Xerosis

Rage Like Fire

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Rage Like Fire
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Harry hummed to himself a bit as he curled up in the library chair with a book. If Sirius saw what he was reading, he would be most disproving, but the man was off checking the progress on the wards over the cottage, and a ward on the hallway outside the room would warn him before anyone entered the room. Not that Harry expected anyone would, since most people avoided the house unless there was a meeting. Or they were watching him, in which case they avoided the library unless they needed him.

As Harry had half expected, his godfather had offered the use of his mother's house for the Order. Dumbledore had quickly placed it under Fidelius, having no intention of allowing Voldemort to find the building, especially once it was agreed that Harry would spend most of his summer there. Understandably, Sirius avoided the building as much as possible, so Dumbledore had set up a rotation of adults to stay in the house during Harry's stay. For all that the teen was mature for his age, the Headmaster wasn't willing to leave him completely to his own devices, no matter how much Sirius insisted Harry didn't need a baby-sitter.

Molly Weasley had been quite beside herself when she found out that Harry would be staying at Grimmauld Place by himself. She'd put forth various ideas of him coming to stay at the Burrow or perhaps all the Weasleys moving in with the boy to keep him company. Thankfully, Dumbledore had immediately refused any mention of Harry staying somewhere besides Headquarters or Sirius' cottage. Harry, himself, had been the one to veto anyone else staying with him full time, citing his need to get his work done in peace and catch up with his extra reading. Sirius had supported him, knowing well how Harry enjoyed his alone time during the summer. (Not that Harry didn't like the Weasleys, but he really had no interest in putting up with Ginny's crush or Ron's jealousy for the entire summer.)

Molly and her four youngest were often around, as the motherly woman had been quite adamant about spending some time around the Ravenclaw teen, and Dumbledore did seem to like the idea of him becoming friendly with the Weasleys. His close friendship with Lillian and her Darker friends had probably worried Dumbledore, for all that the man approved of reforming Slytherins.

As for the Dark Order, Voldemort had moved on to staging weekly attacks on mundane shopping areas, moving from city to city at random to keep the Order from guessing where they were going to strike next. Xerosis almost always appeared with him, making a point to use NEWT-level spells or above as often as possible to keep people guessing as to his real identity. He and Voldemort also made a point of scheduling attacks around lunch or supper-time, when someone would be certain to see Harry Potter in the kitchen, just in case some brainless Order member finally connected Harry's similarities to his other self.

Snape was, for the most part, at least told about the attacks before they happened, occasionally being dragged along for the Dark Lords' amusement. Snape was directed to not tell about some attacks or give misleading information on others. Every once in a while, he was allowed to forewarn the Order about an actual attack, to keep them from getting too suspicious. As far as Harry could tell from sneaking in to Order meetings, the spy was behaving himself, but Dumbledore occasionally gathered his forces to respond to an attack too quickly to have not been forewarned, which meant Snape may be relaying the information directly to the Headmaster, leaving the Order out of things. Harry didn't have any way to check, however, not with the way Fawkes had watched him the last time he'd shadowed in the Headmaster's office to watch Snape and Dumbledore talk. Without clear evidence of Snape's wrongdoing, he and Voldemort were at a bit of an impasse about whether or not to kill him, especially since he was still useful in giving them information on the Order and misleading them about half the time.

According to Lucius, who'd heard it from a distraught Fudge, the mundane Prime Minister was quite distressed by these attacks on his people and the magical government's inability to do anything about it. The mundane people themselves were freaking out a bit, and the Ministry couldn't seem to obliviate everyone who saw an attack, which caused all sorts of wild reports to be circulating about what the attacks actually were.