‘Listen, I’ve got a feeling you’d be able to tell who lived there if you looked through the Lovegoods’ window. Let’s try the next lot of hills.’

  So they Disapparated a few miles further north.

  ‘Aha!’ shouted Ron, as the wind whipped their hair and clothes. Ron was pointing upwards, towards the top of the hill on which they had appeared, where a most strange-looking house rose vertically against the sky, a great, black cylinder with a ghostly moon hanging behind it in the afternoon sky. ‘That’s got to be Luna’s house, who else would live in a place like that? It looks like a giant rook!’

  ‘It’s nothing like a bird,’ said Hermione, frowning at the tower.

  ‘I was talking about a chess rook,’ said Ron. ‘A castle to you.’

  Ron’s legs were the longest and he reached the top of the hill first. When Harry and Hermione caught up with him, panting and clutching stitches in their sides, they found him grinning broadly.

  ‘It’s theirs,’ said Ron. ‘Look.’

  Three hand-painted signs had been tacked to a broken-down gate. The first read ‘The Quibbler. Editor: X. Lovegood’, the second, ‘Pick Your Own Mistletoe’, the third, ‘Keep Off the Dirigible Plums’.

  The gate creaked as they opened it. The zigzagging path leading to the front door was overgrown with a variety of odd plants, including a bush covered in the orange, radish-like fruit Luna sometimes wore as earrings. Harry thought he recognised a Snargaluff, and gave the wizened stump a wide berth. Two aged crab-apple trees, bent with the wind, stripped of leaves but still heavy with berry-sized red fruits and bushy crowns of white-beaded mistletoe, stood sentinel on either side of the front door. A little owl with a slightly flattened, hawk-like head peered down at them from one of the branches.

  ‘You’d better take off the Invisibility Cloak, Harry,’ said Hermione, ‘it’s you Mr Lovegood wants to help, not us.’

  He did as she suggested, handing her the Cloak to stow in the beaded bag. She then rapped three times on the thick, black door, which was studded with iron nails and bore a knocker shaped like an eagle.

  Barely ten seconds passed, then the door was flung open and there stood Xenophilius Lovegood, barefooted and wearing what appeared to be a stained nightshirt. His long, white, candyfloss hair was dirty and unkempt. Xenophilius had been positively dapper at Bill and Fleur’s wedding by comparison.

  ‘What? What is it? Who are you? What do you want?’ he cried, in a high-pitched, querulous voice, looking first at Hermione, then at Ron, and finally at Harry, upon which his mouth fell open in a perfect, comical ‘O’.

  ‘Hello, Mr Lovegood,’ said Harry, holding out his hand. ‘I’m Harry, Harry Potter.’

  Xenophilius did not take Harry’s hand, although the eye that was not pointing inwards at his nose slid straight to the scar on Harry’s forehead.

  ‘Would it be OK if we came in?’ asked Harry. ‘There’s something we’d like to ask you.’

  ‘I … I’m not sure that’s advisable,’ whispered Xenophilius. He swallowed and cast a quick look around the garden. ‘Rather a shock … my word … I … I’m afraid I don’t really think I ought to –’

  ‘It won’t take long,’ said Harry, slightly disappointed by this less-than-warm welcome.

  ‘I – oh, all right then. Come in, quickly. Quickly!’

  They were barely over the threshold when Xenophilius slammed the door shut behind them. They were standing in the most peculiar kitchen Harry had ever seen. The room was perfectly circular, so that it felt like being inside a giant pepper pot. Everything was curved to fit the walls: the stove, the sink and the cupboards, and all of it had been painted with flowers, insects and birds in bright primary colours. Harry thought he recognised Luna’s style: the effect, in such an enclosed space, was slightly overwhelming.

  In the middle of the floor, a wrought-iron spiral staircase led to the upper levels. There was a great deal of clattering and banging coming from overhead: Harry wondered what Luna could be doing.

  ‘You’d better come up,’ said Xenophilius, still looking extremely uncomfortable, and he led the way.

  The room above seemed to be a combination of living room and workplace, and as such, was even more cluttered than the kitchen. Though much smaller, and entirely round, the room somewhat resembled the Room of Requirement on the unforgettable occasion that it had transformed itself into a gigantic labyrinth comprised of centuries of hidden objects. There were piles upon piles of books and papers on every surface. Delicately made models of creatures Harry did not recognise, all flapping wings or snapping jaws, hung from the ceiling.

