Harry Potter 1 Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

HP 1 - Harry Potter and the
Sorcerer's Stone

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CHAPTER TWELVE
THE MIRROR OF ERISED
C hristmas was coming. One morning in mid-December, Hogwarts woke to
find itself covered in several feet of snow. The lake froze solid and the Weasley
twins  were  punished  for  bewitching  several  snowballs  so  that  they  followed
Quirrell around, bouncing off the back of his turban. The few owls that managed
to battle their way through the stormy sky to deliver mail had to be nursed back
to health by Hagrid before they could fly off again.
           No  one  could  wait  for  the  holidays  to  start.  While  the  Gryffindor
common  room  and  the  Great  Hall  had  roaring  fires,  the  drafty  corridors  had
become icy and a bitter wind rattled the windows in the classrooms. Worst of all
were Professor Snape’s classes down in the dungeons, where their breath rose in
a mist before them and they kept as close as possible to their hot cauldrons.
“I do feel so sorry,” said Draco Malfoy, one Potions class, “for all those
people who have to stay at Hogwarts for Christmas because they’re not wanted
at home.”
He was looking over at Harry as he spoke. Crabbe and Goyle chuckled.
Harry, who was measuring out powdered spine of lionfish, ignored them. Malfoy
had been even more unpleasant than usual since the Quidditch match. Disgusted
that the Slytherins had lost, he had tried to get everyone laughing at how a wide-
mouthed tree frog would be replacing Harry as Seeker next. Then he’d realized
that  nobody  found  this  funny,  because  they  were  all  so  impressed  at  the  way
Harry  had  managed  to  stay  on  his  bucking  broomstick.  So  Malfoy,  jealous  and
angry, had gone back to taunting Harry about having no proper family.
It was true that Harry wasn’t going back to Privet Drive for Christmas.
Professor  McGonagall  had  come  around  the  week  before,  making  a  list  of
students  who  would  be  staying  for  the  holidays,  and  Harry  had  signed  up  at
once.  He  didn’t  feel  sorry  for  himself  at  all;  this  would  probably  be  the  best
Christmas  he’d  ever  had.  Ron  and  his  brothers  were  staying,  too,  because  Mr.
and Mrs. Weasley were going to Romania to visit Charlie.
When they left the dungeons at the end of Potions, they found a large fir
tree blocking the corridor ahead. Two enormous feet sticking out at the bottom
and a loud puffing sound told them that Hagrid was behind it.
“Hi, Hagrid, want any help?” Ron asked, sticking his head through the

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branches.
“Nah, I’m all right, thanks, Ron.”
“Would you mind moving out of the way?” came Malfoy’s cold drawl
from behind them. “Are you trying to earn some extra money, Weasley? Hoping
to  be  gamekeeper  yourself  when  you  leave  Hogwarts,  I  suppose  —  that  hut  of
Hagrid’s must seem like a palace compared to what your family’s used to.”
Ron dived at Malfoy just as Snape came up the stairs.
“WEASLEY!”
Ron let go of the front of Malfoy’s robes.
           “He  was  provoked,  Professor  Snape,”  said  Hagrid,  sticking  his  huge
hairy face out from behind the tree. “Malfoy was insultin’ his family.”
           “Be  that  as  it  may,  fighting  is  against  Hogwarts  rules,  Hagrid,”  said
Snape  silkily.  “Five  points  from  Gryffindor,  Weasley,  and  be  grateful  it  isn’t
more. Move along, all of you.”
           Malfoy,  Crabbe,  and  Goyle  pushed  roughly  past  the  tree,  scattering
needles everywhere and smirking.
           “I’ll  get  him,”  said  Ron,  grinding  his  teeth  at  Malfoy’s  back,  “one  of
these days, I’ll get him —”
“I hate them both,” said Harry, “Malfoy and Snape.”
“Come on, cheer up, it’s nearly Christmas,” said Hagrid. “Tell yeh what,
come with me an’ see the Great Hall, looks a treat.”
So the three of them followed Hagrid and his tree off to the Great Hall,
where  Professor  McGonagall  and  Professor  Flitwick  were  busy  with  the
Christmas decorations.
“Ah, Hagrid, the last tree — put it in the far corner, would you?”
           The  hall  looked  spectacular.  Festoons  of  holly  and  mistletoe  hung  all
around the walls, and no less than twelve towering Christmas trees stood around
the  room,  some  sparkling  with  tiny  icicles,  some  glittering  with  hundreds  of
candles.
“How many days you got left until yer holidays?” Hagrid asked.
“Just one,” said Hermione. “And that reminds me — Harry, Ron, we’ve
got half an hour before lunch, we should be in the library.”
“Oh yeah, you’re right,” said Ron, tearing his eyes away from Professor
Flitwick, who had golden bubbles blossoming out of his wand and was trailing
them over the branches of the new tree.
“The library?” said Hagrid, following them out of the hall. “Just before
the holidays? Bit keen, aren’t yeh?”
           “Oh,  we’re  not  working,”  Harry  told  him  brightly.  “Ever  since  you
mentioned Nicolas Flamel we’ve been trying to find out who he is.”

