Two to Obey

LAST CHAPTER: Harry's birthday meant leaving the Dursleys for good, having a good excuse to make a move on Mrs. Polkiss, and being taken out by Remus and the Weasley boys. As Britain's Most Eligible Bachelor and The Boy Who Lived, he threw a bit of his fame behind Mr. Weasley's Ministerial campaign and talked Hermione into holding the Seventh Year Shindig so that all the kids could tie one on and have a good time and still be well-protected. Harry finally starts putting the advice of his future self to work, by employing Sirius' mirror so that he can stay in contact with Malfoy and Thera. Not that he's particularly thrilled about that. Snape made an argument for evil people enjoying the simplicity and clean lines of Asian design and commiserated with Thera and Draco about how the Seventh Year Shindig could be turned into a big, fat Death Eater trap. Balder confronted Vivian about the whole Order lying to him all the time thing. Draco confronted Harry largely because he felt like confronting somebody. Hermione yelled at them both, and then there was an explosion...

Chapter 10: The Thick of the Fight

And we were sharp.

As sharp as knives.

And we were so gung-ho to lay down our lives...

-Billy Joel, "Goodnight, Saigon"

*******

When he apparated to Diagon Alley, Balder arrived nearly on top of about fifty Death Eaters. Luckily, they were busy terrorizing shoppers, so he dove into the nearest establishment and pressed himself into the space between the door and the large display window, taking out his wand and trying to think of a plan.

Then he looked up and realized that he had dived into the apothecary, and that a Death Eater was holding the pudgy little clerk up by the neck of his robes, pointing a wand in his face. Balder's arrival had apparently come as a surprise; both the clerk and the Death Eater were staring at him.

The Death Eater recovered, sending a curse at him. Ducking behind a barrel full of newt's eyes, Balder managed to stun the Death Eater, who collapsed to the floor. Breathing a sigh of relief, he rose to check on the clerk.

"I'm fine," the man said shakily. "Good shot, there." He glanced out the window. "Thank Merlin. They're leaving."

Turning, Balder saw that the Death Eaters appeared to be proceeding on down the thoroughfare. Each one seemed to be dragging a civilian with them. He frowned. Death Eaters generally killed on the spot. What were they doing?

There was only one way to find out that wouldn't involve getting himself cursed to bits. "Get out of here," he told the clerk, grabbing the Death Eater's mask and putting it on.

He jogged out of the apothecary and joined the back of the pack.

"Crabbe, is that you?" a cold, haughty voice said. Balder's heart sank. The voice belonged to someone his uncle had been quite close to: Lucius Malfoy. "Where's your hostage? I thought you were going after the apothecary's assistant."

Hostage? Well, at least they weren't planning a massacre. "He got away," Balder grunted, trying to sound as much like the elder Crabbe as he could.

"Well, get somebody else, then," Malfoy snapped. "We haven't much time. They're surely getting the Aurors together as we speak."

"Okay."

"Oh, forget it. Take this one. I'll get a different one."

The man shoved a whimpering old woman at him and stalked off into the Quidditch shop.

"It's okay," Balder whispered to the old woman. "I'm not really one of them." Either she didn't hear or was well beyond caring. Malfoy returned with a mousy-haired teenage boy and they proceeded through the alley to the entrance leading to the Leaky Cauldron.

"Portnoy, Beagles, Haverman - blow it up," Malfoy ordered.

"Blow it up?" a voice asked. It sounded familiar, but Balder couldn't place it. "Shouldn't we try to sneak..."

"Secrecy isn't important," Malfoy said smoothly, "and we may very well need the escape route."

"Awright, then," the voice said. Balder felt like smacking himself on the forehead. Walden Macnair. There was quite a nice group of luminaries here tonight, apparently.

Balder's hand tightened around his wand as the three Death Eaters blasted the wall to smithereens. He was surrounded by the very people he'd been charged with destroying, and he couldn't do anything about it - not yet, at least. Patience, he told himself.

The Death Eaters scrambled over the rubble into the small yard just as the back door of the Leaky Cauldron slammed shut.

"Well, everybody inside knows we're here now," Macnair said dryly.

"Ooooh, looky here," a female voice rang out - Bellatrix LeStrange, no doubt. She began digging into a pile of rubble from which a hand and foot protruded. Balder sidled over to the edge of the group with his hostage, who was weeping piteously. If he could get some good cover, he might be able to...well, he might be able to take down one or two of them before they killed him, which didn't sound terribly promising. There wasn't much he could do at the moment. He'd just have to hold tight and wait for his opportunity.

"Take these two," Bellatrix said, shoving a young mother and her baby at the nearest Death Eater. "I've got a much more useful hostage."

*******

Someone was swearing and jostling him around. Harry felt himself being dragged, but couldn't seem to put up much of a fight. His face felt wet and sticky, and someone seemed to be trying to drive a railroad spike through his forehead.

"Potter!" a voice said. Harry groaned. It was Malfoy. "Potter, wake up!" Harry tried to open his eyes, but his eyelids felt like they'd been weighted down. Malfoy began slapping his face lightly. "Potter! Wake the fuck UP!"

"W'happen?" Harry rasped. His mouth didn't seem to want to move correctly.

"Harry!" It was Remus, sounding terrified. "Dear Merlin, what happened?" His hands touched Harry's face, using a cloth to wipe it off.

"We were in the back. They blew up the entrance to Diagon Alley," Malfoy said quickly. "I think I got him inside before they saw us, but they came through the entrance just as I got through the door." His voice dropped lower. "And...uh...you should probably know that Granger's still out there."

"Hermione?" Remus and Harry asked at the same time. Harry forced his eyes open by sheer will alone, panic and fear pushing head injuries aside. His glasses had survived intact, probably due to Hermione's newest unbreakable charm. "We have to go get her," Harry decided, trying to force himself up into a sitting position.

