The Paradigm Of Uncertainty

HARRY POTTER AND THE PARADIGM OF UNCERTAINTY

Chapter 13: The Dweller on the Threshold

Allegra watched as a few of her wizards tossed Harry, bound and hooded,into a cell and slammed the bars shut. She waved them out and sat down on a bench against the opposite wall. Harry just stood there, hands behind his back.

"You're not fooling me, Potter," Allegra said, sounding amused with the entire situation. Harry took a few steps forward until hewas just inches from the bars, then slowly brought his hands out from behind his back, free of the cuffs that had bound them just moments ago, and tossed the restraints through the bars to clatter to the stone floor ather feet. He reached up and pulled the hood off his head.

Allegra chuckled. "Stone walls do not a prison make, nor iron bars acage," she said. She stood up and poked at the cuffs with the toe of herboot. "I knew these could not hold you, but this will," she said, motioning to the bars of the cell. "It's enchanted so thoroughly that not even you can slip out. I don't recommend any attempts at escape. I can't have you damaging yourself before I get the chance to change you over."

Harry gripped the bars tightly and stared out at her. "Are you happy here, Allegra?"

She looked calmly back at him. "All right, now with the attempts to reach the goodness that you're sure must be lurking inside me if you could only just *reach* it!" she cried, melodramatically laying the back of her hand across her forehead. "Save yourself the trouble. You can sweet-talk me,you can patronize me, you can even threaten me...nothing you can say will sway me from my master."

Harry took a step back, his face sad. "Then you deserve him."

"I'll take that as a compliment, even though I know you meant it to sound threatening." She pressed up against the bars of hiscell. Harry backpedaled another step. "You know, this is supposed to be the part where the evil ex-lover, having entwined the hero in her web, taunts him sexually and displays her shapely body parts in an attempt to, ahem, get a rise out of him. Then your line would be something in the manner of 'Get away from me, vile wench, you'll never get any satisfaction out of me.' Then I'm supposed to toss my hair about, give an evil cackle,display my cleavage shamelessly and promise you a long, slow death full ofspiders and hot pokers and...oh, I don't know...quicksand, perhaps." Shegrinned merrily at him.

Harry shook his head. "Are you enjoying yourself?"

She shrugged. "Eh. It has its moments."

**********

Quinn watched Hermione pacing in a circle in the middle of a chamber a safe distance from the crypt. "I think you're being a tad hasty," she commented.

"Hasty? Hasty? Allegra's taken Harry, we can't get into the crypt without him, she'll do her thing at midnight, get the tablets, do the changeover and that'll be the end of the world as we know it not to mention the end of Harry. Forgive me for feeling a sense of urgency."

"Urgency without a plan of action is wasted energy."

"I have a plan of action. I'm going after him."

"*You're* going after him?"

"Well...you're coming with me."

"And you and I all by ourselves are going to infiltrate Allegra's secret hideout, free Harry and save the world, is that it?"

Hermione stopped short, facing Quinn with her hands on her hips. "You have any better ideas? I'd be delighted to hear them!" Quinn said nothing."Then shut up! What are you, afraid of a little action? I thought you were a good Enforcer!"

"I *was* a good Enforcer, and part of being a good Enforcer involves knowing when you're outnumbered!"

Hermione stepped closer to her, one hand out. "Quinn, I don't know you that well. But I have to wonder if you have any idea what it's like to really share your life with someone. To be there for every significant moment, every triumph, every tragedy and to be so close to them that it's hard to tell where you end and they begin." She took a breath, her eyes shining, her words coming quickly and with agitation. "Well, *I* know what that's like. I'm lucky enough to have someone who is as essential to my life as the air I *breathe* and then I was lucky enough to fall in love with him!" Her last phrases were almost shouted. She stepped back and took ahold of herself, and when she spoke again, she spoke softly. "I understand your hesitance. You're under no obligation to come along, but I - am - going. I can't stay here and do nothing, I'll run mad." She resumed her pacing. Quinn followed her with her eyes.

"Hermione, you know I'm with you all the way."

Hermione smiled sideways at her. "I do now."

"What's your plan?"

Hermione reached into her pocket and pulled out the Apparation locator that Sorry had given her. "Sneak in," she said.

Quinn gestured towards the locator. "So we Apparate to Allegra's hideout using Sorry's locator as a guide."

"Yes."

"A lot of things have to go our way for this to work," Quinn said, ticking them off on her fingers. "Sorry has to be *at* the hideout, wherever that is, and not off in Broken Spoke, Oklahoma getting double-tall lattes for the whole crew. Those locators have to function properly, which is by no means guaranteed. We have to manage to sneak by Allegra's wizards once we get there. And as I'm sure you're aware those locators will only put us within 10 meters of Sorry's position, and for all we know 10 meters away could be in the middle of a lake or something."

Hermione sighed. "Well, I know how to swim." She looked around. "I suppose there's no time like the present. I'm so anxious I feel like I'm about to jump right out of my skin."

Quinn nodded, holstering her wand. Hermione held out the Apparation locator. "Ready?"

Quinn hesitated a moment. "Let me see that," she said. Hermione handed her the locator. "I used to be in charge of locators for my squad. They can get screwed up pretty easily, I'd better check it before we trust our physical integrity to it." She examined it visually for a moment, then held up her wand and said a charm over it. The locator glowed bright blue in response, which seemed to please her. "Seems okay." She handed it back to Hermione.

"All right, let's go," she said, holding out her hand palm up with the locator in the middle of it. Quinn laid her hand over it and wrapped her fingers around Hermione's so they were both touching the locator. "Now."

The two women vanished. Hermione shut her eyes tight as she Disapparated, keeping them closed as she felt herself rematerialize. There was ground beneath her feet and air around her body; at least they weren't in the middle of a lake. She felt Quinn's hand grasped tightly in her own.

She cautiously opened one eye, then the other. Quinn was standing before her with her eyes also shut. "Psst," Hermione hissed. "You can look now." Quinn opened them, dropping Hermione's hand.

Hermione looked around. They were in a narrow tunnel made of rough stone with an arched ceiling. It was lit with flaming torches set into the wall every twenty feet or so. Quinn sighed. "Oh great. This is *so* much different than the dank stone tunnel we were just in."

Herminoe turned in a circle. "Where are we? Do you suppose this is Allegra's hideout?"

"If it is, I'm very disappointed in her. It's so cliche and Gothic." She cocked her head. "Do you hear anything?"

Hermione listened. "No." She fumbled in Harry's kit bag, into which she'd also transferred the contents of her pack, and came out with Cho's compass. She grinned, relieved. "We're in the right place...look, the compass face is green...that means Harry is close." She pulled out Harry's invisibility cloak. "Come on, we can't be too careful." Quinn stepped to her side and Hermione draped the cloak around both of them.

