Snape apparated near the entrance to Hogwarts and walked quickly to Dumbledore’s office. He waited outside the statue for Dumbledore to let him in. He knew that the old wizard would be expecting him, and he didn’t feel like playing Dumbledore’s candy guessing game.

The door opened almost immediately and Dumbledore ushered Snape into his office.

"Ah Severus, come in and sit down. Where is Mr. Potter?" Dumbledore asked. Snape could tell that the old man was relieved that he had been released from the unintentional wards.

"Mm, you mean you don't know?" Snape settled back on his chair.

"No Severus, I don't know anything. All I know is that you are here. Where is Mr. Potter?" the headmaster repeated neutrally.

Snape avoided the headmaster's gaze and replied just as evenly. "He's gone. He disappeared and when he did the wards vanished as well."

Dumbledore stood up immediately. "Where do you think he is, Severus?"

"I said he disappeared. Vanished. Is no longer there. He must have apparated somewhere; I suspect he could if he wanted to badly enough. But I don't know where he would have gone."

"First, I’ll have the Order members begin looking out for him. If he has a way to contact us, then he will.”

“You’re assuming he wants to contact us,” Severus said.

“You mean there is reason that he may not?” Dumbledore questioned.

Snape just glared at the older wizard. Did he think that he would suddenly start getting along with Potter just because they were locked up together? Snape kept his expression neutral; he didn’t want to give the old geezer any ideas.

Dumbledore cleared his throat and continued, “If he is...reachable then we will be able to locate him unless he is in the hands of Voldemort...If he cannot be located then it is possible that he is at the Knight House. What happened right before he apparated away?"

"He was being arrogant and didn't want to listen to me or reason. He was angry, and then he disappeared."

"What exactly happened Severus?" Albus asked firmly.

"I told you. He said he didn't have to listen to me, and then he vanished. That's all."

"Then his anger must have caused him to apparate away. The wards must have vanished because he did, too. If he did end up at the Knight house, there is little we can do until he decides he wants to come back. We just have to wait."

"Do you really think he was desperate enough to make it to the Knight house?"

"Only four people I have known were desperate enough to make it there, Severus. One of them hasn’t been heard from still. I really don't know if Harry was that desperate or not," Dumbledore said sadly.

"Well I don't know where else he could have gone-" Both men looked up when the heard someone pounding at the door.

Dumbledore walked over to the door and knew that it was Nymphadora. "Come in Tonks," Dumbledore said as he opened it.

"This just came in. There was an attack in Surrey," Tonks slammed the lasted copy of the Daily Prophet down on Dumbledore's desk. "Four Muggles were killed, and there are reports that they were tortured. Did you know anything about this?"

"We hadn't heard anything about Muggle attacks," Dumbledore replied. "This is unfortunate. Voldemort is getting braver. He's not afraid of attacking during the day. We must find Harry."

Harry had spent the entire day at the Knight House. He met some of the people there, but they didn't seem to keen on talking about how they had gotten there. Harry brought it up a few times, but they always seemed to avoid answering. Of course, he didn’t want to answer that question either, so he soon stopped asking.

Doing the chores was difficult, but he had to do them in order to get food. People dragged him here and there and even supplied him with some pain medication. The medicine didn’t help much with the pain, but he was sure that he was better off than if he’d stayed with Snape. He didn't even know if he could go back if he wanted to. He would ponder that another time though.

Harry spent most of the evening just lying in his bed too bored to even read the lousy selection of books around him. He heard some whispering and saw some people getting up off their beds and moving to the center of the room. He closed his eyes and tried to ignore all the noise the others were making. He started thinking about all the things that had happened in the last week, and tried to tune out everything else.

But the whispering kept getting louder and more excited, and some of the words caught his attention, “"Four Muggles dead? I can't believe there was another attack," Harry heard.

Harry sat up in his bed and looked towards the group. Everyone else in the room was now gathered around one of the beds looking at one copy of the Daily Prophet.

"Looks like you-know-who is at it again. A bunch of death eaters, I guess," someone replied.

"I'm sure glad that we're safe here, but we can't do anything here either."

“Can I see?” Harry asked quietly. All conversation stopped as everyone looked over at him. Then, an older woman walked over and handed him the paper. Harry read the front page. There was no information except that four Muggles were attacked in Surrey. Names weren't released.

Harry became overwhelmed with a rush of guilt. What if it were the Dursleys? He had to find out. He felt like he could have prevented this from happening, and he felt like it was somehow his fault. He couldn't let it happen again. He was the only who could stop if from happening again. He had to get out of here.

Then next thing he knew, Harry found himself back in Snape's basement. The room was dark and deserted now. Snape must have found a way to get out - that must mean that he would be able to get out, too. Except he couldn't walk.

Harry looked around. He was in the exact same place from which he’d left. The fireplace was near him, and he could tell the wards were down. He grabbed some of the leftover floo powder and propped himself up. How was he going to do this? He leaned against the wall and using his good leg he stood himself up. Still hanging onto the wall with one hand, he threw the floo powder into the fire with the other. Where could he go?

"Gryffindor tower!" he yelled right after he hopped into the fire place and threw the powder.

Harry tumbled out of the fire place into his familiar common room. He was a little surprised that he was able to floo into Hogwarts so easily, but Snape must have set it up so that he could go back and forth between the two places easily. So, he was at Hogwarts, now what? He knew that he had to find Dumbledore.

But, he was tired. He couldn't believe how exhausted he had gotten from just that small amount of traveling. He scooted to the nearest couch and plopped himself up on it. He was getting used to the look of his leg not being there, but he hated having to get used to such a thing. Of course he knew there was nothing he could do about it, at least for now. He closed his eyes planning on trying to think of a way to reach Dumbledore, when he heard singing. He opened his eyes immediately and looked over to the far corner of the common room. There was a house elf intensely reorganizing a shelf of books in the corner. The little elf didn't even notice Harry.