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       “You what?”  Hagrid  looked  shocked. “Listen  here  — I’ve  told  yeh  —
drop it. It’s nothin’ to you what that dog’s guardin’.”
“We just want to know who Nicolas Flamel is, that’s all,” said Hermione.
“Unless you’d like to tell us and save us the trouble?” Harry added. “We
must’ve  been  through  hundreds  of  books  already  and  we  can’t  find  him
anywhere — just give us a hint — I know I’ve read his name somewhere.”
“I’m sayin’ nothin’, said Hagrid flatly.
“Just have to find out for ourselves, then,” said Ron, and they left Hagrid
looking disgruntled and hurried off to the library.
           They  had  indeed  been  searching  books  for  Flamel’s  name  ever  since
Hagrid had let it slip, because how else were they going to find out what Snape
was trying to steal? The trouble was, it was very hard to know where to begin,
not knowing what Flamel might have done to get himself into a book. He wasn’t
in  Great  Wizards  of  the  Twentieth  Century,  or  Notable  Magical  Names  of  Our
Time; he was missing, too, from Important Modern Magical Discoveries, and A
Study of Recent Developments in Wizardry. And then, of course, there was the
sheer  size  of  the  library;  tens  of  thousands  of  books;  thousands  of  shelves;
hundreds of narrow rows.
Hermione took out a list of subjects and titles she had decided to search
while  Ron  strode  off  down  a  row  of  books  and  started  pulling  them  off  the
shelves at random. Harry wandered over to the Restricted Section. He had been
wondering for a while if Flamel wasn’t somewhere in there. Unfortunately, you
needed  a  specially  signed  note  from  one  of  the  teachers  to  look  in  any  of  the
restricted  books,  and  he  knew  he’d  never  get  one.  These  were  the  books
containing  powerful  Dark  Magic  never  taught  at  Hogwarts,  and  only  read  by
older students studying advanced Defense Against the Dark Arts.
“What are you looking for, boy?”
“Nothing,” said Harry.
Madam Pince the librarian brandished a feather duster at him.
“You’d better get out, then. Go on — out!”
Wishing he’d been a bit quicker at thinking up some story, Harry left the
library. He, Ron, and Hermione had already agreed they’d better not ask Madam
Pince where they could find Flamel. They were sure she’d be able to tell them,
but they couldn’t risk Snape hearing what they were up to.
           Harry  waited  outside  in  the  corridor  to  see  if  the  other  two  had  found
anything,  but  he  wasn’t  very  hopeful.  They  had  been  looking  for  two  weeks,
after A, but as they only had odd moments between lessons it wasn’t surprising
they’d  found  nothing.  What  they  really  needed  was  a  nice  long  search  without
Madam Pince breathing down their necks.