The two women began slowly walking along the edge of the corridor, following Hermione's compass as best they could. "Wherever we are, it justkeeps getting creepier and creepier," Quinn whispered. Hermione nodded in complete agreement. The walls were damp and in places overgrown with lichen. They didn't see another living soul for several minutes. Finally the passage began to slope gently upward, and the sound of voices began to filter down to them. "Shh," Quinn whispered. They both stopped and listened. "Sounds like five or six people." They inched forward and the illumination grew brighter.

The corridor opened up into a balcony that looked down into a pit-like room, roughly circular. Quinn and Hermione snuck up to the ledge and peered over. Half a dozen witches and wizards were moving about arranging some chairs and tables. Near the far side of the room was a raised circular platform; sitting upon it was an ordinary straight-backed wooden chair fitted with wrist and ankle irons. Hermione shivered. "Kinky," she muttered.

"Where does she want this thing?" one of the wizards called across the room.

"I don't know. I think it's for the tablets, so probably near the chair."The first wizard was lugging a thick wooden podium across the room. "Where's Carlisle?" the second wizard said. "He's the expert."

"He's still in Philadephia. Allegra left him in charge down in the catacombs."

Hermione blinked. "He's...he's not here?" she said. Quinn returned her puzzled look. "If he's not here then how did *we* get here?"

"I don't know...perhaps he was here and he only just left."

"We've been here five minutes, that's a bloody huge coincidence." She took the locator out of her pocket. "What did you do to this thing back in Philly?"

"Nothing! I just checked it!"

"This could be a trap if we've been brought here on purpose," Hermione said, frowning.

"Trap or not, Harry *is* here, right?" Hermione nodded. "Then we don't have much choice. Come on, let's get moving."

**********

Harry sat cross-legged on the floor of his cell, experiencing an odd combination of extreme stress and extreme boredom. Being the only occupant in the five cells that he could see, he had no company except the wizard who sat at the door guarding him. Allegra hadn't been lying about the enchantments around the cell, he'd tried an experimental unlocking charm on it and the response had nearly fried his arm off. The guard hadn't tried to stop him, probably because he knew the deterrent value of the punishment would be far more effective at preventing escape attempts than any warning he could deliver verbally.

Footsteps were drawing nearer, a whole group of them. Harry got to his feet and faced the door as Allegra came in, accompanied by four of her wizards in matching dark green cloaks with silver piping around the seams and edges. Harry jerked his head towards them. "Who's that, your honor guard?" he said.

Allegra smiled. "Just some of my little helpers." She nodded towards Harry. The guard at the door stood up and withdrew a large gold key from the pocket of his cloak. He inserted it into the keyhole and the entire door of the cell glowed red for a moment then died down. One of Allegra's wizards opened the door and yanked Harry out by the arm, slapping chains on his wrists as he did so. "Those are enchanted chains...unbreakable," Allegra said. "So don't try it." She turned and walked out. Two of her wizards grabbed Harry's arms and marched him out of the room, the other two wizards bringing up the rear. Harry's mind raced, thinking of escape. He could break ordinary chains, but not enchanted ones...at least not in this situation. Sitting calmly in his office with time to concentrate he could do it. Even if he could manage to break them, he was quite efficiently surrounded.

After a long trip through many dank and dimly lit corridors they came into a circular pit-like room with a raised platform at one end. A dozen or so witches and wizards were standing about, waiting. Allegra stepped to the raised platform and made imperious gestures with one arm; the wizards holding Harry maneuvered him to the middle of the floor facing her. They removed the chains but kept firm grips on his arms and shoulders. "Is this your throne room?" he said sarcastically. "Holding court for your loyal subjects?"

"I serve my master."

"Voldemort never managed to kill me in the dozen or so times he tried, what makes you think *you* can do it?"

She ignored him, glancing around at their surroundings. "This is my little hideaway. What do you think?"

He looked around. "Nice. Homey. Could use a coat of paint and some track lighting." He looked back at her. "Why have you dragged me down here? You can't change me over yet, you can't get the tablets until five a.m."

"Very true. But we do have business to take care of before the ritual is ready."

Harry suddenly felt quite sad looking at her and listening to her casual manner in discussing his upcoming demise. "Do you have any feelings left, Allegra?"

She stepped down to his level and stood before him. "Oh, are we to talk about the past, are we? Goody."

"No, I really want to know."

"Why this sudden interest in me?"

"I've always been extremely interested."

"Because you want to see me strung up and punished for what I did to you."

"I want to see you punished for what you did to a lot of people. It's not about me."

"Oh, yes it is, Harry," she said, leaning forward, her eyes flashing. "It's always about *you.* You're the great Harry Potter and everyone worships the ground you walk on."

He shook his head. "Don't insult my intelligence. You're not doing all this because you're jealous of whatever power you think I have."

"You only want to know why I'm doing all this because it will make you feel better to have a reason. You want to know if it's because I want the power, or the control, or the ability to cancel Christmas if I want to, or maybe my mother just never loved me. Well, perhaps there is no reason. Maybe I just like it. Maybe I'm just a bad person."

"You don't think you're a bad person."

"How do you know?"

"No one ever does, even if they clearly are one."

"You always want to find something good in everyone, Harry. It's a crutch I fortunately don't share."

"Did you ever care about me? At all?" he said, the sudden question taking her by surprise. He had wondered about this at least a million times over the years and he thought he might actually get an honest answer at this moment. "Or was it all just an act?"

She sighed. "It's difficult to tell where reality ends and the act begins, to tell you the truth." She smiled coldly. "I knew that if I ever wanted to beat you I had to *know* you. So I seduced you. It wasn't hard. You were just a kid, giddy with all the trappings of your new job at the I.D. and eager to embark on a vision quest like a real live grownup. You couldn't wait to prove yourself...and not just on the job. You were Lefty's most enthusiastic student in training classes and you were overeager and clumsy in bed."

Harry just shook his head, one eyebrow cocked witheringly. "Do you all have some sort of standard Evil 101 textbook? 'Chapter 3: How to discourage your opponent by attacking his masculinity.' Fortunately I don't need your validation of my sexual prowess...in fact I'd be delighted to learn that you faked it every time. I've always hated the idea that I made any part of your time with me enjoyable."

Allegra resolutely ignored him, though he could see that his lack of reaction to her taunts rattled her. She continued. "Back then, I saw in your eyes a youthful vigor and a brash readiness to try anything." She peered at him. "I don't see that brashness there now. You're not giddy, and you're not eager. You've seen too much and you've been hurt too badly."

