Harry released his final class of the day five minutes early and rushed to the Great Hall for dinner. After eating his meal quickly, he fetched his winter cloak from his apartments and left the castle. It had been snowing all day. Thus, the path from Hogwarts to Hogsmeade had become difficult to traverse. It was dark and the snow was deep. Harry trudged on. Orion's visit had aroused his curiosity about Lestrange's act of arson down in Hogsmeade. What had Orion seen in it that neither Harry nor Bellatrix had observed?
Eventually, he reached the town and its streets that were lit by lamps. He passed the Three Broomsticks and its lights glowing in the cold, winter night. It wasn't bustling with students on a weeknight, but there did seem to be some traffic going in and out. The townspeople of Hogsmeade, Harry supposed, or perhaps some travelers.
From there, it didn't take too long to find the street and small restaurant that Bellatrix had guided him to before the fire. Just across the street was the burned out building in question. Harry scanned the street and neighboring buildings to see if there were any onlookers. Seeing none, he approached the ruins.
The light that the streetlamps provided was sufficient to reveal that very little of the building had survived the devastation-only some of the parts that he and Bellatrix had put bluebell flames on. Harry noted with a little bit of amusement that the staircase they had rushed up still stood amidst the ruins. The wall he had originally experimented the bluebell flames on had fallen, but only because everything else supporting it had been burned to ashes.
Unfortunately, there didn't seem to be anything in the ashes that Harry could use. It was a hopeless cause. Harry sighed. Dead end, he thought.
"Hey! What are you doing?" called a voice.
Harry spun toward the voice's origin and found an aged witch looking at him from a porch situated across the street, next to the restaurant. "Just looking," he said, trying to sound confident.
"That's off limits," the woman informed him. "The Ministry is investigating the fire."
"Oh, I didn't know," Harry said, wondering if the woman might know more about the fire or the shop the building had been before the fire. He walked over to the house. He needed a cover story. Quickly, he tried to think one up. "My wife's birthday is coming up," he explained to the woman. I just got off work and was hoping to buy her something from that antiques shop. I guess they're out of business, eh?"
"You've got a gift for stating the obvious," the woman said wryly. "Yeah, Dark wizards burned it down."
"Dark wizards?" Harry exclaimed. "Really?"
"What else could it have been?" the woman said. "It took hours for the Ministry to put it out."
"Yeah, well we all know how competent the Ministry is," Harry noted.
The woman laughed. "I like you, lad."
"Is the owner around anywhere?" Harry asked.
"He's living with his son and their family. About time, too. He was getting pretty senile," the woman said.
"That's too bad about everything," Harry said, his brows furrowed in thought. If the old man was senile as the woman said, would tracking him down be of any use?
"I know of a good antiques shop down London way," the woman offered. "You could find your wife something from there."
"Uh, okay," Harry said, "where is it?"
The woman thought for a second. "It's down Smythe Lane, off of Diagon Alley. It's called Treasured Trifles."
"Treasured Trifles," Harry repeated dutifully. "Thanks."
The woman nodded. "No problem."
There was then an awkward moment while Harry and the woman eyed each other. Harry had hoped she might disappear from her porch so he could take a last look at the burned shop, but she seemed to be waiting for him to leave before she herself returned to her house. Apparently, the incident had planted the seeds of distrust in her.
With an inaudible sigh, Harry drew his wand of pine and Apparated away. He landed in an alley near Diagon Alley. He wasn't actually looking to purchase an antique, but going to a similar shop might give him a clue as to what might have been special about the other shop. It can't hurt to take a quick look, Harry told himself. After all, he was out and about anyway.
Harry walked quickly through the brisk winter air around the corner and into the Leaky Cauldron from whence he made his way into Diagon Alley. The atmosphere was sleepy, but pleasant. Most of the shops were open, but only the most dedicated customers seemed to be shopping. He strolled past Ollivander's. A small voice in the back of his mind reminded him that he really ought to purchase a wand from Ollivander, but he ended up telling himself that he could always come back later and that his need wasn't pressing.
Eventually he was looking into the window of Treasured Trifles. The display was full of various trinkets. Harry was reminded of Professor Dumbledore's collection of magical devices-howbeit, the stuff in Dumbledore's office looked a lot less like rubbish than the stuff in the shop window.
A chime announced Harry's entrance into the shop. The shopkeeper, a bald and rather skinny man stood behind a glass counter. The counter was topped by a very old-fashioned cash register-at least by Muggle standards. The man tilted his head and smiled a proprietary smile in Harry's direction. "Good evening, sir. What are you in the market for?"
"I'm not really sure," Harry replied carefully, trying to think of a good way to find useful information. He did not think that strolling around and looking at the junk on sale would do him very much good. On the other hand, directly asking the man for the information he wanted didn't seem very practical either. "My wife is interested in old things," he said.
"Old things is our business," the man said, a slightly mocking smile on his face. "What kind of old things?"
This slightly stumped Harry. Wasn't an antique an antique? Frantically, Harry cast his mind about for what sort of antiques a young man like Rodolphus Lestrange might find interesting. In the middle of this, he had an epiphany-an epiphany that caused him to want to slap himself for stupidity. Lestrange wasn't the customer-Voldemort was. Harry knew Voldemort well. "Old things," Harry repeated and then continued, "valuable things, mysterious things… powerful things."
"I might have just the thing," said the shopkeeper. He opened his glass display case and pulled out a bracelet. He held it up for Harry's inspection. "They say that this belonged to the Borgia family and was passed down from mother to daughter. It has powerful curses on it."
Harry sighed. "I'm not interested in that sort of trash. I'm in the market for the real thing."
Instead of protesting as might be expected, the shopkeeper sighed. "Well Mr… ."
"Polkiss," Harry supplied, annoyed that the man was prying for his name.
"Well Mr. Polkiss," the man said, "the real thing isn't very easy to come by."
"Would you care to elaborate for me?" Harry asked.
The man placed the alleged Borgia ring back into the glass case. "That kind of thing almost always belongs to pureblood families. They hoard them. When circumstance forces them to sell, they don't exactly put them up on the auction block-the shame that they have to sell in the first place, and of course, the minor fact that many of those heirlooms are illegal."
Harry nodded thoughtfully. "So where does one listen for the happenings of this particular market?"
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