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Five minutes later, Ron and Hermione joined him, shaking their heads.
They went off to lunch.
           “You  will  keep  looking  while  I’m  away,  won’t  you?”  said  Hermione.
“And send me an owl if you find anything.”
“And you could ask your parents if they know who Flamel is,” said Ron.
“It’d be safe to ask them.”
“Very safe, as they’re both dentists,” said Hermione.
Once the holidays had started, Ron and Harry were having too good a time to
think  much  about  Flamel.  They  had  the  dormitory  to  themselves  and  the
common  room  was  far  emptier  than  usual,  so  they  were  able  to  get  the  good
armchairs by the fire. They sat by the hour eating anything they could spear on a
toasting fork — bread, English muffins, marshmallows — and plotting ways of
getting  Malfoy  expelled,  which  were  fun  to  talk  about  even  if  they  wouldn’t
work.
           Ron  also  started  teaching  Harry  wizard  chess.  This  was  exactly  like
Muggle  chess  except  that  the  figures  were  alive,  which  made  it  a  lot  like
directing  troops  in  battle.  Ron’s  set  was  very  old  and  battered.  Like  everything
else  he  owned,  it  had  once  belonged  to  someone  else  in  his  family  —  in  this
case,  his  grandfather.  However,  old  chessmen  weren’t  a  drawback  at  all.  Ron
knew them so well he never had trouble getting them to do what he wanted.
           Harry  played  with  chessmen  Seamus  Finnigan  had  lent  him,  and  they
didn’t trust him at all. He wasn’t a very good player yet and they kept shouting
different bits of advice at him, which was confusing. “Don’t send me there, can’t
you see his knight? Send him, we can afford to lose him.”
On Christmas Eve, Harry went to bed looking forward to the next day for
the food and the fun, but not expecting any presents at all. When he woke early
in the morning, however, the first thing he saw was a small pile of packages at
the foot of his bed.
“Merry Christmas,” said Ron sleepily as Harry scrambled out of bed and
pulled on his bathrobe.
“You, too,” said Harry. “Will you look at this? I’ve got some presents!”
“What did you expect, turnips?” said Ron, turning to his own pile, which
was a lot bigger than Harry’s.
Harry picked up the top parcel. It was wrapped in thick brown paper and
scrawled across it was To Harry, from Hagrid. Inside was a roughly cut wooden
flute. Hagrid had obviously whittled it himself. Harry blew it — it sounded a bit
like an owl.
A second, very small parcel contained a note.

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           We  received  your  message  and  enclose  your  Christmas  present.  From
Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia. Taped to the note was a fifty-pence piece.
“That’s friendly,” said Harry.
Ron was fascinated by the fifty pence.
“Weird!” he said, ‘What a shape! This is money?”
“You can keep it,” said Harry, laughing at how pleased Ron was. “Hagrid
and my aunt and uncle — so who sent these?”
“I think I know who that one’s from,” said Ron, turning a bit pink and
pointing  to  a  very  lumpy  parcel.  “My  mom.  I  told  her  you  didn’t  expect  any
presents and — oh, no,” he groaned, “she’s made you a Weasley sweater.”
Harry had torn open the parcel to find a thick, hand-knitted sweater in
emerald green and a large box of homemade fudge.
           “Every  year  she  makes  us  a  sweater,”  said  Ron,  unwrapping  his  own,
“and mine’s always maroon.”
“That’s really nice of her,” said Harry, trying the fudge, which was very
tasty.
His next present also contained candy — a large box of Chocolate Frogs
from Hermione.
This only left one parcel. Harry picked it up and felt it. It was very light.
He unwrapped it.
Something fluid and silvery gray went slithering to the floor where it lay
in gleaming folds. Ron gasped.
           “I’ve  heard  of  those,”  he  said  in  a  hushed  voice,  dropping  the  box  of
Every Flavor Beans he’d gotten from Hermione. “If that’s what I think it is —
they’re really rare, and really valuable.”
“What is it?”
Harry picked the shining, silvery cloth off the floor. It was strange to the
touch, like water woven into material.
“It’s an invisibility cloak,” said Ron, a look of awe on his face. “I’m sure
it is — try it on.”
Harry threw the cloak around his shoulders and Ron gave a yell.
“It is! Look down!”
           Harry  looked  down  at  his  feet,  but  they  were  gone.  He  dashed  to  the
mirror. Sure enough, his reflection looked back at him, just his head suspended
in midair, his body completely invisible. He pulled the cloak over his head and
his reflection vanished completely.
“There’s a note!” said Ron suddenly. “A note fell out of it!”
Harry pulled off the cloak and seized the letter. Written in narrow, loopy
writing he had never seen before were the following words:

