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⚡︎
𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐎𝐍𝐄
⁽ⁿᵒ⁾ ˡᵉᵗᵗᵉʳˢ ᵗᵒ ʰᵃʳʳʸ

"Bᴀʀʟᴏᴡ? ᴀs ɪɴ
ᴛʜᴇ ᴀᴜʀᴏʀ?"

𝐀 𝐋𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓 flickering on, enlightened what was once a darkened hallway. From around him, Harry could still see Tonks stumbling around the place. As well as Moody limping from one place to another, along with Lupin and many of the others who had come to rescue him.

It was just now that Harry had taken a good look at the hallway he was in (which he still didn't know exactly where he was) it was rather horrid. With dark wallpaper peeling off the walls and cobwebs hanging about from every corner. Cracked and rather dusty lamps perched onto every wall. And many blackened portraits of extremely miserable looking witches and wizards. All in all, Harry concurred this was not a place he would want to live in. He had found that even the Dursley's house was more well kept than this. It looked as though a family of dark wizards lived here.

Now seeing the hallway empty, apart from him, Harry walked slowly down the hall, only coming to a stop when he came across a certain room containing none other than Sirius Black. Along with Lupin, some other people of whom he'd never seen before and lastly, a blond haired man sat to the right of Sirius. However, his confusion did not last for long for Mrs. Weasley had come bundling out of the room across from him and slammed the door. Only halting her movements when she herself, came face to face with Harry.

She looked a lot different that from what Harry had remembered. She looked more thinner and a great deal more paler too. It seemed the threat of war was looming over them all.

"Oh Harry, It's lovely to see you!" Mrs. Weasley had said, all while enveloping him into a bone - crushing hug. Then, she held him at arms length and had said, "You're looking peaky; you need feeding up, but you'll have to wait a bit for dinner, I'm afraid . . ."

Harry hadn't really thought about just how hungry he was until Mrs. Weasley had mentioned dinner. At that moment, his stomach had decided to make the strangest of noises. Looking down (slightly embarrassed by this) he felt his face heat up ever so slightly. Harry was only broken from his thoughts when he heard hushed voices and whispers from behind the older women.

"He's just arrived! The meetings started. Let the poor boy go see his friends, I'm sure he'd like to know what's going on, don't you?"

At that more hushed whispers emitted from the group, only to be hushed by Mrs. Weasley's glare.

Despite her mention of his friends and finally being able to know what was going on, Harry inched forward towards the door in front of him, containing the group of people who had gotten him from Privet Drive, Lupin, Sirius (of which he was most eager to see again) and the blond — haired man sitting to the right of Sirius who he had never seen before. Him, Lupin and Sirius were all talking in quietened whispers. As if they felt Harry's curious gaze, all three men looked up and smiled at Harry, all receiving one back from Harry. Although, Harry didn't get much further as Mrs. Weasley prevented him from doing so by closing the door and began ushering him upstairs.

"No, Harry, the meeting's only for members of the Order. Ron, Hermione and Tasmin are upstairs, you can wait with them until the meeting's over and then we'll have dinner." she rushed out before continuing. "And keep your voice down in the hall," she added in an urgent whisper.

Confused by the new name and the sudden request to 'keep his voice down' Harry asked,

"What? Why? And who's Tasmin?"

"I don't want to wake anything up." the woman answered, completely ignoring the boy's multiple questions.

"Wake what? What d'you — ?"

"— I'll explain later, I've got to hurry, I'm supposed to be at the meeting — I'll just show you where you're sleeping." she interrupted in a hurry.

Harry's confusion only increased as they moved down the hall. He was sure the moth — eaten curtains carried more dust than anything he'd ever seen before. The boy wasn't too sure he wanted to find out what was behind them. Next, they passed a plaque on the wall, which was mounted with heads. They all had the same rather snout - like noses, informing Harry that they must of been the previous owners house elves, (it was rather grim if you asked him) but who was he to judge? Surely this place had to be somewhat better than the Dursley's. Oh who was he kidding? Anywhere was better than the Dursley's. That was even including Miss. Fig's house, and that mind you was a stretch.

