Dreams Are Falling Short

I lay on one of the two twin-beds, looking up at the gloomy high ceiling of Ron and, soon Harry’s, room. I let the loud twittering noise of Pigwidgeon fade into the background as we all sat around anxiously waiting; they should be back by now. At that moment, the serpentine doorknob turned, and my head snapped towards it.

“HARRY! Ron – Corey – he’s here, Harry’s here! We didn’t hear you arrive! Oh, how are you? Are you all right? Have you been furious with us? I bet you have, I know our letters were useless – but we couldn’t tell you anything, Dumbledore made us swear we wouldn’t, oh, we’ve got so much to tell you, and you’ve got things to tell us – the Dementors! When we heard – and that Ministry hearing – it’s just outrageous, I’ve looked it all up, they can’t expel you, they just can’t, there’s provision in the Decree for the Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery for the use of magic in life-threatening situations –“

“Let him breathe, Hermione,” I said, grinning as I closed the door.

As soon as Hermione had let go of him, I hugged Harry. Before anyone could say another word, however, there was a soft whooshing sound and something white soared from the top of the dark wardrobe, where Calandra sat, and landed gently on Harry’s shoulder.

“Hedwig!”

The snowy owl clicked her beak and nibbled his ear affectionately as Harry stroked her feathers.

“She’s been in a right state,” said Ron. “Pecked us half to death when she brought your last letters, look at this –“

He showed Harry the index finger of his right hand, which sported a half-healed but clearly deep cut.

“Oh, yeah,” Harry said. “Sorry about that, but I wanted answers, you know –“

“We wanted to give them to you, mate,” Ron said. “Hermione was going spare, she kept saying you’d do something stupid if you were stuck all on your own without news, but Dumbledore made us-“

“ – swear not to tell me,” Harry finished. “Yeah, Hermione’s already said.”

Harry didn’t look at either of us, and a strained silence fell, in which Harry stroked Hedwig, and I flopped down on the same bed again.

“He seemed to think it was best,” said Hermione rather breathlessly. “Dumbledore, I mean.”

“Right,” said Harry.

“I think he thought you were safest with the Muggles –“ Ron began.

“Yeah?” said Harry, raising his eyebrows. “Have any of you been attacked by Dementors this summer?”

“Well, no – but that’s why he’s had people from the Order of the Phoenix tailing you all the time –“

“Didn’t work that well, though, did it?” said Harry. “Had to look after myself after all, didn’t I?”

“He was so angry,” said Hermione, in an almost awestruck voice, while I sat unable to speak at all. “Dumbledore. We saw him. When he found out Mundungus had left before his shift had ended. He was scary.”

“Well, I’m glad he left,” Harry said coldly. “If he hadn’t, I wouldn’t have done magic and Dumbledore would probably have left me at Privet Drive all summer.”

“Aren’t you... aren’t you worried about the Ministry of Magic hearing?” said Hermione quietly.

“No,” Harry said, walking away from us with Hedwig nestled contentedly on his shoulder. I was sure the room wouldn’t raise his spirits though, for it was dark and dank. “So why’s Dumbledore been so keen to keep me in the dark? Did you – er – bother to ask him at all?”

“We told Dumbledore we wanted to tell you what was going on,” I said, rolling onto my stomach and watching Harry walk around the room. “We did, mate. But he’s really busy now, we’ve only seen him twice since we came here and he didn’t have much time, he just made us swear not to tell you important stuff when we wrote, he said the owls might be intercepted.”

“He could still’ve kept me informed if he’d wanted to,” Harry said shortly. “You’re not telling me he doesn’t know ways to send messages without owls.”

Hermione glanced at Ron, then me, and then said, “I thought that, too. But he didn’t want you to know anything.”

“Maybe he thinks I can’t be trusted,” Harry said, watching our expressions.

“Don’t be thick,” said Ron.

“Or that I can’t take care of myself.”

“Of course he doesn’t think that!” said Hermione anxiously.

“So how come I have to stay at the Dursleys’ while you three get to join in everything that’s going on here?” said Harry, his words tumbling over one another in a rush, his voice growing louder with every word. “How come you three are allowed to know everything that’s going on?”

“We’re not!” I interrupted. “Molly won’t let us near the meeting, she says we’re too young –“

But before I knew it, Harry was shouting.

“SO YOU HAVEN’T BEEN IN THE MEETIGS, BIG DEAL! YOU’VE STILL BEEN HERE, HAVEN’T YOU? YOU’VE STILL BEN TOGETHER! ME, I’VE BEEN STUCK AT THE DURSLEYS’ FOR A MONTH! AND I’VE HANDLED MORE THAN YOU TWO’VE EVER AMGED AND DUMBLEDORE KNOWS IT – WHO SAVED THE PHILOSOPHER’S STONE? WHO GOT RID OF RIDDLE? WHO SAVED BOTH YOUR SKINS FORM THE DEMENTORS?”