  Luna was not there: the thing that was making such a racket was a wooden object covered in magically turning cogs and wheels. It looked like the bizarre offspring of a workbench and a set of old shelves, but after a moment Harry deduced that it was an old-fashioned printing press due to the fact that it was churning out Quibblers.

  ‘Excuse me,’ said Xenophilius, and he strode over to the machine, seized a grubby tablecloth from beneath an immense number of books and papers, which all tumbled on to the floor, and threw it over the press, somewhat muffling the loud bangs and clatters. He then faced Harry.

  ‘Why have you come here?’

  Before Harry could speak, however, Hermione let out a small cry of shock.

  ‘Mr Lovegood – what’s that?’

  She was pointing at an enormous, grey spiral horn, not unlike that of a unicorn, which had been mounted on the wall, protruding several feet into the room.

  ‘It is the horn of a Crumple-Horned Snorkack,’ said Xenophilius.

  ‘No it isn’t!’ said Hermione.

  ‘Hermione,’ muttered Harry, embarrassed, ‘now’s not the moment –’

  ‘But Harry, it’s an Erumpent horn! It’s a Class B Tradeable Material and it’s an extraordinarily dangerous thing to have in a house!’

  ‘How d’you know it’s an Erumpent horn?’ asked Ron, edging away from the horn as fast as he could, given the extreme clutter of the room.

  ‘There’s a description in Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them! Mr Lovegood, you need to get rid of it straight away, don’t you know it can explode at the slightest touch?’

  ‘The Crumple-Horned Snorkack,’ said Xenophilius very clearly, a mulish look upon his face, ‘is a shy and highly magical creature, and its horn –’

  ‘Mr Lovegood, I recognise the grooved markings around the base, that’s an Erumpent horn and it’s incredibly dangerous – I don’t know where you got it –’

  ‘I bought it,’ said Xenophilius dogmatically, ‘two weeks ago, from a delightful young wizard who knew of my interest in the exquisite Snorkack. A Christmas surprise for my Luna. Now,’ he said, turning to Harry, ‘why exactly have you come here, Mr Potter?’

  ‘We need some help,’ said Harry, before Hermione could start again.

  ‘Ah,’ said Xenophilius. ‘Help. Hm.’ His good eye moved again to Harry’s scar. He seemed simultaneously terrified and mesmerised. ‘Yes. The thing is … helping Harry Potter … rather dangerous …’

  ‘Aren’t you the one who keeps telling everyone it’s their first duty to help Harry?’ said Ron. ‘In that magazine of yours?’

  Xenophilius glanced behind him at the concealed printing press, still banging and clattering beneath the tablecloth.

  ‘Er – yes, I have expressed that view. However –’

  ‘– that’s for everyone else to do, not you personally?’ said Ron.

  Xenophilius did not answer. He kept swallowing, his eyes darting between the three of them. Harry had the impression that he was undergoing some painful internal struggle.

  ‘Where’s Luna?’ asked Hermione. ‘Let’s see what she thinks.’

  Xenophilius gulped. He seemed to be steeling himself. Finally he said, in a shaky voice difficult to hear over the noise of the printing press, ‘Luna is down at the stream, fishing for Freshwater Plimpies. She … she will like to see you. I’ll go and call her and then – yes, very well. I shall try to help you.’

  He disappeared down the spiral staircase and they heard the front door open and close. They looked at each other.

  ‘Cowardly old wart,’ said Ron. ‘Luna’s got ten times his guts.’

  ‘He’s probably worried about what’ll happen to them if the Death Eaters find out I was here,’ said Harry.

  ‘Well, I agree with Ron,’ said Hermione. ‘Awful old hypocrite, telling everyone else to help you and trying to worm out of it himself. And for heaven’s sake keep away from that horn.’

  Harry crossed to the window on the far side of the room. He could see a stream, a thin, glittering ribbon lying far below them at the base of the hill. They were very high up; a bird fluttered past the window as he stared in the direction of The Burrow, now invisible beyond another line of hills. Ginny was over there somewhere. They were closer to each other today than they had been since Bill and Fleur’s wedding, but she could have no idea he was gazing towards her now, thinking of her. He supposed he ought to be glad of it; anyone he came into contact with was in danger, Xenophilius’s attitude proved that.