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Your father left this in my possession before he died.
It is time it was returned to you.
Use it well.
A Very Merry Christmas to you.
There  was  no  signature.  Harry  stared  at  the  note.  Ron  was  admiring  the
cloak.
           “I’d  give  anything  for  one  of  these,”  he  said.  “Anything.  What’s  the
matter?”
“Nothing,” said Harry. He felt very strange. Who had sent the cloak? Had
it really once belonged to his father?
Before he could say or think anything else, the dormitory door was flung
open and Fred and George Weasley bounded in. Harry stuffed the cloak quickly
out of sight. He didn’t feel like sharing it with anyone else yet.
“Merry Christmas!”
“Hey, look — Harry’s got a Weasley sweater, too!”
Fred and George were wearing blue sweaters, one with a large yellow F
on it, the other a G.
           “Harry’s  is  better  than  ours,  though,”  said  Fred,  holding  up  Harry’s
sweater. “She obviously makes more of an effort if you’re not family.”
           “Why  aren’t  you  wearing  yours,  Ron?”  George  demanded.  “Come  on,
get it on, they’re lovely and warm.”
“I hate maroon,” Ron moaned halfheartedly as he pulled it over his head.
           “You  haven’t  got  a  letter  on  yours,”  George  observed.  “I  suppose  she
thinks  you  don’t  forget  your  name.  But  we’re  not  stupid  —  we  know  we’re
called Gred and Forge.”
“What’s all this noise?”
Percy Weasley stuck his head through the door, looking disapproving. He
had clearly gotten halfway through unwrapping his presents as he, too, carried a
lumpy sweater over his arm, which Fred seized.
“P for prefect! Get it on, Percy, come on, we’re all wearing ours, even
Harry got one.”
           “I  —  don’t  —    want  —”  said  Percy  thickly,  as  the  twins  forced  the
sweater over his head, knocking his glasses askew.
           “And  you’re  not  sitting  with  the  prefects  today,  either,”  said  George.
“Christmas is a time for family.”
They frog-marched Percy from the room, his arms pinned to his side by
his sweater.

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Harry  had  never  in  all  his  life  had  such  a  Christmas  dinner.  A  hundred  fat,
roast  turkeys;  mountains  of  roast  and  boiled  potatoes;  platters  of  chipolatas;
tureens of buttered peas, silver boats of thick, rich gravy and cranberry sauce –
and  stacks  of  wizard  crackers  every  few  feet  along  the  table.  These  fantastic
party  favors  were  nothing  like  the  feeble  Muggle  ones  the  Dursleys  usually
bought,  with  their  little  plastic  toys  and  their  flimsy  paper  hats  inside.  Harry
pulled a wizard cracker with Fred and it didn’t just bang, it went off with a blast
like  a  cannon  and  engulfed  them  all  in  a  cloud  of  blue  smoke,  while  from  the
inside exploded a rear admiral’s hat and several live, white mice. Up at the High
Table, Dumbledore had swapped his pointed wizard’s hat for a flowered bonnet,
and was chuckling merrily at a joke Professor Flitwick had just read him.
Flaming Christmas puddings followed the turkey. Percy nearly broke his
teeth  on  a  silver  sickle  embedded  in  his  slice.  Harry  watched  Hagrid  getting
redder  and  redder  in  the  face  as  he  called  for  more  wine,  finally  kissing
Professor  McGonagall  on  the  cheek,  who,  to  Harry’s  amazement,  giggled  and
blushed, her top hat lopsided.
           When  Harry  finally  left  the  table,  he  was  laden  down  with  a  stack  of
things  out  of  the  crackers,  including  a  pack  of  nonexplodable,  luminous
balloons,  a  Grow-Your-Own-Warts  kit,  and  his  own  new  wizard  chess  set.  The
white  mice  had  disappeared  and  Harry  had  a  nasty  feeling  they  were  going  to
end up as Mrs. Norris’s Christmas dinner.
           Harry  and  the  Weasleys  spent  a  happy  afternoon  having  a  furious
snowball  fight  on  the  grounds.  Then,  cold,  wet,  and  gasping  for  breath,  they
returned  to  the  fire  in  the  Gryffindor  common  room,  where  Harry  broke  in  his
new  chess  set  by  losing  spectacularly  to  Ron.  He  suspected  he  wouldn’t  have
lost so badly if Percy hadn’t tried to help him so much.
After a meal of turkey sandwiches, crumpets, trifle, and Christmas cake,
everyone  felt  too  full  and  sleepy  to  do  much  before  bed  except  sit  and  watch
Percy chase Fred and George all over Gryffindor tower because they’d stolen his
prefect badge.
           It  had  been  Harry’s  best  Christmas  day  ever.  Yet  something  had  been
nagging  at  the  back  of  his  mind  all  day.  Not  until  he  climbed  into  bed  was  he
free to think about it: the invisibility cloak and whoever had sent it.
Ron, full of turkey and cake and with nothing mysterious to bother him,
fell  asleep  almost  as  soon  as  he’d  drawn  the  curtains  of  his  four-poster.  Harry
leaned over the side of his own bed and pulled the cloak out from under it.
His father’s…this had been his father’s. He let the material flow over his
hands, smoother than silk, light as air. Use it well, the note had said.