"Don't flatter yourself. I never loved you."

"If you say so. But I made you into a real adult, Harry. Not even you can deny that. You would not be the man you are today if it weren't for me."

"Perhaps not." He raised his head and looked into her eyes. "Perhaps I'd be a better one."

She stepped to the raised platform, back in charge. "Tonight I will change you over. It will be a shame to lose a person such as yourself in the world from a purely academic standpoint, after all you are the only one of your kind, but the benefits far outweigh the risks in that regard."

"Did you drag me down here to listen to another villainous monologue? Save it, I've heard it all before."

"No, I have another purpose." She picked up a sword that was leaning against the chair on the platform and idly twirled it against the stone floor. "I'm doing this for a lot of reasons."

"To undo all the spells I've ever performed and return Voldemort to his full power."

"You'd think, wouldn't you?"

He blinked. "But...I thought that..."

She grinned at him. "Who told you that? Your friend Sorry?" Harry stared, all the color falling from his face. "Oh yes, I know all about it. If you think that he could fool me with his little double-agent routine then you must have a very low opinion of me indeed. Even with Liu's help he couldn't manage it."

Harry was speechless. A cold lead ball was forming in the pit of his stomach. If she knows about Sorry, what else does she know? "Why haven't you..."

"Drug him out the back and blasted him into a million pieces? He's far too useful to be wasted. As long as he thinks he's fooling me he'll keep doing a fabulous job of researching the changeover for me. He's just as interested as I am in what's on those tablets...and in case you're hoping he'll conveniently mistranslate something so I can't change you over, then I'm sorry to disappoint you. I have another changeover expert working independently, one that Sorry doesn't know about."

Harry shook his head. "You do plan ahead, don't you?"

"An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. But we were discussing the changeover. According to the documents I uncovered months ago which started this whole quest, the ritual will only reverse those spells that the wizard has intentionally performed. So your babyhood victory is immune."

"What a shame. How disappointed your master must have been."

"My master is indifferent to Voldemort. Your changeover will have other effects that will benefit us." Harry suddenly felt like he'd stepped into the middle of a play where everyone knew their lines but him. "I see by the look on your face that you'd assumed my master *was* Voldemort." Harry's mouth opened and closed a few times. "It's unwise to assume in your line of work. When did I ever say that I served Voldemort?"

Harry's mind raced. She'd always referred to him as "my master." He'd just thought that...idiot, he scolded himself. You *did* assume. "Who then?" he managed.

Her smile widened. "No, I don't think so." She clucked her tongue at him. "You know better." Harry's heart was pounding. He wasn't sure he could take another surprise. Allegra was holding far more of the cards than he'd originally thought. "Now then. We keep getting distracted, but I do have a purpose here." She began to pace back and forth across the raised platform, tapping the sword against the floor in time with the click of her heels against the stones. "The changeover I am to do on you this morning is difficult even in the best of circumstances. The fact that it's *you* on whom I am attempting it only exacerbates the difficulties. So I need you to do something for me." She stopped and fixed him with a steady gaze. "If the ritual is to be successful, you must be in the correct frame of mind. Therefore I need you to submit yourself willingly and without resistance."

For a moment Harry wondered if she was joking...but soon enough saw that she wasn't. He snorted brief laughter. "Don't hold your breath."

"Believe me, it will make things a great deal easier on you."

Harry set his jaw, marveling that she could even entertain the delusion that he'd agree to just surrender to her. "Allegra, you're insane if you think I'll submit without resistance."

She winked at him. "You may not think so, but you will." She glanced at one of her wizards near the door and gave him a brief nod. He turned and left the room. Everyone waited...Harry was beginning to get a very bad feeling.

A few moments later the wizard came back into the room, followed by another wizard dragging something behind him, something that was struggling. As they entered the throne room Harry's blood ran cold. "Oh no," he breathed.

It was Hermione.

She was gagged; her hands were bound loosely before her and she looked flustered and disheveled. Her eyes darted anxiously around the room. The wizard dragged her up onto the platform and stood her before Harry. Allegra moved to stand behind her, placing one arm amicably about her shoulders. Hermione just stared straight ahead, her whole body tense.

Harry felt like his brain was trying to fly apart at the seams. He couldn't concentrate, all he could do was stare at Hermione standing there bound while he was helpless and surrounded by Circle wizards. Allegra could do anything she liked to her, anything at all. He suspected that he knew what she'd meant when she'd assured him that he *would* surrender. "It's okay," he mouthed at Hermione.

Allegra ran one finger down Hermione's jawline. "Look who we found skulking about," she purred. "Isn't love wonderful? She came here to save you, I imagine. She'd have done better to have stayed home. Her friend escaped but we'll find her soon enough. Do not entertain thoughts of rescue. Professor Cashdollar may have been a good Enforcer but this room is surrounded by enough wizards and witches to blast her into oblivion." She looked at Hermione, whose jaw was clenched so tight Harry wondered that her teeth didn't crumble. "Thank you for coming," she said softly. "You've given me the perfect tool to use against Harry."

In a burst of rage Harry tried to run forward but the wizards holding him yanked him back so hard his arms nearly pulled out of their sockets. "Let her go," he growled, trying to sound a lot more threatening than he felt.

Allegra made a big show of considering this carefully. "Hmm. No, I think I'd better keep her here." She walked around to stand behind Hermione, leaning on her shoulders. "What would you do to save her, Harry?"

He stared into Hermione's eyes, every muscle tensed and his heart thudding heavily against his ribcage. He said nothing. Allegra already seemed to know that he would do anything to save her.

"I would be willing to let her go unharmed, Professor Cashdollar too...if you'll submit to the changeover willingly." She reached up and pinched Hermione's cheek with a twinkle in her eye. She was enjoying this.

Harry's eyes darted from one woman's face to the other. Hermione shook her head at him, emphatically. He shot her a look...what do you expect me to do? it said.

"Give me your answer, Harry!" Allegra exclaimed.

"I'll do it," he said through gritted teeth. Hermione shut her eyes. Just buy yourself some time, he thought. Time to think. "I'll do it, I'll surrender...as long as you promise not to hurt her."

Allegra smiled. "Agreed." She walked around her prisoner, examining her. Hermione just stood there, facing grimly forward. "What is it that you see in her, anyway?"

Harry couldn't take his eyes off her, scarcely daring to believe that Allegra was through with them. "I wouldn't expect you to understand."