"Mrs. Weasley, why — ?" Harry tried to speak, only to be interrupted once again.

"— Ron Hermione and Tasmin will explain everything, dear, I've really got to dash." Mrs. Weasley whispered distractedly.

"There," — they had reached the second landing, "you're the door on the right. I'll call you when it's over."

And with that, Mrs. Weasley had hurried off down the corridor and down the stairs, then into the room he had forbidden from. From the small glimpse of the room he could see through the banisters, he could still see Sirius, Remus and the blond — haired man. Yet again, Molly was reprimanding them all about something. Then, the door closed again and all he could hear before was gone. Not a single hushed whisper or quietened voice could be heard.

Harry then grabbed onto the door knob, which looked oddly like a snake's head, twisted it and entered the room. He didn't see much before his vision was obscured by a flurry of bushy hair. It was of course Hermione.

"HARRY! Ron, he's here, Harry's here! We didn't hear you arrive! Oh, how are you? Are you all right? Have you been furious with us? I bet you have, I know our letters were useless — but we couldn't tell you anything, Dumbledore made us swear we wouldn't, oh, we've got so much to tell you, and you've got to tell us — the dementors! When we heard — and that Ministry hearing — it's just outrageous, I've looked it all up, they can't expel you, they just can't, there's provision in the Decree for the Restriction of Underage Sorcery for the use of magic in life - threatening situations —"

"— Let the man breathe Hermione." another voice piped up. This time it was Ron, who was now behind Harry closing the previously wide open door.

Hermione, still beaming, had finally let go of Harry. Before another word had been spoken, a soft whooshing sound had come from the window. Something white had now landed on top of the wardrobe.

"HEDWIG!" Harry rushed over to the wardrobe with the owl perched on top, the latter was now sitting firmly on Harry's shoulder, more than happy to be reunited with her owner.

"She's been in a right state. Pecked us half to death when she brought your last letters. Look at this!" Ron was now showing Harry his finger which had a rather deep, but healing cut.

"Oh Ron put that away." groaned Hermione. "Not everyone wants to see that. Especially not right now when Harry's just arrived."

Ignoring the two's slight bickering, Harry spoke up. "Oh yeah," Harry said. "sorry about that, but I wanted answers, you know . . ."

"We wanted to give them to you, mate," said Ron. "Hermione was going spare, she kept saying you'd do something stupid if you were stuck all on your own without news, but Dumbledore made us —"

"— swear not to tell me," interrupted Harry. "Yeah, Hermione's already said." he clarified. The feeling of anger slowly bubbling in his stomach.

"He seemed to think it was best," said Hermione rather breathlessly. "Dumbledore I mean."

"Right," said Harry. He noticed that her hands too bore the marks of Hedwig's beak and found that he was not at all sorry.

"I think he thought you were safest with the Muggles —" Ron began.

"— Yeah?" said Harry, raising his eyebrows. "Have either of you been attacked by dementors this summer?"

"Well, no — but that's why he's had people from the Order of the Phoenix tailing you all the time —"

Harry felt a great jolt in his guts as though he had just missed a step going downstairs. So everyone had known he was being followed except him.

"— Didn't work that well, though, did it?" said Harry, doing his utmost to keep his voice even. "Had to look after myself after all, didn't I?"

"He was so angry," said Hermione in an almost awestruck voice. "Dumbledore. We saw him. When he found out Mundungus had left before his shift had ended. He was scary." Hermione added as she thought back to the look on their Headmaster's face. It was true, none of them had ever seen him that angry except from that time he sent off the dementors back in their third year.

"Well, I'm glad he left," Harry muttered out coldly, his anger spilling out of him. "If he hadn't, I wouldn't have done magic and Dumbledore would probably have left me at Privet Drive all summer. Trapped there, day after day without a scrap of news."

"Aren't you . . . aren't you worried about the Ministry of Magic hearing?" asked Hermione quietly.

"No," Harry lied defiantly. He walked away from them, looking around, with Hedwig nestled contentedly on his shoulder, but this room was not likely to raise his spirits. It was dank and dark. A blank stretch of canvas in an ornate picture frame was all that relieved the bareness of the peeling walls and as Harry passed it he thought he heard someone lurking out of sight snigger.

