“I came on the Knight Bus,” said Hermione airily, pulling off her jacket before Harry had time to speak. “Dumbledore told me what had happened first thing this morning, but I had to wait for term to end officially before setting off. Umbridge is already livid that you lot disappeared right under her nose, even though Dumbledore told her Mr. Weasley was in St. Mungo’s and he’d given you all permission to visit. So…”

  She sat down next to Ginny, and the two girls and Ron all looked up at Harry.

  “How’re you feeling?” asked Hermione.

  “Fine,” said Harry stiffly.

  “Oh, don’t lie, Harry,” she said impatiently. “Ron and Ginny say you’ve been hiding from everyone since you got back from St. Mungo’s.”

  “They do, do they?” said Harry, glaring at Ron and Ginny. Ron looked down at his feet but Ginny seemed quite unabashed.

  “Well, you have!” she said. “And you won’t look at any of us!”

  “It’s you lot who won’t look at me!” said Harry angrily.

  “Maybe you’re taking it in turns to look, and keep missing each other,” suggested Hermione, the corners of her mouth twitching.

  “Very funny,” snapped Harry, turning away.

  “Oh, stop feeling all misunderstood,” said Hermione sharply. “Look, the others have told me what you overheard last night on the Extendable Ears—”

  “Yeah?” growled Harry, his hands deep in his pockets as he watched the snow now falling thickly outside. “All been talking about me, have you? Well, I’m getting used to it.”

  “We wanted to talk to you, Harry,” said Ginny, “but as you’ve been hiding ever since we got back—”

  “I didn’t want anyone to talk to me,” said Harry, who was feeling more and more nettled.

  “Well, that was a bit stupid of you,” said Ginny angrily, “seeing as you don’t know anyone but me who’s been possessed by You-Know-Who, and I can tell you how it feels.”

  Harry remained quite still as the impact of these words hit him. Then he wheeled round.

  “I forgot,” he said.

  “Lucky you,” said Ginny coolly.

  “I’m sorry,” Harry said, and he meant it. “So… so, do you think I’m being possessed, then?”

  “Well, can you remember everything you’ve been doing?” Ginny asked. “Are there big blank periods where you don’t know what you’ve been up to?”

  Harry racked his brains.

  “No,” he said.

  “Then You-Know-Who hasn’t ever possessed you,” said Ginny simply. “When he did it to me, I couldn’t remember what I’d been doing for hours at a time. I’d find myself somewhere and not know how I got there.”

  Harry hardly dared believe her, yet his heart was lightening almost in spite of himself.

  “That dream I had about your dad and the snake, though—”

  “Harry, you’ve had these dreams before,” Hermione said. “You had flashes of what Voldemort was up to last year.”

  “This was different,” said Harry, shaking his head. “I was inside that snake. It was like I was the snake… what if Voldemort somehow transported me to London—?”

  “One day,” said Hermione, sounding thoroughly exasperated, “you’ll read Hogwarts: A History, and perhaps it will remind you that you can’t Apparate or Disapparate inside Hogwarts. Even Voldemort couldn’t just make you fly out of your dormitory, Harry.”

  “You didn’t leave your bed, mate,” said Ron. “I saw you thrashing around in your sleep for at least a minute before we could wake you up.”

  Harry started pacing up and down the room again, thinking. What they were all saying was not only comforting, it made sense… without really thinking, he took a sandwich from the plate on the bed and crammed it hungrily into his mouth.

  I’m not the weapon after all, thought Harry. His heart swelled with happiness and relief, and he felt like joining in as they heard Sirius tramping past their door towards Buckbeak’s room, singing “God Rest Ye, Merry Hippogriffs” at the top of his voice.

  * * *

  How could he have dreamed of returning to Privet Drive for Christmas? Sirius’s delight at having the house full again, and especially at having Harry back, was infectious. He was no longer their sullen host of the summer; now he seemed determined that everyone should enjoy themselves as much, if not more than they would have done at Hogwarts, and he worked tirelessly in the run-up to Christmas Day, cleaning and decorating with their help, so that by the time they all went to bed on Christmas Eve the house was barely recognisable. The tarnished chandeliers were no longer hung with cobwebs but with garlands of holly and gold and silver streamers; magical snow glittered in heaps over the threadbare carpets; a great Christmas tree, obtained by Mundungus and decorated with live fairies, blocked Sirius’s family tree from view, and even the stuffed elf-heads on the hall wall wore Father Christmas hats and beards.