"Look at me," she said, stepping to one side and spreading her arms wide. She was wearing a black velvet bodysuit that laid over her skin like paint. "I'm a knockout! I'm sexy! I'm a hot little number! Don't look at me like that, you thought so yourself at one time." Harry just scowled at her. "And now look at her," Allegra said, standing at Hermione's side and gesturing towards her. "I mean really, Harry. She's wearing *khakis.* And *chambray!* And look at her hair...so *wavy* and *plain.* She doesn't have too bad of a body, really. I could put her in a black vinyl catsuit that'd knock your socks off." She grinned at him. Harry was waiting for the other shoe to drop. She'd gotten him to cave, what else could she possibly want right now?

But Allegra wasn't finished with him, it seemed. She glanced from one to the other, evaluating their locked gazes. "How long since the first time you two doth made the beast with two backs?" She thought a moment. "Hmm. I'm guessing no more than a week. You've still got that new-passion aura hanging around you. It wasn't there when I met her in Detention." She strolled down from the platform, around Harry and then back again, taking her time. "You should be thanking me, really. There's nothing like an impending crisis to make one acknowledge long-buried feelings." At this, Harry did look at her, surprised. "Ha. Thought I didn't know, didn't you? I saw the look in your eyes when you used to talk about her, which was all the bleeding time." Her voice took on a sneering tone. "Hermione this, and Hermione that, and blah blah blah bloody Hermione was Christ down from the bleeding cross. Best friend, my ass." She stood next to Hermione again, idly playing with a strand of her silky black hair and tapping the flat of the sword against her thigh. She sighed and shrugged. "Too bad, really. You should know better than to give me such delicious leverage."

Harry gave her the deadliest stare he could manage. "You wouldn't dare." Allegra was looking at him with a speculative gaze that he didn't like one bit. A cold sliver of fear slid through his abdomen. He was painfully aware of Hermione, standing silent and probably frightened, just at the edge of his field of vision. "Please," he said quietly, deciding that he couldn't keep up his defiant facade when faced with such a delicate situation. Ordinarily if an enemy attempted to intimidate him into giving in he had a strict policy of not blinking. But now...he just couldn't. He couldn't risk provoking Allegra into harming Hermione. "Please leave her alone." He swallowed hard, making a quick and surprisingly easy decision. "I'll beg if you want me to," he said in a low voice. A small sacrifice of his pride was nothing if it placated this woman in front of him...a woman whom, at this moment, was wholly unpredictable to him. "You promised not to hurt her if I agreed to give in."

Allegra walked around behind Hermione. "Yes, I remember. You know what, though? I lied."

And with that, she reached up, tore the gag out of Hermione's mouth andthen plunged the sword through her back.

All the breath was pulled from of Harry's chest as if someone had stuck a fishing hook down his throat and yanked it out. He wanted to cry out but couldn't for lack of air, he felt like someone wearing steel-toed boots had just kicked him in the stomach. Hermione sucked in a huge gurgling breath, her back arching like a bow, the tip of the sword protruding through her chest and blood gushing out of the wound to soak the front of her shirt. Over her shoulder Allegra's face was grinning and grinning. Harry felt his mind trying to get away from him like a bird on a tether straining for the sky. For a moment he thought that the sight of her body, a body that he had held in his arms and touched with great tenderness, impaled on a sharp piece of metal might push him right over the edge. He held onto himself with a great effort; it was like trying to keep a grip on a greased rope. He struggled against the wizards holding him, his face frozen with his mouth open in a voiceless cry. Allegra withdrew the sword and Hermione fell to the platform; in a pure refinement of cruelty she gave a small nod to the wizards holding Harry and they released him...in some distant, still coherent part of his mind Harry marveled that it wasn't enough for her to murder the woman he loved, she had to make sure that she died in his arms.

Harry rushed up to the platform and fell to his knees beside her, drawing her up into his lap, panic flooding his mind and rendering him incapable ofconscious thought. "Oh God...Hermione..." he croaked. "Oh no..." She stared up into his face, blood dribbling from her lips. He pressed his hand against the wound in her chest even though he knew in some part of his mind that it was hopeless, feeling the blood pouring from the wound in her back and staining his jeans. Her hand lifted slowly to his face and settled on his cheek. Harry held it there, dry breaths rasping in and out of his throat, too horrified to even react. Allegra stood over them, the bloody sword held at her side, watching.

Harry looked into Hermione's eyes. "No," he whispered, seeing them grow dim. "No, don't leave me...please, Hermione..." He clutched her body to his chest. "No no no no..." He pressed his forehead to hers as if he could give her the life that was in his own body. A long rattling breath escaped her throat and she shuddered once, then went limp. Harry held her tighter, blank shock and despair clouding his mind. He looked up at Allegra's grim face, his own streaked with blood. "Why?" he cried. "She was no threat to you, why?"

She bent down and looked into his eyes. "Not because she was a threat to *me.* Because she was dear to *you.*

"I loved her," he choked out.

"Then that was her bad luck, wasn't it?" She reached down and smoothed Hermione's hair. "What do you have left to live for now, Harry? She was the last thing, wasn't she?"

He stared up at her face, the grief chased from his mind by blinding homicidal rage that fell over his vision like a red haze. "I will kill you," he said, his voice low and hoarse and deadly. "I'll get away from here or die trying. And then I will come after you and I won't stop until I find you and then I'm going to *hurt* you until you *beg* me to kill you...but I won't. I will drag it out for months and years and when I'm finally done I will reach into your chest and tear out your heart...as you've just done to me," he finished, his voice catching on the last phrase.

"Brave words. You may even do as you say. But it won't bring her back."

Harry held her gaze for a moment but the crushing weight of what had just happened was too much for him and his face crumpled. He bowed his head into Hermione's shoulder, one hand tangling into her hair, his shoulders shaking with silent sobs that were inadequate to express the grief that suffused him. Allegra made a small motion to the wizards who'd been holding him earlier and they came forward and pried him away from Hermione, his arms gripping her body like a vise. "No," Harry kept repeating quietly. His mind was trying to get away from it and he couldn't think or act or do anything as they hauled him to his feet and began to lead him out of the room. His feet wouldn't move on their own, Allegra's wizards dragged him along like a dead body...which was, in truth, what he felt like.

Allegra watched until he was gone, then spoke to the other wizards in the room. "Get rid of this," she said, motioning to the body at her feet. "We won't have any trouble controlling him now."

**********

They tossed Harry into his cell, slamming the bars home and leaving him alone with that same stone-faced guard. Harry paced back and forth, his hands making meaningless spastic movements in the air, first grasping at his hair and then pulling at his cloak and then rubbing at the bloodstains on his shirt and sleeves. His chest heaved with great gulping breaths of air as if he'd just run the hundred-meter dash.

He stopped and let his head droop; his chin trembled and he felt the sorrow rising in him like magma in a volcano that would erupt and tear him to bits. He saw her in his mind, laughing, dancing, smiling at him across a pillow backlit by the moonlight. He clenched his hands into fists, hands that still remembered the texture of her skin, pressing them to his face to shut out the image of the life leaving her eyes.

