Harry Potter and the Fifth Element

Chapter 69 - What Price Victory?

More than anything, using the Killing Curse gave Lord Voldemort intense pleasure. Few executions promised more fulfillment than the green jet of fatal magic with which he would dispatch the mudblooded Hermione Granger.

"Avada Kedavra!"

As his wand flashed emerald, the Dark Lord's red eyes filled with sadistic glee, anticipating how this act would shatter his nemesis. But before any gloating could escape his lips, Voldemort's triumphant expectations turned to ashes - and then became incalculably worse.

The Dark Lord's aim was true, and his curse pulsed directly at the girl's exposed body. It mattered not one bit that she wore unusual armour. The Killing Curse was unblockable.

But so was Harry Potter, to the Dark Lord's chagrin. At the last second, the pesky Boy Who Still Lived bellowed, of all things, a Freezing Charm.

Voldemort's green bolt of death disappeared into - into nothing - into absolute blackness.

Snarling, deprived of an intensely personal victory, the Dark Lord was ready to give Potter a dose of the same deadly medicine when....

Following the path of least resistance, his delayed and deflected Killing Curse emerged from whatever limbo it had entered.

Energy draining spells like Avada Kedavra travel by siphoning energy from the environment they traverse. Potter's inexplicable magic had blocked a second curse, Bellatrix Lestrange's Cruciatus simultaneously cast at the Mudblood.

Potter's magic created an energy vacuum. Following the only available energy source, the Killing Curse traced the path of the Cruciatus and zoomed right up Lestrange's wand....

An anguished, "Bella!" ripped from Voldemort's throat as the Dark witch keeled over. She did not exactly die - their precautions protected against that - but before his eyes, her body began disintegrating.

Years ago a deflected Killing Curse had similarly destroyed his.

Lord Voldemort took two steps in her direction, thought better of it, and, "Depulso!" banished Nagini to the location of Lestrange's rapidly evaporating body.

By then, the Dark Lord had other worries.

The Granger girl and someone else - two bodies in a tight embrace - began emitting brilliant blue-white light. Light pressure from the powerful glow elevated the Invisibility Cloak covering them almost a metre into the air.

Before Voldemort could react with a new curse, this effulgent gleam burst its earthly bounds. Incandescent shafts of blazing magic streaked to all points of the compass, one for each of the thirty sarsen stones demarcating the great circle. Ricocheting upward from each, the magical beams soared into the heavens like dozens of skyrockets touched off at once.

Darkness fled before the dazzling display. It lit the nemeton more brightly than high noon. The cold January night persisted only as a shrinking black dot where, at the zenith, the luminous tower of magic still opened to the heavens.

Squinting across a suddenly opalescent landscape, the Dark Lord saw Nagini coiled in the small steaming swamp that marked the final resting place of Bellatrix Lestrange's natural-born body. Surrounded by unfamiliar magic, Voldemort could only hope that Nagini had enough time to collect Bella's unearthly remains. Quickly he summoned his familiar. Now to deal with that Mudblood....

Now was never - Voldemort's time at Stonehenge expired.

A rapidly intensifying whistling noise from overhead interrupted the Dark Lord's murderous thoughts. He looked up.

Voldemort did nothing further within the Druids' great stone circle.

Reaching an apex, the thirty arcing jets had merged at a single, glowing mass. From there, nearly a kilometre's height, gravity reversed the magic's skyward surge. Its iridescent leading edge plummeted to earth with increasing speed. All gaps had disappeared - leaving no escape.

Voldemort had no time to squeeze off another curse.

Sometimes even the most powerful Dark Lord in a century has to duck and cover.

Lord Voldemort closed his eyes and howled as the blue-white magical avalanche crashed to earth and penetrated deeply into Stonehenge's bedrock marl.

When he next opened his eyes, the Dark Lord found himself deposited rather unceremoniously on his backside, returned to a place he had never expected to see again - the underground dungeon from which he had departed for Stonehenge not more than five hours ago.

* * * *

It was dark - dark and quiet - when her return to sensibility marked the end of Hermione's latest magical odyssey. The battle that once raged appeared over. Fighting had ceased. The battlefield was as still as death. Only a strong, metallic scent of ozone remained as the residuum of powerful magic. She was.... No, she was not. She felt....

"Luna!" Hermione whispered urgently. Such tranquility could easily be a trap. Were Death Eaters still about? "Luna, what's going on ... what happened?" Hermione shifted towards the girl who had guided her through an incantation that had achieved something - something big.

Luna's laboured, wheezing response raised more questions than it answered. "You ... cleansed ... the evil.... Banished it from...."

The blonde went no further. Her eyes, already glassy, rolled upwards as consciousness departed. Luna's body, which had seemed unnaturally rigid, relaxed and yielded. Her breathing was fast and shallow.

"Luna!" Hermione squeaked louder. Disregarding any Death Eater threat - they seemed no longer in evidence - she grasped Luna by the shoulders....

....And almost shoved her wand down the poor girl's throat.

"My word," Hermione muttered as she assessed her own condition. "I can use it again." Her wounded right hand no longer felt numb and swollen. She could flex it....

Hermione frantically ripped off the goblin plasters. Her hand still looked injured, at least on the surface. A nasty, painful slash, like a fresh burn, stretched halfway across her wrist. But she could make a fist, and whilst that hurt, it was endurable. Her hand was no longer darkened and discoloured like Dumbledore's.

"Lumos." Lighting her wand, Hermione placed her other hand to her friend's forehead. Luna felt cold and clammy. Her already pale skin had taken on a worrisome bluish tinge. The Ravenclaw's flaccid tongue lolled from the side of her mouth.

Hermione had enough Healer training to recognise the symptoms of old-fashioned shock. Forgetting her surroundings, she focussed on her friend's plight. She gently levitated Luna's legs slightly above her head.

That made the reason for Luna's perilous condition painfully apparent.

Her right leg was mangled; nothing else could describe it. Much of Luna's calf muscle was missing, jaggedly stripped away. The edge of this gaping, raw mess peeked from Luna's trouser leg. In pallid wandlight, Hermione saw thick, gooey blood oozing. Gore drenched the inside of Luna's armour. More of the same puddled on the ground - plainly dangerous blood loss.

For a moment, Hermione tried pushing Luna's Basilisk-hide trousers up, but they would not budge. Oh, Merlin! What to do? She knew a spell to remove them, but that would rip loose clotted blood and cause more bleeding. Luna felt so cold....

Pressure and hope were the only avenues.

Hermione seized the old plaster that had once bound her own wrist and began wrapping it around Luna's affected leg, beginning where it started to feel ... not right.

It was much too small. What now?

Hermione began shaking. After surviving the fight, was Luna about to die in the post-battle calm?

Think, dammit.

It came back. Are you or are you not a witch?

Stop panicking - you can do this!

Hermione calmed down and began thinking things through rationally. For a witch, the first problem was easily solved. "Elongus! Engorgio!" The plaster more than doubled in length and width. "Ferula!" She conjured a wooden stick to serve as a splint. "En circule!" She set the plaster wrapping itself tightly about both the splint and Luna's ravaged leg.

Having done what she could to stop Luna's bleeding and to stabilise her condition, Hermione went to her belt. Thankfully, it was still in place and intact after all the furious goings on. The last time Hermione had worn her Auror's belt into battle; she had been a field Healer. She hoped that supplies might remain in the belt's magical recesses.

Yes!

Luck - from her prior neglect to empty the belt's contents - was still with her.

From one of the pouches, Hermione withdrew a single precious phial of Phoenix Tear Extract. Luna's wounds were beyond her capacity to heal, but the extract would at least help maintain life. Using both hands, Hermione worked the girl's jaw open and poured in a tiny amount - this was strong stuff. She massaged Luna's throat, to induce swallowing

It seemed to work, but something else seemed rather off....

Her surroundings were well lit - much more brightly than her puny wandtip could manage. Nor was this light the same colour as her paltry and distracted efforts.

Hermione rolled over. She came face to face with a full-grown - maybe more than full grown - stag. Less than a metre distant, it lay placidly on the tattered grass, glowing brilliantly gold. It had been waiting patiently for Hermione to finish with Luna.

Nestled between the animal's? image's? Patronus'? substantial legs and resting firmly, if not comfortably, on its side was....

Harry!

In the somewhat harsh, sodium-yellow-like illumination, Harry looked downright frightful.

Innumerable small cuts and gashes marred his face and hands. Blood trickled from one of his ears. Large plasters of uncertain provenance heavily swaddled his lower left leg. And his right leg.... Oh, Merlin! It hung loosely from Harry's side at a crazy angle that even a master contortionist like Tonks could not have managed safely.

Harry was unconscious - dead to the world - which in his condition might be considered a blessing.

Once again, Hermione repressed incipient shivers of panic that tickled at the edges of her mind. 'A Healer's work is never done,' she repeated to calm herself.

This was different; this was Harry.

The battle was, for all intents and purposes over, but he could yet die. After all they had overcome, she could still lose him. Forget the last battle. Another one needed fighting. This time, she had to be the strong one - for him.

Swallowing hard, Hermione reckoned that Luna was as well as she could be. Forget Death Eaters, too. If any were still about, she doubted that whatever this - thing - was would be acting so calmly. It seemed quite protective of Harry.

Cautiously, as gingerly as she had approached any Hippogriff, Hermione crept towards Harry. Hoping the ... Patronus, she supposed ... would recognise a pacific gesture, Hermione stowed her wand and held her palms flat out in front of her.

If of a mind, this glowing Patronus-stag could do a great deal of damage. Its antlers were more impressive than any of her father's hunting trophies. Fluttering from those antlers, like tiny flags in the cold night air, were bits of shredded black fabric.

As calmly as she could, Hermione soothed, "That's it ... let me help him...."

Slowly, tentatively, she edged closer. She froze as the stag's head bobbed towards her outstretched hands - and licked the tips of her fingers. The Patronus-stag turned its head and licked Harry's cheek.

