Cloak, he could perform a Disillusionment Charm so powerful that he made himself

completely invisible without one!”

Something fell to the floor and rolled, glittering, under a chair: He had dislodged

The Snitch when he pulled out the letter. He stooped to pick it up, and then the newly

Tapped spring of fabulous discoveries threw him another gift, and shock and wonder

Erupted inside him so that he shouted out.

“IT’S IN HERE! He left me the ring – it’s in the Snitch!”

“You --- you reckon?”

He could not understand why Ron looked taken aback. It was so obvious, so clear

to Harry. Everything fit, everything…His Cloak was the third Hallow, and when he

Discovered how to open the Snitch he would have the second, and then all he needed to

Do was find the first Hallow, the Elder Wand, and then ---

But it was as though a curtain fell on a lit stage: All his excitement, all his hope

And happiness were extinguished at a stroke, and he stood alone in the darkness, and the

Glorious spell was broken.

“That’s what he’s after.”

The change in his voice made Ron and Hermione look even more scared.

“You-Know-Who’s after the Elder Wand.”

He turned his back on their strained, incredulous faces. He knew it was the truth.

It all made sense, Voldemort was not seeking a new wand; he was seeking an old wand, a

Very old wand indeed. Harry walked to the entrance of the tent, forgetting about Ron and

Hermione as he looked out into the night, thinking…

Voldemort had been raised in a Muggle orphanage. Nobody could have told him

The Tales of Beedle the Bard when he was a child, any more than Harry had heard them.

Hardly any wizards believed in the Deathly Hallows. Was it likely that Voldemort knew

about them?

Harry gazed into the darkness…If Voldemort had known about the Deathly

Hallows, surely he would have sought them, done anything to possess them: three objects

that made the possessor master of Death? If he had known about the Deathly Hallows, he

might not have needed Horcruxes in the first place. Didn’t the simple fact that he had

Taken a Hallow, and turned it into a Horcrux, demonstrate that he did not know this last

great Wizarding secret?

Which meant that Voldemort sought the Elder Wand without realizing its full

power, without understanding that it was one of three…for the wand was the Hallow that

could not be hidden, whose existence was best known…The bloody trail of the Elder

Wand is splattered across the pages of Wizarding history…

Harry watched the cloudy sky, curves of smoke-gray and silver sliding over the

Face of the white moon. He felt lightheaded with amazement at his discoveries.

He turned back into the tent. It was a shock to see Ron and Hermione standing

exactly where he had left them, Hermione still holding Lily’s letter, Ron at her side

looking slightly anxious. Didn’t they realize how far they had traveled in the last few

minutes?

“This is it?” Harry said, trying to bring them inside the glow of his own

astonished certainty, “This explains everything. The Deathly Hallows are real and I’ve

got one --- maybe two ---“

Date: 2015-12-11; view: 740