Could not hear Ron or Hermione anymore. They seemed to have run out of earshot,

Searching for the diadem.

“So how come you three aren’t with Voldemort?” asked Harry.

“We’re gonna be rewarded,” said Crabbe. His voice was surprisingly soft for such

an enormous person: Harry had hardly ever heard him speak before. Crabbe was speaking

like a small child promised a large bag of sweets. “We ‘ung back, Potter. We decided not

to go. Decided to bring you to ‘im.”

“Good plan,” said Harry in mock admiration. He could not believe that he was

This close, and was going to be thwarted by Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle. He began edging

Slowly backward toward the place where the Horcrux sat lopsided upon the bust. If he

Could just get his hands on it before the fight broke out . . .

“So how did you get in here?” he asked, trying to distract them.

“I virtually lived in the Room of Hidden Things all last year,” said Malfoy, his

voice brittle. “I know how to get in.”

“We was hiding in the corridor outside,” grunted Goyle. “We can do Diss-lusion

Charms now! And then,” his face split into a gormless grin, “you turned up right in front

of us and said you was looking for a die-dum! What’s a die-dum?”

“Harry?” Ron’s voice echoed suddenly from the other side of the wall to Harry’s

right. “Are you talking to someone?”

With a whiplike movement, Crabbe pointed his wand at the fifty foot mountain of

Old furniture, of broken trunks, of old books and robes and unidentifiable junk, and

shouted, “Descendo!”

The wall began to totter, then the top third crumbled into the aisle next door

Where Ron stood.

“Ron!” Harry bellowed, as somewhere out of sight Hermione screamed, and

Harry heard innumerable objects crashing to the floor on the other side of the destabilized

wall: He pointed his wand at the rampart, cried, “Finite!” and it steadied.

“No!” shouted Malfoy, staying Crabbe’s arm as the latter made to repeat his spell.

“If you wreck the room you might bury this diadem thing!”

“What’s that matter?” said Crabbe, tugging himself free. “It’s Potter the Dark

Lord wants, who cares about a die-dum?”

“Potter came in here to get it,” said Malfoy with ill-disguised impatience at the

slow-wittedness of his colleagues. “so that must mean –“

“’Must mean’?” Crabbe turned on Malfoy with undisguised ferocity. “Who cares

what you think? I don’t take your orders no more, Draco. You an’ your dad are finished.”

“Harry?” shouted Ron again, from the other side of the junk wad. “What’s going

on?”

“Harry?” mimicked Crabbe. “What’s going on – no, Potter! Crucio!”

Harry had lunged for the tiara; Crabbe’s curse missed him but hit the stone bust,

Which flew into the air; the diadem soared upward and then dropped out of sight in the

Mass of objects on which the bust had rested.

“STOP!” Malfoy shouted at Crabbe, his voice echoing through the enormous

room. “The Dark Lord wants him alive –“

“So? I’m not killing him, am I?” yelled Crabbe, throwing off Malfoy’s restraining

arm. “But if I can, I will, the Dark Lord wants him dead anyway, what’s the diff – ?”

A jet of scarlet light shot past Harry by inches: Hermione had run around the

corner behind him and sent a Stunning Spell straight at Crabbe’s head. It only missed

Date: 2015-12-11; view: 543