The door downstairs crashed open.

  ‘Didn’t I tell you there was no need to hurry, Travers?’ said a rough voice. ‘Didn’t I tell you this nutter was just raving as usual?’

  There was a bang and a scream of pain from Xenophilius.

  ‘No … no … upstairs … Potter!’

  ‘I told you last week, Lovegood, we weren’t coming back for anything less than some solid information! Remember last week? When you wanted to swap your daughter for that stupid bleeding headdress? And the week before –’ another bang, another squeal ‘– when you thought we’d give her back if you offered us proof there are Crumple –’ bang ‘– Headed –’ bang ‘– Snorkacks?’

  ‘No – no – I beg you!’ sobbed Xenophilius. ‘It really is Potter! Really!’

  ‘And now it turns out you only called us here to try and blow us up!’ roared the Death Eater, and there was a volley of bangs interspersed with squeals of agony from Xenophilius.

  ‘The place looks like it’s about to fall in, Selwyn,’ said a cool second voice, echoing up the mangled staircase. ‘The stairs are completely blocked. Could try clearing it? Might bring the place down.’

  ‘You lying piece of filth,’ shouted the wizard named Selwyn. ‘You’ve never seen Potter in your life, have you? Thought you’d lure us here to kill us, did you? And you think you’ll get your girl back like this?’

  ‘I swear … I swear …Potter’s upstairs!’

  ‘Homenum revelio,’ said the voice at the foot of the stairs.

  Harry heard Hermione gasp, and he had the odd sensation that something was swooping low over him, immersing his body in its shadow.

  ‘There’s someone up there all right, Selwyn,’ said the second man sharply.

  ‘It’s Potter, I tell you, it’s Potter!’ sobbed Xenophilius. ‘Please … please … give me Luna, just let me have Luna …’

  ‘You can have your little girl, Lovegood,’ said Selwyn, ‘if you get up those stairs and bring me down Harry Potter. But if this is a plot, if it’s a trick, if you’ve got an accomplice waiting up there to ambush us, we’ll see if we can spare a bit of your daughter for you to bury.’

  Xenophilius gave a wail of fear and despair. There were scurryings and scrapings: Xenophilius was trying to get through the debris on the stairs.

  ‘Come on,’ Harry whispered, ‘we’ve got to get out of here.’

  He started to dig himself out under cover of all the noise Xenophilius was making on the staircase. Ron was buried deepest: Harry and Hermione climbed, as quietly as they could, over all the wreckage to where he lay, trying to prise a heavy chest of drawers off his legs. While Xenophilius’s banging and scraping drew nearer and nearer, Hermione managed to free Ron with the use of a Hover Charm.

  ‘All right,’ breathed Hermione, as the broken printing press blocking the top of the stairs began to tremble; Xenophilius was feet away from them. She was still white with dust. ‘Do you trust me, Harry?’

  Harry nodded.

  ‘OK then,’ Hermione whispered, ‘give me the Invisibility Cloak. Ron, you’re going to put it on.’

  ‘Me? But Harry –’

  ‘Please Ron! Harry, hold on tight to my hand, Ron, grab my shoulder.’

  Harry held out his left hand. Ron vanished beneath the Cloak. The printing press blocking the stairs was vibrating: Xenophilius was trying to shift it using a Hover Charm. Harry did not know what Hermione was waiting for.

  ‘Hold tight,’ she whispered. ‘Hold tight … any second …’

  Xenophilius’s paper-white face appeared over the top of the sideboard.

  ‘Obliviate!’ cried Hermione, pointing her wand first into his face, then at the floor beneath them: ‘Deprimo!’

  She had blasted a hole in the sitting-room floor. They fell like boulders, Harry still holding on to her hand for dear life, there was a scream from below and he glimpsed two men trying to get out of the way as vast quantities of rubble and broken furniture rained all around them from the shattered ceiling. Hermione twisted in mid-air and the thundering of the collapsing house rang in Harry’s ears as she dragged him once more into darkness.

  — CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO —

  The Deathly Hallows

  Harry fell, panting, on to grass and scrambled up at once. They seemed to have landed in the corner of a field at dusk; Hermione was already running in a circle around them, waving her wand.