Clearly, the stag wanted her to come to Harry.

A relieved sigh passed her lips.

Now moving confidently, Hermione settled on her haunches next to Harry. He did not feel cold, but he was deeply unconscious. His eyes did not react to light. His right leg and hip looked awful.... Beneath a discoloured patch in his armour, on his hip where most of the Basilisk scales had been scraped loose, Harry's flesh felt swollen and altogether too soft and pliable. Suppressing a shudder, Hermione concluded he must have broken every major bone in that area.

Under her breath Hermione cursed her lack of skill. Tentatively she employed diagnostic spells from her classes with Madam Pomfrey - which now seemed painfully rudimentary - spells she had learnt, but not fully revised.

The third spell told her something she needed to know. Beyond all his physical injuries, Harry had somehow overloaded his magic. That explained his mental state. He was not just unconscious, but in magical shutdown as well.

Harry was so exhausted he could no longer tap the zero-point energy field that permeated everything - and powered every wizard's magic....

Finally, something Hermione did know how to treat. A basic use of Phoenix Tear Extract was to restore a wizard's lost connection to the all-encompassing magical forces of the cosmos.

Again opening her precious phial, Hermione measured another dose of Phoenix Tear Extract and opened Harry's mouth. She trickled it down his throat and again used tracheal massage to get him to swallow. Assuming the extract worked, Harry still had more than enough non-magical issues to send him to the grave.

The thigh and hip have a lot of space. If sharp edges of even one of Harry's broken bones sliced one of the major vessels in that area - she recited to herself the abdominal aorta, inferior vena cava, femoral artery, femoral vein - he would bleed to death internally with nary a drop touching the ground.

That was not yet the case. Harry was still alive.

But if it happened, she would be helpless.

Nothing from her Healer training to date could stop internal blood loss on that scale. Even a splint would not help. His femur was too badly shattered for her even to try realign its jagged fragments. Removing them was utterly beyond her capability.

The stag's head bobbed whilst Hermione was working Harry's throat. She looked up to find the animal staring intently over her shoulder, its pricked ears straight up. It was listening to, or for, something.

Hermione cocked her head, stared into the darkness, and listened. She heard it too. Someone, somewhere in the darkness was calling out a name.... Could it be Tonks, trying to find Mad-Eye?

At least somebody else was alive.

Whoever it was would have to wait. Harry needed her more.

She had no choice but to stabilise Harry immediately. At any moment, something else could happen. Just looking at him, Hermione could tell something already was. The golden Patronus-stag was starting to fade away - not all at once, but the antlers, feet, and tail were all markedly less visible. The beast's colour was becoming concentrated, pooling where Harry lay in contact with it. It was as if....

Yes! Harry was reconnecting with the magic around him. Evidently, he was reabsorbing the magical essence of what Hermione now knew had to be a remarkable Patronus - sufficiently unusual that none of her copious reading ever referenced anything like it.

She drew her wand and touched it to Harry's mangled hip. Concentrating, she dragged the tip around the region of greatest concern until she had outlined the entire area. Then she incanted, "Petrificus Ceteris."

Nothing happened - but nothing was supposed to. Her spell simply froze everything in whatever place it was, so Harry could be moved, if necessary, without making his physical situation worse. But every treatment carried its own risks. If that spell were not removed soon, blood deprivation in the affected area could cause irreparable damage. In the worst case scenario, gangrene could take his leg. Given the alternative, even that was the lesser of two evils.

Unlike Luna, Harry had not gone into regular, non-magical shock. Hermione intended to keep it that way. The injuries he did have were bad enough.

Beyond Harry, Luna, and the slowly evaporating Patronus, all Hermione knew at the moment was that Death Eaters were conspicuous by their absence. Perhaps the goblins had put them to flight. For now, she did not care, as long as they stayed gone. She had two severely wounded people to care for and was hardly unscathed herself.

To be useful - Hermione always tried to be useful - she set to healing Harry's visible cuts.

Her isolation was brief.

Before she had finished with Harry's face, a familiar spell lit up the night. Overhead, Hermione saw the same Auror Assist signal that Mad-Eye used at the battle's start.

Backing slowly away from Harry, to avoid upsetting the steadily dwindling, but still substantial, gold-coloured Patronus, Hermione pointed her wand skyward and responded in kind.

A second crimson cross lit up the sky over Stonehenge.

That triggered everything.

Almost immediately the sound she had heard before - a coordinated shriek of innumerable voices - arose again.

"Ulululululu...!"

The goblins had been poised beyond the stone circle's perimeter - wary of whatever magic, quite probably hers, had concluded the battle. Whatever unknown Druid spell Luna had induced her to perform not only had struck the goblin army dumb but also stopped it in its tracks.

Until now.

Until the goblins recognised wizard activity, and therefore wizards, still present inside the circle.

Immediately, the goblin army resumed storming Stonehenge - now unopposed - since every single Death Eater and Triad defender had vanished, leaving only their dead behind. Goblins in their thousands swarmed across the vacant field of battle.

Suddenly victorious, the goblin warriors commenced their traditional practice of plundering everything in sight. That mostly meant stripping the corpses on the deserted battlefield. More fortunate units found themselves looting the abandoned tents of Voldemort's minions. Others rooted through the collapsed grandstand.

Soon the onrushing goblins encountered Hermione and her two charges.

Hermione did the only thing she could. Drawing herself up to full height, she faced the horde. Her wand crackled with magic, but she kept it pointed at the ground. Grimly, she set her jaw. For Harry, she had faced down Death Eaters. Now she would face down goblins, if necessary.

Fortunately - and fortune smiled with abnormal frequency upon her and her compatriots that night - things did not get that far.

The goblin infantry pulled up short. They were facing a witch clad in what was plainly goblin-forged Basilisk hide armour of the sort worn only by elite warriors. The focus of hundreds of pairs of intense goblin eyes, Hermione stood her ground resolutely and (outwardly) unafraid. A very long moment passed before the goblins noticed Harry Potter - their Prince and now their Deliverer of Victory - lying at her feet, his head on what appeared to be a golden pillow.

"Savini," a familiar goblin voice rasped. Roxtar took two steps forward, dropped to his knees, and then onto his face.

Simultaneously, as if cut down by a great invisible scythe, every goblin in sight fell prostrate before her and their unconscious prince.

The goblins were thus positioned when, suddenly, they had company.

With a flash like a Muggle short circuit, a most windblown wizard popped into existence astride a broom that - to Hermione - was very familiar.

Throughout her goblin encounter, Hermione had kept her wand lowered to prevent any misimpression of hostile intent. At this unexpected intrusion, she instantly assumed a dueller's crouch. Likewise, the goblins hastily scrambled to their feet, welcoming the intruder with aggressive glances and threatening gestures. Indeed, a couple goblin bolts were cast at the wizard, but bounced harmlessly off his invisible shield.

Recognising the visitor, Hermione tersely ordered, "Stop!"

"Mannock, thank Merlin, somebody from the Ministry finally shows up! Where are the Aurors? The Hit Wizards? Anyone? I need help - please! They're hurt badly." She gestured at the Harry's and Luna's unmoving bodies.

Reaching Stonehenge after a frantic flight, Mannock had expected - even hoped - to throw himself into a huge firefight against the Death Eaters. But excepting some jumpy goblins, things seemed calm enough.

Wary of the crowd of bellicose - if also exhausted and (all too often) wounded - goblins surrounding Hermione, Mannock addressed her whilst catching his breath. "Came from the Burrow.... Fred Weasley alerted us ... said Deaters captured his brother.... Said you bunch of damn fools went to the rescue.... There's more on the way ... but I outflew 'em, it seems. Once I saw ... Apparated the last klick or so.... Are you safe?"

"I seem to be...."

"She's safe," another wizard's voice rang out.

Accompanied by the senior goblin officer, General Barduk, Kingsley Shacklebolt strode forward. Others trailed only a couple of steps behind....

"Professor Shacklebolt! Professor Flitwick! Oh, Merlin, Poppy!" Hermione greeted her relief frantically. "Thank Circe you're here! We need help! Harry's terribly hurt. Luna, too, and I don't know where the others are!"

Madam Pomfrey took one look at the pair at Hermione's feet and concluded that Harry was much worse off than Luna. "I'll have to conduct a field deboning," she pronounced. "Otherwise, it won't be safe to move him...."

"I ... umm ... cast Petrificus Ceteris on his...," Hermione advised nervously, worried that she might have done something wrong. Much more than a N.E.W.T. grade rode on her efforts.

"How long ago?" Pomfrey's response was clipped, all business.

"Five ... maybe ten minutes."

Pomfrey nodded. "Good enough. Now please stand back and give me room."

As the Hogwarts charge nurse went right to work, the others all started talking at once.

"....no idea what's going on...?"

"...afraid we'd find you all dead...."

"...not from Hogwarts, the wards were disrupted...."

"...who else is with you; are they alive...?"

"...and Mad-Eye, and Neville and George and...."

"...she's frantic. She'll be here soon, I'm sure...."

With everyone else on more familiar and better terms with Hermione, Mannock was being ignored. "Ahem, Miss Granger," he said loudly. "If you don't mind, then, I'll be off to check on Auror Headquarters.... Don't think you need me here."

"Oh, by all means," she said to the Valkyrie-riding wizard, before her attention was again diverted.

Several goblins approached. This crew had been pillaging the Death Eater tents. They carried several red and white banners emblazoned with Chinese characters. The banners were on poles, and skewered atop each pole was a bloody, severed head with oriental features. Their prior owners were undoubtedly were recently deceased Triads.

"Oh, my," Hermione squeaked. "Do you have to use their heads as decorations?"

"Savini," General Barduk replied in a business-like manner. "If tell us can where you to be found is this Voldemort, gladly all these spoils to him return would we."

"Oh," she quailed at the thought. Such a gesture would be seen, and was undoubtedly intended, as a direct insult to the Dark wizard - practically daring him to attack again.

