The Uproar Caused by the Second Petrification Incident (IV)

"I didn't!" Harry's voice finally burst from his throat, hoarse and urgent, like a string pulled too tight and ready to snap. "I didn't do anything! I just came out of the Hospital Wing! I didn't see anything when I got here! I didn't know he was here! I didn't—"

His voice seemed so pale and powerless beneath that crowd of terrified, accusing stares. He could even feel Colin's frozen eyes, filled with shock and fear, staring fixedly at him, accusing him in silence.

Those eyes could not speak, but their silence was more powerful than any voice—they lay there, less than two steps from Harry's feet, like a corpse murdered beneath the killer's feet.

And the killer was himself, stepping out from the shadows.

The torches in the corridor flickered, stretching everyone's shadows long and longer. Those shadows swayed across the walls, overlapping and separating, like a crowd of bodiless ghosts arguing soundlessly.

Harry stood in the center of the crowd, watched by a dozen pairs of eyes, pointed at by a dozen fingers, accused by a dozen mouths. His left arm throbbed faintly—not from his bones, but from his tensed muscles. His right hand clenched the hem of his robes until his knuckles turned white.

His face was pale, but not with fear. It was the pallor of someone driven into a dead end, who had discovered that every path was cut off and every door was shut—the pallor of despair.

He wanted to say, "It wasn't me," but he had already said that.

He wanted to say, "I didn't do anything," but he had already said that too.

He wanted to say, "Listen to my explanation," but he did not know how to explain. What was he supposed to explain? That he had come out of the