"You can't," Malfoy said flatly.

"Of course we can!" Harry cried, his heard thudding in his chest, his voice higher than usual. She was right on the other side of that door. Of course he could get her.

"Potter, she was underneath a big pile of rubble. There wasn't time to dig her out. The Death Eaters were coming through the entrance just as I got you in here."

He didn't get it. "I'm going after her!" Harry yelled, his head splitting in two at the sound. Ignoring it, he began pushing himself up.

Footsteps sounded, and he saw Ron running up, his face pale, hardening as his eyes landed on Malfoy. "What happened? Where's Hermione? She went looking for you."

"She's out there," Harry panted, gesturing at the back door as he tried to get himself into a sitting position. "I'm about to go get her." Assuming my legs still work, that is...

"Out there?!" Ron yelped. "The wards only go to the back door!"

"Yeah, we kind of figured that out when the Death Eaters blew up the entrance to Diagon Alley," Malfoy said sarcastically.

"Death Eaters!?"

"I have to..." Harry began, but he was cut off by a magically amplified voice outside.

"Harry!" it called mockingly. He gritted his teeth in response, hatred flaring up, flowing through him like fire. Bellatrix LeStrange. "We've got your little friend out here! She's still breathing...for now, at least!"

Ron's face went utterly rigid. "You left her out there?!" he shouted at Malfoy. "You had Harry out there, too, didn't you? Nice trap you set up, Malfoy."

"I'm the one who dragged Potter in here," Malfoy bit out. "Nobody told me the wards only went to the back door. And if I'd been able to find Granger before the bloody Death Eaters came piling in..."

"You SET IT UP!" Ron yelled, launching himself at Malfoy. Remus moved over to subdue him, leaving Harry with his opening.

He staggered up, his mind thinking no further than reaching the door, his head clearing as his anger grew. Remus said his name, but Harry held up a hand, throwing up a wandless shield the way Fox had taught him to, though he'd never been able to do it this well before. Remus pounded his fists on the shield, screaming his name. "I'm not going past the wards!" Harry told him over his shoulder. As long as he stayed within them, they couldn't do anything to him.

He ripped open the door, wand out, swaying a little bit with the effort of standing and holding up a shield at the same time. The sight that met him caused his stomach to drop through the bottom of the floor. The little yard was packed with masked Death Eaters standing in a semi-circle, each one holding up another person - hostages, apparently - in front of them.

At the center stood Bellatrix LeStrange, unmasked and smirking. She held up Hermione's unconscious body like a shield. Hermione's face was bloody, her clothes torn and covered with dirt. She'd lost one of her shoes and her arm was twisted at an impossible angle. The curse that had been on the tip of Harry's tongue was quickly swallowed. He couldn't risk hitting her with it.

His appearance caused the Death Eaters to send a volley of stunners, all of which bounced off the wards. Quite a few of them bounced off and hit hostages, who went limp and became a great deal more difficult to hold up, giving Harry an idea.

"Idiots!" Bellatrix shrieked. "Ennervate them!" She put her wand to Hermione's head. "Come out, Harry, or your girlfriend gets it."

"I'll be right there," he called back, slamming the door shut, turning around and lowering his shield. He heard Bellatrix's roar of rage behind him and knew he didn't have much time. "Remus," he said, grabbing his old professor by the shoulder.

Remus shook him, his face parchment-white. "What were you thinking?!"

"I'm still alive, aren't I?" Harry pointed out. "I imagine the Order's on their way down. They'll have to attack from behind the wards."

"You made a shield without a wand," Ron said, agog. "I didn't know you could do that."

"Neither did I," Harry said honestly. "Get the D.A. Put half to work evacuating everyone out and get the other half over here."

Ron nodded, staring at him strangely.

"Malfoy!" Harry barked. The blonde Slytherin was leaning against the wall. Harry saw with satisfaction that Ron had managed to give him a puffy lip.

Malfoy turned his head to look at him, raising an eyebrow at his tone.

"Get Fox. You'll know her when you see her. Tell her to bring you out ten seconds after me."

"Potter, I don't take orders..."

"Do it," Harry said, raising his wand, his voice brooking absolutely no argument. He had no idea what had come over him. Perhaps he was simply, at long last, able to put into practice what Fox had taught him. He just seemed to know what to do, and he knew his orders would be followed, and there would be hell to pay if they weren't. Malfoy took one look at his face, blinked, then nodded slowly and walked away.

"Are you hiding, Baby Harry? Are you too scared to come out and face the nasty Death Eaters?" Bellatrix's voice taunted him.

"No," Remus said, realizing his intentions. "Not a chance. You're not going out there."

"Yes, I am," Harry said. "They sent stunners. They're trying to capture me, not hurt me. I can block stunners, and besides, I won't be out there very long without help."

"What are you...?"

"When Fox takes Malfoy out there, stun everybody - Death Eaters and hostages alike. It'll make them harder to use as shields," Harry said, turning to leave again.

"No," Remus grabbed his arm, nearly frantic. "You're not going out there, Harry."

"I don't have time for this," Harry said softly, looking up at him. "Let me go, or I'll make you let me go. Voldemort's not here, and they won't get me. Don't worry."

The werewolf looked flabbergasted for a moment. "Remus," Harry sighed, and the man snatched his hand back as if he'd been burned. He stared down at the hand, then at Harry, in complete shock. Harry opened the door, casting an overall shield charm as he stepped outside the wards, so that a white globe glowed around him. One or two Death Eaters sent stunners at him, but they bounced off, as Harry had known they would. He felt wild, uncontrollable, and at the same time utterly sure and confident. Even if they sent an Unforgivable at him, he didn't think it could hurt him right now. Something inside of him had been awakened, something that sizzled through his bloodstream and ignited every nerve ending along the way. He felt almost drunk with the power of it.

