Blood (thicker than) Water (but what about) Lemonade?

Trapdoor and a Burst of Wind

As Harry followed Sirius out of Dumbledore's office he stopped.

Sirius turned back and frowned. "Harry? C'mon- we've only so much time."

"Azkaban's on an island, isn't it?" Harry asked, returning to Sirius' side.

"Yes," Sirius answered.

"Then how are we going to get there?" Harry asked, hoping that the answer was not 'swim'.

"I'm making this up as I go, Harry. Just trust me, OK?"

Sirius began walking faster now down the corridors.

Harry struggled to follow and think at the same time.

"Should I get the Invis-"

"No, Dementors can see right through them, remember?"

"Oh, right," Harry remembered. "What about the ma-"

"Harry! That's for Hogwarts only! It doesn't work everywhere," Sirius replied, shaking his head.

Harry tried to think harder.

"Well, I guess we could always fly-"

Sirius stopped, and Harry thought maybe he had come up with a good idea, but the look on Sirius' face told him it wasn't so.

"Harry, if we flew, they'd see us miles before we were even close to getting there," he said.

"Why don't we just phone Fudge and ask him to give us a lift on a flying carpet?"

Harry nodded. "Sorry- my mind's scrabbled. This is that last thing I'd see myself doing if Snape was arrested this time last year."

Sirius let out a laugh, dry and hollow. "Feeling's mutual."

They hurried down the main flight of stairs leading to the Entrance Hall, then out the doors onto the grounds.

"Sirius! Wait!" Harry gasped, skidding to a stop. "What's the plan?"

Sirius grabbed Harry and half dragged him along down the path toward the woods.

"If we can't fly, swim or Apparate, how do you think we're getting there?" Sirius said.

When Harry didn't answer, Sirius said "underground!"

"Underground?" Harry asked, not sure whether he heard Sirius correctly or not.

"That's right."

Harry again stopped. "But wait- isn't Azkaban in the middle of the ocean?"

"Yup."

*****

Avril rolled over onto her side, her entire body aching and trembling.

Voldemort smiled at his wand.

"You didn't like that, did you Avril?" he asked in a laughing voice. "Perhaps you'd better stop playing a fool, so to speak."

Avril winced and sat up. "I'm telling you the truth! I don't know where your stupid books are! My parents never told me anything!"

Voldemort didn't say anything for a moment.

Then, before he could curse her again, Lucius Malfoy strode into the room from the kitchen.

"My Lord, I've just received a letter from my son- Draco. He says Dumbledore has sent Potter and Black to retrieve Snape from Azkaban."

Avril smiled despite the lingering pain she still felt. They were going to save Snape! Even if they didn't know where she was, or if she was in trouble, Snape probably would. After all, he should be able to know where his own twin would live shouldn't he?

Voldemort looked furious.

"So, they think they can save you, do they?" he asked, twisting his mouth angrily and gripping his wand tightly.

"Lucius! Alert the Dementors to be on the watch. Although, I doubt they'll get that far- they'll have to go over the mountains to reach the sea. Wormtail!"

The pitiful man leapt a few feet into the air at the sound of his own name.

"Send owls to the Mountain Giants. Inform them of our two troublemakers. I will make sure they don't make it over the mountians on brooms. Go!"

The two hurried off to do Voldemort's bidding, leaving Lastrange standing alone with Avril and Voldemort.

"Lastrange, take Miss Ardree somewhere where she can't escape. A room upstairs, perhaps. It will give her time to think about where my spell books are, don't you think?"

"Yes, my Lord," Lastrange bowed slightly and seized Avril's arm.

He led her upstairs, past the familiar paintings hung on the walls.

As they passed, the portraits whispered to each other, clearly terrified at the sight of Avril back home in such a state.

Avril didn't dare speak to them, though she had often had rather light conversations with them before, as she didn't want Lastrange to get angry.

Instead, she averted her eyes and tried not to notice her legs protesting to her walking up the stairs.

The curse Voldemort had used on her was most definitely the infamous Cruciatus, and it stung like hell.

Lastrange opened the first door on his left- ironically, Avril's old bedroom- and shoved her in.

He then shut the door without another word, leaving Avril alone in a room that totally crept her out.

It wasn't dark; the time difference in BC was only a few hours from England, and judging by the light outside, it was just about lunchtime.

Avril looked around. Her bed had been covered by a white sheet, as had her wardrobe and vanity desk.

Her mirror was hidden by a thick layer of dust, and the cobwebs in each corner of the room made it look as if the house hadn't been visited in years.