The goblins laid their gory souvenirs at Harry's feet.

Another pair of goblins unceremoniously dumped before Hermione the naked body of ... Cho Chang. Although breathing, the woman had been stunned and then dragged halfway across the Stonehenge circle. Her feet were now cloven hooves. Battered and shriveled pinkish wings hung loosely from her back. A foul-smelling red and black burn marred her abdomen, completely obliterating the tattoo that had held her in thrall for so long.

"Does live this one," one of the goblin braves informed Hermione. "No others ... dead all."

General Barduk stepped forward. He yanked a long, pointed dirk from his shoulder holster. Holding the dagger over his head with both hands, the growling goblin declared, "Succubus... To live we suffer not."

"No!" Hermione screamed, as everyone else fell silent. "In Harry's name, I forbid it."

General Barduk froze in mid-stroke. The blade's ivory handle firmly grasped in his clawed fingers, he regarded the Basilisk-clad consort of the Prince with considerable scepticism.

"She's every bit as much a victim as...."

POP!

Hermione whirled around to find a very tired and anxious looking Dumbledore. He had Apparated not ten metres away, side-alonging Remus Lupin. The Apparition-averse werewolf looked frantic rather than sick.

"Thanks be to Merlin," the Headmaster wheezed. "I feared we would be too late. What has happened?"

"Victory," declared General Barduk, sheathing his dirk. The goblin commander addressed his troops in Gobbledegook. Hundreds of goblins had gathered atop Stonehenge's broken and half-collapsed stones. They responded with a loud undulating cheer and noisily banged their weapons together.

Hermione did not know what General Barduk had said, but heard Harry's title distinctly mentioned least twice in the short address.

"Where are Tonks and Mad-Eye?" Remus urgently demanded. His yellowish eyes glanced this way and that and his nose urgently sniffed the air.

"No idea," Hermione replied sadly. "I might have heard Tonks behind me, but they, Neville, Jazzy, and George are all unaccounted for. Oh, Merlin, did they all die? What did we lead them into?"

Her composure rapidly crumbling as her epinephrine ebbed, Hermione released a great sob. She dropped heavily to a sitting position, close to Madam Pomfrey, who was still trying to heal Harry's many injuries.

Lupin growled, "Dammit!" and bolted away, to begin a personal search for the missing.

The Headmaster watched him go. "I concur that locating the rest should be our first order of business," he pronounced. "General Barduk, are your troops in condition to undertake a search and bring anyone you find - alive or dead - back here?"

General Barduk hesitated. He had known Dumbledore longer than any other wizard, but the Headmaster lacked authority to give such an order. Instead, the goblin officer looked to Hermione, whose head was still buried in her hands.

Almost embarrassed, the goblin general cautiously approached the distraught girl.

"Uhh ... Savini," he spoke softly as the clawtips reluctantly touched Hermione's arm. "For the rest ... shall search we?"

Hermione's breath hitched as she realised the goblin general considered her to be Harry's second. Fighting back her tears, she nodded and choked out: "Yes."

Even now, she had to be strong - for the both of them.

The general barked the command for a general search. Goblin braves began scrambling in all directions.

With the search underway, Dumbledore turned to other urgent business. "And how is our Mister Potter?" he inquired.

"Not good," Madame Pomfrey responded from Harry's side. "He needs, I suppose, the Hospital Wing immediately - who knows where else is safe. His pelvis and right leg require immediate and complete reboning. Miss Lovegood and Miss Chang also require prompt attention, and Miss Granger has obvious spell damage to her right wrist. Albus, can you assist with this, and obtain the services of a Healer who's actually reboned a pelvis before...?"

"Certainly," Dumbledore agreed. He carefully Levitated Harry. "He seems too badly injured to Apparate. My dear Barduk, may I borrow one of your fliers for Mister Potter? And Kingsley, can you please side-along Miss Granger to Hogwarts...?"

"No. I'm ... I'm not leaving until everyone I came with is accounted for," Hermione tremulously, but firmly, announced. "Harry wouldn't if he were in my shoes."

The Headmaster might have tried to convince her otherwise, but at that moment Molly and Arthur Weasley Apparated in. Dumbledore could only attend to so many things at once. Understanding what had happened.... Harry's injuries ... and Luna's.... The mystery of Cho Chang.... Goblins occupying Stonehenge....

Relatively speaking, trying to convince a very headstrong, emotionally fragile, and comparatively not badly injured witch to leave this place - where she had surely earned another Order of Merlin - ranked quite low in the hierarchy of matters that currently demanded the Headmaster's attention.

Hermione was, again, true to her word.

* * * *

The cold winter gale howled. Icy spindrift and stinging pellets of airborne salt blasted the shoreline, ripped from the raging waves that crashed against the rocky coast.

To the east, the inky blackness of the long midwinter night began its fade to deepest purple, heralding the eventual dawn of the new day. Presently, the third-quarter moon, high overhead, shown brightly through scudding, broken clouds. In its pale light, the natural ramparts, cresting one-hundred fifty metres or more above the roiling sea, shone ghostly white. Beyond the surf, a Muggle lighthouse rhythmically pierced the darkness.

But the Muggles' efforts seemed trite to the solitary soul waiting at the base of the forbidding cliffs. To brace himself against the whipping wind, he leaned against a half-rusted-out railing that protruded from an eroded concrete breakwater. Clad completely in black, he stared out to sea - alone on a lee shore with his wintry thoughts.

As a wizard, he could easily have parried the wind-driven ice and salt that battered his face. He chose otherwise. A Warming Charm would have countered the subfreezing gusts, but he was content to expose himself to the elements. His mood was as icy as the weather. His only concession to the environment was a Protego shield against occasional chunks of flint that the elements tore from the overhanging escarpment and gravity sent crashing randomly to the rocks below.

Finally, he heard a resounding CRACK completely unlike any rockfall.

"Albus," the gaunt, black-haired man greeted the arrival without turning his head. "I see my message reached you."

"Severus," the white-haired newcomer put a hand on his agent's back. "It did indeed. Against the chance that you remained behind, I checked thoroughly. Why the haste?"

"The Dark Lord suffered a significant defeat tonight," came the reply. "His disarray provided ... an opportunity."

"A propitious occasion, indeed," Dumbledore agreed. "But at my age, I require more inviting accommodations."

"Inside, then?" Snape shrugged. He turned and silently cast a spell. A battered cast-iron plate moved to one side with an earsplitting screech as it slid across the rock. The pair entered one of the many tunnels that honeycombed Beachy Head's seemingly solid mass.

Safely inside, the two men lit their wands and conjured furniture of their choice. "Why such a dramatic setting, Severus?" The Headmaster broke the silence.

Snape could (or would) not repress a sneer as he answered, "The Ministry's surveillance of Apparition is deficient. It ends at the top of the cliffs, not at the base. We will be undetected here."

"Ah yes," Dumbledore acknowledged, running his good hand through his beard. "Another of the Ministry's security failings. And what of Tom Riddle?"

"He lives, that is all I can deduce with confidence," Snape divulged. He pulled back his sleeve. "My Dark Mark is intact, not faded as before. Where he is now, I do not know. Everyone vanished."

"Vanished?" echoed the Headmaster.

"Correct ... gone, at least from Stonehenge. Does Potter have the slightest idea what he bumbled into tonight?" Snape asked bluntly, foregoing further pleasantries.

"As he has yet to regain consciousness from his injuries, I rather doubt it," the Headmaster replied. "Perhaps you could enlighten me. All manner of wild rumours are circulating."

"I shall tell you what I know, and then what I suspect," Snape began, a typically testy look screwed firmly onto his face.

"Excellent," Dumbledore agreed. "At this point all I know with certainty is that, somehow, Mister Potter and a few friends fought a thousand or more Death Eaters and Triad wizards and ultimately emerged victorious."

"Nonsense," Snape sneered. "The goblins defeated them, not Potter."

"The goblins would disagree," the Headmaster corrected. "Indeed, they do. What little I know comes primarily from goblin sources."

"Potter fell off his broom," countered Snape. "Whatever happened - whatever vanished hundreds of Dark minions whilst leaving me behind - he could not possibly have done it."

"Very well," Dumbledore sighed, as perplexed as Snape. "Perhaps you should begin at the beginning."

"Perhaps I should," Snape agreed. "The gathering that Potter and company encountered was supposed to be the Dark Lord's wedding party."

A pause. Staring down his half-moon glasses, Dumbledore gave the former professor an appraising look. "Tom? Marriage? You are sure?"

"Absolutely. I personally brewed potions to support the consummation."

"Potions?" Dumbledore's eyebrows rose further.

"Yes, potions," Snape repeated as if it were obvious. "He needed potions, but in the end the Dark Lord would have outsmarted himself."

Intrigued, the Headmaster asked, "How so?"

"The Love Potion he requested would have cancelled out the Fertility Potion, thus aborting, so to speak, the purpose of the entire enterprise."

"And that was?" Dumbledore prompted.

"Purely dynastic, of course," Snape sneered. "The Dark Lord, particularly in his condition, could hardly consummate a marriage in the same fashion as anyone else."

"No, I suppose not," the Headmaster agreed. "So who was the lucky lady?"

"One of your current students, Cho Chang," Snape revealed archly, "as a succubus. Ronald Weasley was to play the victim necessary to complete that process. Chang.... I assume she is dead now."

"You assume wrongly, Severus," Dumbledore chided. "She survived."

Snape's eyebrows rose in scepticism. "The goblins did not kill her?"

"Evidently not," the Headmaster answered. "I have her at the Castle."

"I strongly recommend isolating her for at least forty-eight hours, until she regains responsibility for ... her actions," Snape declared, looking more than usually disagreeable.

"Most assuredly she will remain in seclusion much longer," Dumbledore assured. "You seem rather familiar with this potion - which, by the way, Madame Pomfrey did not detect when she took the girl away."