He knew the rest of them could feel it, too. The Death Eaters shifted nervously as he walked past them to stand in front of Bellatrix, who took a small fearful step back, pulling Hermione more fully in front of her.

"Sorry about that," Harry said. "Where were we, then?"

"So," she said, sounding a little nervous. "Baby Harry's finally come out to play."

"Not really a baby anymore," he said pleasantly. "Turned seventeen a few weeks ago. Didn't you hear?" He smirked at her. "I'm sure your present got lost in the post."

*******

"Here," Gautham said proudly as he handed her a small egg-like device.

"What is it?" Fox asked.

"New and improved Death Bomb. Kills every magical being within a hundred yards - not counting those within the wards, of course."

"So in other words, it kills all the innocent civilians, too."

Gautham looked miffed. "I didn't say it was perfect."

Not bothering to respond, Fox turned on her heel and hustled downstairs. The Malfoy boy stepped out of apparently nowhere, blocking Fox's progress to the back door. "Potter has a plan," he said simply.

"Harry? Plan?" she snorted, angrier than she'd been since...well, since the last time Harry had done something monumentally stupid. He'd stepped outside the wards, and the alarm on her belt had gone off. He was back inside now, but he wasn't any safer.

Because she was about to kill him.

"He said for you to bring me out ten seconds behind him," the boy said in a bored voice that belied his fear.

"He did, did he?" she asked, smiling humorlessly as she snaked her way around the confused tangles of students towards the back door. "How did you know who I was?"

"He told me to find Fox. I made an educated guess."

Glancing down at her shirt, which read 'FOX' in large black letters, she suppressed a smile, which fled quickly as the alarm on her belt went off yet again.

"Dammit, Harry," she muttered, elbowing students aside. 10...9...

If they got him to Shirag Castle or Slytherin Castle, she couldn't follow him, and he wasn't ready to fight Voldemort. Not by a long shot. And yet she could feel it as she drew closer to the back door - the buzzing along her skin, the sound of static in her head. The feel of Guardian power nearby. And it wasn't Voldemort. It wasn't Dumbledore, either. It was Harry.

His power - hopefully only some of it, but possibly all of it - had broken free. She had taught him how to control it, but if he was in a state, she wasn't sure he'd be able to. So now, on top of everything else, she had to keep him from destroying everything in a twenty-mile radius.

...8...7...

Order members were walking with her now, gathering at the back door. Harry's redheaded friend was in the corner talking to a small group of students in a low, urgent voice. ...6...5...

"Fox," the werewolf said with relief as he stepped forward to greet her. "He's out there."

"He's fine," she said, "which is to say that he's alive. I'd know if he wasn't. Stay out of sight until the Death Eaters notice us. Wait until they turn, then..."

"Stun everybody," the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor said tightly. "We know."

...4...3...

"Why am I here, though?" Malfoy asked.

"To help me create a diversion," she explained.

...2...

"What sort of diversion?" he asked, looking at her askance.

...1..

"It's a classic," she said, pulling him towards her, unsheathing the dagger from her thigh holster, placing it at his throat and magically opening the door.

"What the fuck is this?" the boy hissed at her as she walked them through the wards.

"A diversion," she whispered in his ear. "Hey!" she yelled out. The Death Eaters automatically turned to look at her. "Let them go or I slice up your little golden boy!"

She had to give Harry credit. It wasn't a bad plan. Malfoy couldn't be hurt permanently and she couldn't be hurt at all, so they weren't in any real danger. And introducing one of their own into the mix forced the Death Eaters to think for a good long while before deciding how to react.

Fox skirted the Death Eaters, going behind even Bellatrix LeStrange, standing at the entrance to Diagon Alley. The diversion worked. With this new threat introduced, the Death Eaters took their eyes off of Harry and turned away from the back door of the Leaky Cauldron, leaving themselves wide open for an attack from within the wards.

Which the Order and the D.A. used to their advantage as they suddenly threw the back door open and began stunning with abandon.

The Death Eaters returned fire, only to find themselves dodging their own curses as they bounced off the wards. Fox pushed her captive to the ground and heard Harry yell, "Accio Hermione!" She looked up to see Hermione fly out of Bellatrix LeStrange's arms and into Harry's, but Bellatrix was a powerful witch and had damn good reflexes, and she followed it up with an Avada Kedavra aimed directly at Hermione.

The spell shattered Harry's shield, and Fox saw what he was going to do a split second before he did it. His reasoning was fairly sound. Because of the prophecy, the curse couldn't kill him. He turned them around, preparing to take the curse himself.

All the same, Fox wasn't about to take that chance. The curse may not be able to kill him, but there were a whole long list of things it could do to him, all of them horrible. Reaching out with her power, she captured Harry and yanked him towards her, holding his friend. Fox realized her mistake just a moment too late. She'd been seeking to protect Harry, and by extension, Hermione. But Harry didn't have a strong grip on Hermione; it looked like he'd been trying to protect her broken arm. And Bellatrix seemed to be perfectly happy with Hermione alone. She dove at Harry as he flew past and grabbed onto one of the unconscious girl's feet, snatching her out of Harry's grasp. The woman sent Fox a grin as she apparated away.

Fox caught Harry, bringing him underneath her shield. "Hermione!" he yelled, struggling against her, his power rebelling, completely out of control now. Bolts of energy shot out of him, hitting Death Eaters and stunned hostages alike.

"Calm down!" she ordered him. "Harry..."

A Death Eater had taken cover behind a trash can near them. "Draco," he called out sharply. Fox levitated the trash can out of the way, intent on stupefying him, but before she could, Harry thrust out a hand. White lightning shot out of his fingertips, wrapping around the Death Eater's throat, dragging him out from behind the trash can, gagging.

"Where is she?" Harry hissed, his voice sparkling with power.