"Hey," Harry called, but the elf seemed too absorbed in his work to notice him. “HEY!” Harry yelled again. Still nothing. Harry picked up one of the pillows from the couch and threw it will all his might towards the elf. His first attempt made it only three quarters of the way, but by the time he got to the last pillow, he’d pinned the elf right on the back.

The elf dropped what he was doing and ran over to where Harry was sitting on the couch. "Mr. Potter sir. What are you doing here? Are you all right? Master Dumbledore's been looking for you."

"Um well, here I am, but I can't go anywhere, could you tell him that I'm here?"

"Anything Master Potter." And the elf disappeared with a snap of his fingers.

Shortly after, Professor Dumbledore, Professor Snape and Madam Pomfrey came storming into the common room. "Mr. Potter, where in Merlin's name have you been?" Poppy screeched disapprovingly.

"Um...I somehow ended up at...the Knight House."

Dumbledore looked knowingly at Snape and then back at Harry. "And how did you get back here."

"I heard about the attack. I know that I can't just wait it out there where it's safe. I'm the only one that can do something about it. I wound up back at Snape Manor and took the floo here, but then I couldn't move."

"How is the leg now, Mr. Potter?" Madam Pomfrey said.

"Well, it's still not there," Harry replied.

"That is obvious, Potter," Snape said in his usual drawl. "I believe she was asking you how it feels."

"It hurts like hell. They had some pain medication at the house, but it wasn't that great," Harry said avoiding Snape's eyes. He was still so mad at the man.

"Well then Potter, we had best get you to the hospital wing to properly care for that leg of yours. You haven't had a proper examination on it since it happened! You also must take a sleeping draught at once!" Madam Pomfrey insisted.

"Why?" Harry protested.

"Because you've been neglecting your health. You are finally in a position where you can get some proper care and you will," she explained.

"I'll go to the hospital wing, but I'm not taking a sleeping potion. I've been doing nothing but lying in bed since you chopped off my leg. It's not like I can do anything else."

"Well, with that attitude, you won't," Snape said.

"Now, I remember why I left," Harry muttered trying to push down the feeling of guilt for the deceased Muggles.

"We will discuss that later, Mr. Potter," Dumbledore said with a familiar gleam in his eye." For now sit tight; we shall get you up to the hospital wing."

Before Harry could think about what was going on, Dumbledore had levitated him up, and he was floating out of the common room with Dumbledore in the lead. From the air, Harry looked back and he could see Madam Pomfrey followed by Professor Snape. Great, he thought, we’re making a processional to the Hospital Wing. At least it’s summer and nobody will see me, he added to himself.

Harry was placed on the bed nearest the office, which happened to be the farthest from the door. He didn't mind that; in fact, he was glad to be away from the door where people from the hallway might see him and get curious. Once he was on the bed, Madam Pomfrey began doing all the tests that he was sure she had been waiting to do since she's seen his injury. He just sat there waiting for her to tell him that he really didn't have to lose his leg. Of course it would be too late to do anything about that now.

Professor Snape came billowing into the hospital wing. He had left earlier to make potions and came back holding four. "Take this," he said. Harry looked at the potions in slight fear before downing all the terrible tasting liquids.

"Why can't I feel the bottom half of my body?" Harry exclaimed, but his voice came out as a slow tired blurb.

"There is still some work to be done on this leg. Mr. Potter," Pomfrey explained.

"What? No!" Harry yelled.

"Just relax dear. You won't feel a thing," Madam Pomfrey said. "We just have to clean it up a little and make it possible for you to get a magical prosthesis in the future."

"Harry, perhaps you can tell me about your stay in the Knight house while Madam Pomfrey is working on you," Dumbledore said.

"I don't want to talk about it," Harry said. "Nothing happened there."

"Yes, but Mr. Potter, I am quite curious about it. I have known a few people to go there, but not many do. I have never been there and was wondering if you could tell me what it is like. It is far more uncommon than the Knight Bus."

"It is like the Knight bus. I was sick of...I don't know. I just apparated there, and they gave me food and a bed. Some people have been there for a very long time. Yeah I did meet someone who had been there for a long time. But I don't think I should really talk about it. People go there because they don't want people to find them or know about what they're doing," Harry said.

"Right, Right, Harry. So what did you do while you were there?"

"I helped cook a little and laid in bed a lot. There's not much that I could do. Everyone was pretty nice though. I might like to go back."

"It's not that easy to get there just because you want to. Many people have tried. You have to really need to be there. Why did you feel you needed to be there?"

"Er...I have a feeling that I could go back if I wanted to. I don't know why I went. I just did. I apparated there in a split second."

Dumbledore knew there was a reason why Harry had gone. His real reason must have been a much deeper one than what he was revealing.

The potion was making him feel quite woozy, Harry realized, and it must have been the reason that he couldn’t stop talking. He was pretty sure that normally he wouldn’t have gone on like that and likely would have had the same attitude he’d had with Snape and not said anything. He still couldn’t feel anything, but he knew that Madam Pomfrey was working on him.

"So you won't tell me anyone's name who was there?" Dumbledore tried again. Harry felt like he was being taken advantage of in this state.

"Who was where?" Harry asked absently; he felt his thoughts slowly being lifted from his mind.

"At the Knight House Harry," Dumbledore said trying one last time.

"I don't want to talk.." Harry felt himself drifting, and he didn't care. At least he wouldn't have to talk to Dumbledore.

"That's alright for now," Dumbledore said and stood up tall. "Go to sleep." With that Dumbledore and Madam Pomfrey swept out of the room leaving Harry to sleep.