"It was ... a failed experiment," Snape chose his words carefully, "designed to be undetectable. But no Love Potion is perfect. It had ... other failings - inexplicable locational limitations ... and libidinal issues upon withdrawal."

This time Dumbledore's eyebrows rose. "This was your devel...?"

"For reasons already known to you," Snape quickly cut the Headmaster off. "But I did not discover these failings initially. When I did, I binned the entire project."

"Am I correct to assume that had you succeeded, Mister Potter would never have been conceived?" the Headmaster inquired elliptically.

Snape looked pained. "Must we again regurgitate this?" he growled. "It was a failed, abandoned experiment. I tried telling you when I realised it could be relevant. Did you not get my owl?"

"No, I certainly knew nothing of your extracurricular activity," Dumbledore answered. "My immediate concern is how much potion does Voldemort retain?"

"From the quantity of ingredients I was ordered to obtain, little or none," Snape answered, looking somewhat less disgruntled. "He could brew enough for one person, and a bit extra, but nothing more. I'll find a better way to inform you if the Dark Lord requests more ingredients."

"Very well, back to the event Mister Potter prevented," Dumbledore commented, content to let the prior subject drop.

"Potter and that 'Dumbledore's Army' of his, Weasley, and now Chang.... I'd recommend a bit stricter supervision of ... student extracurricular activities." Snape made no attempt to disguise the disapproval spilling savagely from his lips.

A very weary Hogwarts Headmaster kneaded his brow with his one capable hand. "You are right; I suspected as much...."

"Then pray tell, why didn't you prevent it?" Snape hissed.

"My suspicions were belated," Dumbledore confessed. "I failed Miss Chang, then - and the rest as well. As students in my charge, none should have had to experience such a thing. Once I received Mister Potter's owl, I feared I would be too late, and I was."

"Indeed, you were," Snape nastily agreed. "Throughout the battle I expected you to appear and save Potter's hide as before. Where could you have been, if even Apparition were too slow?"

Dumbledore fumed. "In Tabriz. Ironically, I was travelling to China to meet about this very thing, when a Blackwalls international fast owl intercepted us."

"Us?" Snape's eyebrows arched.

"Remus had encountered the wand prints of the White Lotus Triad previously, whilst investigating Tom's finances. Somehow Mister Potter obtained information concerning Mister Chang, and contacted my friend Kung Meng-tse, who concluded that Mister Chang is that triad's overlord. Lao Kung is too ill to travel, so we took advantage of the holiday to visit him." Anguish showed in the Headmaster's eyes. "Some advantage that turned out to be."

"Such irony," Snape added with a bitter laugh. "Without Granger's help, Potter couldn't think his way through a first-year logic problem. Now, the same discovery that loosed Potter to play hero again left you unable to rescue him."

"That was no play, Severus - he was a genuine hero tonight, they all were." Dumbledore spoke in a tone that told Snape he was on thin ice. "But simply put, if we had all been paying better attention, we could well have prevented this."

"I find that questionable," Snape disagreed. "The Dark Lord kept this event quite confidential. Even I was mistaken about the reason for the potions he demanded until earlier this evening. The full scope of his ambitions is still not entirely clear."

"But if the wedding was to be a dynastic arrangement," Dumbledore sought confirmation. "Why a succubus?"

"As we've discussed, the Dark Lord's original return was botched when Potter survived that ritual," Snape recounted sourly. "Among other things his fertility is questionable. Conversely, succubi are quite fecund after one of their blood feasts."

"That is contrary to popular conceptions," Dumbledore cautioned.

"It is," Snape concurred, "but the popular view is false, as succubical instincts are more cannibalistic than maternalistic. With sufficiently Dark mates, they breed readily, which I believe my potions were intended to exploit. With Love and Fertility Potions for her, and a double dose of the latter for him, I've no doubt that the Dark Lord intended to conceive an heir tonight. But this particular Love Potion had contraceptive properties. Thank Merlin he failed, and evil did not beget evil."

"Merlin is long dead," the Headmaster reminded. "Mister Potter's band and a goblin army accomplished the feat."

Snape's lips quivered at yet another mention of that name, but he did not comment. "I've told you what I know. What I suspect is worse. I believe, from several opportunistic Legilimency efforts and from the initial absence of Lestrange and certain others, that the Dark Lord intended a takeover of the Ministry itself - a putsch."

Dumbledore nodded. "That, I can confirm," he said very gravely. "I have not told anyone, lest panic ensue, but Tom came appallingly close to succeeding. Shortly after my belated arrival, a distress signal arose from the Salisbury Auror facility. With matters well in hand at Stonehenge, I answered that call. Everyone in the building, the entire changeover squad, had been massacred, save Colin Creevey. Floo connexions into the Ministry, but not from it, were wide open, presumably to facilitate entry by intruders. But we found only one Death Eater - the seriously injured Antonin Dolohov."

"Dolohov? Are you certain?" a transparently disbelieving Snape inquired.

"I saw him myself, yes," Dumbledore declared.

"Because he wasn't at Stonehenge, I suspected something greater was being planned," Snape indicated. "But the Dark Lord used my Mark during the battle to recall those who were missing. Afterwards, I personally saw Dolohov, as well as Malfoy, Lestrange, and Greyback, join the battle...."

"Interesting," Dumbledore murmured, his expression thoughtful. "It did seem odd. Dolohov's injuries were consistent with goblin, not Auror weaponry, and there was far too little blood about his body to account for his very serious injuries."

"His interrogation should prove interesting," Snape observed.

"Quite," the Headmaster affirmed. "I have ... umm ... acquiesced in his extraordinary rendition to goblin custody. His suspected involvement in quite a number of misdeeds will be...." Dumbledore stopped in midsentence. His Order shoulder amulet had gone off. He cocked his head towards the affected shoulder, and his expression went from quizzical to pale over the course of a short conversation.

"I am sorry, Severus, I must be off," the Headmaster declared. "I have to attend to yet another crisis."

"What now?" Snape asked; disappointment evident in his voice.

"Whilst all this was going on, it appears that someone has burnt Grimmauld Place to the ground," Dumbledore revealed, "...with Fiendfyre."

* * * *

Draco Malfoy had always slept soundly at Malfoy Manor. Now being Lord of the manor, with its wards and other security apparatus at his command, only accentuated that tendency.

He was having a relatively pleasant dream, for once, about Daphne Greengrass, some chocolate candles, a pair of silver hand-cuffs, and a very large pool of....

CRACK!!

Draco awoke with a start. "What the...? Father! What are you...?"

Lucius Malfoy, looking distinctly tired and disoriented, had just Apparated in, popping into existence at the foot of his son's palatial four-poster bed.

"Whilst you fill my shoes admirably," Lucius drawled, "the wards still recognise me. As I certainly mean you no harm, they allowed me entrance."

Draco bounded out of bed to greet the man he had not really met (except briefly, in custody) since the last spring holiday. It was awkward. "Father, I'm just ... glad to see you ... finally...."

Lucius ignored his son's proffered hand, took a great step forward and enveloped him in a warm embrace. "You've ... done very well, my son," he said, choking with emotion. "Very well, indeed...."

Malfoys never cried. Draco no longer even knew how. The elder had driven that rule home to the younger since - since before Draco could remember. But if either of them could have gone teary-eyed, they would have, on the occasion of this reunion.

Lucius seemed to have aged ten years. The ravages of Azkaban did that to a man. For the next several minutes Lucius praised Draco's actions as he understood them - working his way into the Dark Lord's confidence, saving the family's fortune, rebuilding the Manor. Draco had done everything the older man could not do whilst a fugitive from the Ministry. "How did you manage it?" he closed.

Whilst Lucius was his father, that question trenched upon secret matters between Draco and the Dark Lord. If the Dark Lord had not seen fit to take Lucius into his confidence, it would be dangersome for Draco to let anything slip. He demurred with a smile, "You'd be the first to tell me not to answer. If the Dark Lord wanted you to know, he'd have told you. And what brings you here ... tonight?"

"Chaos," was Lucius' terse reply. His son's look of incomprehension made that answer all the more satisfying. "Both sides are in chaos at the moment, the Ministry and the Death Eaters. Tonight, the Ministry was very nearly overthrown. The Dark Lord played them for fools. If all had gone as planned, the Ministry would have been ours by sunrise, and I could have returned here in broad daylight."

With every word, Draco eyes grew wider. He knew that the Dark Lord compartmentalised - that plenty was afoot amongst the Death Eaters that he, Draco, knew nothing about. But something this huge? "What ... what was supposed to happen?" he stammered.

That question was met by Lucius' thoughtful expression, and then a sly grin.

"I see I'm the first to tell you. If the Dark Lord meant for you to know, I suppose he would have cut you in," Lucius quoted his son's words back to him. "What you need to know is that the operative word is 'almost.' Suffice it to say that Potter and a mob of goblins tossed a Bludger into the works. I don't know the beginning, because my mission was different, but after spending more time than is preferable with a smelly, uncouth werewolf, we were re-summoned by the Dark Lord."

"Summoned?" Draco mouthed dispassionately. "You mean you weren't with him?"

"No, I was assigned a special mission; awaiting a signal which never came. I returned when called, and fought alongside the Dark Lord until ... something happened, and I was involuntarily cast back to where I'd been. We were in shock. Such magic is unknown. So taking advantage of the chaos, I decided to come here - to give you a warning."

Draco's face creased into a frown. "What warning would that be? Certainly, nothing can be traced to my wand."

"The Ministry are fools," Lucius scoffed. "You need be on guard for the Dark Lord. Tonight's debacle ... he has nobody to blame but himself - save Potter, goblin rabble, and Merlin knows what that ended it all. You need to watch yourself. The Dark Lord was already far too fixated upon Potter than was wise, and I can only imagine how he will react. I shall not inquire as to your role, but be on guard; plainly you're his inside man at Hogwarts...."

"I'll not hear of this, Father," Draco interrupted testily. "Loyalty to the Dark Lord is paramount...."

