Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows hp-7 Read online

  Harry and Ron looked at her. She was standing with one foot in midair, with the dumbstruck look of one who had just been Obliviated: her eyes had even drifted out of focus.

  “…at the time,” she finished in a whisper.

  “Something wrong?” asked Ron.

  “There was a locket.”

  “What?” said Harry and Ron together.

  “In the cabinet in the drawing room. Nobody could open it. And we… we…”

  Harry felt as though a brick had slid down through his chest into his stomach. He remembered. He had even handled the thing as they passed it around, each trying in turn to pry it open. It had been tossed into a sack of rubbish, along with the snuffbox of Wartcap powder and the music box that had made everyone sleepy…

  “Kreacher nicked loads of things back from us,” said Harry. It was the only chance, the only slender hope left to them, and he was going to cling to it until forced to let go. “He had a whole stash of stuff in his cupboard in the kitchen. C’mon.”

  He ran down the stairs taking two steps at a time, the other two thundering along in his wake. They made so much noise that they woke the portrait of Sirius’s mother as they passed through the hall.

  “Filth! Mudbloods! Scum!” she screamed after them as they dashed down into the basement kitchen and slammed the door behind them. Harry ran the length of the room, skidded to a halt at the door of Kreacher’s cupboard, and wrenched it open. There was the nest of dirty old blankets in which the house-elf had once slept, but they were not longer glittering with the trinkets Kreacher had salvaged. The only thing there was an old copy of Nature’s Nobility: A Wizarding Genealogy. Refusing to believe his eyes, Harry snatched up the blankets and shook them. A dead mouse fell out and rolled dismally across the floor. Ron groaned as he threw himself into a kitchen chair; Hermione closed her eyes.

  “It’s not over yet,” said Harry, and he raised his voice and called, “Kreacher!”

  There was a loud crack and the house-elf that Harry had so reluctantly inherited from Sirius appeared out of nowhere in front of the cold and empty fireplace: tiny, half human-sized, his pale skin hanging off him in folds, white hair sprouting copiously from his batlike ears. He was still wearing the filthy rag in which they had first met him, and the contemptuous look he bent upon Harry showed that his attitude to his change of ownership had altered no more than his outfit.

  “Master,” croaked Kreacher in his bullfrog’s voice, and he bowed low; muttering to his knees, “back in my Mistress’s old house with the blood-traitor Weasley and the Mudblood—”

  “I forbid you to call anyone ‘blood traitor’ or ‘Mudblood,’” growled Harry. He would have found Kreacher, with his snoutlike nose and bloodshot eyes, a distinctively unlovable object even if the elf had not betrayed Sirius to Voldemort.

  “I’ve got a question for you,” said Harry, his heart beating rather fast as he looked down at the elf, “and I order you to answer it truthfully. Understand?”

  “Yes, Master,” said Kreacher, bowing low again. Harry saw his lips moving soundlessly, undoubtedly framing the insults he was now forbidden to utter.

  “Two years ago,” said Harry, his heart now hammering against his ribs, “there was a big gold locket in the drawing room upstairs. We threw it out. Did you steal it back?”

  There was a moment’s silence, during which Kreacher straightened up to look Harry full in the face. Then he said, “Yes.”

  “Where is it now?” asked Harry jubilantly as Ron and Hermione looked gleeful.

  Kreacher closed his eyes as though he could not bear to see their reactions to his next word.

  “Gone.”

  “Gone?” echoed Harry, elation floating out of him, “What do you mean, it’s gone?”

  The elf shivered. He swayed.

  “Kreacher,” said Harry fiercely, “I order you—”

  “Mundungus Fletcher,” croaked the elf, his eyes still tight shut. “Mundungus Fletcher stole it all; Miss Bella’s and Miss Cissy’s pictures, my Mistress’s gloves, the Order of Merlin, First Class, the goblets with the family crest, and—and—”

  Kreacher was gulping for air: His hollow chest was rising and falling rapidly, then his eyes flew open and he uttered a bloodcurdling scream.

  “—and the locket, Master Regulus’s locket. Kreacher did wrong, Kreacher failed in his orders!”

  Harry reacted instinctively: As Kreacher lunged for the poker standing in the grate, he launched himself upon the elf, flattening him. Hermione’s scream mingled with Kreacher’s but Harry bellowed louder than both of them: “Kreacher, I order you to stay still!”

