Harry rushed through the air, mind racing. The images Fawkes had sent him were a but unnerving. He was headed towards the Himalayas, the fabled mountain range of the East. Evidently the next Horcrux was inside a long forgotten temple, in a pass, high in the mountains, unreachable by any than the flying birds, and in Harry’s case, flying wizard.

He reached Nepal the following morning, landed in a heavily wooded area and lay down to get some rest. He was tired, extremely tired, in fact. Well, he hadn’t gotten a decent night's sleep in weeks. That’s one of those things that tend to catch up to you, even if you’d use some potion or other to not need sleep. It’s just how nature works.

Ten hours later, Harry woke up feeling refreshed, better than he’d felt in some time. He got up and swung his leg over his broom once more and bolted high up in the air. He marveled the freedom this brought, the total control he had over his broom, and he savored it, for he knew that this feeling might not come to him as easily when he was a full participant of the actual war, when, perhaps he had to answer to someone in charge. He didn’t like the idea of not being able to do things his own way, and he dreaded the time when he would have to. But right now, he was his own master, and he loved it.

He was speeding towards the mountains now, the blizzard threatening to blow him off the broom. He stubbornly rode on, though and gradually, he found a cave, in which he might be able to find some momentary refuge from the unforgiving weather. He dismounted and sat down. He shook all over, he was so cold. So cold. His fingers were starting to get numb, and he was having trouble controlling his movements. Have to get a fire going! But there is no wood. He snorted at the thought and remembered a certain incident back in first year that involved him, Hermione, a nasty Devil’s snare and a highly panicking Ron. And in a moment there was a fire going in the small cavern, and what a relief it was indeed!

For two days Harry had to stay in the cave. Two days, the harsh, everlasting winter of the mountains blew, filling every crack, hole and hollow with snow. On the third day, it finally let up and everything was quiet once more. No sound except a slight rumble of protest from the snow underneath Harry’s feet.

By late afternoon, Harry finally found the pass where the temple was. Much to his dismay, it was completely packed with snow. Well, isn’t that just typical. He stood there for a moment, pondering on how to approach the damn structure. He finally decided to melt the snow away. He clapped his hands together and snapped his fingers, and voila! Two balls of fire rested easily in his palms. He grinned widely, and pushed both his hands forward, ushering the fire forward. The fire attacked the snow, which held fast for a few minutes, but eventually had to give in to the intense heat of the fire. It only took about fifteen minutes once the snow started to melt until Harry had a clean passage into the temple. Nice…

He slowly made his way forward, inspecting the walls, as he did. No sign of any traps at all. Strange. Must mean there’s some nasties inside that I do not want to meet. He,he… Man, I've got to upgrade my humour! He stood there facing a massive two-winged doors, made seemingly out of gold, silver and bronze. Nice touch. Now all he had to do was to open the doors and enter, but how? There were no handles on the doors, they were way to heavy to even try to push inward. He tried his magic, but that did not work. Inspect the images… He saw images of men falling on their knees in front of gods, the gods blessing the submissive monks. Every god did so. All but one. This one sat upon a throne, his eyes big like saucers, looking straight forward. Behind him were doors not so unlike the ones Harry was trying to enter. Worth a shot… He put his fingers onto the eyes of the image and ever so slightly, he pushed. There was a scraping sound as the doors slowly opened inward revealing… Nothing…

Total blackness met Harry, but that was of no consequence to Harry’s extraordinary eyes, seeing no threat, he entered the room, swords drawn and ready. But as soon as Harry was in the middle of the room, the candlesticks, and torches flamed to life, bathing the room in a comfortable light. There was a round pillar by Harry’s feet. He looked at it and a beam appeared, coming from above. His gaze followed the ray up. Up and up, trough a hole in the ceiling. He grabbed the swords tightly and stepped on. And up he went…

Five high-ranking Death eaters captured in a flat here in London. The scene a mystery. Witnesses say a fight broke out in the flat late Saturday evening. Our informant at the Ministry spoke of people’s whispers of a vigilante…

Ron threw the Daily Prophet onto the table by their favorite chairs by the hearth in Gryffindor’s common room.

“A load of bullocks all that is. What good is this news if they won’t even give us their names?” Hermione sent him a look.

“Gives people some hope, at least it shows people that the Ministry is capable of something, doesn’t it?” Ron snorted at that, looking Ginny’s way. Ginny remained silent and Ron furrowed his brow and turned his attention back at Hermione.

“True, but they weren’t the ones who caught them, now were they? This vigilante person? What do you reckon?”

“I wouldn’t be surprised if it was the same one that saved us from that Death eater. I mean, it’s not likely that there are many of them roaming around. Voldemort would kill them in a heartbeat.” Ron shuddered at the mentioning of Voldemort’s name. He truly doubted he’d ever get over the nasty feeling of hearing the bastard’s name.

“Well, this one seems to be good enough to elude Voldemort,” Hermione said gravely.

“I wish Harry was here, Hermione,” Ron said and sighed sadly.

“As do I,” Hermione said, “as do I.”
Ginny remained silent. Ginny’s mood was getting worse and worse by the day. She did let out a laugh every now and then, but sadly, those incidents were getting rare indeed. And if she did laugh, it wasn’t a heartfull laugh, nor did the accompanying smiles reach her eyes.