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           He  had  to  try  it,  now.  He  slipped  out  of  bed  and  wrapped  the  cloak
around himself. Looking down at his legs, he saw only moonlight and shadows.
It was a very funny feeling.
Use it well.
Suddenly, Harry felt wide-awake. The whole of Hogwarts was open to
him in this cloak. Excitement flooded through him as he stood there in the dark
and  silence.  He  could  go  anywhere  in  this,  anywhere,  and  Filch  would  never
know.
Ron grunted in his sleep. Should Harry wake him? Something held him
back — his father’s cloak — he felt that this time — the first time — he wanted
to use it alone.
He crept out of the dormitory, down the stairs, across the common room,
and climbed through the portrait hole.
“Who’s there?” squawked the Fat Lady. Harry said nothing. He walked
quickly down the corridor.
Where should he go? He stopped, his heart racing, and thought. And then
it came to him. The Restricted Section in the library. He’d be able to read as long
as he liked, as long as it took to find out who Flamel was. He set off, drawing the
invisibility cloak tight around him as he walked.
The library was pitch-black and very eerie. Harry lit a lamp to see his
way  along  the  rows  of  books.  The  lamp  looked  as  if  it  was  floating  along  in
midair,  and  even  though  Harry  could  feel  his  arm  supporting  it,  the  sight  gave
him the creeps.
           The  Restricted  Section  was  right  at  the  back  of  the  library.  Stepping
carefully over the rope that separated these books from the rest of the library, he
held up his lamp to read the titles.
           They  didn’t  tell  him  much.  Their  peeling,  faded  gold  letters  spelled
words  in  languages  Harry  couldn’t  understand.  Some  had  no  title  at  all.  One
book had a dark stain on it that looked horribly like blood. The hairs on the back
of Harry’s neck prickled. Maybe he was imagining it, maybe not, but he thought
a  faint  whispering  was  coming  from  the  books,  as  though  they  knew  someone
was there who shouldn’t be.
He had to start somewhere. Setting the lamp down carefully on the floor,
he looked along the bottom shelf for an interesting looking book. A large black
and silver volume caught his eye. He pulled it out with difficulty, because it was
very heavy, and, balancing it on his knee, let it fall open.
           A  piercing,  bloodcurdling  shriek  split  the  silence  —  the  book  was
screaming!  Harry  snapped  it  shut,  but  the  shriek  went  on  and  on,  one  high,
unbroken, earsplitting note. He stumbled backward and knocked over his lamp,