  He felt the elf freeze and released him. Kreacher lay flat on the cold stone floor, tears gushing from his sagging eyes.

  “Harry, let him up!” Hermione whispered.

  “So he can beat himself up with the poker?” snorted Harry, kneeling beside the elf. “I don’t think so. Right. Kreacher, I want the truth: How do you know Mundungus Fletcher stole the locket?”

  “Kreacher saw him!” gasped the elf as tears poured over his snout and into his mouth full of graying teeth. “Kreacher saw him coming out of Kreacher’s cupboard with his hands full of Kreacher’s treasures. Kreacher told the sneak thief to stop, but Mundungus Fletcher laughed and r-ran…”

  “You called the locket ‘Master Regulus’s,’” said Harry. “Why? Where did it come from? What did Regulus have to do with it? Kreacher, sit up and tell me everything you know about that locket, and everything Regulus had to do with it!”

  The elf sat up, curled into a ball, placed his wet face between his knees, and began to rock backward and forward. When he spoke, his voice was muffled but quite distinct in the silent, echoing kitchen.

  “Master Sirius ran away, good riddance, for he was a bad boy and broke my Mistress’s heart with his lawless ways. But Master Regulus had proper order; he knew what was due to the name of Black and the dignity of his pure blood. For years he talked of the Dark Lord, who was going to bring the wizards out of hiding to rule the Muggles and the Muggle-borns… and when he was sixteen years old, Master Regulus joined the Dark Lord. So proud, so proud, so happy to serve…

  “And one day, a year after he joined, Master Regulus came down to the kitchen to see Kreacher. Master Regulus always liked Kreacher. And Master Regulus said… he said…”

  The old elf rocked faster than ever.

  “…he said that the Dark Lord required an elf.”

  “Voldemort needed an elf?” Harry repeated, looking around at Ron and Hermione, who looked just as puzzled as he did.

  “Oh yes,” moaned Kreacher. “And Master Regulus had volunteered Kreacher. It was an honor, said Master Regulus, an honor for him and for Kreacher, who must be sure to do whatever the Dark Lord ordered him to do… and then to c-come home.”

  Kreacher rocked still faster, his breath coming in sobs.

  “So Kreacher went to the Dark Lord. The Dark Lord did not tell Kreacher what they were to do, but took Kreacher with him to a cave beside the sea. And beyond the cave was a cavern, and in the cavern was a great black lake…”

  The hairs on the back of Harry’s neck stood up. Kreacher’s croaking voice seemed to come to him from across the dark water. He saw what had happened as clearly as though he had been present.

  “…There was a boat…”

  Of course there had been a boat; Harry knew the boat, ghostly green and tiny, bewitched so as to carry one wizard and one victim toward the island in the center. This, then, was how Voldemort had tested the defenses surrounding the Horcrux, by borrowing a disposable creature, a house-elf…

  “There was a b-basin full of potion on the island. The D-Dark Lord made Kreacher drink it…”

  The elf quaked from head to foot.

  “Kreacher drank, and as he drank he saw terrible thing… Kreacher’s insides burned… Kreacher cried for Master Regulus to save him, he cried for his Mistress Black, but the Dark Lord only laughed… He made Kreacher drink all the potion… He dropped
a locket into the empty basin… He filled it with more potion.”

  “And then the Dark Lord sailed away, leaving Kreacher on the island…”

  Harry could see it happening. He watched Voldemort’s white, snakelike face vanishing into darkness, those red eyes fixed pitilessly on the thrashing elf whose death would occur within minutes, whenever he succumbed to the desperate thirst that the burning poison caused its victim… But here, Harry’s imagination could go no further, for he could not see how Kreacher had escaped.

  “Kreacher needed water, he crawled to the island’s edge and he drank from the black lake… and hands, dead hands, came out of the water and dragged Kreacher under the surface…”

  “How did you get away?” Harry asked, and he was not surprised to hear himself whispering.

  Kreacher raised his ugly head and looked Harry with his great, bloodshot eyes.

  “Master Regulus told Kreacher to come back,” he said.

  “I know—but how did you escape the Inferi?”

  Kreacher did not seem to understand.