Avril sighed and slid down the wall to the floor. She was afraid that if she sat on any of her furniture she wouldn't be able to keep the hysteria that was threatening to burst under control.

The floor was dusty and dirty. A spider of respectable size scuttled over her shoe, making Avril jump.

She sighed and drew her knees up to her chest, keeping a lookout for any more bugs or (yuck, she hoped not) rodents living in her room.

Avril didn't have a watch, so she couldn't keep track of the amount of time she spent in the room. Mostly, she sat on the dirty floor, trying to sort out her thoughts and figure out exactly what had been said downstairs, among the many different shocking revelations.

Then, just as the sun was setting outside her window, Avril, who had been drawing in the dust to take away her hunger pangs, heard muffled voices beneath the floorboards.

"M-my Lord, how p-possible is it for P-Potter and Black t-to actually get past your Dementors? I-I mean, do you really have to have him k-killed?"

The voice belonged to Wormtail.

"Why Wormtail, if I didn't know any better, I would think that you didn't wish Harry Potter dead!"

This time the voice was Voldemort's.

"What? No! No, it- it is not that my Lord," Wormtail squeaked. "It only seems r-rather irrelevant to... go through so much t-trouble to k-kill someone who... is sure to die anyway!" he finished quickly, sounding extremely nervous.

There was such a pause that Avril felt sure the discussion was over. Then-

"You've done this before, Wormtail," Voldemort said, so softly that Avril hardly heard him through the floors.

"P-pardon, my Lord?"

The fearful squeak was also very difficult to hear.

"You have tried to convince me from destroying the boy before. Why is that Wormtail?"

Voldemort's voice was now soft and smooth, without a hint of anger in it- as if he were speaking to a small, mentally disturbed child.

This seemed to relax Wormtail, though his voice was still strangely on edge.

"N- no reason, my Lord. I- I only wish what is easiest for you... you deserve-"

"ENOUGH!" Voldemort shrieked, making Avril yank her ear away from the floor.

"Sometimes, the best way is not always the easiest, Wormtail! Sometimes one must wait very patiently for the desired event to occur! I would know that!"

Avril could now distinctively hear Wormtail sobbing in fear as he spoke.

"No, no my Lord, I know-"

"How long I've had to wait-"

"How long you've waited-"

"Weaving intricate and perfect plans-"

"How hard you've worked-"

"Only to have them DESTROYED-"
Avril heard Wormtail shriek in fear. She didn't blame him; even from upstairs Voldemort's outbursts sent unpleasant shivers down her spine.

Being brought up as a child by two very accomplished Aurors, Avril had been raised under the fact that Voldemort was very smart, very devious and his intelligence was measured by his power and strength.

Now, however, Avril couldn't help but sense that Voldemort was not quite as confident about his power than he had been.

In fact, it now seemed that he was losing his mind. The thought frightened Avril.

It was bad enough when he was sane and evil, but being alone with him when he was insane was almost too much.

*****

Harry followed Sirius to the broom shed, where the Quiddich Cleansweep Cevens and his own Firebolt were being kept.

Sirius tried the latch.

"Locked," he muttered, glancing at Harry, who gave him a blank stare.

"Er, when I was convicted, they snapped my wand Harry," Sirius said, raising his eyebrows.

"Oh! Right," Harry said, whipping out his own wand.

"Alohomora," he muttered.

The lock slid open with a satisfying click.

They hurried inside.

"Grab your broom," Sirius told Harry.

Harry pushed aside a wall of old and battered Cleansweep Sevens and spotted the familiar glint of his Firebolt's mahogany handle.

He pulled it out and followed Sirius, who was clutching one of the Slytherin's Nimbus Two Thousand and Twos.

"Right, now we're heading over the forest, and towards those distant mountains," Sirius said, nodding toward the mountains peeking out over the Forbidden Forest.

"And?" Harry asked, mounting his broom.

"We'll just fly over them as best we can," Sirius said, shrugging. "Then, once we reach the sea, we'll land."

Before Harry could question as to what would happen then, Sirius had kicked off from the ground and was flying quickly toward the forest.

The trees was a lot taller than Harry had anticipated, for once they were above them at a considerable height, he saw that Hagrid's hut was about as big as his fist.

They flew over top the forest at breakneck speed. Harry kept his broom at leveled speed with Sirius, though he knew his Firebolt was capable of much more acceleration.

"The forest is a lot deeper than it is wide," Sirius shouted over the wind blowing past. "See? we're almost to the mountains."

