Harry Potter 05 - Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

people like that.
    And then, with a terrible stab of panic, he thought, but this is insane – if Voldemort’s possessing me, I’m giving him a clear view into the Headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix right now! He’ll know who’s in the Order and where Sirius is … and I’ve heard loads of stuff I shouldn’t have, everything Sirius told me the first night I was here …
    There was only one thing for it: he would have to leave Grimmauld Place straightaway. He would spend Christmas at Hogwarts without the others, which would keep them safe over the holidays at least … but no, that wouldn’t do, there were still plenty of people at Hogwarts to maim and injure. What if it was Seamus, Dean or Neville next time? He stopped his pacing and stood staring at Phineas Nigellus’s empty frame. A leaden sensation was settling in the pit of his stomach. He had no alternative: he was going to have to return to Privet Drive, cut himself off from other wizards entirely.
    Well, if he had to do it, he thought, there was no point hanging around. Trying with all his might not to think how the Dursleys were going to react when they found him on their doorstep six months earlier than they had expected, he strode over to his trunk, slammed the lid shut and locked it, then glanced around automatically for Hedwig before remembering that she was still at Hogwarts – well, her cage would be one less thing to carry – he seized one end of his trunk and had dragged it halfway towards the door when a snide voice said, ‘Running away, are we?’
    He looked around. Phineas Nigellus had appeared on the canvas of his portrait and was leaning against the frame, watching Harry with an amused expression on his face.
    ‘Not running away, no,’ said Harry shortly, dragging his trunk a few more feet across the room.
    ‘I thought,’ said Phineas Nigellus, stroking his pointed beard, ‘that to belong in Gryffindor house you were supposed to be brave ? It looks to me as though you would have been better off in my own house. We Slytherins are brave, yes, but not stupid. For instance, given the choice, we will always choose to save our own necks.’
    ‘It’s not my own neck I’m saving,’ said Harry tersely, tugging the trunk over a patch of particularly uneven, moth-eaten carpet right in front of the door.
    ‘Oh, I see ,’ said Phineas Nigellus, still stroking his beard, ‘this is no cowardly flight – you are being noble .’
    Harry ignored him. His hand was on the doorknob when Phineas Nigellus said lazily, ‘I have a message for you from Albus Dumbledore.’
    Harry spun round.
    ‘What is it?’
    ‘“Stay where you are.”’
    ‘I haven’t moved!’ said Harry, his hand still upon the doorknob. ‘So what’s the message?’
    ‘I have just given it to you, dolt,’ said Phineas Nigellus smoothly. ‘Dumbledore says, “ Stay where you are .”’
    ‘Why?’ said Harry eagerly, dropping the end of his trunk. ‘Why does he want me to stay? What else did he say?’
    ‘Nothing whatsoever,’ said Phineas Nigellus, raising a thin black eyebrow as though he found Harry impertinent.
    Harry’s temper rose to the surface like a snake rearing from long grass. He was exhausted, he was confused beyond measure, he had experienced terror, relief, then terror again in the last twelve hours, and still Dumbledore did not want to talk to him!
    ‘So that’s it, is it?’ he said loudly. ‘“ Stay where you are ”? That’s all anyone could tell me after I got attacked by those Dementors, too! Just stay put while the grown-ups sort it out, Harry! We won’t bother telling you anything, though, because your tiny little brain might not be able to cope with it!’
    ‘You know,’ said Phineas Nigellus, even more loudly than Harry, ‘this is precisely why I loathed being a teacher! Young people are so infernally convinced that they are absolutely right about everything. Has it not occurred to you, my poor puffed-up popinjay, that there might be an excellent reason why the Headmaster of Hogwarts is not confiding every tiny detail of his plans to you? Have you never paused, while feeling hard-done-by, to note that following Dumbledore’s orders has never yet led you into harm? No. No, like all young people, you are quite sure that you alone feel and think, you alone recognise danger, you alone are the only one clever enough to realise what the Dark Lord may be planning –’
    ‘He is planning something to do with me, then?’ said