  ‘Protego totalum … Salvio hexia …’

  ‘That treacherous old bleeder!’ Ron panted, emerging from beneath the Invisibility Cloak and throwing it to Harry. ‘Hermione, you’re a genius, a total genius, I can’t believe we got out of that!’

  ‘Cave inimicum … didn’t I say it was an Erumpent horn? Didn’t I tell him? And now his house has been blown apart!’

  ‘Serves him right,’ said Ron, examining his torn jeans and the cuts to his legs. ‘What d’you reckon they’ll do to him?’

  ‘Oh, I hope they don’t kill him!’ groaned Hermione. ‘That’s why I wanted the Death Eaters to get a glimpse of Harry before we left, so they knew Xenophilius hadn’t been lying!’

  ‘Why hide me, though?’ asked Ron.

  ‘You’re supposed to be in bed with spattergroit, Ron! They’ve kidnapped Luna because her father supported Harry! What would happen to your family if they knew you’re with him?’

  ‘But what about your mum and dad?’

  ‘They’re in Australia,’ said Hermione. ‘They should be all right. They don’t know anything.’

  ‘You’re a genius,’ Ron repeated, looking awed.

  ‘Yeah, you are, Hermione,’ agreed Harry fervently, ‘I don’t know what we’d do without you.’

  She beamed, but became solemn at once.

  ‘What about Luna?’

  ‘Well, if they’re telling the truth and she’s still alive –’ began Ron.

  ‘Don’t say that, don’t say it!’ squealed Hermione. ‘She must be alive, she must!’

  ‘Then she’ll be in Azkaban, I expect,’ said Ron. ‘Whether she survives the place, though … loads don’t …’

  ‘She will,’ said Harry. He could not bear to contemplate the alternative. ‘She’s tough, Luna, much tougher than you’d think. She’s probably teaching all the inmates about Wrackspurts and Nargles.’

  ‘I hope you’re right,’ said Hermione. She passed a hand over her eyes. ‘I’d feel so sorry for Xenophilius if –’

  ‘– if he hadn’t just tried to sell us to the Death Eaters, yeah,’ said Ron.

  They put up the tent and retreated inside it, where Ron made them tea. After their narrow escape, the chilly, musty old place felt like home, safe, familiar and friendly.

  ‘Oh, why did we go there?’ groaned Hermione after a few minutes’ silence. ‘Harry, you were right, it was Godric’s Hollow all over again, a complete waste of time! The Deathly Hallows … such rubbish … although actually,’ a sudden thought seemed to have struck her, ‘he might have made it all up, mightn’t he? He probably doesn’t believe in the Deathly Hallows at all, he just wanted to keep us talking until the Death Eaters arrived!’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ said Ron. ‘It’s a damn’ sight harder making stuff up when you’re under stress than you’d think. I found that out when the Snatchers caught me. It was much easier pretending to be Stan, because I knew a bit about him, than inventing a whole new person. Old Lovegood was under loads of pressure, trying to make sure we stayed put. I reckon he told us the truth, or what he thinks is the truth, just to keep us talking.’

  ‘Well, I don’t suppose it matters,’ sighed Hermione. ‘Even if he was being honest, I never heard such a lot of nonsense in all my life.’

  ‘Hang on, though,’ said Ron. ‘The Chamber of Secrets was supposed to be a myth, wasn’t it?’

  ‘But the Deathly Hallows can’t exist, Ron!’

  ‘You keep saying that, but one of them can,’ said Ron. ‘Harry’s Invisibility Cloak –’

  ‘“The Tale of the Three Brothers” is a story,’ said Hermione firmly. ‘A story about how humans are frightened of death. If surviving was as simple as hiding under the Invisibility Cloak, we’d have everything we need already!’

  ‘I don’t know. We could do with an unbeatable wand,’ said Harry, turning the blackthorn wand he so disliked over in his fingers.

  ‘There’s no such thing, Harry!’

  ‘You said there have been loads of wands – the Deathstick and whatever they were called –’

  ‘All right, even if you want to kid yourself the Elder Wand’s real, what about the Resurrection Stone?’ Her fingers sketched quotation marks around the name, and her tone dripped sarcasm. ‘No magic can raise the dead, and that’s that!’

  ‘When my wand connected with You-Know-Who’s, it made my mum and dad appear … and Cedric …’

  ‘But they weren’t really back from the dead, were they?’ said Hermione. ‘Those kinds of – of pale imitations aren’t the same as truly bringing someone back to life.’