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which went out at once. Panicking, he heard footsteps coming down the corridor
outside — stuffing the shrieking book back on the shelf, he ran for it. He passed
Filch  in  the  doorway;  Filch’s  pale,  wild  eyes  looked  straight  through  him,  and
Harry slipped under Filch’s outstretched arm and streaked off up the corridor, the
book’s shrieks still ringing in his ears.
He came to a sudden halt in front of a tall suit of armor. He had been so
busy  getting  away  from  the  library,  he  hadn’t  paid  attention  to  where  he  was
going.  Perhaps  because  it  was  dark,  he  didn’t  recognize  where  he  was  at  all.
There was a suit of armor near the kitchens, he knew, but he must be five floors
above there.
           “You  asked  me  to  come  directly  to  you,  Professor,  if  anyone  was
wandering  around  at  night,  and  somebody’s  been  in  the  library  Restricted
Section.”
Harry felt the blood drain out of his face. Wherever he was, Filch must
know  a  shortcut,  because  his  soft,  greasy  voice  was  getting  nearer,  and  to  his
horror,  it  was  Snape  who  replied,  “The  Restricted  Section?  Well,  they  can’t  be
far, we’ll catch them.”
Harry stood rooted to the spot as Filch and Snape came around the corner
ahead. They couldn’t see him, of course, but it was a narrow corridor and if they
came much nearer they’d knock right into him — the cloak didn’t stop him from
being solid.
He backed away as quietly as he could. A door stood ajar to his left. It
was  his  only  hope.  He  squeezed  through  it,  holding  his  breath,  trying  not  to
move  it,  and  to  his  relief  he  managed  to  get  inside  the  room  without  their
noticing anything. They walked straight past, and Harry leaned against the wall,
breathing  deeply,  listening  to  their  footsteps  dying  away.  That  had  been  close,
very close. It was a few seconds before he noticed anything about the room he
had hidden in.
It looked like an unused classroom. The dark shapes of desks and chairs
were piled against the walls, and there was an upturned wastepaper basket – but
propped  against  the  wall  facing  him  was  something  that  didn’t  look  as  if  it
belonged there, something that looked as if someone had just put it there to keep
it out of the way.
It was a magnificent mirror, as high as the ceiling, with an ornate gold
frame, standing on two clawed feet. There was an inscription carved around the
top: Erised stra ehru oyt ube cafru oyt on wohsi. His panic fading now that there
was no sound of Filch and Snape, Harry moved nearer to the mirror, wanting to
look at himself but see no reflection again. He stepped in front of it.
He had to clap his hands to his mouth to stop himself from screaming. He

---

whirled around. His heart was pounding far more furiously than when the book
had  screamed  —  for  he  had  seen  not  only  himself  in  the  mirror,  but  a  whole
crowd of people standing right behind him.
But the room was empty. Breathing very fast, he turned slowly back to
the mirror.
           There  he  was,  reflected  in  it,  white  and  scared-looking,  and  there,
reflected behind him, were at least ten others. Harry looked over his shoulder —
but  still,  no  one  was  there.  Or  were  they  all  invisible,  too?  Was  he  in  fact  in  a
room  full  of  invisible  people  and  this  mirror’s  trick  was  that  it  reflected  them,
invisible or not?
           He  looked  in  the  mirror  again.  A  woman  standing  right  behind  his
reflection was smiling at him and waving. He reached out a hand and felt the air
behind  him.  If  she  was  really  there,  he’d  touch  her,  their  reflections  were  so
close together, but he felt only air – she and the others existed only in the mirror.
She was a very pretty woman. She had dark red hair and her eyes — her
eyes are just like mine, Harry thought, edging a little closer to the glass. Bright
green  —  exactly  the  same  shape,  but  then  he  noticed  that  she  was  crying;
smiling,  but  crying  at  the  same  time.  The  tall,  thin,  black-haired  man  standing
next  to  her  put  his  arm  around  her.  He  wore  glasses,  and  his  hair  was  very
untidy. It stuck up at the back, just as Harry’s did.
Harry was so close to the mirror now that his nose was nearly touching
that of his reflection.
“Mom?” he whispered. “Dad?”
They just looked at him, smiling. And slowly, Harry looked into the faces
of the other people in the mirror, and saw other pairs of green eyes like his, other
noses  like  his,  even  a  little  old  man  who  looked  as  though  he  had  Harry’s
knobbly knees — Harry was looking at his family, for the first time in his life.
The Potters smiled and waved at Harry and he stared hungrily back at
them,  his  hands  pressed  flat  against  the  glass  as  though  he  was  hoping  to  fall
right through it and reach them. He had a powerful kind of ache inside him, half
joy, half terrible sadness.
           How  long  he  stood  there,  he  didn’t  know.  The  reflections  did  not  fade
and  he  looked  and  looked  until  a  distant  noise  brought  him  back  to  his  senses.
He couldn’t stay here, he had to find his way back to bed. He tore his eyes away
from his mother’s face, whispered, “I’ll come back,” and hurried from the room.
“You could have woken me up,” said Ron, crossly.
“You can come tonight, I’m going back, I want to show you the mirror.
“I’d like to see your mom and dad,” Ron said eagerly.