He rubbed at the scar in the palm of his hand as he paced. I let her die, Ron, he thought. I let you die, and now I've let her die. I've failed you both in every way. I had two best friends. I had a substitute brother and I had a woman I loved, and now there is only me. Alone with nothing but my revenge.

He began to shake and his legs buckled beneath him; he fell to his knees on the stone floor of the cell. He threw his head back and screamed out his grief to the ceiling, his whole body thrumming in sympathy with the despair that ran through his blood in a poisonous tide. His voice gave out and he sagged to a sitting position, burying his face in his hands and waiting for the tears that refused to come as they had come so freely for Ron...but this was worse, far too much worse for mere sobs to express. Ron had been his best friend. Hermione had been...she was something I can't put into words, he thought. And she was all I had left. He crumpled forward until his forehead rested against the stones, his body folded in half at the waist with his arms clutched around his midsection as if to physically hold himself together. Ron hadn't died in his arms, and he hadn't had to feel the life leave his body as he'd had to feel it leave hers, knowing that a part of himself died with her.

**********

Hermione and Quinn, both concealed under the Invisibility Cloak, skulked along the corridor. "Check the compass," Quinn whispered.

Hermione pulled it out. "Bloody hell, it's back to white again." In thelast half an hour the compass had switched from green to white and then back again, now it was once again white. "They can't be moving him that far that often."

"They may be keeping him in a magically shielded location that the homing charm can't see."

Hermione nodded. "Yes, that's possible." She looked around. "Where the hell are we *now?*" In their forays around this...whatever this was, they had seen dungeons and large meeting halls and what looked like residential chambers and a lot of rooms full of cells. Now they were back in yet another dank, dimly lit corridor. They had passed a few people in the hallways, but it seemed like this was a very large facility and the number of Circle members was relatively small.

Quinn was looking around, frowning. "You know, I have an idea where we might be."

"Where?"

"This might be Lexa Kor."

Hermione frowned. "The old prison?"

"Yes. It was decommissioned when Azkaban was built, some six hundred years ago, I think."

"I remember hearing of it, but I don't remember where it is."

"No one knows. The day Azkaban opened its doors, Lexa Kor vanished right off the face of the earth. One day there it was, sitting in the valley, and the next day all that was there were some sheep. No one knows what happened to it."

"So how did we end up here? And where *is* here?"

"Some people think that Lexa Kor was stolen by dark wizards and put into a pocket."

"That's difficult. Anyone can take a point in space and expand it past its physical boundaries," Hermione said, thinking of the back seat of the Weasley's old Ford Anglia, "but it takes a lot of magic to make a pocket large enough to hold an entire castle."

"But think of the advantages. If they pick a small enough point to expand, once the castle's inside the pocket it'd be virtually invisible! It wouldn't show up on maps and it wouldn't be accessible unless you *knew* to Apparate here." She looked around. "Yep, I think I'm right. And I might be able to remember the floor plan, I have a book about it." She turned in a circle, took a look out the window, and walked up and down the corridor for a moment, dragging Hermione along with her. "I think we're near the western outer wall."

"That'd be really helpful if we knew where we were going."

"We should try and head to the main public areas...Allegra would probably pick those to use as her headquarters and meeting rooms. And that pit-room we found when we first got here, that was the execution theater! Stupid, I should have figured it out before this." She grabbed Hermione's hand. "Let's go. This way."

They hurried through the corridors, Quinn leading the way. They came to a Y-junction and paused for a moment. Quinn was pondering which way to go when they both looked up in alarm as a horrible sound came to their ears. It was a scream, a terrible wrenching scream that sounded like it came from the very depths of someone's soul; it was a sound of absolute suffering. Hermione gasped, growing cold all over. "That's Harry," she whispered.

"Are you sure?" Quinn whispered back.

"Positive."

"My God, that scream! I've never heard anything like it!"

"I have," Hermione said grimly. "I've heard him make that sound only once before. I can't imagine what could be causing him to make it now." Shelooked at Quinn under the cloak, anxiety clearly visible in her eyes." Let's go. We've got to get to him."

"Sounded like it was coming from this direction," Quinn said, pointing down the right-hand corridor. Hermione nodded in agreement and they walked quickly past the Y-intersection, their need to hurry at odds with their need to be as quiet as possible.

Hermione's mind raced as they passed through one corridor after another. What is she doing to him? she thought. Torture? Some sort of attack charm that's driving him mad and making him see things? She tried not to think about it and just concentrated on getting to him.

Finally they came to a large double door. Quinn stopped in front of it. "I think this is the infirmary. We can go through it, it'll save us some time." She put her ear to the door. "I don't hear anything."

Hermione looked up and down the corridor and then pulled the door open; they quickly slipped inside and closed the door after them. It was a large, depressing room lined with beds and steel tables. The air seeemd to echo with the cries of the injured, the tortured, the despondent. "Let's hurry," Hermione hissed. "This place is creepy." She grabbed Quinn's arm and they scurried across the floor. Hermione kept her head down, not wanting to look around, so when Quinn gave a brief cry and stopped short she was almost jerked off her feet in surprise. "What?" she whispered.

Quinn's eyes were wide and shocked. "Look!" she hissed, pointing to what looked like an autopsy table.

Hermione gasped and clapped her hands over her mouth to stop the cry that rose in her throat. Lying there on the table was a body...her own body. "Oh my God!" she said shakily. "That's...me!"

Quinn ducked out from underneath the cloak and edged closer, finally stretching out a finger to poke the body's leg. "Well, it's real...and it does look like you." Hermione forced herself to come forward. The body was dressed in the same clothes she was wearing at the moment, except that she wasn't covered in blood. "She's been stabbed," Quinn said, pointing to a gaping wound in the body's chest. She met Hermione's eyes across the table. "I think..." She sighed. "I think I might know why Harry was screaming."

In her surprise Hermione hadn't even thought of what it meant, but the truth of Quinn's words slammed home in her brain with an almost audible clanging sound. "Oh no," she breathed. "Allegra killed her in front of him so he'd think I was dead!" She looked up at Quinn with a stricken expression on her face. "I never thought she'd do anything so horrible to him."

"Oh, of course not. Just because she's attacked innocent people, killed those who went against her and plans to undo your boyfriend's very existence is no reason to think that she'd do anything *evil.*"

Hermione wanted to feel annoyed at Quinn's sarcasm, but given the validity of her point she couldn't bring herself to it. "Harry was right," she murmured. "I wouldn't last a day in this business. I do look for the most flattering explanation."

