𝐭𝐨 𝐡𝐨𝐥𝐝 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐜𝐥𝐨𝐬𝐞 | 𝐡. 𝐩𝐨𝐭𝐭𝐞𝐫

𝟏𝟐𝟔 - 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐜𝐚𝐯𝐞

𝙃𝙖𝙧𝙧𝙮 𝙘𝙤𝙪𝙡𝙙 𝙨𝙢𝙚𝙡𝙡 𝙨𝙖𝙡𝙩 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙝𝙚𝙖𝙧 𝙧𝙪𝙨𝙝𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙬𝙖𝙫𝙚𝙨; a light, chilly breeze ruffled his hair as he looked out at moonlit sea and star-strewn sky. He was standing upon a high outcrop of dark rock, water foaming and churning below him. He glanced over his shoulder. A towering cliff stood behind them, a sheer drop, black and faceless. A few large chunks of rock, such as the one upon which Harry, Ophelia and Dumbledore were standing, looked as though they had broken away from the cliff face at some point in the past. It was a bleak, harsh view, the sea and the rock unrelieved by any tree or sweep of grass or sand.

"What do you think?" asked Dumbledore. He might have been asking Harry's opinion on whether it was a good site for a picnic.

"They brought the kids from the orphanage here?" asked Harry, who could not imagine a less cozy spot for a day trip.

"Not here, precisely," said Dumbledore. "There is a village of sorts about halfway along the cliffs behind us. I believe the orphans were taken there for a little sea air and a view of the waves. No, I think it was only ever Tom Riddle and his youthful victims who visited this spot. No Muggle could reach this rock unless they were uncommonly good mountaineers, and boats cannot approach the cliffs, the waters around them are too dangerous. I imagine that Riddle climbed down; magic would have served better than ropes. And he brought two small children with him, probably for the pleasure of terrorizing them. I think the journey alone would have done it, don't you?"

Harry looked up at the cliff again and felt goose bumps.

"But his final destination--and ours--lies a little farther on. Come. "

Dumbledore beckoned the two teenagers to the very edge of the rock where a series of jagged niches made footholds leading down to boulders that lay half-submerged in water and closer to the cliff. It was a treacherous descent and Dumbledore, hampered slightly by his withered hand, moved slowly. The lower rocks were slippery with seawater. Harry could feel flecks of cold salt spray hitting his face, Ophelia appeared to be quite whoozy as she clung to a rock staring across the horizon as though she was reliving the worst moments of her life, Harry reached to pull her down but she flinched from his touch, he remembered it wasn't quite her and scowled bitterly.

"Lumos," said Dumbledore, as he reached the boulder closest to the cliff face. A thousand flecks of golden light sparkled upon the dark surface of the water a few feet below where he crouched; the black wall of rock beside him was illuminated too.

"You see?" said Dumbledore quietly, holding his wand a little higher. Harry saw a fissure in the cliff into which dark water was swirling.

"You will not object to getting a little wet?"

"No," said Harry.

"Then take off your Invisibility Cloak--there is no need for it now--and let us take the plunge. "

And with the sudden agility of a much younger man, Dumbledore slid from the boulder, landed in the sea, and began to swim, with a perfect breaststroke, toward the dark slit in the rock face, his lit wand held in his teeth. Harry pulled off his cloak, stuffed it into his pocket, and followed. Ophelia dived expertly into the water before he had chance to object, and was also swimming in seaweed.

The water was icy; Harry's waterlogged clothes billowed around him and weighed him down. Taking deep breaths that filled his nostrils with the tang of salt and seaweed, he struck out for the shimmering, shrinking light now moving deeper into the cliff. The fissure soon opened into a dark tunnel that Harry could tell would be filled with water at high tide. The slimy walls were barely three feet apart and glimmered like wet tar in the passing light of Dumbledore's wand. A little way in, the passageway curved to the left, and Harry saw that it extended far into the cliff. He continued to swim in Dumbledore's wake, the tips of his benumbed fingers brushing the rough, wet rock.