"So why's Dumbledore been so keen to keep me in the dark?" Harry questioned, still trying hard to keep his voice casual.

"Did you — er — bother to ask him at all?" He glanced up just in time to see them exchanging a look that told him he was behaving just as they had feared he would.

"We told Dumbledore we wanted to tell you what was going on," said Ron. "we did, mate. But he's really busy now, we've only seen him twice since we came here and he didn't have much time, he just made us swear not to tell you important stuff when we wrote, he said the owls might be intercepted —"

"— He could still of kept me informed if he'd wanted to," Harry said shortly. "you're not telling me he doesn't know ways to send messages without owls."

Hermione glanced at Ron and then said, "I thought that too. But he didn't want you to know anything."

"Maybe he thinks I can't be trusted," added Harry, watching their expressions.

"Don't be thick," Ron dismissed, looking highly disconcerted.

"Or that I can't take care of myself —"

"— Of course he doesn't think that!" Hermione interrupted anxiously, not wanting to say anything else that would make her friend yell out loud.

"So how come I have to stay at the Dursleys' while you two get to join in everything that's going on here?" Harry asked. He couldn't stop, the words just kept on tumbling out of his mouth.

"We're not!" Ron interrupted. "Mum won't let us near the meetings, she says we're too young —"

But before he knew it, Harry was shouting. So much for keeping calm he thought.

"— SO YOU HAVEN'T BEEN IN THE MEETINGS, BIG DEAL! YOU'VE STILL BEEN HERE, HAVEN'T YOU? YOU'VE STILL BEEN TOGETHER! ME, I'VE BEEN STUCK AT THE DURSLEYS' FOR A MONTH! AND I'VE HANDLED MORE THAN YOU TWO'VE EVER MANAGED AND DUMBLEDORE KNOWS IT — WHO SAVED THE SORCERER'S STONE? WHO GOT RID OF RIDDLE? WHO SAVED BOTH YOUR SKINS FROM THE DEMENTORS?"

At the boy's yelling, Hedwig had flown off of Harry's shoulder and landed back onto the wardrobe. Before either of the two could speak, Harry had started to yell again, much to the duos dismay.

"WHO HAD TO GET PAST DRAGONS AND SPHINXES AND EVERY OTHER FOUL THING LAST YEAR? WHO SAW HIM COME BACK? WHO HAD TO ESCAPE FROM HIM? ME!"

Ron and Hermione just stood there, mouth agape and stunned silent. Hermione looked to be on the verge of tears.

"BUT WHY SHOULD I KNOW WHAT'S GOING ON? WHY SHOULD ANYONE BOTHER TO TELL ME WHAT'S BEEN HAPPENING?"

"Harry, we wanted to tell you, we really did —"

Hermione began."— CAN'T'VE WANTED TO THAT MUCH, CAN YOU, OR YOU'D HAVE SENT ME AN OWL, BUT DUMBLEDORE MADE YOU SWEAR —"

"— Well, he did —" began Hermione, before she was interrupted by Harry again.

"— FOUR WEEKS I'VE BEEN STUCK IN PRIVET DRIVE, NICKING PAPERS OUT OF BINS TO TRY AND FIND OUT WHAT'S BEEN GOING ON —"

"— We wanted to —"

"— I SUPPOSE YOU'VE BEEN HAVING A REAL LAUGH, HAVEN'T YOU, ALL HOLED UP HERE TOGETHER —"

"— No, honest —"

"— Harry, we're really sorry!" Hermione yelled, eager to calm the boy down once more. "You're absolutely right, Harry — I'd be furious if it was me!"

At his friend's words, Harry only continued to glare at her. Still breathing heavily, he turned his gaze to Hedwig, who was still perched happily on the wardrobe, but now with another owl. The second owl was a soft dark brown colour with accents of black and white.

"So what exactly is this place?" asked Harry, now he was done shouting, he could finally get his questions answered. He would finally find out what was going on.

"It's a secret society." Hermione answered wearily, still on edge. Not wanting to say anything that would make her friend blow up again. "Dumbledore formed it back when they first fought You — Know — Who."

