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Harry heard a clacking, grinding sort of sound from the grandfather clock, and he stared at it, confused. He felt Sirius’s hand on his shoulder, and he was promptly yanked aside - and just in time too, for a heavy bolt suddenly launched from it and struck the wall behind him at chest height, the end wobbling slightly as it was embedded in the plaster.
‘Right,’ growled Sirius. ‘You’re not the first I’ve had to pull out of the way of that sodding thing.’ He marched over to the stairs, and bellowed Lupin’s name up them.
‘Yeah?’ came a distant call.
‘Give us a hand with this bloody clock.’
Lupin arrived a minute or two later, looking a little flustered. ‘Sorry, I was checking for a poltergeist in the study, there was a lot of banging-’
‘Yeah?’ said Sirius. ‘Colourful one is it?’
Lupin threw Sirius an unusually sharp look, before clearing his throat and turning to the clock. ‘Ah, this thing.’
‘It nearly shot me with that bolt,’ said Harry.
‘Yes, it almost got Hestia the other day,’ said Lupin, frowning at it.
‘I had to pull Bill Weasley out of it’s way too,’ said Sirius. ‘It’s a disaster waiting to happen.’
Carefully, so that none of them were in the path of the clock face, they edged closer to the clock so that Lupin was on one side, Harry and Sirius on the other. ‘Right,’ said Lupin. ‘If you two take the hinges off the front there, I’ll dismantle the face…’
They pulled off the front of the clock’s tower off, which hid the pendulum and a stack of bolts. It also revealed a large quantity of unpleasant looking insects.
‘Ah, glumbumbles,’ said Lupin knowledgeably. ‘Don’t let any of the secretions get on you, it causes melancholy.’
‘Wouldn’t want any of that in here,’ said Sirius darkly. He took out his wand and began vanishing the insects, and with each bolt he uncovered Harry took it and carefully laid it on the floor.
‘I think you might have more of them upstairs, Sirius,’ said Lupin, who was fiddling with the mechanics inside the clockface, poking at them with his wand. Occasional hissing, spitting noises were coming from it. ‘Beneath the floorboards of the bedrooms.’
‘This whole house is swarming with filth. But once we’ve got all the nastiness out, you’ll have to pick a room, Harry,’ said Sirius.
‘A room?’ said Harry, surprised.
‘Yes, to be yours. I’m just defaulting to my childhood bedroom, I’ve no desire to sleep where my mother did, so you’ve got your pick.’
‘Dumbledore will insist Harry’s with his relatives for some of the time,’ said Lupin cautiously.
‘Yes, yes,’ said Sirius dismissively. ‘But the rest of the time - you don’t go back there for Christmas, do you?’
‘No,’ said Harry. ‘I’ve not had a Christmas there since I was ten.’
‘Well there you go,’ said Sirius gruffly. ‘You can pick a room and we’ll get rid of whatever foul decor my own family left behind and make it yours.’
Harry didn’t really know what to say. A lump had risen in his throat. ‘I…’
‘Sirius,’ said Remus sharply. There was a twanging sort of noise, and another bolt shot from the clock, breezing frighteningly close beneath Sirius’s arm and shattering a vase on the other side of the room.
‘Who would make a clock like this?’ spluttered Harry. ‘What’s the point of it?’
‘Gets unwelcome guests out rather swiftly, I imagine,’ said Lupin with a small smile.