Deeds and their consequences

Chapter four: Determination

~I\'ll find you somewhere.
I\'ll keep on trying until my dying day.
I just need to know whatever happened,
the truth will free my soul.

Lost in the darkness, try to find your way home.
I want to embrace you and never let you go~

(Somewhere, Within Temptation)


Hermione looked everywhere for her friend that evening and the following day, but he was nowhere to be found. He was seen in the library late at night by some students, but others were convinced that he had left the Hogwarts’ grounds early the next morning. Hermione was worried. What could it be that had roused Harry out of his state and made him leave Hogwarts? That night she couldn’t get any sleep, hoping that her friend was alright.

She was tossing an turning in bed, when there was a knock on her door. A quick glance at the clock told her that it was two AM. She slipped out of bed and pulled on her dressing gown. She was startled to see the person on her doorstep. It was Harry, his clothes ruffled, glasses askew, hair sticking into all possible directions except down and a mad determination in his eyes. Hermione involuntarily made a step back.

“Harry, what happened? Where did you go off to?”

Harry just grabbed hold of her arm, not too gently, and leaned inside the door. “I need to talk to you. I need your help.”

“Harry, let go, you’re bruising me. Do you even have the slightest idea what time it is? And please keep your voice down, you’ll wake everyone.”

“Sorry.” He let go of her arm immediately. “Please come with me and I’ll explain.”

Hermione sighed and threw a backward glance to her bed, where Ron was still sleeping peacefully. “Oh ok”

They moved swiftly through the silent halls until they found an empty classroom. They stepped inside and Harry locked the door. The whole situation started to creep Hermione out.

“Would you now please tell me what the hell is going on?”

“Sit down, this may take awhile.”

She sat down behind an empty desk and Harry took a place across her. His eyes surveyed the room, not knowing where to start. His eyes fixed on his best friend.

“I’m going to bring him back and I need your help to do so.”

There was a long silence within which Hermione was trying to comprehend what was said to her. Followed by…

“What?!”

“I’m going to bring Sirius back and I need your help with some of the aspects of the ritual,” Harry answered matter-of-factly.

She looked at his with a mingle of disbelieve and sadness. Like she thought he had finally lost it.
“Harry, you can’t bring him back. Sirius is dead.”

“You’re wrong. Yes he has fallen beyond the veil, but there is a way. There is a ritual that can bring people from beyond. I won’t lie to you. It’s dark magic, very dangerous dark magic that requires a lot of preparation, skill and a great deal of magical power. It can be compared with the ritual Voldermort used to get his body back.”

“But you told me yourself that Voldermort had invented this ritual. It was his creation. How can there be a ritual alike?”

“His ritual was actually based on a very old spell that could bring people back that had just died, whose souls hadn’t yet moved on. I have researched the nature of the Death Ark and it is made to keep the souls of everyone who passes through. So Sirius’ soul hasn’t gone beyond, yet.”

“But where did you get that information? The whole Ark is top-secret, not to speak of that old spell you’re talking about. It must be ancient and I’ve never heard about it.”

“The stuff about the Ark wasn’t very hard to find. There was something in the Restricted Section and at The Ministry itself. I sneaked in there last night. The spell was more difficult to come by. I had to go to the only witness. The one who had witnessed Voldermort make it. Wormtail.”

“You were in Azkaban today?!”

“Yes. So he told me everything he knew about the spell and the potion and the rest I managed to get with some research.”

“He just TOLD you everything he knew? Why should you believe a word he says?”

“I didn’t believe him. I forced him to drink a whole vial of veritaserum before I questioned him.”

“And how exactly did you force him?”

“I let him feel exactly what my parents had felt the second before they died,” Harry’s face had turned grim at that statement, “and I told him that I would make that feeling stay with him forever if he wouldn’t tell me everything. I told him I was a Seer and would know if he held something back. That’s pure bullshit off course, but he believed me.”

Hermione looked at him in horror. He was just sitting there telling her absolutely calm how he had broken an immense amount of laws, tortured and threatened Wormtail and now wanted to bring back the dead with a highly dangerous dark art’s ritual. She was shocked into silence for a moment, but then came the outburst.

“Harry James Potter have you finally gone completely mad?! You could have been arrested, you could have been killed! And now you want to meddle with Dark Arts? You can wind up dead and take the whole school with you! Do you understand that?”

Harry just let Hermione rave and patiently waited for her to calm down. When she sat down again and took a deep breath he started to talk again.
“I knew you would react like that. I won’t force you into helping me. It’s up to you. But no matter what you say, I won’t give it up. I won’t give Sirius up. Not when there is a chance. I need to know…I need to ask him…,” he was lost in his own thoughts for a moment. “I will do it, with or without your help. Think about it.” With that he stood up and walked out of the classroom leaving a baffled Hermione behind.

***

Hermione told Ron everything the next morning. He took it rather well. He told her to look on the bright side: at least Harry was up and actually doing something. Besides that, if they would manage to pull it off, they wouldn’t only get Sirius back, but, with a little luck, also the old Harry. Hermione was still angry, but let herself be persuaded to help her best friend. After classes they went looking for Harry and found him in the library bent over a bunch of old looking scrolls and books.

“Hi there Harry,” Ron greeted his friend cheerfully. Harry waved in return, not taking his eyes from the scroll he was engrossed in.

“I heard Snape was furious today. Says someone has been in his dungeon. You don’t happen to know who that was, now do you?”

“It was me. How else could I get my hands on veritaserum?” Harry answered matter-of-factly, still reading. Ron burst in a fit of giggles and Hermione fumed. When Ron’s laughter died, helped by a well aimed elbow between his ribs by Hermione, he turned serious.

“Actually we came here not to talk about Snape. We came here to say we want to help you.” He lowered his voice to whisper and glanced around. “We want to help you bring Sirius back.”

At that Harry took his eyes from the scroll and looked at his friends. Then he did one thing he hadn’t done for an eternity it seemed; he smiled. Not the reassuring smirk he gave everyone who asked how he was doing, but a genuine open smile.

“Great!”

He beckoned them to sit down and started to tell them all he had found out so far. He had a vague description of the ritual, but some ingredients were hard to find, other needed to be made, the spell needed to be decrypted and the right date and time to perform the ritual needed to be calculated by the stars. Hermione was given the task to find out how to make some of the ingredients and where to find the others. Ron took out astronomy books and started to study different star calendars. Harry busied himself with the spell and the things Hermione couldn’t do, like stealing stuff or getting somewhere unnoticed. After a week of hard work, which Ron and Hermione had to combine with classes and homework, they finally figured out how to make all the ingredients, what the spell meant and when the ritual had to be preformed. The right date would be January the twelfth at half past midnight, so they had a little more than a month left to make all the necessary preparations. The next time the planets would be in the same stance would be 30 years later…