From underneath her, Malfoy threw an elbow, catching Harry in the ribs. "Enough!" Fox roared, immobilizing them both. The lightning ceased, and the Death Eater stumbled forward, his mask askew, unable to see and gasping for breath.

Putting a shield around Harry, she levitated his frozen body into the pub. At the exact same moment, a desperate Death Eater sent a killing curse at him. Fox jumped Harry up a little to dodge it. The curse missed Harry entirely, instead hitting the Death Eater Harry had just tried to strangle. He slumped to the side, dead. A clench-jawed scream issued from the Malfoy boy as she wrestled him back into the pub.

*******

Thera was growing antsy. She'd stationed herself in the parlor just off the entryway with a book, but nobody had come or gone since she'd been there. Maybe the Death Eaters weren't even planning an attack. Maybe they'd already attacked and she just didn't know it. Even if they attacked, it was a battle they couldn't win; she knew that. But she'd still like to know what the hell was going on.

"There you are," a voice said from the doorway. It was Damien Mulciber, her other dungeon guard love interest. He was one of the Death-Eaters-by-rite-of-my-father-being-one-and-making-me-do-it-too, and seemed largely disinterested in the entire process. He was tall with sandy blonde hair and a decent physique and was mainly interested in that beloved pastime of so many generations of rich pureblood males: hedonism.

He also had one of the smallest cocks she'd ever laid eyes on.

"I thought you were on duty," she said, putting her book aside.

"They've all gone for a while," he said, leaning against the doorjamb with a raised eyebrow in invitation.

"Gone where?" she asked, unfolding herself from the chair and approaching him.

"To go try and get Potter again," he said distractedly, watching her with interest. Thera had slinking down to an art form. She had a feeling she could hop on one leg all the way across the room and still pull it off.

She slinked right up to him, running her hands across his shoulders and down his arms. "How long ago did they leave?"

"Ten minutes or so," he said, unbuttoning her blouse. "We should have enough time for a quickie before they get back."

She hummed. Well, there wasn't any point in trying to warn anybody of anything at this point. Best to stay a few steps ahead just in case, which meant going where the action would be. "You know what I've always wanted to do?" she breathed, nuzzling his neck.

He opened her blouse and started to work on her skirt. "What?"

"Fuck in the dungeons," she said, drawing back and sending him her most heated look.

He made a face. "Really? It's pretty dirty down there, you know."

"It's about to get a lot dirtier. If you're a good boy, I'll let you chain me to the wall."

That sparked some enthusiasm. "Is that what you want?"

"It's a start," she said, smiling up at him.

Damien smiled back and took her hand, leading her down into the dungeons. "Have you ever been down here?" he asked.

"Of course."

He turned around, trapping her wrists in his hands. "Have you ever been down here as a prisoner?" he asked, a glint in his eye.

"No, I haven't," she said, playing coy, but not fighting him.

"Well, now you have," he said, his voice deepening as he pulled her down to the cell at the very end of the hall.

"Oh, dear. What are you going to do to me?" she asked innocently.

"Punish you," he said, grinning. He sat her on the cot, then tackled her, pinning her arms down and straddling her, putting on his best evil face. "You're in desperate need of some punishment," he said seriously. "So now I'm going to...punish you."

He was obviously fishing for clues as to what she wanted. "You're not going to chain me up and ravish me, are you?" she prompted. "Because that would be really awful."

"That's exactly what I'm going to do," he said quickly, scanning the room. There were two pairs of shackles in the corner. He darted over and picked them up, securing them to the walls at either end of the cot and then clamping them on her wrists and ankles.

Thera pulled against them hard, but there wasn't any give at all. Apparently the Death Eaters knew how to do something right. "Nice," she said, struggling happily. Nobody ever said she couldn't have fun at her job. Then she paused. "Er...you do know how to get these off of me, don't you?"

"Of course I do. I'm a guard," he said, climbing back on top of her. "Where were we?"

"Please don't hurt me," Thera begged, closing her eyes. "I'll do whatever you want."

"I think you'll do whatever I want anyway," he said, opening her blouse. He amused himself for a while as Thera grew increasingly impatient. There wasn't supposed to be foreplay after shackling. She wanted brutality, dammit.

"Fuck me already, will you?" she finally asked, dropping the role for a moment.

He didn't. Raising his head, he reached out and gripped her jaw hard, his voice fierce. "I'll fuck you when I'm good and ready to, you filthy whore."

That was more like it. Thera curled her toes in anticipation.

And then there was the unmistakable sound of an apparation crack nearby. They both froze. Thera heard a low, murmuring female voice. It had to be Bellatrix. Who else could it be?

Of course, if Bellatrix was here...Thera shut down the thought. "Let me go," she whispered to Damien. She didn't want to think of the possibilities, really.

He undid the shackles and Thera stood. "Stay here," she told him. "If she needs you, she'll call for you." Walking out of the cell, she left her clothes as they were - she'd need an excuse to be down here, after all, and sex was as good an excuse as any. As she neared the cell, she realized that Bellatrix was singing - a lullabye, by the sound of it. "Fucking psychopath," she muttered under her breath.

There was a list of people - however short - that Thera prayed weren't in that cell. As she knocked on the bars to attract Bellatrix's attention and looked inside, however, she saw that her prayers had not been answered.

*******

Hermione opened her eyes, but it was hard to focus. Her head was sore and felt strangely hollow. Her face was burning, and it slowly sank in that everything hurt. A lot. It was dark, but there was a woman leaning over her, singing softly. She had black hair.

Mum doesn't have black hair, though. Neither does Madame Pomfrey.

But she was acting like Mum did when she was sick, stroking her hair, singing.

"Hush, little Mudblood, don't say a word.

Bella's going to conjure you a mockingbird.

And if that mockingbird don't sing,

Bella's going to shove it down your dirty fucking throat."