  ‘But she, the girl in the tale, didn’t really come back, did she? The story says that once people are dead, they belong with the dead. But the second brother still got to see her and talk to her, didn’t he? He even lived with her for a while …’

  He saw concern and something less easily definable in Hermione’s expression. Then, as she glanced at Ron, Harry realised that it was fear: he had scared her with his talk of living with dead people.

  ‘So that Peverell bloke who’s buried in Godric’s Hollow,’ he said hastily, trying to sound robustly sane, ‘you don’t know anything about him, then?’

  ‘No,’ she replied, looking relieved at the change of subject. ‘I looked him up after I saw the mark on his grave; if he’d been anyone famous or done anything important, I’m sure he’d be in one of our books. The only place I’ve managed to find the name “Peverell” is Nature’s Nobility: A Wizarding Genealogy. I borrowed it from Kreacher,’ she explained, as Ron raised his eyebrows. ‘It lists the pure-blood families that are now extinct in the male line. Apparently the Peverells were one of the earliest families to vanish.’

  ‘“Extinct in the male line”?’ repeated Ron.

  ‘It means the name’s died out,’said Hermione, ‘centuries ago, in the case of the Peverells. They could still have descendants, though, they’d just be called something different.’

  And then it came to Harry in one shining piece, the memory that had stirred at the sound of the name Peverell: a filthy old man brandishing an ugly ring in the face of a Ministry official, and he cried aloud, ‘Marvolo Gaunt!’

  ‘Sorry?’ said Ron and Hermione together.

  ‘Marvolo Gaunt! You-Know-Who’s grandfather! In the Pensieve! With Dumbledore! Marvolo Gaunt said he was descended from the Peverells!’

  Ron and Hermione looked bewildered.

  ‘The ring, the ring that became the Horcrux, Marvolo Gaunt said it had the Peverell coat of arms on it! I saw him waving it in the bloke from the Ministry’s face, he nearly shoved it up his nose!’

  ‘The Peverell coat of arms?’ said Hermione sharply. ‘Could you see what it looked like?’

  ‘Not really,’ said Harry, trying to remember. ‘There was nothing fancy on there, as far as I could see; maybe a few scratches. I only ever saw it really close up after it had been cracked open.’

  Harry saw Hermione’s comprehension in the sudden widening of her eyes. Ron was looking from one to the other, astonished.

  ‘Blimey … you reckon it was this sign again? The sign of the Hallows?’

  ‘Why not?’ said Harry excitedly. ‘Marvolo Gaunt was an ignorant old git who lived like a pig, all he cared about was his ancestry. If that ring had been passed down through the centuries, he might not have known what it really was. There were no books in that house, and trust me, he wasn’t the type to read fairy tales to his kids. He’d have loved to think the scratches on the stone were a coat of arms, because as far as he was concerned, having pure blood made you practically royal.’

  ‘Yes … and that’s all very interesting,’ said Hermione cautiously, ‘but Harry, if you’re thinking what I think you’re think—’

  ‘Well, why not? Why not?’ said Harry, abandoning caution. ‘It was a stone, wasn’t it?’ He looked at Ron for support. ‘What if it was the Resurrection Stone?’

  Ron’s mouth fell open. ‘Blimey – but would it still work if Dumbledore broke –’

  ‘Work? Work? Ron, it never worked! There’s no such thing as a Resurrection Stone!’ Hermione had leapt to her feet, looking exasperated and angry. ‘Harry, you’re trying to fit everything into the Hallows story –’

  ‘Fit everything in?’ he repeated. ‘Hermione, it fits of its own accord! I know the sign of the Deathly Hallows was on that stone! Gaunt said he was descended from the Peverells!’

  ‘A minute ago you told us you never saw the mark on the stone properly!’

  ‘Where d’you reckon the ring is now?’ Ron asked Harry. ‘What did Dumbledore do with it after he broke it open?’

  But Harry’s imagination was racing ahead, far beyond Ron and Hermione’s …

  Three objects, or Hallows, which, if united, will make the possessor master of Death … master … conqueror … vanquisher … the last enemy that shall be destroyed is death …

  And he saw himself, possessor of the Hallows, facing Voldemort, whose Horcruxes were no match … neither can live while the other survives … was this the answer? Hallows versus Horcruxes? Was there a way, after all, to ensure that he was the one who triumphed? If he were the master of the Deathly Hallows, would he be safe?