Hedwig took fright at the noise of Harry yelling and soared off to the top of the wardrobe again; Pigwidgeon twittered in alarm and zoomed even faster around our heads.

“WHO HAD TO GET PAST DRAGONS AND SPHINXES AND EVERY OTHER FOUL THING LAST YEAR? WHO SAW HIM COME BACK? WHO HAD TO ESCAPE FROM HIM? ME!”

Ron was standing with his mouth half-open, clearly stunned and at a loss for anything to say, whilst Hermione looked on the verge of tears. I lay watching Harry intently, knowing he was just blowing off steam.

“BUT WHY SHOULD I KNOW WHAT’S GOING ON? WHY SHOULD ANYONE BOTHER TO TELL ME WHAT’S BEEN HAPPENING?”

“Harry, we wanted to tell you, we really did – “ Hermione began.

“CAN’T’VE WANTED TO THAT MUCH, CAN YOU, OR YOU’D HAVE SENT ME AN OWL, BUT DUMBELEDORE MADE YOU SWEAR –“

“Well, he did –“

“FOUR WEEKS I’VE BEEN STUCK IN PRIVET DRIVE, NICKING PAPERS OUT OF BINS TO TRY AND FIND OUT WHAT’S BEEN GOING ON –“

“We wanted to –“

“I SUPPOSE YOU’VE BEEN HAVING A REAL LAUGH, HAVEN’T YOU, ALL HOLED UP HERE TOGETHER –“

“No, honest –“

‘Harry, we’re really sorry!” said Hermione desperately, her eyes now sparkling with tears. “You’re absolutely right, Harry – I’d be furious if it was me!”

Harry glared at her, still breathing deeply, before he started pacing up and down.

“You done yelling now?” I asked calmly.

“What is this place, anyway?” Harry said, ignoring me.

“Headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix,” Ron said at once.

“Is anyone going to bother telling me what the Order of the Phoenix –?”

“It’s a secret society,’ said Hermione quickly. “Dumbledore’s in charge, he founded it. It’s the people who fought against You-Know-Who last time.”

“Who’s in it?” Harry said, coming to a halt with his hands in his pockets.

“Quite a few people –“

“We’ve met about twenty of them,” I said, looking up at the ceiling again, “but we think there are more”

“Well?” Harry demanded.

“Er,” said Ron. “Well what?”

“Voldemort!” said Harry furiously, and I saw both Ron and Hermione wince out of the corner of my eye. “What’s happening? What’s he up to? Where is he? What are we doing to stop him?”

“We’ve told you, the Order don’t let us in on their meetings,” said Hermione nervously. “So we don’t know the details – but we’ve got a general idea,” she added hastily.

“The boys and I have invented Extendable Ears, see,” I said, referring to Fred and George. “They’re really useful.”

“Extendable -?”

“Ears, yeah. Only we’ve had to stop using them lately because Molly found out and went berserk. Fred, George ad I had to hide them all to stop her binning them. But we got a good bit of use out of them before Molly realised what was going on. We know some of the Order are following known Death Eaters, keeping tabs on them, you know –“

‘Some of them are working on recruiting more people to the order –“ said Hermione.

“And some of them are standing guard over something,” said Ron. “They’re always talking about guard duty.”

“Couldn’t have been me, could it?” said Harry sarcastically.

“Oh, yeah,” said Ron.

Harry snorted, walking around the room again. “So, what have you been doing, if you’re not allowed in meetings?” he demanded. “You said you’d been busy.”

“We have,” said Hermione quickly. “We’ve been decontaminating this house, it’s been empty for ages and stuff’s been breeding in here. We’ve managed to clean out the kitchen, most of the bedrooms and I think we’re doing the drawing room tomo- AARGH!”

With two loud cracks, which caused me to roll over straight away, Fred and George materialised out of thin air in the middle of the room. Pig twittered more wildly than ever and zoomed off to join Calandra and Hedwig on top of the wardrobe.

“Stop doing that!” Hermione said weakly to the twins, who were as vividly red-haired as Ron, though stockier and taller.

“Hello, Harry,” said George, beaming at him. “We thought we heard your dulcet tones.”

“You don’t want to bottle up your anger like that, Harry, let it all out,” said Fred, also beaming. “There might be a couple of people fifty miles away who didn’t hear you.”

“You two passed your Apparation tests, then?” asked Harry grumpily.

“With distinction,” said Fred, who was holding an Extendable Ear.

“It would have taken you thirty seconds longer to walk down the stairs,” said Ron.

“Time is Galleons, little brother,” said Fred. “Anyway, Harry, you’re interfering with reception. Extendable Ears,” He added in response to Harry’s raised eyebrows, showing him the very long, flesh-coloured sting with an ear at the end. “We’re trying to hear what’s going on downstairs.”