Hermione frowned a little. She didn't think those were the right words.

Something clanged faintly, and the woman turned. "What are you doing down here?" There was more clanging, metal on metal, another voice.

"Nothing beats sex in the dungeons. So...Granger, eh? Nice catch."

There was a laugh. "Master will be very pleased. I snatched her right from underneath Potter's nose, too. I'm sure he's weeping and wailing as if his poor, ridiculous life was over, which it nearly is. If he doesn't come after her himself, we'll at least be able to get enough information out of her to get him soon." A faint, fleeting thought went through Hermione's mind. I don't think this is good. But she was so tired, and everything hurt so much. It even hurt to think. It was hard to do anything but lie still and listen.

"I think she needs to be ennervated again. She looks pretty groggy."

"You know what? I think you're right. We want you bright-eyed and bushy-tailed for Master, little Mudblood." The spell came, and Hermione sucked in a breath as her mind snapped sharply into focus and every ache and pain multiplied exponentially.

The woman who had sung to her appeared again, looking smug. It was Bellatrix LeStrange. Hermione tried to move, to get away, but the room tilted sickeningly.

"There's the Mudblood I want to see," the woman said, reaching down to tweak her nose. "So intelligent. You can see it in her eyes. Merlin, I love that," she cooed, folding her hands under her chin and gazing down at Hermione as if she were a particularly adorable newborn. "I love it when they know exactly what I'm doing to them."

The other voice made itself visible, in the person of Thera Castelar. Hermione stared at her, too surprised by her presence to put together why she'd be here. "Can I watch?"

"Watch?" Bellatrix laughed. "It's about time you started doing, Thera - for real. This one will be a fantastic learning experience. The smart ones always are."

"Yes, I think she will be." Thera said, her hands in her pockets, her expression completely vacant, looking down at Hermione.

The girls's hands shot out too fast for her to see. Suddenly Hermione was hauled up by the front of her robes, a sharp pain stabbing across her chest. "Stay down," Thera whispered in her ear. Bellatrix LeStrange cried out in the background, "What are you doing?!"

Hermione fell back onto the cot, another pain lashing her, wondering where Thera Castelar had gotten the idea that she was capable of doing anything but staying down.

Hermione didn't know if it actually happened in quick, confusing succession, or if her dulled mind merely painted it that way, but Thera whipped her hand out of her pocket and sent a killing curse at Bellatrix, her voice sounding strangely high-pitched.

As soon as Bellatrix hit the floor, Thera bent down, rummaging through the dead woman's pockets as she slammed her hand into the metal frame of the cot a few times, yelling random nonsense. "No!" and "Die, Bitch!" seemed to be prevalent, her voice alternating between pitches and tones.

She finally fished a wand out of Bellatrix's pocket. Aiming it a few feet above Hermione's head, she cast another killing curse, blasting a hole in the rock. Almost immediately, she lifted up Bellatrix LeStrange, killed her again, then dropped both her and the wand. Hermione stared at it as it clattered on the stone.

And then Thera's hand was over Hermione's mouth, her face above her, pale and terrified-looking. She raised a finger to her lips, then waved it in a circle above her head, and a tiny kernel of understanding dawned in Hermione's brain. The Death Eaters could hear them.

"What the hell is going on in there? Is everything alright?" a male voice asked.

Footsteps sounded in the corridor and she stiffened. Thera leaned down. "Stun him," she whispered, her hands grabbing the front of her robes again. With surprise, Hermione found herself standing unsteadily on her feet, Thera Castelar's wand in her left hand. Thera was sprawled at her feet, eyes wide open and staring blankly at the ceiling.

If a Death Eater guard weren't approaching and if she weren't uncertain of her ability to stun him, Hermione had a feeling she might find this whole situation quite funny.

Only she couldn't curse him from here. He'd surely get her first; her reaction time was laughable at this point. Painfully, Hermione crouched down behind the cot, poking her wand out through the slats at the head of it.

A blonde head appeared, jaw dropping at the scene inside.

"Stupefy," Hermione muttered. Her curse hit the mark, and he dropped to the floor. Sagging with relief and exhaustion against the cool metal of the cot, she watched as Thera stooped down next to the stunned guard, removing his wand and tapping it against the door from the outside. It sprang open, Thera waved it in a wide circular movement that Hermione recognized at once. She'd blocked the Death Eater bugs. Then she handed the wand to Hermione and snatched her own back.

"They could show up at any moment, so hurry," the girl said, giving her a vial. "It's anti-hangover potion," she explained at Hermione's questioning glance. "Best I can do at the moment, but it should at least sharpen your wits some."

Figuring that nobody would go through this much trouble just to poison her, Hermione drank it down. Her vision focused a little more, the pounding in her head receded to nothing, and the rest of the pain ratcheted down to a much more tolerable level.

"End of the hallway, up the stairs, turn left and you're out of here," Thera said. "Please tell me you know how to apparate."

"I'm still underage. I'm not authorized..." Hermione said automatically, realizing how stupid it sounded the moment it came out of her mouth.

The other girl stared at her. "I think these qualify as extenuating circumstances."

Hermione blushed. "Right. Yes."

"Come on," Thera said, hauling her up to her feet.

"Why are you doing this?" Hermione asked. She didn't expect an answer; the words were more to fill the empty silence as she attempted to stand on her own.

"I don't like killing people I know," Thera said, her eyes falling on Hermione, her voice changing, becoming more brisk. "When you get back, the story is that you snatched my wand out of my hand and killed me. You and Bellatrix scuffled, she tried to kill you and missed, you killed her. Then you stunned the guard and escaped."

Hermione nodded.

"That's the truth. That's what happened. Memorize it, know it, live it. Understand?"

"Yes, I understand."

"Top of the stairs, go left," Thera repeated.

"I don't know how well I can apparate right now," Hermione admitted in a small voice.