  He turned away from the window and his gaze fell upon another peculiar object, standing upon the cluttered, curved sideboard: a stone bust of a beautiful but austere-looking witch wearing a most bizarre-looking headdress. Two objects that resembled golden ear-trumpets curved out from the sides. A tiny pair of glittering blue wings was stuck to a leather strap that ran over the top of her head, while one of the orange radishes had been stuck to a second strap around her forehead.

  ‘Look at this,’ said Harry.

  ‘Fetching,’ said Ron. ‘Surprised he didn’t wear that to the wedding.’

  They heard the front door close and a moment later Xenophilius had climbed back up the spiral staircase into the room, his thin legs now encased in wellington boots, bearing a tray of ill-assorted teacups and a steaming teapot.

  ‘Ah, you have spotted my pet invention,’ he said, shoving the tray into Hermione’s arms and joining Harry at the statue’s side. ‘Modelled, fittingly enough, upon the head of the beautiful Rowena Ravenclaw. Wit beyond measure is man’s greatest treasure!’

  He indicated the objects like ear-trumpets.

  ‘These are the Wrackspurt siphons – to remove all sources of distraction from the thinker’s immediate area. Here,’ he pointed out the tiny wings, ‘a Billywig propeller, to induce an elevated frame of mind. Finally,’ he pointed to the orange radish, ‘the Dirigible Plum, so as to enhance the ability to accept the extraordinary.’

  Xenophilius strode back to the tea tray, which Hermione had managed to balance precariously on one of the cluttered side tables.

  ‘May I offer you all an infusion of Gurdyroots?’ said Xenophilius. ‘We make it ourselves.’ As he started to pour out the drink, which was as deeply purple as beetroot juice, he added, ‘Luna is down beyond Bottom Bridge, she is most excited that you are here. She ought not to be too long, she has caught nearly enough Plimpies to make soup for all of us. Do sit down and help yourselves to sugar.

  ‘Now,’ he removed a tottering pile of papers from an armchair and sat down, his wellingtoned legs crossed, ‘how may I help you, Mr Potter?’

  ‘Well,’ said Harry, glancing at Hermione, who nodded encouragingly, ‘it’s about that symbol you were wearing around your neck at Bill and Fleur’s wedding, Mr Lovegood. We wondered what it meant.’

  Xenophilius raised his eyebrows.

  ‘Are you referring to the sign of the Deathly Hallows?’

  — CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE —

  The Tale of the Three Brothers

  Harry turned to look at Ron and Hermione. Neither of them seemed to have understood what Xenophilius had said, either.

  ‘The Deathly Hallows?’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Xenophilius. ‘You haven’t heard of them? I’m not surprised. Very, very few wizards believe. Witness that knuckle-headed young man at your brother’s wedding,’ he nodded at Ron, ‘who attacked me for sporting the symbol of a well-known Dark wizard! Such ignorance. There is nothing Dark about the Hallows – at least, not in that crude sense. One simply uses the symbol to reveal oneself to other believers, in the hope that they might help one with the Quest.’

  He stirred several lumps of sugar into his Gurdyroot infusion and drank some.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said Harry. ‘I still don’t really understand.’

  To be polite, he took a sip from his cup too and almost gagged: the stuff was quite disgusting, as though someone had liquidised bogey-flavoured Every-Flavour Beans.

  ‘Well, you see, believers seek the Deathly Hallows,’ said Xenophilius, smacking his lips in apparent appreciation of the Gurdyroot infusion.

  ‘But what are the Deathly Hallows?’ asked Hermione.

  Xenophilius set aside his empty teacup.

  ‘I assume that you are all familiar with “The Tale of the Three Brothers”?’

  Harry said, ‘No,’ but Ron and Hermione both said, ‘Yes.’

  Xenophilius nodded gravely.

  ‘Well, well, Mr Potter, the whole thing starts with “The Tale of the Three Brothers” … I have a copy somewhere …’

  He glanced vaguely around the room, at the piles of parchment and books, but Hermione said, ‘I’ve got a copy, Mr Lovegood, I’ve got it right here.’

  And she pulled out The Tales of Beedle the Bard from the small beaded bag.