She was brooding. Other students had taken to go the long way around, rather than going near her. They were avoiding her on purpose, she knew. Or was she the one who was doing all the avoiding? She wasn’t even sure anymore. How long had it been since she had smiled, truly smiled at someone? She had no answers. The heartache was tearing her up inside. And it was taking it’s tall on all those around her. She had even landed in a detention one day, when she lost her temper at Mcgonagall. The professor had approached her after Transfiguration class on morning and told her that she knew Harry would not have her acting in such a way. Ginny had roared at her and called her a senile old hag. Of course she had felt bad saying such a thing to the old woman, and had bidden her to forgive the outburst. Mcgonagall did so without hesitation, but as rules would have it, Ginny recieved a weeks worth of detentions, and cost Gryffindor fifteen house points. Since then she’d started to act as though she was feeling better, but that only applied to the time she spent outside the common room. She kept asking herself why Harry had left her so. She did understand his need to protect her, that was just how Harry James Potter was. And that had led her to think of her inability to protect Harry. She felt so useless. She wanted to be out there with him, a pillar of strength, just to feel his presence.

She realised that she wasn’t the only one in the castle missing him. She had seen some teachers, like Prof. Flitwick sit on top of his book pile, staring at the seat were Harry had usually been. Dobby had a way of mentioning Harry’s name every single day, and his eyes would glace over with tears. “Good master Harry Potter freed Dobby!” This he would shout every so often. Cho Chang was often spotted in the toilets crying. Ginny didn’t blame her, having apparently lost another loved one. And it even seemed as if the castle itself was missing Harry. It had gotten darker, drafty and dirty, almost as if it was brooding, mourning the loss of it’s two greatest heroes; Albus Dumbledore and Harry Potter. Or perhaps it was just her own mood that put things in such perspective. At any rate, the mood at Hogwarts was getting darker, and worsened by the hour…

OK. What will happen once I pick this up? Something nasty, no doubt. Damn! I can’t see any trap, nor indication of such thing. Why does this have to be so fucking complicated?! Why can’t it just be like this: go here, kill this or go around it, avoid that trap, take the thing and get the hell out… Why is this thing lying there, like some self-dead thing?

Harry’s mind was racing as he closely examined the evil Horcrux. This was without doubt Ravenclaw’s item. A raven’s slough. It lay on a table in the center of the room, where the pillar had taken Harry. What unnerved Harry was how plainly the thing was placed upon the table. No traps, no feeling of magic. Nothing. But there was no way there was nothing to greet him once he’d picked it up. If Harry had inspected the floor better, he would have noticed the perimeter painted on the floor, but too intent on the Horcrux, he did not, and crossed it without ever noticing it. Bad.

He finally decided to just pick it up, to get the struggle over and dealt with. When he picked it up, he realised it was basically the same deal as with the locket, the evil presence within the thing trying to overcome Harry’s senses, but it was much stronger now, and had it not been for the Potion of Cat’s grace, he wouldn’t have been able to withstand it. He vomited on the floor, and swooned heavily, his head swimming. When he finally recovered, the slough’s powers shot into his body, dealing a devastating blow on the young man. The pain lasted only a second, but suddenly, he felt a little connection between himself and the slough. It disappeared, but a little raven-like symbol appeared on his neck, jut below his ear. He knew he had been given some kind of power to change into a raven. Neat. He took a few deep breaths, turned about and started for the exit. But as soon as he crossed the magical perimeter the place went dark, pitch black. Who put the lights out? He heard the tell tale sound of stone scraping against stone. He switched to infrared vision and jumped when he realised he was facing at least a dozen Inferi. Damn!

Harry snapped out his swords, and suddenly he realised that fire was creaping from his hands onto the blades, turning them into torches, sharp and deadly torches.

Harry charged forward, his blades going wide, gutting the two creatures closest to him. And in a movement that was a blur to the naked eye, he brought the swords on close again, parrying with inhuman speed. He was engaged in a fight with two Inferi now, swords flashing fervently. He dodged a blow from one, kicking him in the ribs, a blow that sent the thing flying few yards back, and trough the hole in the floor. Harry dropped to one knee, cleanly severing the tendons in the attacking Inferi’s ankles and sent the thing to it’s knees. He sprang up and brought the weapons in low, the blades coming together at the thing’s neck, sending the head flying. The fighter ran towards the hole and peered down. The lower level was flooded with the cursed things, all of them staring up at him, trying to get up there, but the pillar wouldn’t be raised. I have to get out! He held his right hand out and called for his broom, his trusted Firebolt. But what he was holding in his hands two seconds later was not a broom, but a surprisingly big pile of kindling.

Damn you, you filthy things! He was in trouble now. No way out but through the mass of undead things. He looked about the room frantically, and saw a window, but it was of no use. He could not reach it, no man could. Only the flying bird could… Wait… OK… Harry closed his eyes and tried hard to focus on his link between himself and Ravenclaw’s item. He gradually found it and suddenly, he wasn’t a man any more, but a Raven, a creature of the sky, who flew through the window and out in the night sky…

Núna er þetta að ganga! Tveir kaflar á örstuttum tíma! Fun, fun, fun…