"I can't really help you there," the other girl said. "If all else fails, run. Anywhere is better than here. Believe me."

She gave Hermione a little shove and she set off down the hallway, putting one foot in front of the other, focusing her mind on getting to the stairs, then up the stairs until she was at the top, shuffling down the hallway towards the outside door. The night was cool, the stars twinkling above, in complete innocence of the horrors known to earth. Focusing her mind on Dumbledore's voice, on the address he'd given her two years ago, Hermione apparated away.

*******

It wasn't the most comfortable position Vivian had ever fought a battle in, but it was certainly the safest. She was crouched over top of Hestia Jones with one of the Weasley twins pressed against her back. The Order had to look fairly comical, piled up in the doorway the way they were. In any case, it was definitely effective.

They shot spells over top of each other, a wall of stunners. Most of the Death Eaters were hit within the first few seconds. A few managed to get shields up, but it was only a matter of time before they shattered under the assault.

One of the Death Eaters had taken partial cover behind a stack of old newspapers. Vivian aimed at him just as he turned his wand and stunned one of the other Death Eaters.

Huh?

"Whoa, watch out!" somebody shouted, and Vivian saw that Harry - stiff as a board - was shooting towards the door. They all shuffled back as quickly as they could, trying their best not to step on each other without much success.

Harry flew past them, skidding across the floor until he came to a stop. Vivian saw Remus' eyes follow him, looking worried, but Harry seemed okay - Fox had pulled him under her shield - and Fox herself was striding in with an equally stiff Draco Malfoy. She must have immobilized them. The Order crowded back around the door after she passed. Vivian saw another Death Eater fall to her left and realized that the Death Eater hidden behind the newspapers had used the distraction to take him out.

Severus? she wondered, frowning. It didn't seem right. He wasn't to blow his cover unless the circumstances were extreme, and considering the Order had this solidly in hand, Vivian didn't think this battle qualified.

She stupefied him just to be safe. The battle - as it was - concluded shortly thereafter. Bellatrix LeStrange and a few others had escaped, but they'd still come in with a good haul of Death Eaters to imprison. And to interrogate. Vivian felt a hand on her shoulder as they broke up. Remus.

"I'm going to go check on Harry," he said. "He's..."

"He's fine," she said, stroking his hair back and kissing him briefly.

"No, he isn't," Remus said gravely. "I don't know what he is."

She looked at him. "What do you mean?"

Remus shook his head. "He conjured up a shield with a wave of his hand, and it was strong. I put everything I had against it that wouldn't kill him outright, and I couldn't get through. And right before he went out, I tried to stop him. He told me to let him go. Then he made me let him go. I couldn't hold on to him."

"Harry did that?" she asked, surprised. He was undoubtedly her best Defense Against the Dark Arts student. He had a rather understandable knack for it. He was powerful, but then both of his parents had been powerful, too. She never would have imagined he could conjure a wandless shield at all, much less one that could hold off a strong wizard in his own right, who was also a werewolf.

Remus looked as dazed as she felt. "Yes, he did. I just...I'd like to check on him."

"Go," she said, turning to follow the Order out into the small yard. The Death Eater she sought was still in the same position. Walking over to him, she bent down and took off his mask. "I should've known," she mumbled, ennervating him.

*******

Once they were inside the wards, Fox set the boys free. Both of them immediately tried to go back out into the fray. Fox grabbed them both by the scruffs of their necks and carried them to the nearest table, throwing them into chairs. Both immediately tried to get back up again, so Fox bound them to the chairs.

"I have to go after Hermione!" Harry was yelling, his eyes wild and unfocused, sparks shooting out of him. Fox stupefied him before he killed somebody.

Over top of him, Malfoy was yelling, "That's my father, you fucking bitch!"

Fox grabbed his chin. "Calm down. What's wrong, now?"

His face was white with rage. "That's my father," he said in a low voice.

The Death Eater, the one who'd called to him, the one who was... "He's dead," Fox said, as gently as she could.

"I know that!" he spat at her, trying again to get himself free. "I have to get him. I can't let him be found here. The Ministry...my mother..."

Fox wasn't terribly interested in looking after the well being of a dead Death Eater's reputation at that particular moment. "You're not going back out there."

The shock was beginning to wear off. He was struggling like hell to hold on to it, but it was receding nonetheless. The kid looked about ready to explode. "He was trying to help me," he said in a surprisingly even voice. "I can't just..." It broke then, and he swallowed a few times. "I only want to apparate him home."

The battle was over, she realized as she glanced at the back door. The Order members were filing out the door, getting ready to clean things up.

"It's too late for that," she said, taking him by the shoulders, leaning down so their faces were even. "The Order's already going out there."

"That's why you have to let me go now!"

"Listen to me," she said harshly, shaking him. He needed reason and firmness, not sorrow and sympathy. "Even if you apparate him home, he's finished. The Order's out there. They'll see you do it, and trying to pass it off like your father died quietly in his sleep won't fly. All it will do is implicate you in what happened here."

"He's my father," the boy said, his teeth clenched together hard enough to break his jaw.

"Yes, and he was trying to help you. Making a half-assed attempt to sneak him out and cover up for him in front of thirty witnesses won't help you. It will only hurt you."

He squeezed his eyes shut hard, then blinked them open again. "Can you let me go now? I won't do anything. I mean, I'll do what I'm supposed to do. I'm Head Boy. I imagine I should be doing...something Head Boy-ish."

"Harry," the werewolf said, rushing over to him, patting his head and arms down to check for injuries. Aside from the cut that sliced across his scar and a bruise forming on his jaw, Fox couldn't see any damage. "Is he okay? Why is he tied to the chair?"

"Don't wake him up," Fox said, not looking away from the Malfoy boy.

"Why not?"

"You saw him earlier," she said simply. "He'll hurt himself, or somebody else."

