Chapter Nineteen: Extracurricular—er—Project!
For the first time he could remember, Harish really did not want to return to Hogwarts. But, as all good things do, Christmas came to an end, and before Harish knew it he was stepping off the train and boarding the carriages with his friends. Then, they trudged through three feet of snow to get to the castle and practically melted at the warmth inside.
The next day Harish had people running up to him all day long, asking whether they had a DA meeting or not. Harish really would have liked to have a DA meeting, but at the same time he wanted to wait a week to readjust to school (and plan out their lesson because he had forgotten to do so over the break). So, he put off the meeting for that week.
They trudged through their classes, Harish once again sitting in Defense Against the Dark Arts with nothing better to do than watch Umbridge defiantly. Harish did notice that even though they were on NEWT level, their classes were nowhere near as taxing and they did not have close to the same work load as it was in their fifth year.
That evening, Harish started on an essay for Transfiguration while the twins showed off their new joke product. It was actually funny how this product was made; the twins had laughed at their ridiculous hats they got for Christmas, before Harish had jokingly mentioned that they should make it into a joke product. The next thing he knew, the twins were sitting around his living room day and night, charming the hats.
Now the item was ready to show off.
"Headless Hats!" George shouted as Fred waved the pointy hat, causing the pink feather to sway this way and that. "Two Galleons each—watch Fred, now!"
Fred swept the hat onto his head, beaming. For a second he merely looked rather stupid, then both hat and head vanished. A few first year girls screamed, but everyone else was roaring with laughter. It was so loud, there was no possibility of Harish concentrating on his work.
"And off again!" George shouted, and Fred's hand groped for a moment in what seemed to be thin air over his shoulder; this his head reappeared as he swept the pink-feathered hat from it again.
"How do those hats work, then?" Hermione asked, distracted from her work as well and watching the twins. "I mean, obviously it's some kind of Invisibility Spell, but it's rather clever to have extended the field of invisibility beyond the boundaries of the charmed object…I'd imagine the charm wouldn't have a very long life though…"
"Oh, you'd be surprised," Harish said, standing and stretching.
Then he walked over to where the twins were standing. Fred had just put the hat on again and the crowd was waiting for his head to disappear.
"You need to shorten the time between putting on the hat and the invisibility kicking in," he muttered to George, who was scribbling on a clipboard and accepting money from the crowd.
"I know," George replied. "Can you cast a duplication spell, by the way? We're getting too many orders to wait to buy more hats. We would have to wait for them to come in, and then we would have to spend extra time charming them…"
"I don't know a spell that would be able to duplicate both the hat itself and the charms on it," Harish replied. "But I can work on it."
George nodded gratefully.
"Well," Harish said, slapping Fred on the back hard enough to make him jerk forward, and the hat went flying. "I'm turning in."
The next morning Harish finished his essay up during breakfast. Across from him, Hermione was reading the Prophet avidly. Talk in their group suddenly stopped as she straightened out the paper, laid it across the table, and said, "Look at this."
Harish turned the paper towards him and glanced at the front page. Nine black-and-white photos filled the whole page, all of them wizards' faces. Some of the people in the pictures were silently jeering; others were tapping their fingers on the frame, looking insolent. Each picture was captioned with a name and the crime for which the person had been sent o Azkaban.
Antonin Dolohov, the legend read underneath a wizard with a long, pale, twisted face who was looking curiously up at Harish, convicted of the brutal murders of Gideon and Fabian Prewett.
Augustus Rookwood, another caption read. This one was underneath a pock-marked man with greasy hair who was leaning against the edge of his picture, looking bored. Convicted of leaking Ministry of Magic Secrets to He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.
Harish went through the faces, picking out the ones he recognized and mentally filing away the ones he didn't. Then, Daphne nudged him and pointed at the headline over the pictures.
Mass Breakout from Azkaban Ministry Fears Black is "Rallying Point" for Old Death Eaters
"I don't think they realize how close they are to the real culprit," Fred muttered to George. Harish waved a hand for silence and leaned forward to read the article.