Quinn was poking the body's arm. "How do you think she did this?"

"Well, it can't be a Polyjuice potion, that requires that one be alive. The second this woman died she'd have reverted back to herself. It must be a glamour, they can be applied to anything."

Quinn jumped as if she'd suddenly remembered something and thrust a hand into one of the many pockets in her cloak and came out with a pair of large and exruciatingly ugly 70's style horn-rimmed spectacles with blinding silver lenses like thin films of mercury.

"What are those?"

"Old Enforcer trick. They're Glamour Glasses. Put them on and you can see through any glamour." She slipped them onto her face, her eyes on the fake Hermione's body. "Yep. Glamour. Big time."

"Who is it?"

"I don't recognize her. But here, see for yourself. Another function of Glamour Glasses. Just touch the masked object while wearing them..." She laid a hand on the body's arm and the glamour rippled and dissipated. "...and all is revealed." The woman on the slab was a stranger to Hermione. She looked about 35 and was clothed in dark red wizard's robes. "Probably someone who didn't jump high enough when Allegra said 'frog.' "Quinn took off the Glamour Glasses and shook her head sadly. "Why would she do this? Why the subterfuge?"

Hermione, her face thoughtful, shook her head to indicate she didn't know. "Here's a better question...how did she know what I'm wearing right now? It's accurate right down to the tear in my cloak. That only happened a few hours ago, in the catacombs." They locked eyes, the same thought flashing between them, then they both began looking surreptitiously around the room.

"Are we being watched?"

"I don't know, but the questions keep piling up, don't they? How did we get here if Sorry's in Philadelphia? How did Allegra duplicate my appearance? And how did she trap Harry in the first place?" She regarded her companion through narrowed eyes. "Anything you want to tell me, Professor Cashdollar?"

Quinn looked back, her gaze flat. "Anything you want to *ask* me, Dr. Granger?"

For a long moment the two women stood regarding each other silently from opposite sides of the dead body before them. Finally Hermione held up the cloak, beckoning Quinn inside. "Come on, let's find Harry. We'll worry about the rest later."

**********

"Shh...can you see anything?"

Quinn slowly poked her head around the edge of the doorway. "One guard."

"Do you see Harry?"

Another peek. "Yes. Far cell."

"How does he look? Is he okay?"

"Later. Let's worry about the guard first."

"Let me." Hermione raised her wand and they slunk as one into the long, narrow room. They crept closer and closer until they were about a foot away. Hermione thrust her wand forward and stunned the guard before he even realized they were there. "Accio!" she whispered, gesturing towards his pockets with her wand. A large golden key flew out of his cloak andinto her hand.

Quinn held her tightly by the arm. "Now, be calm. We don't want to raise a ruckus and alert the entire building. Also, you don't want to alarm Harry. He's had one shock too many today. Just take it easy."

Hermione nodded. They walked calmly to the door of Harry's cell. For a moment Hermione just stood there looking at him, tears springing to her eyes. He was kneeling on the floor in the middle of the cell, curled up ina ball with his head resting on the floor and his arms wrapped around his stomach. Every few seconds his chest would hitch in the clear aftermath of a bout of intense grief. Hermione thrust the key into the lock and the entire door of the cell glowed and then popped open. Harry's head snapped up as the door swung open and then shut again, seemingly by itself.

Hermione steeled herself and then slipped the cloak off. Harry's eyes narrowed to angry slits; he sucked in a sharp breath and scrambled backwards until he wedged himself into the far corner, pressing up to his feet against the wall and staring at her. Hermione tried not to look at the blood still staining his clothing.

"Harry," she said softly, taking a step forward, her hand out. He tried to back up another step but couldn't.

"How much do you think I can take?" he said through gritted teeth, the anger fairly dripping from his words.

She blinked back the tears and took another step towards him. Quinn hung well back, not wishing to complicate matters. "Sweetheart...it's me. Hermione."

He shook his head once, emphatically. "Hermione's dead," he said in a flat, lifeless voice. It stung her to hear it. "It's a trick. Another trick. What more do you want?" he growled, as if he could talk to Allegra through her. "You've taken the last thing I loved. Can't you be satisfied with that?" he shouted.

Hermione flinched back slightly but moved still closer to him. He was hanging on by a very thin thread. "Harry, just relax. I know what you've been through in the last few hours...because I know what I'd go through if it were me. Just listen to my voice. Quinn and I came here looking for you. I heard you scream. I saw the body," she said, speaking clearly and deliberately. "The woman that she killed. She used a glamour to make her look like me." Harry's eyebrows twitched and he frowned, her words penetrating the mask of shock that still lay over his face. "She killed some unknown woman disguised as me. She wanted you to think I was dead." Throughout this speech she had been inching steadily closer until she stood right before him. "But Harry, I'm *not* dead. I'm right here, I'm fine." Harry blinked at her, she could see that he wanted to believe but he wasn't sure she wasn't another cruel scheme of Allegra's and he wasn't taking any chances.

"How do I know?" he whispered, his previous fury evaporating leaving only naked sorrow in its place.

"You will know." She reached out and picked up one of his hands. "Look at me. Just let yourself believe it." She pressed his hand to the left side of her chest, covering it with both of her own. "Feel my heartbeat. Know that it's me." She lifted one hand and laid it on his face. He flinched but didn't pull away. "It's true. She can't fool you with an impostor, because you know me better than anyone in the world. You told me that you love me. If you really do, then you know more than just my voice and my face and my favorite kind of wine. You know my soul, and you know it as no other but mine." She lowered her hand from his face to his chest, feeling the rapid thump of his heart beneath the skin. He looked into her eyes, and she could see the hope in them. She just waited, knowing he would feel the truth on his own.

His free hand rose to touch her face with hesitant fingertips...but as soon as they brushed her skin he drew them back as if her cheek burned. She smiled encouragingly and he touched her cheek again. "I'm not seeing things, am I?" he rasped.

"No. I'm real." His eyes fell shut and he sighed from deep in his chest. Hermione couldn't stand it any longer. She flung her arms around his neck and pulled his head to her shoulder. Harry stood there stiffly for a moment, then she felt his body relax and he clutched her to his chest, wrapping his arms around her so tightly she thought she could feel her ribs groaning in protest, but she didn't care. He was shaking like a leaf. Hermione stroked the back of his head with one hand. "Shh," she whispered. "It's okay." She'd never expected to be comforting *him* like this.

He drew back, grasped her head between his hands and began planting kisses all over her face. She just stood still and let him, holding onto his forearms. He embraced her again, more tightly than before, one hand rising to twine through her hair. He loosened his grip so he could look into her face. "When I saw you standing there I was sure I'd gone mad," he said, his voice hoarse. "I watched as she stabbed you through the back."