Harry looked ahead and saw the mountains growing steadily larger as they neared.

Hogwarts was still in sight, but only barely.

Suddenly, it hit Harry that he was attempting a very dangerous mission. He was aware that it was for a good cause (saving Avril's life was way worth busting Snape out of prison), but the thought that he may not return to Hogwarts again was enough to distract Harry.

The distraction caused him to miss the sudden gust of wind coming from the nearing mountains.

Harry went spinning, and fought madly to regain his control. He pulled sharply on the handle of his broom and managed to stop his broom in the air.

"Harry!" Sirius suddenly shouted, "look out!"

Harry turned his head just in time to see Sirius and his Nimbus in a blur of wind and motion.

The tip of the Nimbus jabbed into Harry's side, violently shoving him off his Firebolt.

Harry grabbed hold of Sirius' arm as the two of them plummeted downwards.

Sirius gripped the Nimbus tightly with one hand, and Harry with the other, all the while trying to gain control of where they were falling.

Unfortunately, the weight of two people on the Nimbus was obviously too much, and Sirius found control was impossible as they fell. The wind carried them slightly, helping them to drift away from the trees of the Forbidden Forest. It also helped that the Nimbus was a magic broom, and wasn't completely unable to stayt floating. Harry wrapped his legs around the tail of the broom in a desperate attempt to hold on. He watched as his Firebolt fell from the place where he left it and disappeared into the forest.

Harry looked back. They were leaving the woods. In fact, they were nearing the mountains with breakneck speed despite the winds and charm of the broom.

Harry tightened his grip on the broomtail and Sirius' arm as they began to spin.

The Nimbus was falling so fast it was spinning in a downwards direction. It was getting so vertical that Harry was afraid he and Sirius would slip off the end.

The side of the nearest mountain was now blocking their view of the land beyond, and Harry could see the rocks and thin grasses covering the side of it.

"We're going to crash!" Harry yelled up to Sirius, who looked just as panicked as he felt.

Then, they did.

******

Avril had had enough. She had been pacing her room for an hour, unable to escape through the window no matter how hard she tried (some sort of charm had been worked on it to prevent the act of smashing or unlocking it).

Even though she had had her wand taken away from her, Avril still had her powers but found breaking the door down or smashing the window impossible.

She sighed and stopped beside her dressing table.

The only thing to do now was stall and wait for help to come.

Avril hesitantly lifted the corner of the white sheet covering the countertop.

Underneath were assorted knickknacks and picture frames, unspoiled and undisturbed.

Avril spotted a shining picture frame and slowly pulled it out. In the picture were her parents on their wedding day.

Sydney was dressed in flowing white robes and sitting on a chair. Ray stood behind her, in robes of deep green. They were both smiling widely and kept looking back at one another, as if to say- "I'm so happy with you. I love you."

Avril felt tears pricking her eyes as she placed the picture back under the sheet. She lay it face down, as if doing so would prevent the thoughts already flowing through her mind.

Downstairs, she heard a smashing sound, followed by an angry shriek.

Avril shuddered. Any minute Voldemort was sure to come upstairs and demand she tell him the whereabouts of his spell books.

The problem was, she really didn't know.

Sure, there were plenty of secret rooms in the manor, but Avril only knew of half of them.

She would just have to figure out how to stall Voldemort as long as she could without driving him into a murderous rage.

There was also the small problem of the Mountain Giants Voldemort had mentioned. Avril prayed that Harry and Black would arrive back at Hogwarts with Severus safely, without being eaten by a Giants or kissed by a Dementor.

Suddenly there was another smash, this time so loud and close it caused Avril to jump backwards and hit her bed hard, sending it sliding across the floor.

Avril, now sprawled out on the floor, winced. Something was jabbing into her back.

Before Avril could find out what it was, the door to her room flew open and Wormtail stepped inside.

He looked deranged- frightening was the word.

Avril didn't know what was underneath of her, but she knew that she didn't want the little germ to see what it was.

She carefully made sure she was covering it up, and forced herself to look defiantly into Wormtail's watery eyes.

"Can I help you?" she demanded, not afraid of him, but not wanting him to force her away from what she was hiding.

Wormtail gritted his teeth and tightened his fists.

"You'll want to speak to your rescuer a little more kindly," Wormtail said, narrowing his beady eyes.

Avril frowned. "What?"

"That's right," Wormtail hissed, stepping forward and shutting the door behind him, "I can help you to escape."

Avril studied him carefully. "What's the catch?" She asked, readying herself in case he attacked her.

