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The Prince brothers Apparated with Jason to Dr. Hirsch’s apartment in Zurich. Tiberius levitated Jason onto a sofa and said, “We need to get the horocrux back on him before he wakes up.”

“Potter has the horocrux,” Gaius said, nervously. “He got it with a summoning charm.”

“You are a hopeless incompetent,” Tiberius shouted, “how could you let nearly thirty years work be snatched away with a summoning charm?”

“Me, incompetent?” Gaius shouted back. “Who was it who said he obliviated Potter? Who didn’t have the sense to put a simple anti-summoning jinx on the horocrux?”

Hirsch stepped between Gaius and Tiberius. He calmed them down and they told him what had happened.

"It doesn't make sense," Hirsch said as they finished. “Herpo’s book said that the spell on the chain could not be broken by any human magic.”

"The sword of Gryffindor was goblin made. Goblins have their own magic they have never shared with human wizards," Tiberius explained.

“Are you saying that the one weapon that could break the spell just happened to appear in this boy’s back garden at the very moment the needed it?”

"That's because you're a Muggle, very clever, but still a Muggle. Our mistake was obvious. The Creevy boy was in Gryffindor. Godric Gryffindor was the sworn enemy of Herpo the Foul so it make perfect sense that his sword would appear where there were traces of Herpo's magic."

“There’s no time to talk now, we have to get out of here,” Gaius broke in. “Potter could be here any minute now.”

“I thought you had this apartment protected,” Hirsch said..

“The wards will work against Muggles and ordinary wizards but a ministry of magic team can break them. The Portkey will leave in two minutes.”

A few hours later, Harry and a team of Swiss Aurors entered the empty apartment. A thorough search revealed no clues as to where Hirsch, the Prince brothers or Jason might have gone. Only a few traces of magic showed that they had even been there.

In their new hiding place, Hirsch and the Prince brothers reassessed their situation.

“We are still more than half-way to our goal,” Hirsch began. “We have Bourne and half the horocrux. What we need now is the other half plus a victim. Potter could provide both. ”

“So how do get to Potter?”

“We need bait. We have two things Potter wants. We have to put one of them somewhere he will come looking for it.”

“Which one?”

“Bourne, obviously, if Potter gets his hands on the other half-horocrux he would destroy both parts and that would be the end. We need to place Bourne somewhere Potter will attempt to rescue him, then we can trap them. Potter will either have the horocrux with him or we can bargain him for it.”

“It would never work. Potter will have half a dozen Aurors with him.”

Hirsch said and pondered for a minute and asked, “What would the Department of Magic do if Bourne was in Muggle custody?”

“Probably nothing, their policy is not to interfere with Muggle justice unless magical security is threatened. They would just wipe his memory and make sure he didn’t get his hands on a wand,” Tiberius said.

“But Potter, if your late cousin is right, would not leave it at that,” Hirsch mused. “He would attempt a rescue and he would have to work alone.”

“There’s still a problem with your plan.” Gaius said. “The Muggles have never been able to hold Bones before. He could be long gone before Potter gets near him.”

Hirsch looked at the sleeping Jason and said, “He seems quite easy to handle now. How long can he be kept like this.”

“Indefinitely, as long as the spell is renewed and he’s nursed and looked after.”

“I know just the place for him,” Hirsch said.

Even with the half-horocrux, Harry had problems getting the Americans to cooperate. A team of investigators traveled to England to interview Harry and Dennis Creevy. The investigation moved slowly. The attempted murder of a British Muggle-born did not seem to be a high priority. A week later, the Department of Magic agreed to issue arrest warrants for Jason and the Prince brothers. By that time, Gaius and Tiberius had secured their hiding place with several layers of impenetrable charms.

Then the half-horocrux itself became a sticking point. Percy Weasley, who was now Assistant Undersecretary in the Department of International Magical Cooperation asked Harry to come up to his office.

"The Americans want us to send them the dog-tag so they can do their own tests," Percy began. "They don't trust our results. I can hardly blame them. Nobody has made a half-horocrux for at least five hundred years."

"You can't do that," Harry protested. "The Prince brothers must have had inside help to get the horocrux on Jason while he was still in custody. Before we trust them with the horocrux, they need to do a full investigation to find out who it was."

"Well they're not going to do any investigation until they're satisfied that the thing is really a horcrux. It's your call, Harry."

"I guess I'll just wait for a while to see if something else turns up."

What turned up was Jason. An anonymous phone call led the FBI to a park in Washington where an unconscious Jason Bourne was lying against a tree. His condition baffled the doctors. There were no signs of any physical harm and his vital signs were normal, yet nothing they could do would revive him. Jason was turned over to the CIA who moved him to a home in the country they used for convalescent agents they wanted to keep out of sight.

The Department of Magic was also happy to keep Jason out of sight. His existence had become an embarrassment. It raised too many questions that powerful people did not want answered. Harry kept pressuring the Americans to arrange a rescue but they would not budge. Finally, Harry took a Port-key to Washington and met with Jackson Bowerman, the agent in charge of the case.

“Potter,” Bowerman said, “your theory is nonsense. Do you really expect us to believe that a Muggle translated the Codex of Herpo the Foul, a code that has baffled the best wizard minds for a thousand years?”

“Well why did Jason go along with the Prince brothers?”

“There could be lots of reasons. It could have been the Imperius, curse but I don’t think so. Have you ever thought that he might have wanted to go with them? From what I hear, he wasn’t very happy in Britain. He was raised in America and maybe he wanted a chance to make a life for himself here.”

“Then what was he doing back in Britain trying to kill Dennis Creevy? Even the Imperius curse won’t make you kill someone you really liked.”