The Ministry of Magic announced late last night that there had been a mass breakout from Azkaban.
Speaking to reporters in his private office, Cornelius Fudge, Minister of Magic, confirmed that nine high-security prisoners escaped in the early hours of yesterday evening, and that he had already informed the Muggle Prime Minister of the dangerous nature of these individuals.
"We find ourselves, most unfortunately, un the same position we were two and a half years ago when the murderer Sirius Black escaped," said Fudge last night. "Nor do we think the two breakouts are unrelated. An escape of this magnitude suggests outside help, and we must remember that Black, as the first person ever to break out of Azkaban, would be ideally placed to help others follow in his footsteps. We think it likely that these individuals have rallied around Black as their leader. We are, however, doing all we can to round up the criminals and beg the magical community to remain alert and cautious. On no account should any of these individuals be approached."
Harish stopped reading and sat back as the others read the first page. While they did that, he glanced around the Great Hall. No student seemed to know or care that Death Eaters had broken out. It was a different story entirely at the staff table, however. Dumbledore and McGonagall were deep in conversation, both look extremely grave. Professor Sprout had the Prophet propped against a bottle of ketchup and was reading the page with such concern that she was not noticing the gentle drip of egg yolk falling into her lap from her stationary spoon. Meanwhile, at the far end of the table, Umbridge was tucking into a bowl of porridge. For once her pouchy eyes were not sweeping the Great Hall looking for misbehaving students. She scowled as she gulped down her food and every now and then she shot a malevolent glance up the table to where Dumbledore and McGonagall were talking so intently.
The twins finally finished reading the article as Harish's eyes returned to their own table. As Hermione took the paper back and read the rest of it, Harish asked eagerly, "Do you know what this means?"
The others shook their heads.
"It means that my father is preparing for war."
There was a moment of silence as everyone contemplated this, eating their breakfasts again. Then, the silence was broken by Ginny, who was reading over Hermione's shoulder and said, "Oh, my—"
"What now?" Harish asked curiously.
"Look," Hermione said, handing the paper back.
Tragic Demise of Hospital Patient
St. Mungo's Hospital promised a full inquiry last night after their patient, Thorfinn Rowle was discovered dead in his bed, strangled by a potted plant. Healers called to the scene where unable to revive Mr. Rowle, who had been injured in a workplace accident some weeks prior to his death.
Healer Miriam Strout, who was in charge of Mr. Rowle's ward at the time of the incident, has been suspended on full pay and was unavailable for comment yesterday, but a spokeswizard for the hospital said in a statement, "St. Mungo's deeply regrets the death of Mr. Rowle, whose health was improving steadily prior to this tragic accident.
"We have strict guidelines on the decorations permitted on our wards, but it appears Healer Strout, busy over the Christmas period, overlooked the dangers of the plant on Mr. Rowle's bedside table. As his speech and mobility improved, Healer Strout encouraged Mr. Rowle to look after the plant himself, unaware that it was not an innocent Flitterbloom, but a cutting of Devil's Snare, which, when touched by the convalescent Mr. Rowle, throttled him instantly.
"St. Mungo's is as yet unable to account for the presence of the plant on the ward and asks any witch or wizard with information to come forward."
"We saw him," Ginny said just above a whisper. "Me, Fred, George, and Ron. We were at St. Mungo's and saw Lockhart and—"
"Long story short," George said. "We got trapped in a closed ward with Lockhart—"
"Who's still an idiot, and saw Rowle on the bed opposite. He was only just regaining the ability to speak."
"This was obviously my father's doing," Harish said in an even quieter voice. "He probably wanted him silenced. After all, Rowle was a Death Eater. If he had started talking well enough to be questioned, he could divulge important information—specifically about the prophecy and why my father wanted it."
"Was there any reason why your father had him go after the prophecy in the first place?" Hermione asked.
"Wasn't it because he wanted to get Rowle back?" George asked.
"Yeah, because his son attacked you?" Fred added.
Harish nodded.
"That was the reason he said in the meeting," he said. "But ever since Jugson attacked me, I've been wondering…What if more people turned on him than just that one person?"