"You're a Malfoy," Lucius declared, his voice regaining its patrician tone of old. "First and foremost, and I'll not have you forget it." Draco lapsed into silence, so Lucius continued lecturing. "You must see that you're not sacrificed on some fool's errand of revenge against Potter at the Castle. If the Dark Lord requires cannon fodder, let him use Crabbe, Goyle, or Nott...."

"They're all dead," Draco informed his father. "I used them as cannon fodder," he emphasised, "in order to win your release from Azkaban." That Lucius' freedom had been achieved by playing the Dark Lord and Dumbledore against one another went unspoken. Loyalty was a limited resource.

Lucius would not be diverted. "Well, use someone, anyone else - perhaps that Parkinson cow who's lusted after the Malfoy name practically since she could walk."

"Don't worry on that score," Draco reassured. "I'm covering my tracks."

"Good," the long-time Death Eater pronounced. "See that you keep at it."

* * * *

"...Well, son, you're fading out. You've survived again, it seems. Do try to be more careful, won't you?"

"I'll try, Dad, but like Dumbledore says, I have to go with what's right over what's easy."

"I'm very proud of you, Harry; we all are."

"I love you too, Mum."

"Thanks again, Harry. I'll always be in your debt - and so will Cho."

"Cedric, you're dead because of me. You owe me nothing...."

"Only a wizard debt...."

And so, Harry Potter returned to the land of the living.

A faint groan heralded his re-emergence, and a largely failed attempt to move - unsuccessful save a twitch in his right arm.

It was enough. He felt his hand being squeezed in response.

"Oh, Harry ... thank Merlin! You've made it!" relief was almost tangible in that familiar voice.

His eyes fluttered open, and Harry stared into the most beautiful dark russet orbs he could imagine. Everything else was hazy, muddled by his still faltering consciousness, but those eyes - they blazed with unmistakable clarity.

"Hermione," he tried, not sure whether he could speak. "Are we alive?"

Feeling her hands cup his face, Harry realised he was supine, looking up at her. Her hair tickled his chin. "Yes, we are," she confirmed emphatically. "It still astounds me - but yes."

He started to ask, "Where are...?"

She answered before he finished. "The Hospital Wing; look around."

"I don't want ... to look anywhere else, just yet," he mumbled, drinking in her soft, affection-filled features.

"Oh...."

She lowered her lips to his and kissed him. It commenced tentatively, as if she worried he would break. But soon she poured the full measure of her pent up emotions into their kiss. The doubts and fears of the past several hours resolved. Her tormented bedside vigil, hoping, almost praying, that he would come back to her, had ended.

Harry responded as best he could. His head slowly rocking back and forth, he found his own solace. He had been so afraid she would die. Clumsily, he raised the one arm he could move and rested it on her heaving shoulders, slowly caressing her.

For Hermione, it was a moment of pure bliss, until he froze abruptly. Harry's his breath whistled tensely between his teeth. She backed away and immediately saw dread in his eyes.

"Hermione," he whispered. "Please, the truth.... Am I ... am I ... paralysed? I can't ... feel anything ... down there."

He was serious.

"Oh, Merlin, no, Harry. You were very badly hurt. Your pelvis and right femur are being reboned. Healer Huxley Charmed you, to keep you still and because the regrowth is very uncomfortable. You won't be able to move or ... um ... anything else for the rest of today, at least."

"Bugger," Harry sighed wearily. "You seemed interested."

"Extremely," she confirmed, kissing him again to demonstrate her desire. "Survival may be the ultimate aphrodisiac. But rules are rules," she matched his sigh. "And Healer Huxley knows what he's doing."

Harry looked up at her, smiling again, his relief unmistakable. "Then, I guess I'm going to be okay."

Hermione treated his statement as a question. "I can't answer that, but Healer Huxley can, and I'm sure he's monitoring your talismans. I'll get him for you...."

But before Hermione could turn away, Harry grasped her hand, silently asking her to stay. His serious, haunted look had returned. "Before ... before you go...," he began haltingly, "I need to know.... Did we rescue Ron?"

Hermione's smile telegraphed her answer. "Yes, Luna managed to haul him out before he suffered any permanent injuries. He's here, with his family."

"So he's okay, then?" Harry asked hopefully.

"Minor, reversible potions damage only," Hermione explained. "And quite a fright, of course."

"How minor?" Harry followed, fixated on Ron's condition.

"Umm ... his problem is pretty much the opposite of yours," Hermione told him. To ensure Harry understood, she gently cupped his insensate organ through the sheets and his hospital robes.

Harry rolled his eyes. "Damn, I never thought envy him over something like that."

Hermione shook her head. "Well, he was going to mate a succubus...."

Harry rolled his eyes. "Yeah, I was pretty lame. But if I could, there's something I would want right about now."

"You and me both," Hermione agreed. Grasping his near hand, she placed it intimately. "I could really use some entirely mindless pleasure - just not to have to think about things."

Harry groaned, his face falling as he drew back his arm. "Oh, Merlin - we lost someone, didn't we...? More...?"

He looked ready to cry, or worse. Hermione retrieved his hand. Comforting him as best she could, she nodded.

"Was it ... Neville?" Harry asked, afraid of the answer. "He vanished early on."

"No," Hermione replied almost before Harry finished. Relieved to convey a bit of good news before disclosing the inevitable, she told him, "Neville was buried in rubble, but Dobby was with him and saved him from being crushed to death. He's here, too, having a shoulder reboned and reconstructed."

Harry almost seemed not to hear. "I should never have let Jazzy convince me to let her come...."

Harry was quickly plummeting into one of his self-blaming moods. "No, Harry, it was Mad-Eye," she cut off further speculation. "A Death Eater took out his good leg with some Blasting Curse, and then somebody AKed him."

Shaking his head slowly, Harry dragged his hand to his forehead. Down came his Occlumency shields. His voice thick, Harry mourned his guardian's passing. "Dammit!" Harry cursed. "I should never have let him fight without any potion.... Tonks, too....?"

"Dammit, yourself, Harry!" Hermione raised her voice for the first time. "You didn't let Mad-Eye do anything. You couldn't. You answered to him; he certainly took no orders from you. He bloody well refused that potion! I won't have you blaming yourself for Mad-Eye Moody dying the way he always wanted - in battle...." Then she added, "And Tonks ... she's not dead...."

Harry could tell from both the tenor of Hermione's voice and the look in her eyes that, whilst not dead, Tonks was hardly unscathed. "What happened to her?" he tremulously asked.

Hermione shook her head. "Harry, if you're just going to blame yourself for what happened to trained Aurors whose job is to fight Death Eaters, then somebody else can tell you. I'll just go get...."

"No, Hermione, you're right." Harry refused to let go of her hand, pinning it to his cheek. In a moment, he started breathing more easily. "It isn't my fault, and I'd rather have you tell me...."

Hermione had doubts whether to believe that herself - let alone whether Harry believed it - but he wanted her to stay, so she would. "Werewolf bites, bad ones," she told him. "We assume Greyback, because the moon wasn't full. She's with Remus right now.... And two of the goblins who came along also died."

"Who?"

"You don't know them very well, I think. Azdak and Fozfor were their names. Every one of our group was hurt to some degree, but the rest survived. Here, see my wrist," she showed Harry her now largely healed wound. "Fortunately, nothing else permanent ... well, except for George. He lost most of an ear.... And then there's Cho."

Harry's eyes blinked in frank disbelief. "We saved ... Cho?"

"She's every bit the victim Ron was," Hermione briskly replied. "I'm sure of it. They can reverse most of her partial succubus metamorphosis, but her feet are probably lost causes."

"How do...?"

That question was interrupted by the rustling of the privacy curtain. "Hermione, is Harry awake in there? His talismans suggest he is. He really should be seen...."

It was Hlr. Huxley.

And he was right.

Harry's injuries, although no longer life-threatening, were extensive, serious, and required close medical attention. Pelvic reboning was tricky and uncommon and took longer to heal than Harry's prior treatments.

With a deflated, "yes," Hermione bowed to the inevitable. Alone time with Harry was not to be - until Merlin knew when.

In bustled the Healer with an offhand, "Glad to see I'm not interrupting anything," quip that fell quite flat. He plopped his black leather bag at the foot of Harry's bed. Out came a large blue crystal mounted on an ebonywood handle. Carefully, he passed it over Harry from head to foot, moving particularly slowly over the area of the reboning. All the while, he good-naturedly lectured his patient.

"Harry, I'm removing the Paraplegius so I can continue the examination," Hlr. Huxley explained. "Try to not move when I do, please."

"I'll try," Harry consented. "You scared me ... I thought I'd been paralysed."

"Well, Harry, all things considered, it could have been worse," Hlr. Huxley commented. "A quarter turn in the wrong direction and you'd never walk again. Indeed, you're most fortunate still to be with us. Fractures like yours.... They frequently sever blood vessels large enough to bleed out before the fastest emergency Healing - but you hit whatever you hit at just the right angle to avoid fatal hemorrhage."

"All of us ... at least those with a chance of recovering ... took Felix Felicis," Harry wearily pointed out.

"So your ladyfriend informed me," Hlr. Huxley answered in the same non-judgmental vein. "Good stuff, that...." He pulled out a second crystal - this one orange, with a solid gold handle on either side - and began another pass. "Putting that aside, you and that other girl...."

"Luna Lovegood," Hermione offered.

"...were both damn lucky that this one had the presence of mind to pack some Phoenix Tear Extract...."

Hermione blinked. Presence of mind? Was that some kind of joke? Absence of mind was closer to the truth. The Extract was left over from that bollixed rescue mission. With everything else that had happened - her search for Harry, and then nearly dying - she had forgotten its existence, pure and simple.

"...since you managed - again - to overtax your magic to the point of losing contact with the Field. As we've already discussed, you're bloody powerful - but not that powerful...."