“I don’t know. You have to realize that this Bourne or Bones or whatever his name is, wasn’t a normal wizard. His family was killed when he was a baby and he was raised by Muggles who never told him he was a wizard. With an upbringing like that you’re bound to be seriously messed up.”

Harry bit his lip and counted to ten slowly. He did not want to turn Bowerman into a toad with a burst of accidental magic.

“Why are you letting the Muggles hold him.”

“It’s the best place for him now. He’s a high value prisoner. To get him out we would have to memory charm dozens of people and wipe out hundreds of records. We’re looking for the Prince brothers. Once we find them, we’ll decide what to do with Bones.”

“Isn’t leaving him with the Muggles a threat to magical secrecy? Suppose he talks?”

“He is not going to talk. He’s under a deep sleep spell. I personally renew it every twenty-four hours. “

“Where are the Muggles keeping him?”

“That’s none of your business and I’d advise you not to go looking for him. We have a new high-sensitivity tracing charm around his room. If any wizard but me comes near him, we can have a team there in ten seconds flat."

Harry shook hands and walked to the door. As he left, he cast a non-verbal memory charm on Bowerman.

Harry met Septimus Brankovitch for a cup of coffee.

“Don’t be too hard on Jackson,” Septimus said. “You don’t understand what he’s up against.”

“I’m not being hard in him,” Harry said. “I had lots of evidence that the Prince brothers were working together with Hirsch and he refuses to accept any of it.”

“The problem is that he’s afraid of the truth. Everyone here is. You see, the Prince brothers aren’t that smart. If this horocrux scheme is real, then this Dr. Hirsch must be the real brains of the operation. That means that a Muggle has not only discovered Dark Magic, he’s learned to manipulate wizards for his own ends.”

“I’ve seen this before,” Harry said. “No one in England wanted to believe that Voldemort was back until it was too late.”

“This could be worse. I mean Riddle was bad, but he was still only a wizard. I’ve worked with Muggles and I know what they can do. If you could combine Muggle technology with magic, there’s telling what you could do.”

“I know, that’s why I have to find Jason and put a stop to this. Can you tell me where he is?”

“Sorry, no. There’s a Fidelius charm on the location. Jackson is the secret keeper.”

A few hours later Jason Bourne awoke with a start. He was lying in a hospital bed with tubes coming out of various parts of his body. Someone, presumably a nurse or orderly, entered the room. Jason closed his eyes and lay quietly.

Jason considered his situation. His mind was clear and, other than being sore from lying in one position too long, he felt no obvious discomfort. He guessed that he had been kept unconscious by magic rather than drugs or illness. He had the use of all his limbs and the straps holding him to the bed would be easy to remove. He waited for the nurse to return and then checked the clock again It was an half an hour later. He sat up and looked around. From some scraps of conversation he had overheard from the corridor, he gathered that he was in a CIA run facility. However, it did not seem to be a prison or even very well secured.

Jason got out of bed, removed his tubes and looked around the room. Clothes were his first problem. All he had on was a thin hospital gown that tied at the back. There was a linen hamper just outside his door but all he could find in it was a long night shirt in hospital green. It wasn't much of an improvement but he would be decent as long as he didn't try any kick-boxing.

For a moment, Jason contemplated staying. Maybe he should take Pamela Landy's advice, tell the truth and trust the system. It was too late for that now. If he told the whole truth, no one would believe him. He studied the window. There were no locks or bars. There was an alarm but he could easily bypass it with some medical scissors and tape he found in the night stand. This was the best chance of escape he was going to get. He climbed through the window ran across the lawn and over the fence and headed for the woods.

Stones and twigs cut Jason's bare feet as he ran through the woods. His muscles were stiff from weeks of inactivity but he forced himself to go on. A guard had been chasing him but he had been older and overweight. Even in his weakened condition Jason had easily outdistanced him. He needed to find some clothes and hot wire a car.

Jason saw three figures ahead of him. He dived for cover in the bushes. He wondered who they were. It was too soon for a CIA team to have overtaken him. He crept forward for a closer look.

"Can you see him, Tim?" one of the men said.

It was the Dobbs brothers, the same wizards who had held him captive in Nevada. They were still as clumsy as ever. It would be no problem to jump one of them and take a wand. He had learned the spell to counter their animagus trick.

"No, Fred, but I think I heard him. Should I go and take a look?"

"No, keep your distance, wait and see if Potter turns up. We need to take them both."

Instead of separating to search the brush, the three men stayed in a group and backed away down the path.

There was a sound behind him. Someone was searching the woods with a tracking dog. He could hear the sound of a creek not far away, the water would hide his scent. The trackers caught up with him before he could reach the water. Jason took cover behind a log and watched. The dog bounded towards him but then stopped, as though it had struck a wall. It sniffed the air for a moment and then raced back towards its handlers.

Jason got up and headed for the creek. When he reached the bank, he saw what must have frightened the dog. Three thestrals were tethered in a clearing.

Hagrid had introduced Jason to the Hogwarts thestral herd. He had learned that the fearsome animals were really just like horses. They were very large, carnivorous flying horses but the same basic rules of horsemanship applied. He approached the closest thestral on its left hand side, taking care to avoid its blind spot, and released its halter. Then he released the second thestral and finally released and mounted the third. Horses were herd animals. If one took off, the others would follow.

The leathery hide scraped his bare legs as he spurred his thestral into the air. Far below, he could see the Dobbs brothers cursing and firing spells into the air. CIA men were searching the woods with flashlights. He could see the outline of a low mountain range in the moonlight and he turned his thestral towards it.