Fleurs eyes flew wide when she saw her companions, and she gave a little cry of relief.
A little cry, but it was enough. The guard spun around, raising his sword, and advanced on Draco and Harry.
Hermiones stomach dropped down into her shoes. 'Ron?' she shouted, running forward and nearly elbowing Ginny aside. She could hear Charlie right behind her as they approached the spot where Ron had disappeared. 'Ron! Where are you?'
A very irritable voice spoke out of the darkness. 'Down here.'
Beside her, Charlie raised his wand, flooding the corridor with light.
The uneven walls were suddenly thrown into sharp relief, the muddy floor that stretched in front of them… and ended, rather suddenly, in a gaping, jagged-edged hole. Hermione raced to the edge of the hole and peered down.
Rons pale, annoyed face looked up at her. He seemed completely unharmed. Hermione sagged in relief. 'Ron, are you all right?'
An expression of distaste crossed his face. 'Mud,' he said succinctly.
'And its dark.' He glanced around him, squinting. 'Could somebody toss me down a wand? I think I dropped mine into the mud and I?d like to find it.'
Hermione tossed her wand down to Ron, who caught it.
'Lumos,' he said.
Bright light burst from the wand, illuminating the space around Ron. Hermione watched as his expression changed to one of gratified amazement. Instead of the disgruntled look of someone who had fallen off his broomstick in the middle of an important game, Ron now looked like someone who had fallen off his broomstick in the middle of an important game, only to land in a hot tub full of veelas.
'You have got to come down here,' he exclaimed.
Doubtful, Hermione peered over the lip of the hole. Before she could move to do anything, though, Charlie had leaped down beside Ron in the pit, landing on his feet as lightly as a cat. Then he turned around and held his arms up to Hermione. 'Your turn. I?ll catch you.'
Taking a deep breath, she jumped. Charlie caught her easily and lowered her gently to the ground. She stifled a smile — the rough feeling of the dragonhide against her skin made her think of Draco.
She heard the sound as Ginny jumped down after her, but didn?t turn — she was too busy staring around her. The expression on Rons face suddenly made sense.
It looked as if they were in some sort of underground vault. The floor was covered in mud, but stone shelves ranged along the walls held overflowing piles of valuable-looking objects — jewels, gold coins, bolts of tapestry, silver plates, cups and bowls. To be sure, much of it was ruined with age — the cloth rotted through, the silver tarnished — but the majority of it was surprisingly intact.
Hermione looked over at Ron, who was still staring around himself in shock. She could read the look on his face as clearly as if she were reading a book: All this was down here all these years, and we never knew.
A sudden burst of sympathy for him propelled her to his side.
'Ron…'
But he was examining something in his hand. 'Look at this.' He held out a gold coin to her; she took it without much interest-then stared. The face stamped on the coin was… familiar. 'That looks like Harry,' she said blankly.
'Its Godric Gryffindor,' said Ron. 'Its a Gryffindor Galleon. Really old. They?re worth loads.' He looked at it a bit wistfully. 'I wish we could show it to Harry — he?d think it was hilarious, him on a coin.'
'He?ll get to see it,' said Hermione firmly. She slipped it into Rons breast pocket, and patted the pocket closed. A gleam at the corner of her eye caught her attention, and she turned and picked up a tiny round mirror, edged with silver. It reminded her strongly of the Mirror of Erised, with a very slight difference -
'I think we probably shouldn?t take anything from here,' said Charlie from behind them. Hermione turned and looked at him. He was wearing an expression of mingled amazement and wariness. He pushed a stray lock of dark red hair back from his eyes, and sighed.
'I know its tempting, but you never know what kind of spells -
Ginny, what are you doing?'
Hermione and Ron both turned, and saw Ginny. She was standing in a corner of the room, staring quite fixedly at the wall. Exchanging looks, Hermione and Ron hurried over to her. 'Gin, what is it?'
Ginny pointed. She was looking at a wall of even, gray stone bricks -
or so it looked from a distance. Up close, it was possible to see that one of the bricks stood out. It was a pale silver color, metallic. All around it the wall was thick with dust, but it was clean, untarnished.
Etched across the side of it was a sentence of what looked like poetry in thin, engraved letters:
To be gold is to be good to be stone is to be nothing to be glass is to be fragile to be cold is to be cruel.
Ron made a little groaning sound. 'Another riddle?'
'It looks like it,' said Charlie, ever the cautious voice of reason.
'Anyone want to venture a guess?'
I know the answer, Hermione thought to herself. But instead of speaking, she looked at Ginny.
Ginny hesitated. She took a step forward. Then she raised her hand, and with her right index finger drew, in the dust that covered the wall beneath the silver brick like a thick powdering of flour, the shape of a heart.
Hermione thought she heard a faint chiming noise, as of distant music — and the brick slid out of the wall and toppled into Ginnys outstretched hands.
From which it was immediately removed by Charlie, bent on examining it. It turned out not to be a brick at all but a sealed silver casket, rectangular in shape. The top was engraved with a raised emblem: a magical
