The Cupboard Series 3: Potter Haven

Chapter 14

"Auror Dawlish, if you would?" Cornelius Fudge asked, gesturing to the door behind the auror.

With a nod, the red-robed man turned, brandished his wand and cast a selection of privacy wards to seal the room from any potential eavesdroppers.

"Thank you," the Minister of Magic said. "Now, if you'd kindly give us your report?"

Dawlish looked at each of the three in the room. The Minister of Magic, of course, was seated behind his desk, various piles of parchment scattered in front of him. The Senior Undersecretary, Delores Umbridge was seated to the side, her pudgy legs neatly crossed at the ankle, just before her toes stretched down in a futile effort to reach the floor. And, tucked away in the corner almost behind him, Lucius Malfoy leant against the wall, staring impassively back at him.

"To be honest, Minister," Dawlish began, "there really isn't much to report. There's been no sighting of Potter in the six weeks since he disappeared."

Fudge frowned, not liking that answer at all. "Please outline the steps that your team have already tried."

"Well, firstly, we've been watching the Big Board," Dawlish replied. "As you know, any underage or unusual magic is tracked on it. In the last six weeks, there's only been seven times that it's lit up. Stevenson and I responded to every one of them and found the culprits each time. But none of them were Potter. Just a bunch of pre-Hogwarts muggleborns doing some accidental magic.

"And Daniels and Higginson have been tailing all of Potter's friends, but he hasn't met with any of them," he continued.

"What have you done to keep track of them?" Umbridge asked.

"We've put monitoring and tracking charms on as many as we could – Granger, Lovegood, Longbottom, Moon, Greengrass, Davis, Creevey and Abbot. We couldn't get close enough to tag that niece of Bones' and for some reason, every time we think we tag the Weasley twins, it doesn't take or it fails after a couple of hours," he replied. "We've also been intercepting all of their mail. And you were right, Minister, the boy has been keeping in contact with them all, but between that infernal Goblin Postal Service and what little he actually writes in his letters, we haven't managed to get anything that'll even tell us what end of the country he's holed up in."

"What about his guardians?" Fudge asked.

"We've been keeping tabs on both Black and McGonagall, and the werewolf Lupin as well, but only through their mail. Potter's not telling them anything either," Dawlish replied.

"What information have you gathered from the boy's correspondence?" Malfoy drawled.

Dawlish rubbed the back of his head as he thought about what Daniels and Higginson had told him.

"We think he might be getting some kind of help, but whoever it is, it's definitely not one of his friends. It also seems that he's trying to teach himself magic but wherever he is, it must be heavily warded for the trace not to show up on the Big Board. But that's it. The boy's too careful in his letters to let anything slip," Dawlish grudgingly allowed.

"If he's within a warded area then perhaps that is an avenue to pursue. Someone must have put the wards in place for him. And if not his guardians or friends ...," Umbridge finished with a wave of her hands.

"We thought of that," Dawlish replied. "I sent Daniels and Higginson to every warding company in Britain but they came up empty. The best that we can figure is that he either already knew of a place that was warded or he got the goblins to do it for him."

Fudge scowled. Even using the full influence of the Office of the Minister of Magic wouldn't get the goblins to divulge any information about their clients.