The next morning Harry was in a foul mood. He had hardly slept at all, and his conscience was grating at him. After breakfast, he decided that it would be best if he sat alone in the study. He didn't want to be around Hermione and Ron at the moment. He walked into the study and closed the door. He thought 'colloportus' and heard the door seal itself. He looked through some of the books on the bookshelf, and as he passed a certain area he felt the hairs on the back of his neck rise. He moved back to that spot and felt that the room was cooler. He peered at the books and noticed they were all faded and looked ancient. They were all black, and had a general feeling of evil about them. He picked one up and decided to take a look. He sat down on one of the comfy armchairs and looked at the front cover. He took out his wand and muttered 'specialis revelio'.
A deafening scream filled the room and the windows shook. Harry leapt up from the chair in shock, putting in hands on his ears in a desperate attempt to block out the blood-curdling scream. For the lack of anything better to do, Harry cast a silencing charm. He was surprised when it worked. He grabbed another book and held it open. The book appeared to shiver in his hands and he could sense the presence in the room had gone. He grabbed some string from the drawer and bound the book up tightly. He thought 'incendio' and the book caught fire. The red blaze filled the room and abruptly went out, leaving a pile of ashes in its place. Breathing hard, Harry sat back down on the chair. Couldn't he even read a book anymore without something trying to attack him? He removed the silencing charm from the room and could suddenly hear Ron and Hermione pounding on the door, shouting in concern for him.
"I'm fine, I'll be out later on…" he called out a little gruffly, and then proceeded to pick up the book again. 'Well,' he thought to himself 'At least whatever was in this book is gone, so no harm in reading it…' He opened the book to find a lot of worn pages and blood spatters everywhere. He shivered and flipped through some more pages. He gave a gasp as he saw the word 'Horcrux' and stopped to read the section. He scanned the section about the evils of the Horcrux, and found a section on destruction. He held his breath as he read the section with eager anticipation
'To create a Horcrux requires an evil nature; to destroy one requires courage and the ability to resist against the temptation the evil will produce once released. In order to destroy a Horcrux you must first release the evil within it. To do this the witch or wizard must use the incantation:
'Liberatio pravus fascino'
For this to work you must activate the Horcrux, and then give a part of yourself to it. Only by giving the Horcrux magic will the incantation work. Once you have released the evil from the object, you will then have to destroy it. The beauty of the Horcrux is that one must weaken oneself to separate the evil from the object, and then the weakened person must try to battle the evil accordingly. The results are usually the Witch or Wizard dying and the evil returning to the object'
Harry read the page over and over. He had to talk to Hermione. He had hoped that it would be simple, removing a spell from an object. All he'd had to do with the Diary was stab it for goodness sakes! Now here was this book telling him he had to face evil. Though he supposed that murdering someone was evil, and the soul of the murderer was evil. 'I guess it makes sense' He thought to himself as he walked out of the study to find Hermione.
After searching for ten minutes, Harry finally found Ron and Hermione in the garden. Hermione was sitting on a lounge chair, watching Crookshanks randomly thrust his paw into the pond, trying to get a fish. Ron was at the very end of the garden, polishing his broom.
'Hermione," said Harry excitedly "I found this in one of the books in the study" He passed her the book and was surprised when she didn't take it, but looked up at him with her eyebrow raised. She looked angry. After a couple of seconds where she seemed to be calming herself down she said -
"We heard a scream from the study and came to find you. We were worried. You didn't even have the nerve to act thankful that we came to see if you were ok. You basically told us to bugger off."
"I'm sorry. I've been in a bad mood and I wanted to be alone" he said, looking at the floor not knowing how to explain himself.
"Apology accepted. But I would like to know why you've been so funny with me today. Every time I look at you, you look away as if I have the lurgy or something," said Hermione. She searched his face for an answer, but he simply looked at her stonily.
"I just…miss Ginny. I've been feeling a bit depressed about it, I didn't mean to take it out on you," Harry figured that this was the most believable excuse he could come up with. He felt quite pleased with himself, surely there was no way she could think he had been staring at her last night when he missed Ginny so terribly. He felt ashamed at being so dishonest with his best friend, but really, which would be better? 'Sorry I've been acting funny, but I've recently begun noticing how gorgeous you are, and I can't believe I didn't see it before. It's been taking all my self-control to not grab and kiss you senseless' after which she would look at him disgustedly and run to Ron. Of course then their friendship would be in ruins. Or he could run with the Ginny story. He preferred the latter. Ron came walking up the pathway to where he and Hermione were talking. He eyed Harry resentfully.
"Decided to come and speak to us then?" asked Ron with a touch of bitterness in his voice.
"Listen mate, I'm sorry about earlier. I've just had a lot on my mind. I shouldn't have taken it out on you though. It won't happen again," said Harry. Ron was a little surprised by the readiness in which Harry apologised. Usually it took Harry a while to see if he'd been acting badly, so this was a record. Ron grinned happily at Harry
"'S alright mate, no problem. You want to come and polish your broom with me? Mum picked up this great new wax last week, it works a treat!" Hermione looked at Ron and Harry as they began to move away. Hermione interrupted the beginning of their broom talk with-
"What did you want to show me Harry?" Harry looked confused for a moment before Hermione reminded him.
"The reason you were in the study? The book?" she said, exasperated.
"Oh my God! I can't believe I forgot! Ron the brooms have to wait. Wait 'til you read what I found out about Horcruxes."
After reading the passage on Horcruxes, they sat at the dining room table and ate dinner. Ron was eating with his usual gusto; Harry was eating hungrily in between reading sections of a book that Hermione had given him. Hermione was reading a book on the four founders of Hogwarts and was, predictably, eating nothing. Eventually Harry looked towards Hermione and said -
"So…how do you think we're supposed to activate a Horcrux?" Ron looked interestedly over at Hermione, waiting to hear what she'd say…but obviously not abandoning his food for speech.