Ron and Hermione studied the puzzles look on Harry's face and took that as a sign to continue. "It's headquarters for the Order of the Phoenix." answered Ron.

"Is anyone going to bother to tell me what the Order of the Phoenix is?"

Sighing, Hermione replied this time. "I already told you. It's a secret society."

"Who's in it?" Harry asked.

"Quite a few people —"

"— But we've only met about twenty of them. But we think there are more."

"Well?" he demanded, looking from one to the other."

Er," said Ron. "Well what?" Ron questioned, confused.

"Voldemort!" said Harry furiously, and both Ron and Hermione winced at the use of the dark wizard's name.

"What's happening? What's he up to? Where is he? What are we doing to stop him?"

"We've told you, the Order don't let us in on their meetings," said Hermione nervously. "so we don't know the details — but we've got a general idea —" she added hastily, seeing the look on Harry's face.

"— Fred and George have invented Extendable Ears, see," added Ron. "they're really useful for listening in to the meetings and stuff they don't let us hear. Bear in mind, that is pretty much anything."

"Extendable —?"

"— Ears yeah." Ron finished. "Only we've had to stop using them because mum found out. Fred and George had to hide them because mum kept on binning them. We did get a good use out of them though before mum found out. We know some of the Order are following known Death Eaters, keeping tabs on them, you know —"

"— some of them are working on recruiting more people to the Order —" said Hermione.

"— and some of them are standing guard over something," Ron added with a look of confusion plastered on his face. "They're always talking about guard duty."

"Couldn't have been me, could it?" Harry queried rather sarcastically.

"Oh yeah," said Ron, with a look of dawning comprehension on his face.

"So what have you been doing?" Harry asked with a bitter tone. "You said you'd been busy."

"We have," defended Hermione quickly.

"We've been decontaminating this house, it's been empty for ages and stuff's been breeding in here. We've managed to clean out the kitchen, most of the bedrooms, and I think we're doing the drawing room tomo — AARGH!" with two loud cracks, appeared Fred and George, Ron's twin brothers. Pigwidgeon had twittered rather loudly and had flown to join Hedwig and the other owl on top of the wardrobe.

"Stop doing that!" Hermione said weakly to the twins."

"Hello, Harry," said George, beaming at him. "We thought we heard your dulcet tones."

"You don't want to bottle up your anger like that, Harry, let it all out," said Fred, also beaming.

"There might be a couple of people fifty miles away who didn't hear you." George added.

"You two passed your Apparation tests, then?" asked Harry rather grumpily.

"With distinction," said Fred, who was holding what looked like a piece of very long, flesh — colored string.

"It would have taken you about thirty seconds longer to walk down the stairs," Ron said with a look of disdain on his face, presumably wishing he could apparate.

"Time is Galleons, little brother," said Fred.

"Anyway, Harry, you're interfering with reception. Extendable Ears," he added in response to Harry's raised eyebrows, holding up the string, which Harry now saw was trailing out onto the landing. "we're trying to hear what's going on downstairs."

"You want to be careful," Ron warned staring at the ear. "if Mum sees one of them again . . ."

"It's worth the risk, that's a major meeting they're having down there," Fred dismissed with a grin, ideas already forming in his mischievous mind.

With no one protesting to Fred's plan, the Weasley siblings, Hermione and Harry made their way to the staircase, the extendable ear hanging down the side. Muffled voices now becoming clear.

They had been listening for a while, so far nothing interesting had been said. Not to them at least. A little while later Ginny and another girl had joined them. Harry noticed he had never seen her before. Thinking this must be the Tasmin that everyone had been mentioning.

"Hey Ginny, Tasmin." George greeted the two girls.

The girl Harry now knew to be Tasmin only nodded in reply while Ginny smiled at the group, he noticed how Ginny's stare lingered on him before looking downstairs to the door they were trying to listen behind.

Suddenly, a new voice had spoke. A voice all of the children knew, a voice they all unfortunately recognised.

"As touchingly paternal your concern is Black. Perhaps Potter will grow up to become a felon just like his Godfather."

It was Snape.