  Harry awoke on Christmas morning to find a stack of presents at the foot of his bed and Ron already halfway through opening his own, rather larger, pile.

  “Good haul this year,” he informed Harry through a cloud of paper. “Thanks for the Broom Compass, it’s excellent; beats Hermione’s—she got me a homework planner—”

  Harry sorted through his presents and found one with Hermione’s handwriting on it. She had given him, too, a book that resembled a diary except that every time he opened a page it said aloud things like: “Do it today or later you’ll pay!”

  Sirius and Lupin had given Harry a set of excellent books entitled Practical Defensive Magic and its Use Against the Dark Arts, which had superb, moving colour illustrations of all the counter-jinxes and hexes it described. Harry flicked through the first volume eagerly; he could see it was going to be highly useful in his plans for the D.A. Hagrid had sent a furry brown wallet that had fangs, which were presumably supposed to be an anti-theft device, but unfortunately prevented Harry putting any money in without getting his fingers ripped off. Tonks’s present was a small, working model of a Firebolt, which Harry watched fly around the room, wishing he still had his full-size version; Ron had given him an enormous box of Every-Flavour Beans, Mr. and Mrs. Weasley the usual hand-knitted jumper and some mince pies, and Dobby a truly dreadful painting that Harry suspected had been done by the elf himself. He had just turned it upside-down to see whether it looked better that way when, with a loud crack, Fred and George Apparated at the foot of his bed.

  “Merry Christmas,” said George. “Don’t go downstairs for a bit.”

  “Why not?” said Ron.

  “Mum’s crying again,” said Fred heavily. “Percy sent back his Christmas jumper.”

  “Without a note,” added George. “Hasn’t asked how Dad is or visited him or anything.”

  “We tried to comfort her,” said Fred, moving around the bed to look at Harry’s portrait. “Told her Percy’s nothing more than a humungous pile of rat droppings.”

  “Didn’t work,” said George, helping himself to a Chocolate Frog. “So Lupin took over. Best let him cheer her up before we go down for breakfast, I reckon.”

  “What’s that supposed to be, anyway?” asked Fred, squinting at Dobby’s painting. “Looks like a gibbon with two black eyes.”

  “It’s Harry!” said George, pointing at the back of the picture, “says so on the back!”

  “Good likeness,” said Fred, grinning. Harry threw his new homework diary at him; it hit the wall opposite and fell to the floor where it said happily: “If you’ve dotted the ‘i’s’ and crossed the ‘t’s’ then you may do whatever you please!”

  They got up and dressed. They could hear the various inhabitants of the house calling “Merry Christmas” to one another. On their way downstairs they met Hermione.

  “Thanks for the book, Harry,” she said happily. “I’ve been wanting that New Theory of Numerology for ages! And that perfume’s really unusual, Ron.”

  “No problem,” said Ron. “Who’s that for, anyway?” he added, nodding at the neatly wrapped present she was carrying.

  “Kreacher,” said Hermione brightly.

  “It had better not be clothes!” Ron warned her. “You know what Sirius said: Kreacher knows too much, we can’t set him free!”

  “It isn’t clothes,” said Hermione, “although if I had my way I’d certainly give him something to wear other than that filthy old rag. No, it’s a patchwork quilt, I thought it would brighten up his bedroom.”

  “What bedroom?” said Harry, dropping his voice to a whisper as they were passing the portrait of Sirius’s mother.

  “Well, Sirius says it’s not so much a bedroom, more a kind of—den,” said Hermione. “Apparently he sleeps under the boiler in that cupboard off the kitchen.”

  Mrs. Weasley was the only person in the basement when they arrived there. She was standing at the stove and sounded as though she had a bad head cold as she wished them “Merry Christmas,” and they all averted their eyes.

  “So, is this Kreacher’s bedroom?” said Ron, strolling over to a dingy door in the corner opposite the pantry. Harry had never seen it open.