  “Master Regulus told Kreacher to come back,” he repeated.

  “I know, but—”

  “Well, it’s obvious, isn’t it, Harry?” said Ron. “He Disapparated!”

  “But… you couldn’t Apparate in and out of that cave,” said Harry, “otherwise Dumbledore—”

  “Elf magic isn’t like wizard’s magic, is it?” said Ron, “I mean, they can Apparate and Disapparate in and out of Hogwarts when we can’t.”

  There was a silence as Harry digested this. How could Voldemort have made such a mistake? But even as he thought this, Hermione spoke, and her voice was icy.

  “Of course, Voldemort would have considered the ways of house-elves far beneath his notice… It would never have occurred to him that they might have magic that he didn’t.”

  “The house-elf’s highest law is his Master’s bidding,” intoned Kreacher. “Kreacher was told to come home, so Kreacher came home…”

  “Well, then, you did what you were told, didn’t you?” said Hermione kindly. “You didn’t disobey orders at all!”

  Kreacher shook his head, rocking as fast as ever.

  “So what happened when you got back?” Harry asked. “What did Regulus say when you told him what happened?”

  “Master Regulus was very worried, very worried,” croaked Kreacher. “Master Regulus told Kreacher to stay hidden and not to leave the house. And then… it was a little while later… Master Regulus came to find Kreacher in his cupboard one night, and Master Regulus was strange, not as he usually was, disturbed in his mind, Kreacher could tell… and he asked Kreacher to take him to the cave, the cave where Kreacher had gone with the Dark Lord…”

  And so they had set off. Harry could visualize them quite clearly, the frightened old elf and the thin, dark Seeker who had so resembled Sirius… Kreacher knew how to open the concealed entrance to the underground cavern, knew how to raise the tiny boat: this time it was his beloved Regulus who sailed with him to the island with its basin of poison…

  “And he made you drink the poison?” said Harry, disgusted.

  But Kreacher shook his head and wept. Hermione’s hands leapt to her mouth: She seemed to have understood something.

  “M-Master Regulus took from his pocket a locket like the one the Dark Lord had,” said Kreacher, tears pouring down either side of his snoutlike nose. “And he told Kreacher to take it and, when the basin was empty, to switch the lockets…”

  Kreacher’s sobs came in great rasps now; Harry had to concentrate hard to understand him.

  “And he order—Kreacher to leave—without him. And he told Kreacher—to go home—and never to tell my Mistress—what he had done—but to destroy—the first locket. And he drank—all the potion—and Kreacher swapped the lockets—and watched… as Master Regulus… was dragged beneath the water… and…”

  “Oh, Kreacher!” wailed Hermione, who was crying. She dropped to her knees beside the elf and tried to hug him. At once he was on his feet, cringing away from her, quite obviously repulsed.

  “The Mudblood touched Kreacher, he will not allow it, what would his Mistress say?”

  “I told you not to call her ‘Mudblood’!” snarled Harry, but the elf was already punishing himself. He fell to the ground and banged his forehead on the floor.

  “Stop him—stop him!” Hermione cried. “Oh, don’t you see now how sick it is, the way they’ve got to obey?”

  “Kreacher—stop, stop!” shouted Harry.

  The elf lay on the floor, panting and shivering, green mucus glistening around his snot, a bruise already blooming on his pallid forehead where he had struck himself, his eyes swollen and bloodshot and swimming in tears. Harry had never seen anything so pitiful.

  “So you brought the locket home,” he said relentlessly, for he was determined to know the full story. “And you tried to destroy it?”

  “Nothing Kreacher did made any mark upon it,” moaned the elf. “Kreacher tried everything, everything he knew, but nothing, nothing would work… So many powerful spells upon the casing, Kreacher was sure the way to destroy it was to get inside it, but it would not open… Kreacher punished himself, he tried again, he punished himself, he tried again. Kreacher failed to obey orders, Kreacher could not destroy the locket! And his mistress was mad with grief, because Master Regulus had disappeared and Kreacher could not tell her what had happened, no, because Master Regulus had f-f-forbidden him to tell any of the f-f-family what happened in the c-cave…”

  Kreacher began to sob so hard that there were no more coherent words. Tears flowed down Hermione’s cheeks as she watched Kreacher, but she did not dare touch him again. Even Ron, who was no fan of Kreacher’s, looked troubled. Harry sat back on his heels and shook his head, trying to clear it.