Hermione shut her eyes, horrified. "How awful that must have been."

"You have no idea. It was as if someone had turned me inside out." He leaned forward until their foreheads were resting against each other. "She wanted me to give in, and I would have. I had nothing left once she took you. I didn't care what happened to the world or if she succeeded in changing me over." He sighed. "I felt...I felt weak and alone and frightened." He looked in her eyes and she saw those feelings there still.

"That's how I felt when I realized she'd taken you," she said, smoothing his disheveled hair back from his damp brow. She squeezed him one more time and kissed him firmly. "All right. Are you ready to re-engage your mind to the task at hand?"

He smiled. "Give me a second. I feel like I've just run a marathon." He enfolded her in his arms once more, resting his cheek against her hair, and held her for a long moment. His hands roamed over her back and shoulders as if testing her reality. Finally he pulled back. "All right. I'm ready."

Quinn came forward and stood with them. "I don't suppose Persephone will be able to find us here."

Harry fumbled in his cloak. "She's been and gone, actually. She brought the Librarian's reply...I'm afraid I wasn't in a state of mind to look at it." He opened the envelope.

Hermione glanced around anxiously. "Shouldn't we get out of here?"

Harry shook his head. "Believe it or not, we're less likely to be caught in here. If we went wandering the corridors we'd run into someone before too long, but as long as no one decides to come visit me we're safer here." He opened the Librarian's letter. "'Dear Roman,'" he began to read.

"Who's Roman?" Hermione said, frowning.

Harry glanced at her, a bit sheepishly. "Um...that's my codename."

Quinn and Hermione exchanged an amused glance. "I'm still waiting to learn the secret handshake," Hermione said.

"May I read this please?" He cleared his throat and continued. "She says, 'I am most curious where you came to receive the spell you sent me, and who could possibly have sent it to you during your attacks. No one is supposed to know it. It's an artifact from the Progenitors, the first humans to harness the magical forces and become wizards. It isn't in the spellbooks because it cannot be preserved...it disappears from any writing within 48 hours. I've recopied it for you so you'll have time to study it.'"

"Interesting," Hermione murmured. "That's one way to keep a spell from falling into the wrong hands."

Harry continued. "'It's a powerful incantation, difficult to execute and control. The two spellcasters must be opposites in some significant way, old and young for example, but yet connected. Related, or Enforcer partners or some other connection. It takes extraordinary concentration and magical control to execute the spell without injuring yourself. If performed correctly, this spell will bind any enemies within visual or vocal range from using magic to do harm to anyone."

"Permanently?" Hermione said, amazed. Binding spells were exceedingly tricky and difficult. Even the most successful only had a temporary effect.

"No," Harry said, scanning the rest of the letter. "She says the effect is not permanent, but its duration depends on the connection between the wizards performing the spell. Still, any way of affecting multiple wizards at once is an advantage." He put down the paper and looked at it. "Do you think we can do it?"

She raised an eyebrow. "You and me?"

"We're opposites. Man and woman. And I'd say we're strongly connected."

"How is the spell performed?"

He flipped to the page where the Librarian had recopied the spell. "The incantation is in stanzas, which must be spoken simultaneously by each wizard. After the first three stanzas, the two wizards clasp hands and speak the fourth stanza together. That's it." He handed her the spell.

"You'll need a copy too, so we can learn it."

"I already know it," he said. "It came out of my head, remember? Now that I've recalled it once I can't seem to forget it."

She looked down at the spell, mouthing the words to herself. After a few repetitions she handed the parchment back to Harry. "Okay, got it."

Harry didn't question her, knowing all too well her propensity for learning things by heart. He folded the note from the Librarian and slipped it into one of the inner pockets of his cloak. "All right, let's go."

"Where are we going?" Quinn asked.

Harry bit his lip. "We should try and find her main control center so that the spell neutralizes as many of them as possible."

"How are we going to do this?" Hermione said. "They're not going to just stand there and let us say all these stanzas."

Harry thought for a moment. "We'll get under the Invisibility cloak and whisper the words of the spell. With luck they won't know we're even there until we're finished. Once they're neutralized we'll need to stun them quickly so they don't have a chance to escape...they won't be able to use magic against us but they can still beat us up if we're not careful. We'll Apparate them all back to the I.D. and let them sort it all out."

"Sounds so easy."

"It always does," Harry said. "Somehow it never is." He squeezed Hermione's hand and nodded to Quinn. "Let's go."

They turned to the door of the cell. The guard was still out cold. Harry stood at the bars and listened for a moment. "I don't hear anyone in the hallway. Sounds like the coast is clear."

He opened the door of the cell, then paused. "What's wrong?" Hermione said.

His eyes were darting around as if looking for something. "I don't know. I thought I felt something." Hermione stood perfectly still and strained her ears but heard only silence. The corridor appeared to be empty except for the sleeping guard.

Quinn was peering through the bars with narrowed eyes. "I have a bad feeling."

"I'm right there with you," Harry said. The air in the corridor outside the cells suddenly began to shimmer like the space above a hot road. Harry stepped back, pushing Hermione behind him. Color began to seep into the shimmering and in the space of a few seconds, Allegra was standing before them surrounded by a half-dozen of her wizard followers. She grinned at him.

"Oh, the look on your face, Harry. You always think you've got the market cornered on invisibility." Her expression turned sour as she saw Hermione standing there. "Oh, it's you."

"Alive and well, thanks," Hermione said furiously.

"I hope you're happy, you ruined a very meticulously planned charade."

"Why?" Harry said, his teeth clenched over the words. "What was the point, besides your own amusement?"

She shook her head at him. "I take no amusement in suffering. It's simply not a concern to me. And as to the point, well I'd think that'd be obvious. You might agree to submit but you never really would. I wanted to so dispirit you that you'd welcome death. What better way?"

"How did you know our relationship had changed?" Harry asked.

"I have my sources. Now, back in the cell with you." She extended her wand and the key to the door flew from Hermione's hand to be caught neatly by Allegra's gloved fingers. "You're not going anywhere. And whatever spell you're planning to use on me, it won't work as long as you're in here. The cells are protected by anti-incantation fields." Harry sighed and backed up a step. "Soon I'll go back to Philadelphia and collect the tablets."

"Now that I know Hermione is alive, there's no way I'll submit willingly."

"I'll work around it." She put her hands on her hips. "Even if the changeover doesn't work, it will be victory enough just to kill you." She advanced on him, bright hatred burning from her iceberg blue eyes. Harry backed up, keenly aware of his vulnerability in a cell where he was without magical assistance and outnumbered six to one. "Your kind represent a significant threat to us. Voldemort knew that and he tried to eliminate you as soon as you were born, and we all know how well *that* turned out. It makes my master and indeed myself very nervous to have any wizards like you walking about free."