Hlr. Huxley put his probe away and flicked his wand. A multicoloured ribbon emerged from the tip. "Speaking of magic; now for a MAT scan...." The Healer spread the ribbon on the bedsheet at Harry's feet, produced something resembling a Foeglass, and twiddled a couple of its dials. With the device tuned, the Healer flicked his wand again. Of its own accord, the ribbon rolled slowly upwards, undulating and moulding itself to Harry's bodily contours as it flowed over him.

"...What did you do this time?" Hlr. Huxley inquired, keeping his eyes on the screen. "From all accounts, it was most impressive...."

Hermione's ears perked up. She would like to know what happened, too.

"It was ... Voldemort," Harry began slowly, "and.... Oh, Hermione! I did it! It worked!!" Like throwing a switch, he had become most excited.

"I said, don't move," Hlr. Huxley warned, laying his hand heavily on the boy's left shoulder.

"Did what, Harry?" Hermione really wanted to know.

"The Bose-Einstein stuff," Harry enthusiastically explained. "I made it ... to save you from Voldemort's Killing Curse. It worked!"

This was news - great news - to Hermione. "When? How?"

Harry paused and readied himself. Much of his memory was unpleasant. "You and, I guess, Luna were ... hiding under an Invisibility Cloak, but it came partially off. Voldemort saw you, and Lestrange, too, at the same time. I couldn't get to you, so with no other option, I used the spell I'd been practising. It was that, or well...." Harry paused again.

The alternative would have vapourised not only Voldemort and Hermione both, but all of Stonehenge together with several surrounding kilometres.

"And it really worked?" Hermione eagerly asked, until she realised how stupid that sounded. "I mean, of course, it worked. I'm here, aren't I?"

"I wasn't sure, but I had to try," Harry declared. "I cast it just after Voldemort slammed me into one of those big stones - that's what broke everything down there. Something turned aside the Killing Curse he shot at you. It must have been the Bose-Einstein stuff. I was lucky, too, since Lestrange used a Cruciatus rather than another AK...."

Hermione jumped in, shocked. "Lucky? You're saying you created enough condensate to stop a Killing Curse whilst also fending off a Cruciatus? Harry, that's amazing! That probably took as much energy as ... well, what happened before."

Harry did not follow. "Umm ... I guess so. But the Cruciatus, it's weaker, I think...."

Hermione warmed to the subject, whilst Hlr. Huxley stayed silent, concluding the MAT scan with the multi-coloured ribbon producing images on the screen. "The Cruciatus isn't at all like the Killing Curse," she pointed out. "The AK kills by removing energy; shutting down respiration. Bose-Einstein condensate doesn't have any energy left to remove, so an AK only increases the size of the condensate. But the Cruciatus is the opposite. It imparts energy, lots of it, to stimulate every pain receptor in your body. To create ... to remove enough energy to keep the condensate at essentially absolute zero even with a Cruciatus adding energy - why you must have used as much power as ... the last time. No wonder you exhausted yourself."

"We already knew Harry was remarkable," Hlr. Huxley broke his silence. "It's not easy to talk over my head, but you've been doing so since this condensate stuff came up. How about a simple question? What does it look like?"

Harry eyed Hermione quizzically. She responded with a shoulder shrug. "Umm ... I don't remember it looking like anything at all," Harry admitted. "I saw just the AK disappearing and then deflecting at an odd angle.... In between was totally black."

"That's not surprising," Hermione suggested. "Since this condensate has no energy, it hasn't any light to emit or reflect...."

"That would make it black, all right," Hlr. Huxley observed. "But Poppy and Filius saw how it ended - anything but black, that. You needn't be so modest, Harry, at least amongst present company...."

"But I didn't see it end," Harry denied. "The last thing I saw was the AK stopped. Then I passed out."

"What did they see?" Hermione asked. "I didn't see it either."

"Poppy described a white magic eruption, painfully bright to look at. It went so high she couldn't see the top...." Hlr. Huxley extended his hands above his head for emphasis.

Harry gave Hermione a more pointed, less quizzical look, which Hlr. Huxley, involved with answering the question, missed.

"...Filius said he nearly fell over backwards. Brilliantly white magic shot up like the Eiffel Tower, only brighter and much taller. Great shock and awe ... impressive enough to deter the entire goblin army from a battle - and they do love their battles. The goblins weren't sure at first that anything could have survived. They likened it to what happened the last time you escaped the Death Eaters ... only more controlled...."

Harry heard all this, but was no closer to understanding than before.

'Do you have any idea what he's on about?' Hermione felt Harry Legilimence to her.

'Not really,' she silently answered. 'Some suspicions ... but I'd best try to find out.'

'You'd best. I know it wasn't me.'

"...After the thing collapsed back onto itself, the goblins weren't sure what to do until they concluded wizards were still inside. They charged in and found Hermione tending you and the Lovegood girl."

Hlr. Huxley finished his vivid description standing and stayed on his feet. "Harry, the magical examination indicates you're well on the road to recovery. The MAT scan shows all fractures mending and cessation of internal bleeding. To determine when you can get out of bed, I need to check your physical condition." He started to lower the sheet covering Harry, but hesitated with Hermione present.

"Harry, do you mind, with her here?"

"No, it's not like...."

"Actually, now would be an excellent time to get some other things done," Hermione interjected hastily. "Tell me when it's over, and I'll be back." She strode to the exit flap in the privacy barrier. Reaching it, she turned around, and Legilimenced, in her most prim and proper voice, 'After all, I can do without any more sexual frustration.'

* * * *

Hermione slipped noiselessly through another privacy barrier. Her brown eyes immediately met the occupant's silvery ones. "I expected to see you before too long," Luna remarked lazily. "Oh, and thanks for binding me up out there. I'm told I might otherwise have lost the leg."

That slowed Hermione. "Oh, you're welcome ... I hadn't heard that...."

But Hermione would not be denied when she needed information. She produced her wand and both sealed and Imperturbed Luna's sick room.

"Luna, I need to know exactly what...."

"Aren't you forgetting something?" Luna's sing-song voice interrupted.

"Oh, I suppose so," Hermione replied thoughtfully. "Surveillius revelato." Nothing glowed. The area was clean. "Wait a minute.... How did you know I knew that spell?"

"I didn't.... I guessed." Luna responded with a knowing laugh. "Your reputation precedes you."

"Then presumably you also know why I'm here," Hermione bore in.

"Of course," Luna replied, her expression turning serious. "You want to know how you ended the Battle of Stonehenge."

"How I ended...?" Hermione spluttered. "You can't be serious. Luna, what was that spell?"

"It was an ancient Druid spell - maybe three thousand years old. It's a ritual used to cleanse evil, or Dark magic if you will, from our nemetons...."

"And Stonehenge was a Druid temple," Hermione added. To that extent, she now knew where this was going.

"Stonehenge was, and is, the greatest Druid temple - in England anyway," Luna corrected.

"But why me?" Hermione pressed. "Wait, you needed my searching ability, to connect you to the blue stone, that gnomon-cenotaph, I think you called it that night."

"That, but not just that, actually," Luna corrected. "I didn't connect to anything. You did. It had to be you. Whilst I knew the spell, I couldn't do it. Only you, because only you could command the stone's power. It was once Stonehenge's altar."

The more Luna explained, the less Hermione felt she knew. Luna's discussion created so many questions that Hermione was unsure where to begin. Luna just smiled, no doubt amused at the perplexed expression on her friend's face.

Hermione opted to start with something she thought safe.

"But why would you know ancient spells you couldn't perform?"

"Almost two thousand years of Druid tradition," Luna answered. "The Romans, they conquered us because ... well, for a lot of reasons, but the immediate cause was their killing our High Priestess and all her attendants. We selected another High Priestess, but before we could consecrate her properly, the Roman army swept over us. We were leaderless. We had no trained virgins...."

"Virgins? What does that have to do with anything?" Hermione interrupted. "I don't see where this is going." She wished her question had been more precise.

"Please be patient, I'm getting there," Luna hushed her. "The attendants must be virgins, as purity is essential to consecration. They must also offer the spells, so they must know them. For lack of proper attendants, we were defeated...."

"So?" Hermione asked in her annoyed voice. "You mean like Japanese miko?"

"Uh ... I can't say. But amongst the Druids, it was thus decreed that all female Druid children should learn the spells," Luna went on. "So we could act as proper attendants on a moment's notice, if the need arose. That's why I knew...."

Regardless of her question, Hermione was not getting a useful answer. Luna could be as elliptical as Dumbledore.

"Then why couldn't you use it?" Hermione tried to get back to something concrete. "I mean, you're still ... umm ... aren't you...?"

Luna laughed a lovely tinkling little laugh. "I'm still a virgin, if that's what you're asking. But virginity alone doesn't mean I can wield that spell. I can't order a cleansing of the great Stonehenge nemeton. I'm just the attendant...."

The penny dropped. Hermione was stunned. "But I'm not.... I can't be.... I-I don't believe in any god, let alone dozens. I'm not even a Druid, for goodness sake, or a virgin."

"You were when it counted. Now it doesn't matter," Luna declared with finality. "The magic, the Dynion Mwyn, flows through you. Last night you proved it."

"But ... why?" Hermione gave up.

"When you needed to find Harry, you had me learn that set of spells. One of them, the Psycho Patefacius, originally had another use. In original Keltoi, it was our consecration spell for Druid High Priestesses...."

"Why didn't you tell me?" Hermione demanded.

"It didn't seem to matter," Luna shrugged. "I didn't know if the Latin translation would have the same effect, and in any event, a High Priestess couldn't be properly consecrated, except on the gnomon-cenotaph, which had gone missing many centuries earlier."

"Then we go to the Founder's Chamber, and there it is," Hermione reminded her. "Why not tell me then?"

Luna cocked her head, eyeing Hermione sceptically. "That's not a serious question."

Hermione briefly returned a hard stare, until sighing and averting her eyes. "You're right. In that situation such a distraction might have been fatal. It certainly would have disrupted my search for Harry. I can't blame you for keeping mum."