"There is no catch," Wormtail shrugged. "Think of it as my way of apologizing to my good friend James."

Because Hermione had only told her a bit of the story, Avril only knew about half of what Wormtail had just said. Still, she recognized it as being noble- which set of her Bullshit alarm.

"Right- no, really- what's the catch?" she said.

Wormtail sighed.

"Show me where the spell books are, and I will assure that you have a good head start when I present them to my Lord," he replied.

Avril let out a short laugh.

"What makes you think I would just turn them over to you- even if I did know where they were?"

she asked, glaring.

Wormtail stepped forward.

"You think you're safe because you're pretty," he spat, "but Lord Voldemort shows no mercy-"

he shoved his silver fist into Avril's face "- see? Look what he did to my hand!"

Avril averted her eyes. That was not something she wanted to see. She didn't want to think about what would be in store for her.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, "I can't help you... I can't."

Wormtail opened his mouth to say something, but was interrupted by a sudden shriek for his name from downstairs.

He jumped almost three feet in the air.

"My master calls," he muttered distractedly, hurrying out of the room without a second glance at Avril.

When the door shut, Avril rolled off what had been jabbing her back with a sigh of relief.

She turned to see what it had been, and gasped.

It was a trapdoor.

******

"Harry? Harry!" Someone was shaking him and calling his name.

Harry was trying to ignore the sharp pain in his side and the throbbing inside his mouth.

"Sirius?" he mumbled, feeling the inside of his mouth with his tongue. He could taste blood.

Sirius shook him harder. "Harry, are you all right?"

Harry opened his eyes.

Well, they weren't in the air anymore.

He could feel the rock ground underneath him, and saw Sirius' face peering into his.

"Harry?"

"Yeah, I'm OK," Harry replied thickly, attempting to sit up.

Sirius pulled him up by his shoulders.

"You OK?" Harry asked, spotting the Nimbus laying in pieces to his right.

"Me? I'm fine," Sirius replied, though he had a nasty looking cut across one cheek.

"You're bleeding," Harry said.

"Don't worry about it," Sirius stood up and offered him a hand. "Think you can stand up?"

"No problem," Harry said, taking the hand and allowing himself to be pulled up. "We crashed, didn't we?"

Sirius glanced at the shatterd Nimbus. "We sure did. I hope your Quidditch team won't mind what I did to the Nimbus."

Harry grinned, though it hurt.

"Well, it belonged to a Slytherin, so my team'll probably want to throw you a parade."

Sirius let out a dry laugh.

Harry spat out a bit of blood and watched as it was absorbed into the thirsty ground.

"So... what do we do now?" Harry asked, looking up and squinting into the sun.

"Well, considering that your broom is probably a mile downhill from here and this one isn't going anywhere, I'd say start walking."

Sirius then turned and began walking toward a pass in the mountain a few kilometers away.

Harry, fingering the gash in his tongue, followed before Sirius, who was trudging quickly, got too far away.

It was hot for March.

The sun blinded them, and they constantly had to keep their hands up to block the rays.

They had only been walking for about half an hour, heading for the pass, and already sweat was dripping down Harry's face. He pulled his robes off, as they were heavy and dark, and had left it lying in a heap.

He licked a drop that had settled in the corner of his mouth, and winced when it stung his tongue.

He spat another bit of blood out and wondered exactly how badly he had bitten his tongue when they crashed.

"Sirius," he called, as Sirius had gotten furthur ahead, "wait up."

Sirius beckoned for him to hurry, but stopped to wait.

"Now that we don't have any means of transportation, we'll have to go faster," Sirius said bewteen long, sturdy strides. "That is, as long as you still want to save the Lamia."

Harry couldn't help but feel slightly irked by this.

"Sirius, she's got a name, you know," he said, trying to keep up with Sirius.

Before Sirius could reply, Harry pushed him down onto the ground and behind a rock.

"Harry, what-"

"Shut up!" Harry hissed, nodding to the shadow being cast upon a rock ledge ahead.

It was huge, both broad and high.

"What is it?" Harry whispered. He had only acted, not thought. Something had told him to hide.

"A Giant," Sirius whispered back. They didn't see the creature, they only saw the shadow moving around, and remained in their places until the shadow disappeared completely.

"I didn't think Giants were up in these mountains," Harry muttered, brushing himself off.

"Of course they are," Sirius replied, looking darkly at the ledge where the shadow had been.

"I knew we'd see them, but I thought it would be from a bird's eye view. This is far too close for comfort."

Harry gripped his wand, which was sticking out of his pocket as they approached the pass, just in case.