Courage - Harry Potter

-109-

Book: Courage
Chapter 109
Word Count: 3349

"Guys, stop."

"What's wrong?" asked Layla, glancing at Hermione.

They had only just reached the grave of the unknown Abbott.

"There's someone there. Someone's watching us. I can tell. There; over by the bushes."

They stood quite still, holding on to each other, gazing at the dense black boundary of the graveyard. Layla could not see anything.

"Are you sure?"

"I saw something move, I could have sworn I did..."

"We look like Muggles," Harry pointed out.

"Muggles who've just been laying flowers on your parents' grave! I'm sure there's someone over there!"

But then, Layla heard a rustle and saw a little eddy of dislodged snow in the bush to which Hermione had pointed. Ghosts could not move snow.

"It's a cat," said Harry, after a second or two," or a bird. If it was a Death Eater, we'd be dead by now. But let's get out of here, and we can put the Cloak back on."

They glanced back repeatedly as they made their way out of the graveyard.

They pulled the Invisibility Cloak back over themselves. The pub was fuller than before: Many voices inside it were now singing the carol that they had heard as they approached the church.

"Let's go this way," murmured Hermione, pulling Layla and Harry down the dark street leading out of the village in the opposite direction from which they had entered. They walked as quickly as they dared, past more windows sparkling with multicolored light, the outlines of Christmas trees dark through the curtains.

"How are we going to find Bathilda's house?" asked Hermione, who was shivering a little and kept glancing back over her shoulder. "Guys? What do you think?"

But suddenly, Harry began speeding up, dragging Layla and Hermione along with him; Hermione slipped a little on the ice.

"Harry—"

"Look... Look at it, guys..."

"I don't—" Layla frowned. "Oh!"

The Fidelius Charm must have died with James and Lily. The hedge had grown wild in the sixteen years since Hagrid had taken Harry from the rubble that lay scattered amongst the waist-high grass. Most of the cottage was still standing, though entirely covered in dark ivy and snow, but the right side of the top floor had been blown apart. The three of them stood at the gate, gazing at the wreck of what must once have been a cottage just like those that flanked it.

"I wonder why nobody's ever rebuilt it?" whispered Hermione.

"Maybe you can't rebuild it?" Harry replied, "Maybe it's like the injuries from Dark Magic and you can't repair the damage?"

"You're not going to go inside?" Layla whispered. "It looks unsafe, it might — Harry, look!"

A sign had risen out of the ground in front of them, up through the tangles of nettles and weeds, like some bizarre, fast-growing flower, and in golden letters upon the wood it said:

On this spot, on the night of 31 October 1981, Lily and James Potter lost their lives. Their son, Harry, remains the only wizard ever to have survived the Killing Curse. This house, invisible to Muggles, has been left in its ruined state as a monument to the Potters and as a reminder of the violence that tore apart their family.

And all around these neatly lettered words, scribbles had been added by other witches and wizards who had come to see the place where the Boy Who Lived had escaped. Some had merely signed their names in Everlasting Ink; others had carved their initials into the wood, still others had left messages. The most recent of these, shining brightly over sixteen years' worth of magical graffiti, all said similar things.