"Yes, I did. What the hell was that? What happened to him?"

"It's a long story. Just leave him be," she said impatiently, freeing the Malfoy boy from his bonds. "Stay here," she told him.

*******

Finally released from the chair, Draco stood slowly, his mind thrashing about like a wounded animal. Potter - it was his fault, his plan. Or Fox's. If she hadn't dodged Potter over the curse, it wouldn't have hit his father. But why should he care anyway? Isn't this what he'd wanted? His father gone? Yes, but he hadn't wanted him dead.

Underneath it all was a sense of utter, dumb disbelief. It seemed impossible, somehow, that Lucius Malfoy could die at all, that he could even be killed. It was unfathomable.

The urgency rose in him again, the desire to run past all of them and find his father, get him out. In the end, it was ingrained in him to look after the family name. The fleeting disrespect he'd had for it had been largely theoretical. In practice, Draco found, the knowledge that it was his responsibility now - solely his - brought out something almost primeval in him that drew him towards the door, to his father's body, to getting it out, to protecting the name of Malfoy, which would be dragged through the mud over this.

His father. The Ministry destroyed the bodies of Death Eaters so the Dark Lord couldn't use them, as he had in the last war. Draco could go outside, get his father and apparate somewhere they'd never find. He could bury his father the way a Malfoy deserved to be buried. And yet he didn't. He didn't even try. He was frozen in place, and it had nothing to do with Fox's command to stay put.

He couldn't move. If he moved, he'd either have to somehow get his father home, or he'd have to act the part of helpful Head Boy, who had been completely oblivious to the fact that his father had been a Death Eater - not that anybody would believe it.

And he didn't have the energy for either role at the moment. A million questions stabbed through him, from his brain down towards the solid icy mass that had settled in his stomach. The answers were inside it, but he couldn't break it open. He didn't want to, really. He didn't think he wanted to know the answers.

Why hadn't Lucius just apparated away? He'd been protected. The Order couldn't have stunned him where he was, behind the rubbish bins. Why had his father called out to him and blown his cover? Why had he come to every single one of his Quidditch matches? Had it just been to see him fail? Even when he won, his father had always had a list of critiques, things he could have done better. It was the same with his marks. All of his tutors - his father always complained about the cost, but he always hired them again, every summer. So what did it mean, then?

Draco let his eyes stray to Potter, still tied to his chair, still unconscious. Ex-Professor Lupin crouched next to him, one hand on Potter's shoulder, watching him worriedly.

The familiar swell of hatred didn't come. His hatred was focused on himself and his father. He didn't have any to spare for Potter. And it seemed relatively pointless, under the circumstances. Potter, Granger...they stood between him and what he was supposed to be, but what he was supposed to be was entirely dependent on his father.

And considering his father was dead, Draco found it difficult to care one way or the other. Let them rule the school. Let them rule the world. Just let them stay far the fuck away from me, he thought tiredly. "Mister Malfoy?" a voice asked.

He snapped to attention. It was McGonagall. "Yes, ma'am?"

"I just spoke to Fox. Would you like to...to see your father?" she asked, her normally severe demeanor softened by moist, sympathetic eyes. Draco stiffened, came back to himself a little. What the hell was it with these people?

"Yes, please," he said, rustling up all the haughtiness he could manage. He neither desired nor appreciated McGonagall's fucking sympathy.

They ran into Professor Wellbourne and some gigantic bodybuilder guy on the way out to the yard behind the Leaky Cauldron. Professor Wellbourne paused, looking at him.

"Draco? Are you all right?"

"I'm fine," he said, hurrying his crotchety old Transfiguration professor through the door before she could recruit more members to the Sympathy Squad. What were they going to do, hold a memorial service among the rubbish bins? If McGonagall tried to hug him, Draco swore he'd curse all of her bloody limbs off.

As if sensing this, McGonagall hung back as they approached the lone figure at the edge of the yard. They'd turned him over onto his back and taken his mask off. Somebody had shut his eyes, for which Draco was thankful.

Lucius didn't look like himself. His hair was a wreck, but it wasn't just that. He seemed smaller, somehow. Crouching down, Draco pulled the Malfoy signet ring from his father's hand. It came off easily, solid and heavy in his hand.

"I don't think you're allowed to take anything," McGonagall said from behind him.

"It's the Malfoy ring," he said shortly. "I'm the Malfoy now. It would have come to me anyway. It's magicked to. Besides, I can't get into the Manor without it." With a sense of unreality, he slipped it on the ring finger of his right hand. It automatically adjusted to fit him. He looked down at his father again, feeling like he should say something, but he couldn't think of anything to say. He didn't even know if he was sad or not.

"I imagine the Ministry will want to catalogue everything," she said uncomfortably.

"Go on then," he said, standing up and offering her his hand, smirking. "Take it off."

She eyed him suspiciously. "It's cursed, isn't it?"

"No," he said, looking down at it, marveling at how heavy it felt on his hand. "But it won't come off, either. Not until I die, and even then only for my heir. If the Ministry wants to take a gander at it, they know where to find me, though they might want to wait a few days. As soon as the head of the family dies, all the wards reset themselves."

Which meant - Draco realized - that his mother had just been expelled from the Manor and was probably standing outside the gates. Even wives weren't exempt from the wards - not after Osiris Malfoy's wife had plotted to have him murdered in 1274. Well, at least he wouldn't have to break the news to her. She'd already know.

McGonagall gulped. "Mr. Malfoy, I am...I am truly sorry."

"Thanks," he said blandly. "Can I leave now? I should go and collect my mother."

"The Aurors will want to question you, but I suppose that can wait," she said.

