The interlude was over in a very short time.
Jon could not figure out why the old man had suddenly come here to look for him, but since it had happened, it was solved.
Recently, things of this level were no longer difficult for him.
Back in his manor, Jon first went to the study to say hello to Helga, then went back to the bedroom to take a bath and get ready for bed.
Of course, one would not be able to sleep so early.
Jon pulled at the air and pulled out a light screen, intending to watch the live broadcast of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
This bad habit was passed on to him by Cinnabar.
The scene on the screen happened to be midnight.
Hermione was huddled in the tent, reading The History of Magic by the light of her wand.
The snow was still falling heavily. Harry came out of the tent and suggested to Hermione that they should change places.
"Yes, we need to change to a more secluded place."
Hermione was naturally in favor of Harry's suggestion. As she spoke, she shivered as she put on a sweatshirt over her pajamas. "I always think I hear someone walking around outside, and once or twice I think I saw a shadow."
Harry, who was putting on the sweatshirt, stopped and looked at the silent, motionless speculum on the table.
"I believe it's an illusion."
Hermione looked a little nervous. "The snow in the dark can easily make people's eyes see things...
But maybe we should use Apparition under the Invisibility Cloak, just in case, right? "
Half an hour later, the tent was packed. Harry took the Deathly Hallows, and Hermione grabbed the beaded bag and used Apparition together.
The familiar feeling of suffocation engulfed them. Harry's feet left the snow and landed heavily on the ground, like a frozen soil covered with fallen leaves.
"Where are we?"
He looked at the unfamiliar forest.
Hermione had opened the beaded bag and began to pull out the tent pole.
"The Forest of Dean," she said. "I came here to camp once, with Mum and Dad."
It was bitterly cold here, and the forest was covered in snow, but at least it was protected from the wind.
They spent most of their time in the tent, huddling around the bright blue flames that Hermione was good at creating.
These flames were very useful, and could be scooped up and put in a bottle to carry around.
Harry felt as if he were recuperating after a short but serious illness, a feeling reinforced by Hermione's concern.
In the afternoon, snowflakes floated in the sky again, and even the open space they were in was sprinkled with a layer of crystal dust.
Harry hadn't slept much for two nights, and his senses seemed to be more alert.
The narrow escape from death in Godric Valley was so thrilling. Voldemort seemed to be even closer than before, and the threat was even greater.
When night fell again, Harry refused to let Hermione keep watch and told her to go to bed.
Harry took an old cushion and sat down in the mouth of the tent, shivering in all his sweaters.
The darkness grew thicker and thicker, so thick that it was almost impenetrable.
He was about to look at Jenny's black spot on the map when he remembered that it was Christmas and that she should be at her humble abode.
In the forest, every slight movement seemed to be magnified.
Harry knew that there must be many animals in the wood, but he wanted them all to be quiet, lest he should mix their harmless scurrying and walking with other sounds that promised danger.
He remembered the sound of the cloak sliding on the withered leaves many years ago. He immediately felt as if he had heard it again, so he quickly pulled himself together.
The protection spell had worked for so many weeks. How could it not work now?
But he couldn't shake off the feeling that something was wrong tonight.
Harry sat up abruptly several times, his neck stiff and aching, for he had fallen asleep against the wall of the tent without realizing it.
The night deepened. It was a kind of thick, velvet-like darkness. He seemed to be suspended in the realm between Phantom Transfiguration and Phantom Manifestation.
He was about to raise one hand in front of his face to see if he could see the fingers, when a strange thing happened.
A bright silver light appeared directly in front of him, moving through the trees.
He didn't know what it was, but it moved so silently that the light seemed to float towards him.
He jumped up, holding up Hermione's wand, and his voice froze in his throat.
He squinted, for the light was so bright that the trees in front of him were black silhouettes, and the thing was still coming …
Then, the source of light floated out from behind an oak tree. It was a silver-white deer, as bright as the moonlight. It gracefully stepped on the ground without making a sound, leaving not a single hoof print on the soft white snow.
It came towards him, its beautiful head held high, its eyes wide, its lashes long.
Harry stared at the spirit creature, his heart full of wonder, not because of its strangeness, but because of its inexplicable familiarity and familiarity.
He felt as if he had been waiting for it, but had forgotten for a while, and only now remembered their appointment.
His impulse to call out to Hermione, so strong a moment ago, was gone.
He knew, and would have bet his life, that it was coming for him, specifically for him.
They looked at each other for a long time, and then it turned away.
"No," he said.
He said, his voice hoarse from not using it for a long time, "Come back!"
The doe continued to move deliberately through the wood, and soon its bright body was stamped with the stripes of the thick black trunks.
For a tense, trembling second, Harry hesitated, and alarm bells rang softly: it might be a trick, a decoy.
But instinct, irresistible instinct, told him that it was not black magic.
He ran after it.
The snow crunched under Harry's feet, but the doe moved silently through the wood, for it was only light.
It led him deeper and deeper into the forest. Harry walked quickly, confident that when the doe stopped, it would let him approach it properly. Then it would speak, and the voice would tell him what he needed to know.
Finally, the doe stopped and turned its beautiful head toward Harry again.
Harry hurried forward, a question burning in his mind, but as he opened his mouth to ask it died away.
Though the darkness had swallowed it whole, its bright image was still imprinted on his retinas, blurring his vision.
When he lowered his eyes, the image grew brighter, so that he could not tell which direction he was going.
Now fear came over him: its presence had meant safety.
"Flicker!"
The image of the doe faded away with each blink of Harry's eyes.
He stood there, listening to the sounds of the forest, the snapping of distant branches, the soft rustle of the night snow.
Would he be attacked?
Would it lead him into an ambush?
It seemed as if someone were watching him from where the light of the wand could not reach. Was it his imagination?
Harry raised the wand higher. No one rushed toward him. No green light shone from behind the trees.
Then why had the doe brought him here?
Something flashed in the fluorescent light of the wand, and Harry whirled around. It was only a small pond, frozen over.
He held the wand aloft. Its cracked black surface glittered.
He stepped forward cautiously and looked down, the ice reflecting his shape-shifting shadow and the light of the wand.
But there was something shining under the thick, hazy grey sheet of ice. A great silver cross...
His heart leaped into his throat: he ran down the edge of the pond, tilting the wand so that the light reached as far as it could reach the bottom.
There was a flash of crimson...
It was a sword, the ruby on the hilt glinting...
Gryffindor's sword lay at the bottom of the pond in the forest.
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