  “Yes,” said Hermione, now sounding a little nervous. “Er… I think we’d better knock.”

  Ron rapped on the door with his knuckles but there was no reply.

  “He must be sneaking around upstairs,” he said, and without further ado pulled open the door. “Urgh!”

  Harry peered inside. Most of the cupboard was taken up with a very large and old-fashioned boiler, but in the foot of space underneath the pipes Kreacher had made himself something that looked like a nest. A jumble of assorted rags and smelly old blankets were piled on the floor and the small dent in the middle of it showed where Kreacher curled up to sleep every night. Here and there among the material were stale bread crusts and mouldy old bits of cheese. In a far corner glinted small objects and coins that Harry guessed Kreacher had saved, magpie-like, from Sirius’s purge of the house, and he had also managed to retrieve the silver-framed family photographs that Sirius had thrown away over the summer. Their glass might be shattered, but still the little black-and-white people inside them peered up at him haughtily, including—he felt a little jolt in his stomach—the dark, heavy-lidded woman whose trial he had witnessed in Dumbledore’s Pensieve: Bellatrix Lestrange. By the looks of it, hers was Kreacher’s favourite photograph; he had placed it to the fore of all the others and had mended the glass clumsily with Spellotape.

  “I think I’ll just leave his present here,” said Hermione, laying the package neatly in the middle of the depression in the rags and blankets and closing the door quietly. “He’ll find it later, that’ll be fine.”

  “Come to think of it,” said Sirius, emerging from the pantry carrying a large turkey as they closed the cupboard door, “has anyone actually seen Kreacher lately?”

  “I haven’t seen him since the night we came back here,” said Harry. “You were ordering him out of the kitchen.”

  “Yeah…” said Sirius, frowning. “You know, I think that’s the last time I saw him, too… he must be hiding upstairs somewhere.”

  “He couldn’t have left, could he?” said Harry. “I mean, when you said ‘out,’ maybe he thought you meant get out of the house?”

  “No, no, house-elves can’t leave unless they’re given clothes. They’re tied to their family’s house,” said Sirius.

  “They can leave the house if they really want to,” Harry contradicted him. “Dobby did, he left the Malfoys’ to give me warnings two years ago. He had to punish himself afterwards, but he still managed it.”

  Sirius looked slightly disconcerted for a moment, then said, “I’ll look for him later, I expect I’ll find him upstairs crying his eyes out over my mother’s old bloomers or something. Of course, he might have crawled into the airing cupboard and died… but I mustn’t get my hopes up.”

  Fred, George and Ron laughed; Hermione, however, looked reproachful.

  Once they had eaten their Christmas lunch, the Weasleys, Harry and Hermione were planning to pay Mr. Weasley another visit, escorted by Mad-Eye and Lupin. Mundungus turned up in time for Christmas pudding and trifle, having managed to “borrow” a car for the occasion, as the Underground did not run on Christmas Day. The car, which Harry doubted very much had been taken with the consent of its owner, had been enlarged with a spell like the Weasleys’ old Ford Anglia had once been. Although normally proportioned outside, ten people with Mundungus driving were able to fit into it quite comfortably. Mrs. Weasley hesitated before getting inside—Harry knew her disapproval of Mundungus was battling with her dislike of travelling without magic—but, finally, the cold outside and her children’s pleading triumphed, and she settled herself into the back seat between Fred and Bill with good grace.

  The journey to St. Mungo’s was quite quick as there was very little traffic on the roads. A small trickle of witches and wizards was creeping furtively up the otherwise deserted street to visit the hospital. Harry and the others got out of the car, and Mundungus drove off around the corner to wait for them. They strolled casually towards the window where the dummy in green nylon stood, then, one by one, stepped through the glass.

  The reception area looked pleasantly festive: the crystal orbs that illuminated St. Mungo’s had been coloured red and gold to become gigantic, glowing Christmas baubles; holly hung around every doorway; and shining white Christmas trees covered in magical snow and icicles glittered in every corner, each one topped with a gleaming gold star. It was less crowded than the last time they had been there, although halfway across the room Harry found himself shunted aside by a witch with a satsuma jammed up her left nostril.

  “Family argument, eh?” smirked the blonde witch behind the desk. “You’re the third I’ve seen today… Spell Damage, fourth floor.”