  ‘Harry?’

  But he scarcely heard Hermione: he had pulled out his Invisibility Cloak and was running it through his fingers, the cloth supple as water, light as air. He had never seen anything to equal it in his nearly seven years in the wizarding world. The Cloak was exactly what Xenophilius had described: a cloak that really and truly renders the wearer completely invisible, and endures eternally, giving constant and impenetrable concealment, no matter what spells are cast at it …

  And then, with a gasp, he remembered –

  ‘Dumbledore had my Cloak, the night my parents died!’

  His voice shook and he could feel the colour in his face, but he did not care. ‘My mum told Sirius Dumbledore borrowed the Cloak! This is why! He wanted to examine it, because he thought it was the third Hallow! Ignotus Peverell is buried in Godric’s Hollow …’ Harry was walking blindly around the tent, feeling as though great new vistas of truth were opening all around him. ‘He’s my ancestor! I’m descended from the third brother! It all makes sense!’

  He felt armed in certainty, in his belief in the Hallows, as if the mere idea of possessing them was giving him protection, and he felt joyous as he turned back to the other two.

  ‘Harry,’ said Hermione again, but he was busy undoing the pouch around his neck, his fingers shaking hard.

  ‘Read it,’ he told her, pushing his mother’s letter into her hand. ‘Read it! Dumbledore had the Cloak, Hermione! Why else would he want it? He didn’t need a Cloak, he could perform a Disillusionment Charm so powerful that he made himself completely invisible without one!’

  Something fell to the floor and rolled, glittering, under a chair: he had dislodged the Snitch when he pulled out the letter. He stooped to pick it up, and then the newly tapped spring of fabulous discoveries threw him another gift, and shock and wonder erupted inside him so that he shouted out.

  ‘IT’S IN HERE! He left me the ring – it’s in the Snitch!’

  ‘You – you reckon?’

  He could not understand why Ron looked taken aback. It was so obvious, so clear to Harry: everything fitted, everything … his Cloak was the third Hallow, and when he discovered how to open the Snitch he would have the second, and then all he needed to do was find the first Hallow, the Elder Wand, and then –

  But it was as though a curtain fell on a lit stage: all his excitement, all his hope and happiness were extinguished at a stroke, and he stood alone in the darkness, and the glorious spell was broken.

  ‘That’s what he’s after.’

  The change in his voice made Ron and Hermione look even more scared.

  ‘You-Know-Who’s after the Elder Wand.’

  He turned his back on their strained, incredulous faces. He knew it was the truth. It all made sense. Voldemort was not seeking a new wand; he was seeking an old wand, a very old wand indeed. Harry walked to the entrance of the tent, forgetting about Ron and Hermione as he looked out into the night, thinking …

  Voldemort had been raised in a Muggle orphanage. Nobody could have told him The Tales of Beedle the Bard when he was a child, any more than Harry had heard them. Hardly any wizards believed in the Deathly Hallows. Was it likely that Voldemort knew about them?

  Harry gazed into the darkness … if Voldemort had known about the Deathly Hallows, surely he would have sought them, done anything to possess them: three objects that made the possessor master of Death? If he had known about the Deathly Hallows, he might not have needed Horcruxes in the first place. Didn’t the simple fact that he had taken a Hallow, and turned it into a Horcrux, demonstrate that he did not know this last great wizarding secret?

  Which meant that Voldemort sought the Elder Wand without realising its full power, without understanding that it was one of three … for the wand was the Hallow that could not be hidden, whose existence was best known … the bloody trail of the Elder Wand is splattered across the pages of wizarding history …

  Harry watched the cloudy sky, curves of smoke-grey and silver sliding over the face of the white moon. He felt light-headed with amazement at his discoveries.

  He turned back into the tent. It was a shock to see Ron and Hermione standing exactly where he had left them, Hermione still holding Lily’s letter, Ron at her side looking slightly anxious. Didn’t they realise how far they had travelled in the last few minutes?

  ‘This is it,’ Harry said, trying to bring them inside the glow of his own astonished certainty. ‘This explains everything. The Deathly Hallows are real, and I’ve got one – maybe two –’