  “I don’t understand you, Kreacher,” he said finally. “Voldemort tried to kill you, Regulus died to bring Voldemort down, but you were still happy to betray Sirius to Voldemort? You were happy to go to Narcissa and Bellatrix, and pass information to Voldemort through them…”

  “Harry, Kreacher doesn’t think like that,” said Hermione, wiping her eyes on the back of her hand. “He’s a slave; house-elves are used to bad, even brutal treatment; what Voldemort did to Kreacher wasn’t that far out of the common way. What do wizard wars mean to an elf like Kreacher? He’s loyal to people who are kind to him, and Mrs. Black must have been, and Regulus certainly was, so he served them willingly and parroted their beliefs. I know what you’re going to say,” she went on as Harry began to protest, “that Regulus changed his mind… but he doesn’t seem to have explained that to Kreacher, does he? And I think I know why. Kreacher and Regulus’s family were all safest if they kept to the old pure-blood line. Regulus was trying to protect them all.”

  “Sirius—”

  “Sirius was horrible to Kreacher, Harry, and it’s no good looking like that, you know it’s true. Kreacher had been alone for such a long time when Sirius came to live here, and he was probably starving for a bit of affection. I’m sure ‘Miss Cissy’ and ‘Miss Bella’ were perfectly lovely to Kreacher when he turned up, so he did them a favor and told them everything they wanted to know. I’ve said all along that wizards would pay for how they treat house-elves. Well, Voldemort did… and so did Sirius.”

  Harry had no retort. As he watched Kreacher sobbing on the floor, he remembered what Dumbledore had said to him, mere hours after Sirius’s death: I do not think Sirius ever saw Kreacher as a being with feelings as acute as a human’s…

  “Kreacher,” said Harry after a while, “when you feel up to it, er… please sit up.”

  It was several minutes before Kreacher hiccupped himself into silence. Then he pushed himself into a sitting position again, rubbing his knuckles into his eyes like a small child.

  “Kreacher, I am going to ask you to do something,” said Harry. He glanced at Hermione for assistance. He wanted to give the order kindly, but at the same time, he could not pretend that
it was not an order. However, the change in his tone seemed to have gained her approval: She smiled encouragingly.

  “Kreacher, I want you, please, to go and find Mundungus Fletcher. We need to find out where the locket—where Master Regulus’s locket it. It’s really important. We want to finish the work Master Regulus started, we want to—er—ensure that he didn’t die in vain.”

  Kreacher dropped his fists and looked up at Harry.

  “Find Mundungus Fletcher?” he croaked.

  “And bring him here, to Grimmauld Place,” said Harry. “Do you think you could do that for us?”

  As Kreacher nodded and got to his feet, Harry had a sudden inspiration. He pulled out Hagrid’s purse and took out the fake Horcrux, the substitute locket in which Regulus had placed the note to Voldemort.

  “Kreacher, I’d, er, like you to have this,” he said, pressing the locket into the elf’s hand. “This belonged to Regulus and I’m sure he’d want you to have it as a token of gratitude for what you—”

  “Overkill, mate,” said Ron as the elf took one look at the locket, let out a howl of shock and misery, and threw himself back onto the ground.

  It took them nearly half an hour to calm down Kreacher, who was so overcome to be presented with a Black family heirloom for his very own that he was too weak at the knees to stand properly. When finally he was able to totter a few steps they all accompanied him to his cupboard, watched him tuck up the locket safely in his dirty blankets, and assured him that they would make its protection their first priority while he was away. He then made two low bows to Harry and Ron, and even gave a funny little spasm in Hermione’s direction that might have been an attempt at a respectful salute, before Disapparating with the usual loud crack.

  11. THE BRIBE

  If Kreacher could escape a lake full of Inferi, Harry was confident that the capture of Mundungus would take a few hours at most, and he prowled the house all morning in a state of high anticipation. However, Kreacher did not return that morning or even that afternoon. By nightfall, Harry felt discouraged and anxious, and a supper composed largely of moldy bread, upon which Hermione had tried a variety of unsuccessful Transfigurations, did nothing to help.