“You want to be careful,” said Ron, staring at the Ear, “if mum sees one of them again...”

“It’s worth the risk, that’s a major meeting they’re having,” I said.

The door opened and a long mane of red hair appeared.

“Oh, hello, Harry!” Ginny said brightly. “I thought I heard your voice.”

Turning to Fred and George, she said, “It’s no-go with the Extendable Ears, she’s gone and put an Imperturbable Charm on the kitchen door.”

“How d’you know?” said George, looking crestfallen.

“Tonks told me how to find out,” said Ginny. “You just chuck stuff at the door and if it can’t make contact the door’s been Imperturbed. I’ve been flicking Dungbombs at it from the top of the stairs and they just soar away from it, so there’s no way the Extendable Ears will be able to get under the gap.”

Fred heaved a deep sigh.

“Shame. I really fancied finding out what old Snape’s been up to.”

“Snape!” said Harry quickly. “Is he here?”

“Yeah,” said George, carefully closing the door and sitting on the bed with me; closely followed by Fred and Ginny. I instantly leant against Fred, not even thinking about it, and he wrapped his arm around me. “Giving a report. Top secret."

“Git,” said Fred idly.

“He’s on our side now,” said Hermione reprovingly.

I snorted. “Doesn’t stop him being a git. The way he looks at us when he sees us.”

“Bill doesn’t like him, either,” said Ginny, as though that settled the matter.

“Is Bill here?” he asked. “I thought he was working in Egypt?”

“He applied for a desk job so he could come home and work for the Order,” said Fred. “He says he misses the tombs, but,” he smirked, “there are compensations.”

“What d’you mean?”

“Remember old Fleur Delacour?” said George. “She’s got a job at Gringotts to eemprove ‘er Eeenglish –“

“And Bill’s been giving her lots of private lessons,” sniggered Fed.

“You’re such a girl,” I observed.

“Charlie’s in the Order, too,” said George, “but he’s still in Romania. Dumbledore want as many foreign wizards brought in as possible, so Charlie’s trying to make contacts on his days off.”

“Couldn’t Percy do that?” Harry asked.

We all exchanged looks.

“Whatever you do, don’t mention Percy in front of Mum or Dad,” Ron told Harry in a tense voice.

“Why not?”

“Because every time Percy’s name’s mentioned, Dad breaks whatever he’s holding and Mum stars crying,” Fred said.

“It’s been awful,” said Ginny sadly.

“I think we’re well shot of him,” said George, with an uncharacteristically ugly look on his face.
“What’s happened?” Harry said.

“Percy and Dad had a row,” said Fred. “I’ve never seen Dad row with anyone like that. It’s normally Mum who shouts.”

“It was the first week back after term ended,” I said. “We were about to come and join the Order. Percy came home and told us he’d been promoted.”

“You’re kidding?” said Harry.

“Yeah, we were all surprised,” said George, “because Percy got into a load of trouble about Crouch, there was an inquiry and everything. They said Percy ought to have realised Crouch was off his rocker and informed a superior. But you know Percy, Crouch left him in charge, he wasn’t going to complain.”

“So how come they promoted him?”

“That’s exactly what we wondered,” said Ron, who seemed very keen to keep normal conversation going now that Harry had stopped yelling. “He came home really pleased with himself – even more pleased that usual, if you can imagine that – and told Dad he’d been offered a position in Fudge’s own office. A really good on for someone only a year out of Hogwarts: Junior Assistant to the Minister. He expected Dad to be all impressed, I think.”

“Only Dad wasn’t,” said Fred grimly.

“Why not?” said Harry.

“Well, apparently Fudge has been storming round the Ministry checking that nobody’s having any contact with Dumbledore,” said George.

“Dumbledore’s name is mud with the Ministry these days, see,” I said. “They all think he’s just making trouble saying Voldemort is back.”

Everyone in the room shuddered at the name, apart from Harry. I felt Fred’s arm tighten around me as I said the word, and I let out an annoyed sigh at their reactions.

“Dad says Fudge has made it clear that anyone who’s in league with Dumbledore can clear out their desks,” said George.

“Trouble is, Fudge suspects Dad, he knows he’s friendly with Dumbledore, and he’s always thought Dad’s a bit of a weirdo because of his Muggle obsession.”

“But what’s that got to do with Percy?” asked Harry.

“I’m coming to that. Dad reckons Fudge only wants Percy in his office because he wants to use him to spy on the family – and Dumbledore.”

Harry let out a low whistle.

“Bet Percy loved that.”

Ron laughed in a hollow sort of way.

