its waist-length hair and beard streaming behind it, its face sunken, fleshless, with empty eye sockets: Horribly familiar, dreadfully altered, it raised a wasted arm, pointing at Harry. “No!” Harry shouted, and though he had raised his wand no spell occurred to him. “No! It wasn’t us! We didn’t kill you –“ On the word kill, the figure exploded in a great cloud of dust: Coughing, his eyes watering, Harry looked around to see Hermione crouched on the floor by the door with her arms over her head, and Ron, who was shaking from head to foot, patting her clumsily on the shoulder and saying, “It’s all r-right. . . . It’s g-gone. . . .” Dust swirled around Harry like mist, catching the blue gaslight, as Mrs. Black continued to scream. “Mudbloods, filth, stains of dishonor, taint of shame on the house of my fathers –“ “SHUT UP!” Harry bellowed, directing his wand at her, and with a bang and a burst of red sparks, the curtains swung shut again, silencing her. “That . . . that was . . . “ Hermione whimpered, as Ron helped her to her feet.
“Yeah,” said Harry, “but it wasn’t really him, was it? Just something to scare Snape.” Had it worked, Harry wondered, or had Snape already blasted the horror-figure aside as casually as he had killed the real Dumbledore? Nerves still tingling, he led the other two up the hall, half-expecting some new terror to reveal itself, but nothing moved except for a mouse skittering along the skirting board. “Before we go any farther, I think we’d better check,” whispered Hermione, and she raised her wand and said, “Homenum revelio.” Nothing happened. “Well, you’ve just had a big shock,” said Ron kindly. “What was that supposed to do?” “It did what I meant it to do!” said Hermione rather crossly. “That was a spell to reveal human presence, and there’s nobody here except us!” “And old Dusty,” said Ron, glancing at the patch of carpet from which the corpse- figure had risen. “Let’s go up,” said Hermione with a frightened look at the same spot, and she led the way up the creaking stairs to the drawing room on the first floor. Hermione waved her wand to ignite the old gas lamps, then, shivering slightly in the drafty room, she perched on the sofa, her arms wrapped tightly around her. Ron crossed to the window and moved the heavy velvet curtains aside an inch. “Can’t see anyone out there,” he reported. “And you’d think, if Harry still had a Trace on him, they’d have followed us here. I know they can’t get in the house, but – what’s up, Harry?” Harry had given a cry of pain: His scar had burned against as something flashed across his mind like a bright light on water. He saw a large shadow and felt a fury that was not his own pound through his body, violent and brief as an electric shock. “What did you see?” Ron asked, advancing on Harry. “Did you see him at my place?” “No, I just felt anger – he’s really angry –“ “But that could be at the Burrow,” said Ron loudly. “What else? Didn’t you see anything? Was he cursing someone?”
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