"Now you stay out of this Snivellus." Sirius spoke sourly.

"Snivellus?" Tasmin spoke, a perplexed expression clear as day on her face.

"Snape's part of the Order?" Harry asked, clearly as confused as the girl stood next to him was, his face matching that of hers.

"Git." Ron spat out. He of all people couldn't understand why their potions professor was apart of the order.

"Sirius." Michael spoke warningly, not wanting his friend to get into a fight. Especially when his Godson was only a floor above them.

The slightly muffled argument of Sirius and Snape only continued, the children trying to listen as closely as they could. That was until a rather ginger and tabby cat came across the ear and started to grab at it.

It was of course Hermione's cat.

"No! Get off it. Quick!" Hermione whisper — yelled. But of course they cat did not listen and only continued.

"Crookshanks!"

"Get off, you bloody cat."

"Crookshanks, leave it alone!" she demanded.

However, the cat did not stop, and after a few more agitated shouts, the cat successfully managed to rip the extendable ear off of the wire. Crookshanks then ran away with said ear in his mouth.

They all sighed in annoyance and disappointment, that was until Ron spoke up.

"I hate that bloody cat of yours Hermione."

"Bad Crookshanks!" Hermione yelled out.

After the extendable ear debacle, they all decided to go downstairs as the meeting was finally over.

"Now, we'll all be eating down in the kitchen." Mrs. Weasley spoke.

With a loud crack!, Fred and George appeared out of nowhere, scaring the poor woman.

"Just because your allowed to use magic now does not mean you have to whip your wands out for everything!" she screeched, clearly tired of their misuse of magic. The twins however, only had matching grins broad on their faces.

With getting a greeting from her second youngest son, a small tired smile was put back on her face. "You hungry, Harry?"

"You sure you're alright, Harry?" Mr. Weasley questioned as he made his way over to Mrs. Weasley, putting an arm around her shoulder. "You gave us quite a turn."

However, he didn't get much time to respond as the familiar voice of his Godfather rang out the room, from behind the Weasley parents, came Sirius Black.

"Sirius!"

At the voice and sight of the older man, Harry's eyes lit up entirely, much like a child's would on Christmas Day. A wide grin spread onto the boy's face, replacing the once gloomy, sullen look. His smile never once fading as he ran up to hug his father's best friend. Harry felt as though he could smile no more, his cheeks aching from the permanent smile etched on his face.

When they finally separated, they saw everyone filing into what looked to Harry to be the kitchen. Harry looked over his shoulder, only to be met with the blue eyes of Tasmin. She gave him a small, shy smile and a wave, her receiving a smile and wave back in response from the boy.

"So, Miss. Barlow huh?" Sirius asked the boy after seeing they were now alone in the hallway. He'd seen the looks the two had just given each other, (even though he pretended not to see anything) that's how James and Lily had started off, with small longing looks and waves.

"Barlow? As in the auror?" Harry's question had brought the man back to reality. Harry had recognised the name Barlow. He knew that, that last name belonged to a famous auror and his family. Harry reckoned that the mysterious blond — haired man seated next to Sirius and Remus was indeed the famous auror he spoke of.

"Indeed like the auror Harry." Sirius agreed while looking at the boy with a small smile on his face, he looked rather smug.

"Her names Tasmin right? I heard Mrs. Weasley say it when she was bringing me to where Hermione and Ron were, and when George said it upstairs when we were using the extendable ears too —"

Harry cut himself off, he had realised his mistake as soon as the words had left his mouth.

Sirius only chuckled slightly, his Godson's antics reminding him much of James. He really was much more like his father than he realised.

Before another word could be said, the door swung open, only to reveal the very same girl they were talking about. Immediately both pairs of eyes turned to her.

"Uhm, sorry to interrupt but Mrs. Weasley really wants you two inside, says the foods getting cold." she explained with a nervous look plastered on her face.

"Tell her we'll be there in a minute." Sirius spoke up while giving the girl a kind smile in response.

"Sure." she agreed, and with that the door clicked closed once more.

"Let's go then shall we? I don't fancy yet another lecture from Molly."

BEAUTIFUL GIF MADE BY sporadicstarsx

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