"He went completely berserk. He said – well, he said loads of terrible stuff. He said he’s been having to struggle against Dad’s lousy reputation ever since he joined the Ministry and that Dad’s got no ambition and that’s why we’ve always been – you know – not had lot of money, I mean –“

“What?” said Harry in disbelief, as Ginny made a noise like an angry cat.

“I know,” said Ron in a low voice. “And it got worse. He said Dad was an idiot to run around with Dumbledore, that Dumbledore was heading for big trouble and Dad was going to go down with him, and that he – Percy – knew where his loyalty lay and it was with the Ministry. And if Mum and Dad were going to become traitors to the Ministry he was going to make sure everyone knew he didn’t belong to our family any more. And he packed his bags the same night and left. He’s living here in London now.”

Harry swore under his breath.

“Mum’s been in a right state,” said Ron dully. “You know – crying and stuff. She came up to London to try and talk to Percy but he slammed the door in her face. I dunno what he does if he meets Dad at work – ignores him, I s’pose.”

“But Percy must know Voldemort’s back,” said Harry slowly. “He’s not stupid, he must know your mum and dad wouldn’t risk everything without proof.”

“Yeah, well, your name got dragged into the row,” said Ron, shooting Harry a furtive look. “Percy said the only evidence was your word and ... I dunno.. he didn’t think it was good enough.”

“Percy takes the Daily Prophet seriously,” said Hermione tartly, and everyone nodded.

“What are you talking about?” said Harry.

“Haven’t haven’t you been getting the Daily Prophet?” Hermione asked nervously.

“Yeah, I have!” said Harry.

“Have you – er – been reading it thoroughly?” Hermione asked, still more anxiously.

“Not cover to cover. If they were going to report anything about Voldemort it would be headline news, wouldn’t it?”

“Well, you’d need to read it cover to cover to pick it up, but they –um – they mention you a couple of times a week.”

“But I’d have seen –“

“Not if you’ve only been reading the front page, you woudn’t,” said Hermione, shaking her head. “I’m not talking about big articles. They just slip you in, like you’re a standing joke.”

“What d’you-?”

“It’s quite nasty, actually,” said Hermione in a voice of forced calm. “They’re just building on Rita’s stuff.”

“But she’s not writing for them anymore, is she?”

“Oh, no, she’s kept her promise – not that she’s got any choice,” Hermione added with satisfaction. “But she laid the foundation for what they’re trying to do now.”

“Which is what?” said Harry impatiently.

“OK, you know she wrote that you were collapsing all over the pace and saying your scar was hurting and all that?”

“Yeah,” said Harry.

“Well, they’re writing about you as though you’re this deluded, attention-seeking person who think she’s a great tragic hero or something,” said Hermione. “They keep slipping in snide comments about you. If some far-fetched story appears, they say something like, “A tale worthy of Harry Potter”, and if anyone has a funny accident or anything it’s, “Let’s hope he hasn’ got a scar on his forehead or we’ll be asked to worship him next” –“

“I don’t want anyone to worship –“ Harry began hotly.

“We know you don’t,” I said.

“We know, Harry. But you see what they’re doing? They want to turn you into someone nobody will believe. Fudge is behind it, I’ll bet anything. They want wizards on the street to think you’re just some stupid boy who’s a bit of a joke, who tells ridiculous tall storied because he loves being famous and wants to keep it going.”

“I didn’t ask – I didn’t want – Voldemort killed my parents!” Harry spluttered. “I got famous because he murdered my family but couldn’t kill me! Who wants to be famous for that? Don’t they think I’d rather it’d never –“

“We know, Harry,” said Ginny earnestly.

“And of course, they didn’t report a word about the Dementors attacking you,” said Hermione. “Someone’s told them to keep that quiet. That should’ve been a really big story, out-of-control Dementors. They haven’t even reported that you broke the International Statute of Secrecy. We thought they would, it would tie in so well with this image f you as some stupid show-off. We think they’re biding their time until you’re expelled, then they’re really going to go to town – I mean, if you’re expelled, obviously. You really shouldn’t be, not if they abide by their own laws, there’s no case against you.”

There were footsteps coming up the steps, and I felt Fred sit up straight.

“Uh oh.”

Fred gave the Extendable Ear a hearty tug; there was another loud crack and he and George vanished. Seconds later, Mrs Weasley appeared in the bedroom doorway.

“The meeting’s over, you can come down and have dinner now. Everyone’s dying to see you, Harry. And who’s left all those Dungbombs outside the kitchen door?”

“Crookshanks,” said Ginny unblushingly. “He loves playing with them.”

“Oh,” said Mrs Weasley. “I thought it might have been Kreacher, he keeps doing odd things like that. Now don’t forget to keep your voices down in the hall. Ginny, your hands are filthy, what have you been doing? Go and wash them before dinner, please.”

Ginny grimaced at us and followed her mother out of the room, leaving the four of us alone.