  They found Mr. Weasley propped up in bed with the remains of his turkey dinner on a tray on his lap and a rather sheepish expression on his face.

  “Everything all right, Arthur?” asked Mrs. Weasley, after they had all greeted Mr. Weasley and handed over their presents.

  “Fine, fine,” said Mr. Weasley, a little too heartily. “You—er—haven’t seen Healer Smethwyck, have you?”

  “No,” said Mrs. Weasley suspiciously, “why?”

  “Nothing, nothing,” said Mr. Weasley airily, starting to unwrap his pile of gifts. “Well, everyone had a good day? What did you all get for Christmas? Oh, Harry—this is absolutely wonderful!” For he had just opened Harry’s gift of fuse-wire and screwdrivers.

  Mrs. Weasley did not seem entirely satisfied with Mr. Weasley’s answer. As her husband leaned over to shake Harry’s hand, she peered at the bandaging under his nightshirt.

  “Arthur,” she said, with a snap in her voice like a mousetrap, “you’ve had your bandages changed. Why have you had your bandages changed a day early, Arthur? They told me they wouldn’t need doing until tomorrow.”

  “What?” said Mr. Weasley, looking rather frightened and pulling the bed covers higher up his chest. “No, no—it’s nothing—it’s—I”—He seemed to deflate under Mrs. Weasley’s piercing gaze.

  “Well—now don’t get upset, Molly, but Augustus Pye had an idea… he’s the Trainee Healer, you know, lovely young chap and very interested in… um… complementary medicine… I mean, some of these old Muggle remedies… well, they’re called stitches, Molly, and they work very well on—on Muggle wounds—”

  Mrs. Weasley let out an ominous noise somewhere between a shriek and a snarl. Lupin strolled away from the bed and over to the werewolf, who had no visitors and was looking rather wistfully at the crowd around Mr. Weasley; Bill muttered something about getting himself a cup of tea and Fred and George leapt up to accompany him, grinning.

  “Do you mean to tell me,” said Mrs. Weasley, her voice growing louder with every word and apparently unaware that her fellow visitors were scurrying for cover, “that you have been messing about with Muggle remedies?”

  “Not messing about, Molly, dear,” said Mr. Weasley imploringly, “it was just—just something Pye and I thought we’d try—only, most unfortunately—well, with these particular kinds of wounds—it doesn’t seem to work as well as we’d hoped—”

  “Meaning?”

  “Well… well, I don’t know whether you know what—what stitches are?”

  “It sounds as though you’ve been trying to sew your skin back together,” said Mrs. Weasley with a snort of mirthless laughter, “but even you, Arthur, wouldn’t be that stupid—”

  “I fancy a cup of tea, too,” said Harry, jumping to his feet.

  Hermione, Ron and Ginny almost sprinted to the door with him. As it swung closed behind them, they heard Mrs. Weasley shriek, “WHAT DO YOU MEAN, THAT’S THE GENERAL IDEA?”

  “Typical Dad,” said Ginny, shaking her head as they set off up the corridor. “Stitches… I ask you…”

  “Well, you know, they do work well on non-magical wounds,” said Hermione fairly. “I suppose something in that snake’s venom dissolves them or something. I wonder where the tearoom is?”

  “Fifth floor,” said Harry, remembering the sign over the welcomewitch’s desk.

  They walked along the corridor, through a set of double doors and found a rickety staircase lined with more portraits of brutal-looking Healers. As they climbed it, the various Healers called out to them, diagnosing odd complaints and suggesting horrible remedies. Ron was seriously affronted when a medieval wizard called out that he clearly had a bad case of spattergroit.

  “And what’s that supposed to be?” he asked angrily, as the Healer pursued him through six more portraits, shoving the occupants out of the way.

  “’Tis a most grievous affliction of the skin, young master, that will leave you pockmarked and more gruesome even than you are now—”

  “Watch who you’re calling gruesome!” said Ron, his ears turning red.

  “—the only remedy is to take the liver of a toad, bind it tight about your throat, stand naked at the full moon in a barrel of eels’ eyes—”

  “I have not got spattergroit!”

  “But the unsightly blemishes upon your visage, young master—”