WE'LL TAKE ON THE WORLD ; h.j.p.

5 | The Slug Club

"Yes, I've already agreed it was fishy, Harry," said Hermione a little impatiently.

Since they had returned from Diagon Alley a week ago, Harry had the desire to constantly speculate about Malfoy's strange behaviour at Borgin and Burkes, and it was getting annoying - on the one hand for Ron, Hermione, and Allison, because they weren't too interested in talking about Malfoy all the time, on the other hand for Harry, because he wasn't met with the enthusiasm he had apparently expected.

Hermione was sitting on the windowsill in Fred and George's room with her feet up on one of the cardboard boxes and had only grudgingly looked up from her new copy of Advanced Rune Translation. "But haven't we agreed there could be a lot of explanations?"

"Maybe he's broken his Hand of Glory," said Ron vaguely, as he attempted to straighten his broomstick's bent tail twigs. "Remember that shrivelled-up arm Malfoy had?"

"But what about when he said, 'Don't forget to keep that one safe'?" asked Harry for the umpteenth time. "That sounded to me like Borgin's got another one of the broken objects, and Malfoy wants both."

"That could have been everything in there...the place is full of broken things," said Allison absentmindedly, pulling another book out of the shopping bag to write her name inside of it.

No one said anything for a while and Allison hoped that he would finally let it go, when, "Malfoy's father's in Azkaban. Don't you think Malfoy'd like revenge?"

Ron looked up, blinking. "Malfoy, revenge? What can he do about it?"

"That's my point, I don't know!" said Harry, frustrated. "But he's up to something and I think we should take it seriously. His father's a Death Eater and -"

Harry broke off, his eyes fixed on the window behind Hermione, his mouth open.

"Harry?" asked Hermione anxiously.

"Is your scar hurting again?" asked Allie nervously.

"He's a Death Eater," said Harry slowly. "He's replaced his father as a Death Eater!"

There was a silence; then Ron erupted in laughter. "Malfoy? He's sixteen, Harry! You think You-Know-Who would let Malfoy join?"

"It seems very unlikely, Harry," said Hermione in a repressive sort of voice. "What makes you think -?"

"In Madam Malkin's. She didn't touch him, but he yelled and jerked his arm away from her when she went to roll up his sleeve. It was his left arm. He's been branded with the Dark Mark."

Allison shared a look with the others.

"Well..." said Ron, sounding thoroughly unconvinced.

"I think he just wanted to get out of there, really," said Allison.

"He showed Borgin something we couldn't see," Harry pressed on stubbornly. "Something that seriously scared Borgin. It was the Mark, I know it - he was showing Borgin who he was dealing with, you saw how seriously Borgin took him!"

The three exchanged another look.

"I'm not sure, Harry..." Hermione said.

"Yeah, I still don't reckon You-Know-Who would let Malfoy join..."

Annoyed with them, Harry sat up and stared at the wall. Allison closed the last book after she had labelled it and was about to put the pile of school books back into the bag when she found something else at the far bottom: Fishing it out, she recognized the colourful box as the Patented Daydream Charms from Fred and George. She had almost forgotten she'd taken that.