"Actually, I was so amazed just to see the great blue stone, that until Dumbledore recited the spell, I'd quite forgotten," Luna admitted. "After that, you were searching, and then you almost died.... No proper occasion occurred. And until recently, even with proper sanctification, you couldn't exercise the powers of the office, in which you would act as mother of our tribe...."

"You would have to put it that way," Hermione groaned, her face dropping into her hands. "I didn't seek this out...."

"And Harry didn't seek out Voldemort," Luna reminded. "It happened. Face it, you're Aima now. Don't be so upset; we Druids aren't so bad - we don't require celibacy.... Besides, the position allowed you to end the battle and defeat the Death Eaters, without you, Harry ... or me for that matter, getting killed."

"Actually, we almost did get killed," Hermione pointed out. Then she told Luna about Harry and the Bose-Einstein condensate.

"Well, that was pretty impressive," Luna agreed upon learning that Harry had been able to deflect the Killing Curse.

"I gather we were too," Hermione commented dryly. "What exactly did that spell of yours do?"

"I've no idea," Luna conceded in her usual airy fashion. "It's never done much in the ceremonies I've seen. But I doubt our little local nemeton ever accumulated very much evil that needed expelling."

"Are you saying...?"

"Yes, Hermione, I think - in fact I'm sure - the gnomon-cenotaph provided the spell you cast with however much magic the cleansing task required. That's why you had to search for the stone first. It's England's strongest magical object. The only alternative might have been Harry...."

"He nearly exhausted his magic as it was," Hermione informed her. "So I suppose this was better."

"So whilst I don't know what the cleansing spell did, it had to expel Voldemort and a thousand or so other Dark wizards, not to mention whatever assorted evil Stonehenge accumulated since it's last cleansing ... the detritus of almost two thousand...."

Luna stopped. One of the assortment of medical talismans on the table beside her bed had started clattering and flashing green light. Luna tapped it with her wand.

"Miss Lovegood, please tell Hermione that Harry's physical examination is over," Hlr. Huxley's rather jovial voice warbled through the crystal. "If she wants to return, he would like to see her."

Hermione looked around. All her spellwork seemed intact. "How did he know?" she wondered aloud.

"Well, in some ways you are fairly predictable," Luna commented.

* * * *

Although pleased to know that Harry's physical exam had gone swimmingly, Hermione was quite concerned about Hlr. Huxley being so sure she was with Luna that he had not bothered to ask. What would it mean if Luna's information, assuming it were true, became generally known?

How could she - a thoroughgoing atheist - be the first properly consecrated Druid High Priestess since the Roman conquest?

Preposterous!

But she had no other halfway plausible explanation for the from-all-accounts spectacular magical outpouring that undeniably ended the Battle of Stonehenge. And a spell targeting evil made sense - not a single living Death Eater was left within the circle - and the Dark injury to her hand was also healed in the process.

Another piece of data was unearthed - literally - when the goblins dug Neville from his rubble-filled hole. Much of the mottled marl that underlay Stonehenge had turned white, that is, to chalk. The very bedrock seemed to be cleansed.

She had to tell Harry. But how?

Walking, deep in thought, Hermione was oblivious to a familiar face trying to attract her attention. When subtlety failed, a more direct approach was taken.

"Hermione, please wait." A tug on her hand brought the troubled witch to an abrupt halt. Rounding, she found herself face-to-face with Ginny Weasley.

"Ginny! How did you get here?" Hermione wondered.

"Floo.... The whole family's here, looking after Ron ... and our new hero George," she added with an exaggerated smirk. "But how are you - and Harry - doing, since once again you're the biggest heroes of the piece?"

Hermione preferred get back to Harry, so she tried to keep it short. "We were both hurt, Harry worse than I, but we survived and rescued Ron, so I guess we're okay. Now, I'd really...."

Suddenly Ginny turned quite serious, "Then, can you step in here - just for a moment?"

"Umm ... what's in there?" Hermione asked, rather reluctant. Now was her chance for free time with Harry. If that did not happen soon, she would fall asleep. Hermione had been awake for almost twenty-four hours and was running on epinephrine fumes.

"Ron," Ginny revealed. "And finally he's ready to apologise for being such a complete git for so long."

A crooked smile on her face, Hermione consented. Ron was the reason for all of the night's craziness. "All right," she agreed, "but are you sure?"

"As sure as I ever can be about Ron," Ginny smirked again, whilst nodding her head.

Hermione pushed aside the flap in the privacy barrier and slipped inside. Ron, wearing the nondescript white robes of a Hospital Wing patient, sat on the edge of his bed. His long legs draped over the near side. His dangling feet grazed the polished wood floor but bore no weight. Ron's wary expression suggested he was not sure they could.

Seeing Hermione, his face brightened immediately. In his eyes was a look of resigned gratitude.

"Hermione ... thanks," Ron mumbled, his voice barely above a whisper. "I - I ... didn't really deserve ... what you did ... you and Harry...."

"Ron, nobody deserved what the Death Eaters planned to do to you," Hermione responded as tears again welled in her eyes. "C'mere," she drew him into a - gentle, for her - hug. It gradually into as full an embrace as possible when one participant is sitting down. Mercifully, Ron's potion injury had been successfully treated.

"Thanks," Ron rumbled once Hermione drew back. "I needed that." He took a deep breath. "Hermione .... I really need to tell you that...."

"Ron," Hermione interrupted, "Can you walk?"

Silently opening and closing his mouth, Ron perplexedly blinked a couple of times. "Umm ... I guess ... haven't really tried. But Hermione, I want you to know...."

"Let's try, then," Hermione instructed whilst again braking Ron's train of thought. "Harry can't move yet, and he deserves to hear this, too."

Ron smiled. Hermione knew exactly what he had in mind - and he, her. Apologies did not come easily to him, and she intended to spare him the necessity of doing it twice. Not that he would have minded.... Given the alternative, he would have done it a hundred times over.

Ginny, who had given those two their privacy, was surprised to see them emerge from Ron's sickroom. Unsteady on his feet, Ron draped one arm heavily over Hermione's shoulder. She extended one of hers around his waist, helping keep him upright. "We're going to see Harry," Hermione told Ron's sister. "Could you open the flap for us, please?"

Ginny mutely nodded and moved to do as asked. She frowned a bit when the others were unable to see. The Trio was being reunited, and she knew she would be excluded. Why invite her? She had nothing to do with Ron's rescue.

Ginny was absolutely correct. Ron closed the curtain to Harry's space in his sister's face.

"Harry, look who I found!" Hermione called as she entered, not knowing if her fiancé was asleep.

"Ron!" Harry rasped as loudly as he could, which was not very. Any regret at the demise of Hlr. Huxley's promised "alone time" with Hermione evaporated immediately when Harry realised who was hanging onto her.

Hermione manœuvred Ron into a chair next to the head of Harry's bed and then sat herself on the bed's edge. Quickly Harry's hand found hers.

"Ron, are you all right?" Harry asked in a quiet voice.

"I still don't believe you, Harry," Ron weakly replied. "You're lying there, too beat up to move, after saving me from as sticky an end as could be imagined ... and you're asking after me?"

"It's better than worrying about what could have happened to any of us," Harry sighed. "And you still haven't answered my question. How the hell are you, mate?"

"I'm sorry, Harry, that's what I am," Ron answered. He needed to do this, and he needed to do this now. "Hell, Harry, you were right about her. I was wrong. I was a right prat about it for months.... And still you came after me! Oh Merlin, I was going to die!" The redhead was close to tears. Harry had never seen him cry.

"Ron...."

"I don't deserve friends like this! I don't deserve ... anything...."

Harry found his face getting extremely warm. He was as embarrassed as he could ever remember. However much he had abstractly wanted Ron to apologise, now that it was actually happening Harry realised that he really did not need, or even want, to hear it.

Lying flat on his back, Harry could do relatively little about his emotionally overwrought best male friend.

Yes, after all that had happened, Ron was still that.

But now Hermione had become so much more.

Hermione noticed Harry's discomfort, although Ron was too caught up in the moment to appreciate or recognise it.

"...let her destroy our trust completely.... Dammit, Harry, I love you, man...!"

"Ron, that's enough, I think," Hermione intervened. "I'm sure Harry understands. It was as rough for you as it was...."

Hermione attracted Ron's attention, but Ron was still determined to apologise, so he started in on her.

"And you, Hermione, I treated worse than Harry," Ron whinged. "You were right all along about Cho, and I gave you nothing but grief. You even tried to stop her, and all I did was hate you for it."

"Ron, you needn't do this," Hermione told him. "You've already apologised to me - twice."

"Yes, I do," Ron contradicted, "because before I didn't really mean what I said ... either time. I only did it because Harry wouldn't do what I wanted unless I...." His voice trailed off, and a ghost of a smile replaced the stricken look on his face.

"I hope you put it to good use," Ron commented, seemingly randomly.

Hermione anticipated what Ron was about. "We did. I doubt any of us would have survived without it - least of all Harry ... whom I practically had to force to drink his share...." She cast a pointed look at the boy lying in bed beside her.

"Bloody good on you, then," Ron agreed. Realisation that at least he had contributed something to his own rescue - even if most unwillingly - buoyed his spirits. "And I apologise, as well, for the Howler. I was a berk to the bloody end ... well almost the bloody end...."

"Ron, without that Howler, we never would have known you were at Cho's," Hermione told him.

"Thought it was going to be ... Chinese New Year," Harry added from his supine position. "Thought we had more time...."

"Well, I'm just happy as hell you figured everything out," Ron added, still oblivious to the timing issue. "I'm so ... well, amazed ... that I'm even still here."

"Frankly, when I look back at that ... all those Death Eaters and Triads, I'm amazed any of us are...."

"Umm ... what's a Triad?" Ron asked, his face blank.