"What's she talking about?" Hermione whispered from behind his shoulder.

She smiled. "Oh my, you haven't told her. I don't think you've told anyone, have you? Methinks someone's going to have a lot of explaining to do later." She sighed. "Since we all have some time to kill, there's someone here I'd like you to meet." She stepped aside to allow a figure to come forward, one who had until now stayed in the shadows. He came to the door of the cell and the light fell on his face. It was Gerald.

Hermione sucked in a shocked breath and tried to rush forward. Harry grabbed her arms and held her back. "You!" she cried. "Who are you? WHO ARE YOU?" Harry had hold of both of her arms above the elbow and kept her back tight to his chest; she struggled against him in an attempt to reach Gerald and perhaps physically rip the mask off his face if she could.

Gerald came forward to look down at her flushed and angry face. "You look so upset, Hermione. Didn't we have a good time together?"

She stopped struggling and just glared at him, breathing heavily. "I'd just like to know who it was I had a good time with."

Gerald looked back at Allegra. "What do you think?"

She shrugged. "It can't possibly matter now."

Gerald turned back to Harry and Hermione, Quinn lurking in the background, all three of them watching him with bated breath. Gerald's expression did not change while a ripple began at the crown of his head and passed over his body as he allowed the glamour to fall away. At the sight of his real appearance, Hermione leaned back against Harry's chest, a strangled cry escaping her throat. She could feel Harry stiffen behind her, his fingers tightening on her arms until his grip was nearly painful. "Oh...my...GOD!" she screamed at the man, unmasked.

It was Draco Malfoy.

He looked...toughened. As if he had been out in the world for a long time with very little in the way of the comforts of home. He was just Harry's height but very lean and sheathed in ropy muscle. He was wearing black jeans that hung low on his narrow hips, thick-soled engineer's boots and a sleeveless dark purple t-shirt. A thick chain attached to his belt hung in an arc against his leg and disappeared into his hip pocket; prominent veins snaked under the skin of his forearms. A black leather bandoleer lay across his chest, his wand slid into a slot over his breastbone. His formerly fair skin was weathered to a leathery tan, and his face was narrow and sharp-featured with hollow cheeks and a tight mean-looking mouth. His eyes were like chips of gray ice, their expression a world-weary thousand-yard stare. His most striking feature, however, was his hair. It had darkened from the platinum it had once been to a maplewood blond and fell well past his shoulders, twisted into hundreds of tiny braids, each of which ended in a shiny black bead. He just stood there waiting for the reaction, looking like nothing less than a complete badass.

Harry stared at him in the grip of total brainlock. Slowly, deliberately, he released Hermione's arms and walked forward until he stood before his former nemesis, whom he had believed dead. For an eternal moment he just stared at him, but he had to do something, even if it made no difference now. Harry hauled back and punched Draco across the jaw as hard as he could, which was quite hard indeed. Draco's head rocked back but he didn't even stumble. He looked back at Harry, a grim little smile on his face and a thin ribbon of blood dribbling from the corner of his mouth. "You've been waiting to do that for fifteen years, haven't you, Potter?" he said. His voice was gravelly, as if at some point someone had used his larynx to practice their tee shot.

"Draco, you *bastard,*" Hermione said, stepping forward. "Did you enjoy yourself? I hope you bloody well had a good time playing Gerald."

"He was a crushing bore, actually," he said, casually examining his fingernails. He smiled at her, a mischievous twinkle coming into his gray eyes. "*You've* got more stamina than I would have predicted, though... especially for a Mudblood." Harry lunged forward as if to attack him again, but Hermione grabbed him and yanked him back. Draco was looking from one to the other. "Well, look at the two of you. Isn't this cozy?" He stepped closer to Harry. "Remember that night I came to collect her for the company party?"

"How could I forget," Harry said.

"You should have seen yourself. Sitting there and just wishing every kind of pain and death upon me. It was all over your face. And then she came down the stairs...you did look beautiful, by the way...and your eyeballs just about popped right out of their sockets. I already knew she loved you just by the way she talked about you *incessantly,*" he said, rolling his eyes on the last word, "but it wasn't until then I realized it was mutual." He shrugged. "I suppose better late than never. Too bad you'll not have years and years to enjoy your relationship...although you do have the rest of your lives to spend together." He cocked his head and looked past them, life coming into his eyes for the first time as he did so. "Quinn, let's go. You've kept it up long enough."

Harry and Hermione stared, flabbergasted, as Quinn strode quickly past them and rushed into Draco's open arms. They kissed hungrily as if they'd been apart for a long time...which, Hermione supposed, they had been. "I *knew* it," Hermione said, her voice low and filled with a mixture of sadness and rage. "I just didn't want to believe it. I liked you too much to believe it."

Quinn looked at them. "I'm sorry, I really am. My job was just to get you here."

Hermione nodded. "The locator. Your knowledge of this facility. My appearance on the fake body. Even my relationship with Harry."

Harry spoke to Allegra. "You've had a direct pipeline into my life for months now, first through him and then through her."

Allegra stepped forward, laying a hand on Draco's shoulder. "He is an invaluable soldier. Years ago we faked his death so that he could assume any persona he liked and no one, not even the Circle, would know his identity. By helping deliver you to me he has earned his own life back. He can take his place in the inner sanctum. Perhaps he can even take his own father's spot...Lucius isn't the asset he used to be. And Professor Cashdollar has at least earned herself membership in the Circle." She smiled at her proteges. "We will leave you alone with yourselves," she said, executing a smug half-bow at Harry, who stood with his arms wrapped around Hermione and beads of sweat gathering at his brow. "When next we speak, everything will be ready. If you've any peace to make I suggest you make it now." With a swish of her robes she was gone, followed by Draco and Quinn, then her entourage of cloaked minions. The guard, who'd been revived, closed and sealed the door, leaving Harry and Hermione holding each other in the middle of the cell.

She clenched her fingers in the fabric of his shirt, her brain spinning in weary and shocked circles. "Draco," she whispered. "Harry, I slept with him."

"Shh. Try not to think about it."

"I can't stop! I feel like I'm about to crawl out of my skin! And Quinn! My God, Harry, we trusted her! We told her everything! Allegra knows so much!" She looked up at his face and saw that he too was trying to get a handle on the situation and having limited success.

"We can't trust anyone," he said grimly. "We have only ourselves now. I just hope it's enough."

"Harry...how are we going to get out of this?"

He sighed and held her tighter. "I don't know." After a long pause, he repeated it in a whisper. "I don't know."