"Well, I've been thinking about this quite a bit now you mention it." said Hermione, "The diary had to be written in and read. So that's how it was activated. Marvolo's ring had to be worn by Dumbledore, so it was activated that way. Which means that we have to drink from Hufflepuff's cup…" Harry interrupted with-
"I hope we get to choose the liquid in this one, I really don't want to be drinking anything Voldemort made" Hermione looked at Harry, wondering where to start with what she had to say next. She knew he was noble, and wouldn't want anything to happen to his friends, but Hermione couldn't see any other way.
"Well actually I think it would be wise if you weren't the one to activate the cup Harry," she said. Harry looked like he was about to continue, but she held up her hand to stop him
"Just listen to what I have to say first, ok?" she asked. Upon receiving his nod she continued.
"If you have to weaken yourself before you destroy the Horcrux, maybe you shouldn't be the one weakening yourself all the time. You're going to have to be the one to actually destroy it. You're far better at this kind of magic that either Ron or I. I think that I should wear Slytherin's locket to activate it. I think that Ron should drink from Hufflepuff's cup…" Ron looked slightly green at this prospect, but seemed to gather his nerve quickly, before he spoke.
"What about Nagini then? How are we supposed to 'activate' a great ruddy snake?"
"Well…Harry's a parcelmouth. I think he has to activate Nagini that way. I haven't thought of what he has to say to her yet though…" Harry looked from Hermione to Ron. He felt moved by the things they would do for him. 'I don't deserve this,' he thought to himself.
"Well, what about the other Horcrux? We don't even know what it is yet, let alone how to activate it" said Ron. Hermione looked like she was about to say something, but Harry cut her off with
"I'll activate it. Don't look at me like that Hermione. You're lucky that I'm willing let either you or Ron go near those things, let alone activate one. I'll do two of them, it's only right," Hermione knew there was no point in arguing further. They sat there in silence for a moment, the magnitude of the situation clear to them. Eventually Ron broke the silence.
"Well, there's no point in getting worried about it now, eh? We have no idea where the locket is. We don't know where the cup is, and we don't even know what one of them might be yet. As for Nagini, I don't think you should try and have your nice little chat with her yet mate, you might end up attracting Snake-face himself," Ron had a large grin on his face as if this meant that they had plenty of time to do nothing, reached for more potatoes and began eating once again. Hermione sighed as she put down the book she was reading on the four founders. She looked agitated.
"I've looked through this book so many times and I can't find an item of Ravenclaw's anywhere!" she said in frustration "There are picture's of Rowena in the book, but I can't see anything of importance in them, other than her wand. I doubt Voldemort would want to use her wand anyway. Who knows what kind of disaster there could have been trying to use magic against magic?" Ron had finally finished eating and sat back with a content and dopey look on his face. Hermione waved her wand and the dishes disappeared, the sound of them washing themselves emanated from the kitchen.
Harry moved his chair next to Hermione so that he could take a look though the book. He noticed that she had a light feminine scent to her; it reminded him of flowers and that wonderful smell just after it rained. He mentally shook himself and tried to concentrate on the book. Below him was a black and white coloured photograph. There were the four founders, Godric, Helga and Rowena were all smiling and waving at him. Salazar had a look of pure boredom on his face. It looked like they were dressed for a ball. He read the caption below the picture and found he was correct. He sighed and went to turn the page when something familiar caught his eye. Hermione heard him gasp and looked at him, excitement beginning to bubble within her.
"What is it Harry?" she asked hurriedly. Ron also seemed to be waiting on the edge of his seat for Harry's reply. Harry looked up at them and said slowly -
"I've seen this somewhere before, but I can't think where…" Hermione went to say something but Ron made a shaking motion with his head. He knew when Harry just needed some silence to figure things out. Hermione watched, transfixed. 'Does he have any idea how sexy he is?' She wondered to herself. She immediately blushed at this comment and earned herself a curious look from Ron. She concentrated on the table and eventually Ron looked away from her, smirking slightly. 'Oh great' she thought to herself 'Now he thinks I'm daydreaming about him, just what I need…' She was brought out of her reverie by Harry suddenly standing up, his face flushed with excitement
"Of course!!" he exclaimed "The room of requirement! Of course it's at Hogwarts! The cave, Hogwarts…where else?" Hermione looked perplexed, whilst Ron was just utterly dumbfounded.
"Harry," asked Hermione, "What are you talking about?"
"Look! Look at Rowena! She's dressed up for the ball and she's wearing a tiara. I remember seeing that tiara in the room of requirement when I was hiding my potions book last term! It makes complete sense that Voldemort would want to hide something at Hogwarts. It was a home to him, a place where he went from an ordinary muggle to the wizard he is today!" Hermione stared at Harry, impressed.
"Bugger," said Ron, "I was hoping we'd have a few weeks before this stage. At least it's not the cup I suppose. Uh, just need a little time to prepare for that," he added, realising that Hermione was looking at him with a disapproving air. "Hey Harry, you're gonna look well fit in that tiara mate!" Harry began to laugh at that thought, and was truly glad that Ron was there. No matter what happened, he would never let anything hurt Ron. Not even him.
"Just one thing though," Ron continued after their laughter had subsided "If we go to Hogwarts…then we're not going to be very well hidden. So what's the point in still hiding?" Harry was going to respond but Hermione got there before him.
"We just need to be careful when we're alone, not to mention we can't have anyone questionable knowing where our hideout is. We'll be fine at school, but outside we need to be very careful…"
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