  ‘The original?’ enquired Xenophilius sharply, and when she nodded, he said, ‘Well then, why don’t you read it aloud? Much the best way to make sure we all understand.’

  ‘Er … all right,’ said Hermione nervously. She opened the book and Harry saw that the symbol they were investigating headed the top of the page, as she gave a little cough and began to read.

  ‘“There were once three brothers who were travelling along a lonely, winding road at twilight –”’

  ‘Midnight, our mum always told us,’ said Ron, who had stretched out, arms behind his head, to listen. Hermione shot him a look of annoyance.

  ‘Sorry, I just think it’s a bit spookier if it’s midnight!’ said Ron.

  ‘Yeah, because we really need a bit more fear in our lives,’ said Harry, before he could stop himself. Xenophilius did not seem to be paying much attention, but was staring out of the window at the sky. ‘Go on, Hermione.’

  ‘“In time, the brothers reached a river too deep to wade through and too dangerous to swim across. However, these brothers were learned in the magical arts, and so they simply waved their wands and made a bridge appear across the treacherous water. They were halfway across it when they found their path blocked by a hooded figure.

  ‘“And Death spoke to them –”’

  ‘Sorry,’ interjected Harry, ‘but Death spoke to them?’

  ‘It’s a fairy tale, Harry!’

  ‘Right, sorry. Go on.’

  ‘“And Death spoke to them. He was angry that he had been cheated out of three new victims, for travellers usually drowned in the river. But Death was cunning. He pretended to congratulate the three brothers upon their magic, and said that each had earned a prize for having been clever enough to evade him.

  ‘“So the oldest brother, who was a combative man, asked for a wand more powerful than any in existence: a wand that must always win duels for its owner, a wand worthy of a wizard who had conquered Death! So Death crossed to an elder tree on the banks of the river, fashioned a wand from a branch that hung there, and gave it to the oldest brother.

  ‘“Then the second brother, who was an arrogant man, decided that he wanted to humiliate Death still further, and asked for the power to recall others from Death. So Death picked up a stone from the riverbank and gave it to the second brother, and told him that the stone would have the power to bring back the dead.

  ‘“And then Death asked the third and youngest brother what he would like. The youngest brother was the humblest and also the wisest of the brothers, and he did not trust Death. So he asked for something that would enable him to go forth from that place without being followed by Death. And Death, most unwillingly, handed over his own Cloak of Invisibility.”’

  ‘Death’s got an Invisibility Cloak?’ Harry interrupted again.

  ‘So he can sneak up on people,’ said Ron. ‘Sometimes he gets bored of running at them, flapping his arms and shrieking … sorry, Hermione.’

  ‘“Then Death stood aside and allowed the three brothers to continue on their way and they did so, talking with wonder of the adventure they had had, and admiring Death’s gifts.

  ‘“In due course the brothers separated, each for his own destination.

  ‘“The first brother travelled on for a week or more, and reaching a distant village, sought out a fellow wizard with whom he had a quarrel. Naturally, with the Elder Wand as his weapon, he could not fail to win the duel that followed. Leaving his enemy dead upon the floor, the oldest brother proceeded to an inn, where he boasted loudly of the powerful wand he had snatched from Death himself, and of how it made him invincible.

  ‘“That very night, another wizard crept upon the oldest brother as he lay, wine-sodden, upon his bed. The thief took the wand and, for good measure, slit the oldest brother’s throat.

  ‘“And so Death took the first brother for his own.

  ‘“Meanwhile, the second brother journeyed to his own home, where he lived alone. Here he took out the stone that had the power to recall the dead, and turned it thrice in his hand. To his amazement and his delight, the figure of the girl he had once hoped to marry before her untimely death, appeared at once before him.

  ‘“Yet she was sad and cold, separated from him as by a veil. Though she had returned to the mortal world, she did not truly belong there and suffered. Finally, the second brother, driven mad with hopeless longing, killed himself so as truly to join her.

  ‘“And so Death took the second brother for his own.

  ‘“But though Death searched for the third brother for many years, he was never able to find him. It was only when he had attained a great age that the youngest brother finally took off the Cloak of Invisibility and gave it to his son. And then he greeted Death as an old friend, and went with him gladly, and, equals, they departed this life.”’