Hermione realised that Ron knew nothing of the machinations that had almost caused his death. "Triads ... well, they're Chinese Dark wizards, at least these were. Cho's father led a gang of Triads, and he was cementing an alliance...."

"Thank Merlin I'll never see her lying little face again," a vehement Ron Weasley broke in. "That bloody tart ... and a succubus.... I didn't know they actually existed. I thought Mum made up all that rot to scare us into being careful. Well, Mum was right after all, and I'm not sure when I'll ever be ready for that again, even if...."

Ron abruptly shut his mouth. He had almost let slip something he had been thinking, but had not revealed to anyone. He could not even express how he felt about that himself - or if he wanted anyone at all, present company excepted.

But Hermione heard - just barely. As Ron verged on saying too much, Hermione felt a shiver of angst. She had said too little. Not only was Ron unaware, so was Harry. She had no choice, and further delay would only make the revelation all the more explosive.

"Ron, I'm afraid that's not going to happen," Hermione told him, grasping the horns of the charging bull.

"What's not going to happen?" Ron asked. "Hasn't everything already...."

"That you'll never see Cho again," she continued. "She's here - at Hogwarts."

"Why the hell is she here?" Ron spluttered. "If she's alive, she belongs in Azkaban."

"Cho ... at Hogwarts...?" Harry was as thunderstruck as Ron - if incapable of being as vociferous about it.

"She's here because no place else was safe," Hermione stoutly maintained. "She was being controlled. She's as much a victim as you are, Ron."

Ron's face reddened so much that his hair looked drab by comparison. "You ... you ... brought that ... that THING back to Hogwarts?!?" Ron yelled as loudly as his physical condition permitted. He tried to stand but, still too weak, sank back into his chair.

Energised by the looming row with Ron, Hermione popped to her feet, arms firmly on her hips, and her hair streaming around her face. She angrily defended her decision. "In case you've forgotten, Ronald Weasley, that thing just happens to be your girlfriend whom you've been madly shagging for the last six months. You would have been quite pleased to declare by for her now...!!"

Ron was having none of it. "In case you've forgotten, Hermione, that disgusting thing would happily have killed me a few hours ago ... quite content to suck out my insides out until I was nothing but some dried up mummy! Succubi are evil, Hermione. Out and out evil!"

"Cho was not evil!" Hermione denied. "I thought that, too, but now I know better. Voldemort and her own father were using her as a means...!"

She stopped abruptly, at the feel of Harry's hand tugging on her sleeve.

She looked into Harry's troubled eyes. "How ... how do you know she's not evil?" he asked.

Hermione gulped. Any answer involved what she had just learnt from Luna. "I know ... because the spell ... the spell that ended the battle ... it was ... it was a cleansing spell. Its purpose was to cleanse Stonehenge of evil. It left no Death Eaters inside the circle, nor Triads - just dead bodies. But the spell left her behind, minus the tattoo."

"You did that?" Ron's expression quickly blanked into awestruck. "George said the last thing ... he didn't know what to call it ... that came from inside the circle was unbelievable - the most impressive magic he'd ever seen. He'd buy...."

"George?" Harry repeated the name as a question.

"Oh, he's about," Ron explained. "Lost most of an ear, but otherwise he's typical George. He told me the goblins had just chased off the last Death Eaters who'd been after him when everything inside the circle just blew up.... Shot straight up higher than he could see...."

"I see," Harry echoed. He turned his head towards Hermione, who looked uncomfortable.

Ron followed up before Harry could.

"Fine, but how does all that involve that ... that thing...?" Ron was so disgusted that he could not bear even to utter Cho's name.

"Isn't it obvious?" Hermione responded, still on the edge of anger. "Cho hadn't died, and she remained, inside the circle, after it ended. That means Cho wasn't evil - she couldn't have been. She was being used ... forced to do things against her will. I don't know for how long, but I'd wager quite a long time...."

Ron's grimace grew with every word she spoke. "Control...? You ... you ... mean that was ... never her? Never...?" By the end, he sounded like a squeaky door hinge

Hermione had tried to be nice, but some things just could not be sugarcoated. "Harry and I ... we always suspected something was off. Cho's parents - her father, really - controlled her with traditional Chinese magic ... that round tattoo. It enforced her obedience. They called it filial piety...."

Looking like he was ready to explode, Ron interjected, "So, you're telling me it was all faked? That she never gave a damn about me?"

"You'll have to ask her," Hermione briskly advised. "I have no idea...."

Had he not still been recovering from his ordeal, Ron might have thrown something, or at least tried putting his fist through a nearby object. His face beet red, Ron slumped in his chair, seemingly unable to speak more than disjointed mutterings that sounded highly uncomplimentary, not just to Cho but to anything and everything Chinese.

Hermione was almost ready to try again when the curtain drew back and Hlr. Huxley's bearded face appeared.

"There you are, Mister Weasley. Your sister thought you were probably in here. It's time I examined you. If all goes well, I might be able to release you - subject to light duty instructions...."

"Oh, all right," Ron grumbled, as he weakly struggled to his feet.

Hlr. Huxley's smile vanished as he reached to steady the boy. He had expected a far more positive response. Usually patients viewed imminent release from the Hospital Wing as good news.

Hlr. Huxley shot a questioning glance first at Harry and then Hermione. Harry's expression was blank, but Hermione sadly shook her head.

Ron's red-faced spluttering had drawn all of Hermione's attention, but their exchange had raised questions in Harry's mind as well. Once the redhead was escorted away, Harry took his fiancée's hand. "What's this about some cleansing spell getting rid of the Death Eaters? How did you even know to do that?"

Hermione's countenance crumbled. "Oh, Merlin, Harry, it's.... I'll tell you all about it, Harry, I have to. But can it wait ... a little bit? I don't want to think anymore right now. It just feels ... the walls are closing in.... I'm so knackered...."

Harry pulled her hand to his mouth and gave it a kiss. "Of course, Luv. I need to remember that you're the only one who's kept going ever since the battle. Umm ... what you mentioned before.... Why Healer Huxley offered us privacy. Do you want to? It might be a bit awkward, but I've been thinking. If you hand me my wand, I'll try that special Engorgement Charm the Twins use for their Ton-Tongue Toffees ... the one that worked so well when we were guests of the Goblins. I'm probably not up to wandless magic right now...."

Hermione's tears stopped flowing as he spoke. She gave him a warm, if wan, smile. She appreciated his offer to pleasure her when she was in no position to reciprocate. "And you would, wouldn't you...? Even though I can't do anything for you."

"You saved my life ... again ... and Ron's," Harry responded. "You don't have to do anything. I love you. It's not a trade...."

Harry studied her carefully in the strange shadows cast by the glow of various healing talismans and charms. Her normally soft and straight hair was stringy, and her face pale - except around the eyes. Those eyes, ordinarily brilliant, were now the colour of faded mud, and scarcely visible within the surrounding shadows. Her normally tight skin almost drooped from her high cheekbones, and her jaw was slack.

Not watching him, Hermione started to disrobe. Taking a deep breath, she uttered a spell that Transfigured the bedknobs at the head of Harry's brass bedstead into a pair of grab bars.

Harry realised she had not slept in over a full day - which included what had to be the most strenuous, fatiguing hours of her life.

"Umm ... or would you just like to sleep, Hermione," he inquired tenderly.

She looked at him gratefully. "Could I? I don't think I've ever been so tired."

"It was always for you, Hermione, not me." Harry answered. "If you don't want, I can wait."

"Tomorrow, then," Hermione yawned. "To regain full strength, you'll need to exercise that reboned pelvis of yours vigorously...." She shed the rest of her clothes and crawled into bed next to him.

* * * *

Hlr. Huxley made his final rounds of the morning, before retiring to the Hogwarts guest quarters for some well-deserved rest. Everyone in his care was out of danger. George Weasley had already been released. Potter and Longbottom would need additional bed rest to complete complicated rebonings, but both were assured of full recoveries.

Whatever malignant magic had resided in Chang's tattoo appeared to have burnt itself out. His Severing Charms had easily amputated her incipient succubus wings, since full metamorphosis had never occurred. Only her feet had suffered permanent damage. They would always be somewhat hoof shaped. It was too soon to tell how much.

Even so, Hlr. Huxley expected everyone to vacate the Hospital Wing before the student body returned at the end of the holiday. But it was a close thing; the Castle's meagre blood supply was all but exhausted. He had mentioned the shortage to the Granger girl, and she promised to discuss ideas for replenishment with Madam Pomfrey.

Those with less severe injuries would probably be released on the morrow. Lovegood's half-eaten calf was regenerating nicely, as were the tendons in the Muslim girl's blown-out knee. Ron Weasley probably could have left with George, but he seemed in poor spirits, so Hlr. Huxley kept him overnight, hoping that more rest, combined with his family's moral support, could do some good.

Granger was free to leave whenever she wanted. Only her desire to be with Potter, not any medical reason, was keeping her.

Hlr. Huxley stopped abruptly as he turned the corner behind Potter's area.

A white-sheeted mattress protruded through the curtain. On it rested a pair of feet - female feet.

This was quite irregular.

He circled to the front and poked his head through the curtain.

Harry was sleeping soundly, in exactly the same position he had been in. But next to him, on an identical bed oriented at a right angle, was the unmistakable, and unmistakably unclothed, form of Hermione Granger. Her head nestled comfortably in the crook of Harry's shoulder whilst the rest of her stretched away - towards and through the curtain.

Hlr. Huxley nodded slightly as he magicked a sheet over her. This was most irregular - but on another level not irregular in the slightest.

The Healer checked that all the talismans and other spells monitoring Harry's condition were in proper working order. Then he closed the curtains and placed a "Do Not Disturb Except In Emergency" sign on the entrance.

'Let them sleep,' he thought as he departed. 'Dumbledore will speak to them both soon enough. They have no idea of the fallout from defeating a Death Eater putsch.'

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C:\Documents and Settings\Owner\My Documents\HP & The Fifth Element.ch51 Padfoot's legacy.doc 5/3/2009