction. "Go. Leave!" Hermione orders the woman and she hurriedly leaves through the back. Once she's gone, Ron takes the lights out with his Deluminator, Hermione shuts the blinds and I lock the front door.

I turn around and when I see the knocked out attacker in the middle of the room, I recognise his face from the night Dumbledore died. "This one is Ral. He was on the Astronomy Tower when Dumbledore was killed," I explain as Ron looks over the other supposed Death Eater. 

"This is Dollahof, I recognise them from the wanted posters," he says, glaring at the frozen man. "Kill us if it was turned round, wouldn't you?" I shake my head immediately. "If we kill them, it will be obvious that we've been here," I add, to Ron's annoyance. Harry says we should wipe their memories.

I nod and I walk back around to Ral, whereas Hermione walks closer to Dollahof, her wand tightly gripped in her hand. We look at each other and nod before we raise our wands, aiming them at the two men.

"Obliviate," we both whisper, extracting and erasing all of the men's memories to clear our tracks. We quickly leave once we're done, our wands safely nearby in our pockets. As we walk down the street, Harry throws out the question about how they were able to find us so quickly.

"The Trace?" Hermione suggests, to which Ron shakes his head and acknowledging that The Trace disappears once someone turns seventeen. I gasp slightly and Hermione also stops walking briefly.

"Oh Harry, it's your birthday and we didn't celebrate it," I announce with a frown, followed up by Hermione saying that both of us and Ginny made a cake that we were planning to bring out at the end of the wedding. "Honestly, I really appreciate the thought, but really? Given the fact that we were almost killed by two Death Eaters a few minutes ago?" He replies, pulling us back to reality.

"Right, sorry," I apologise, looking ahead sorrowfully. "We need to get off the streets, somewhere safe," Ron addresses, quickly changing the subject. Within ten minutes or so, we are stood outside Grimmauld Place, watching the building expand slightly to reveal The Order Headquarters. 

We walk inside and almost immediately, a large swirl of sand or dust starts to come together. It resembles the figure of Dumbledore and it swiftly soars towards the group, his mouth falling down and silently screams, which contrasts Hermione's actual scream and the dust explodes, settling down on the floor.

"What was that all about?" Ron exclaims. Hermione suggests that it was Mad-Eye's idea, in case Snape attempted to enter the building. I nod and decide to double check if anyone is actually inside, so I pull my wand out and raise it into the air. "Homenum Revelio."

Nothing.

"We're alone."

-

My eyes flutter open and a long yawn leaves my lips, my entire body feeling heavy. Slowly, I climb out of my makeshift bed in the living room to see Ron and Hermione still asleep, their hands almost touching. I smile as I stretch, my limbs cracking slightly.

I then realise that Harry isn't in the makeshift bed opposite me, so I grab my bottomless handbag and leave the living room and wander around the house, looking for the dark haired boy. "Harry?" I exclaim loudly as I reach the second floor of the house, which feels just as empty as last night. I go to call his name again, but I see him at the end of the hallway in a bedroom.

When I reach the bedroom, I look up at the door to read the engraving: Sirius Black.

I gently knock on the door and when Harry spins around, I see a despondent look on his face. "Oh, it's you," he says, putting on a fake smile, "sorry, I didn't want to wake you up." I shrug and tell him that it's fine, but I press a small kiss on his cheek before asking how he's doing. "I don't really know... oh, I did find something a bit helpful," he replies as he takes my hand and leads me out of the room.

Confused, I follow him and he stops outside another nearby bedroom, his finger pointing to the door's engraving. "Regulus Arcturus Black," I read and then, I gasp at the realisation of who this person is. The note from 'R.A.B' in the fake Horcrux locket. 

Hurriedly, me and Harry make our way downstairs and once Ron and Hermione are awake, we sit down in the kitchen and listen to Harry reread the note. 

"R.A.B is Sirius' brother?" Ron asks in astonishment, now we officially know who this guy is. Hermione nods, before she says, "Question is did he actually destroy the real Horcrux?" I go to say something, but the sound of something falling over in a nearby broom cupboard makes us all turn around.

Harry walks over to the cupboard and upon opening the door, we see the Black family's house-elf, Kreacher. "You've been spying on us, have you?" Harry asks, letting go of Kreacher's ear angrily. "Kreacher... has been... watching," the elf replies in his low, gravely voice.

'Maybe he knows where the real locket is', I think to myself, so I grab the fake locket and raise it up for the elf to see. "Have you ever seen this before?" I ask just to get some grumbles in return. I reiterate my question with more intent, frustration now settling with the group.

The elf says that it belonged to Regulus, but Harry shakes his head. "But there were two of them, weren't there? Where's the other one?" Kreacher moves out from behind the table, so we can properly see his face now. 

"It was here, in this house," he says, so Harry impatiently asks again where it is. "Was it taken by someone?" I add, not expecting Kreacher to nod his head. "He came... in the night. He took many things, including the locket." 

The four of us all exchange a look, before we turn back to the elf and I ask who this man was. 

"Mundungus... Mundungus Fletcher."

Shock and a stinging sense of hatred hits all of us, remembering that Mundungus is the reason that Mad-Eye is now dead. I put the locket away in my handbag as Harry orders Kreacher to find the man, to which he nods and disapparates.