---

           “And  I  want  to  see  all  your  family,  all  the  Weasleys,  you’ll  be  able  to
show me your other brothers and everyone.”
“You can see them any old time,” said Ron. “Just come round my house
this  summer.  Anyway,  maybe  it  only  shows  dead  people.  Shame  about  not
finding Flamel, though. Have some bacon or something, why aren’t you eating
anything?”
Harry couldn’t eat. He had seen his parents and would be seeing them
again  tonight.  He  had  almost  forgotten  about  Flamel.  It  didn’t  seem  very
important anymore. Who cared what the three headed dog was guarding? What
did it matter if Snape stole it, really?
“Are you all right?” said Ron. “You look odd.”
What  Harry  feared  most  was  that  he  might  not  be  able  to  find  the  mirror
room  again.  With  Ron  covered  in  the  cloak,  too,  they  had  to  walk  much  more
slowly  the  next  night.  They  tried  retracing  Harry’s  route  from  the  library,
wandering around the dark passageways for nearly an hour.
“I’m freezing,” said Ron. “Let’s forget it and go back.”
“No!” Harry hissed. I know it’s here somewhere.”
They passed the ghost of a tall witch gliding in the opposite direction, but
saw no one else. just as Ron started moaning that his feet were dead with cold,
Harry spotted the suit of armor.
“It’s here — just here — yes!”
           They  pushed  the  door  open.  Harry  dropped  the  cloak  from  around  his
shoulders and ran to the mirror.
There they were. His mother and father beamed at the sight of him.
“See?” Harry whispered.
“I can’t see anything.”
“Look! Look at them all…there are loads of them.…”
“I can only see you.”
“Look in it properly, go on, stand where I am.”
Harry stepped aside, but with Ron in front of the mirror, he couldn’t see
his family anymore, just Ron in his paisley pajamas.
Ron, though, was staring transfixed at his image.
“Look at me!” he said.
“Can you see all your family standing around you?”
“No — I’m alone — but I’m different — I look older — and I’m head
boy!”
“What?”
“I am — I’m wearing the badge like Bill used to — and I’m holding the

---

house cup and the Quidditch cup — I’m Quidditch captain, too.”
           Ron  tore  his  eyes  away  from  this  splendid  sight  to  look  excitedly  at
Harry.
“Do you think this mirror shows the future?”
“How can it? All my family are dead — let me have another look —”
“You had it to yourself all last night, give me a bit more time.”
“You’re only holding the Quidditch cup, what’s interesting about that? I
want to see my parents.”
“Don’t push me —”
           A  sudden  noise  outside  in  the  corridor  put  an  end  to  their  discussion.
They hadn’t realized how loudly they had been talking.
“Quick!”
Ron threw the cloak back over them as the luminous eyes of Mrs. Norris
came  round  the  door.  Ron  and  Harry  stood  quite  still,  both  thinking  the  same
thing — did the cloak work on cats? After what seemed an age, she turned and
left.
           “This  isn’t  safe  —  she  might  have  gone  for  Filch,  I  bet  she  heard  us.
Come on.”
And Ron pulled Harry out of the room.
The snow still hadn’t melted the next morning.
“Want to play chess, Harry?” said Ron.
“No.”
“Why don’t we go down and visit Hagrid?”
“No…you go…”
“I know what you’re thinking about, Harry, that mirror. Don’t go back
tonight.”
“Why not?”
“I dunno, I’ve just got a bad feeling about it — and anyway, you’ve had
too  many  close  shaves  already.  Filch,  Snape,  and  Mrs.  Norris  are  wandering
around. So what if they can’t see you? What if they walk into you? What if you
knock something over?”
“You sound like Hermione.”
“I’m serious, Harry, don’t go.”
But Harry only had one thought in his head, which was to get back in
front of the mirror, and Ron wasn’t going to stop him.
That third night he found his way more quickly than before. He was walking
so  fast  he  knew  he  was  making  more  noise  than  was  wise,  but  he  didn’t  meet

