Negotiations

Harry was bleeding.

He clutched his right hand with his left, cursing silently as he pushed open his bedroom door with his shoulder.

Porcelain suddenly crunched beneath his feet. He had failed to notice a cup of cold tea sitting outside his bedroom door and stepped right on it.

"What—?"

Harry looked around, but the landing was completely empty.

The room carried an air of solemn silence, much like the aura around him now—a troubling sense that strangers should keep their distance.

Usually, though, the house was always incredibly noisy.

Dudley, his cousin, would be stomping around and shouting somewhere in the house. His aunt would speak in her shrill voice, and most irritating of all was his uncle, that vicious man.

This tea... Dudley had probably tried to be clever and pull a prank on him.

Holding up his bleeding hand, Harry used his other hand to pick up the broken pieces of the cup and toss them into the already overflowing bin behind his bedroom door.

Then he crossed the room into the bathroom and rinsed his finger beneath the tap.

The house was especially quiet today because something very important was happening in it.

But it had been going on for a long time, and he did not want to trouble himself with it. With that thought, he slammed the bathroom door shut.

Another place was just as solemn.

London.

The Royal family.

Westminster, Buckingham Palace.

This had once been one of the liveliest places around. Normally, it was full of voices and traffic, with members of the House of Lords and House of Commons bickering and playing political games that no one cared about but still had to go through.

But now, it was utterly silent.

Because an extremely important meeting was being conducted in secret.