---

anyone.
And there were his mother and father smiling at him again, and one of
his grandfathers nodding happily. Harry sank down to sit on the floor in front of
the  mirror.  There  was  nothing  to  stop  him  from  staying  here  all  night  with  his
family. Nothing at all.
Except —
“So — back again, Harry?”
Harry felt as though his insides had turned to ice. He looked behind him.
Sitting on one of the desks by the wall was none other than Albus Dumbledore.
Harry  must  have  walked  straight  past  him,  so  desperate  to  get  to  the  mirror  he
hadn’t noticed him.
“I — I didn’t see you, sir.”
           “Strange  how  nearsighted  being  invisible  can  make  you,”  said
Dumbledore, and Harry was relieved to see that he was smiling.
           “So,”  said  Dumbledore,  slipping  off  the  desk  to  sit  on  the  floor  with
Harry, “you, like hundreds before you, have discovered the delights of the Mirror
of Erised.”
“I didn’t know it was called that, Sir.”
“But I expect you’ve realized by now what it does?”
“It — well — it shows me my family —”
“And it showed your friend Ron himself as head boy.”
“How did you know —?”
           “I  don’t  need  a  cloak  to  become  invisible,”  said  Dumbledore  gently.
“Now, can you think what the Mirror of Erised shows us all?”
Harry shook his head.
           “Let  me  explain.  The  happiest  man  on  earth  would  be  able  to  use  the
Mirror  of  Erised  like  a  normal  mirror,  that  is,  he  would  look  into  it  and  see
himself exactly as he is. Does that help?”
           Harry  thought.  Then  he  said  slowly,  “It  shows  us  what  we  want…
whatever we want…”
“Yes and no,” said Dumbledore quietly. “It shows us nothing more or less
than  the  deepest,  most  desperate  desire  of  our  hearts.  You,  who  have  never
known  your  family,  see  them  standing  around  you.  Ronald  Weasley,  who  has
always been overshadowed by his brothers, sees himself standing alone, the best
of all of them. However, this mirror will give us neither knowledge or truth. Men
have  wasted  away  before  it,  entranced  by  what  they  have  seen,  or  been  driven
mad, not knowing if what it shows is real or even possible.
“The Mirror will be moved to a new home tomorrow, Harry, and I ask
you not to go looking for it again. If you ever do run across it, you will now be

---

prepared.  It  does  not  do  to  dwell  on  dreams  and  forget  to  live,  remember  that.
Now, why don’t you put that admirable cloak back on and get off to bed?”
Harry stood up.
“Sir — Professor Dumbledore? Can I ask you something?”
“Obviously, you’ve just done so,” Dumbledore smiled. “You may ask me
one more thing, however.”
“What do you see when you look in the mirror?”
“I? I see myself holding a pair of thick, woolen socks.”
Harry stared.
           “One  can  never  have  enough  socks,”  said  Dumbledore.  “Another
Christmas has come and gone and I didn’t get a single pair. People will insist on
giving me books.”
           It  was  only  when  he  was  back  in  bed  that  it  struck  Harry  that
Dumbledore  might  not  have  been  quite  truthful.  But  then,  he  thought,  as  he
shoved Scabbers off his pillow, it had been quite a personal question.

---