Nodding, Draco apparated home. He arrived just outside the front gates. The rain that had been threatening London was coming down in buckets in Wiltshire, and it took him a moment to locate his mother - a small, white bundle pressed against the front gates, soaked to the skin. Either she hadn't been expelled with her wand, or she hadn't thought to use it. "Mother?" he asked tentatively as he crouched down in front of her and cast an umbrella charm over them to keep the rain off.

She looked young and vulnerable curled up against the gates with her knees drawn up and her arms wrapped around them. But when she lifted her head, it was to reveal an incongruously aged face framed by wet, stringy, bedraggled hair. Narcissa was in her nightgown; she'd probably been preparing for bed and had already taken off all of her cosmetic spells when she'd been tossed out on her ass.

"He's dead, then." It was a statement, not a question. His mother knew quite well that she wouldn't be sitting here right now if her husband were alive.

Draco just nodded. He felt a strange need to pat her shoulder or something, but couldn't quite bring himself to do it. He was too used to her having nice robes on and him having dirty hands. Instead, he shrugged off his robes and draped them over her. She was shivering, and hugged them against her body tightly.

Casting the umbrella charm out a little more, he placed his hand against the front gates to open them, beckoning his mother over. She rose unsteadily, then pressed herself against him, and Draco found his arm wrapping around her as they trudged through the mud up to the front door. His ring made the door swing open and they both hurried inside as Draco slammed the door shut.

They stood there for an awkward moment, neither of them certain what to do. Finally, his mother shivered and Draco began casting drying charms all over her, followed by warming charms. It took a few minutes, but she stopped shivering.

"Thank you," she said, in a surprisingly small voice.

"Is your wand upstairs?" he asked. She nodded. Having no idea what to say next, Draco cleared his throat. "Ummm...would you like some tea?"

His mother nodded again, making a funny coughing sound, then another one. Then she took a few steps forward and pulled him against her, sobbing into his shoulder. Draco was shocked for a moment, then wrapped his arms around her, patting her back.

His mother kept going, crying all over him, one hand fisted in the fabric of his shirt in the front, the other in the back, and Draco felt a rare softening towards her, the way he used to when she defended him to Lucius. He'd always appreciated it, even if it hadn't been sincere, even if it had merely another attack in a never-ending game of one-upsmanship.

Of course, now the game was over. He supposed his mother had won.

Still, it made his father's sudden absence rather strongly felt as he guided her upstairs. Lucius had always done this, but Lucius wasn't here to do it. Draco felt like an interloper all the while, calling up a house elf to draw up some tea, setting it on the bedside table as his mother went into the dressing room to change and dry her hair.

He couldn't quite wrap his mind about it, even as the house elf addressed him as simply "Master" instead of "Master Draco," even as he tucked his mother in and walked back to his room and sank down on the bed, not bothering to light any of the candles.

He should be owling his father's solicitors, making preparations, recalibrating the wards, something. The Ministry would know about his father's death by now, and it would be in the Daily Prophet in the morning. All of these things kept running through his head, a great long "To Do" list. And yet he just sat there until dawn, staring out the window, his eyes unwillingly returning again and again to the mausoleum at the center of the garden that his father would never inhabit.

*******

Thera turned back on the listening devices, tiptoed over to the far wall of the cell and sat down, waiting for the Death Eaters to show up so she could perform 'I've Just Woken Up From Being Dead. Where's the Prisoner?' She was trying very hard not to think about what she'd just done. She'd told Granger the truth: she didn't want to kill anybody she knew, not counting Bellatrix. Unfortunately, the chances of somebody else she knew ending up in these dungeons were fairly high, and the chances of her being able to pull off another escape like the one she just had were low, indeed.

Bellatrix was sprawled out a few feet away, eyes still open, looking surprisingly gleeful in death. Thera shut her eyes and leaned her head against the wall for a moment, her mind running through contingency plans, laying the groundwork for explaining this shit to the inner circle and the Dark Lord. It was chilly in the dungeons, and she shivered a little bit, wrapping her arms around herself.

Suddenly, Thera snapped her head up, eyes wide and searching. Something wasn't right here. In fact, something was very fucking wrong. She couldn't see anything strange, but she could feel it. All of her internal alarms were going off, just like they had in the arena when Bellatrix had had a nice little chat with her dead father. Standing quickly, she held her wand out, her eyes darting back and forth all over the cell.

It was gathering, growing more powerful, and Thera stumbled into the corner, her heart pounding furiously, too scared to even breathe. Her wand was useless. She couldn't say a spell without the listening devices catching it, and even if she could, Thera had a feeling no spell she cast could stop whatever was happening. Her mind was screaming at her to run, but there wasn't anywhere to go except right at it.

She was trapped, and the evil knew it. Thera waited, trembling.

It held back for a moment, then swept over her, too quickly for her to even react. It was terribly cold. There was a loud whistling in her ears and Thera mentally flailed around, trying to find equilibrium where there wasn't any to be found, just black and cold, and she screamed - or at least tried to. Another pointless defense. She had nothing to scream with. She'd lost her body somewhere and was swept up in whatever on earth this was, tumbling aimlessly, stretching out and trying to grab onto something, to stop it. But there was just nothing and more nothing. It was a nothing so large that it nearly wrenched her in two, and then she fell, her ass hitting something blessedly solid.

The scene faded in slowly. She was in the library upstairs. Her father sat opposite her in his usual armchair, not even looking at her, engrossed in a book.

Oh, no. Not this again. Thera sprang into action, leaping over the back of the sofa, sprinting for the door. The handle wouldn't turn. Spinning around desperately, she scanned the room for possible escape routes. She knew she couldn't wake up. He wouldn't let her. But at least she might be able to get away. The windows.

She was on the first floor. People did it in movies all the time. Pushing off of the door, she ran as fast as she could towards the other end of the room.

She didn't see her father wave his hand. She didn't even see the chair shoot out in front of her until she fell over it, tumbling head over heels with a strangled cry. His face appeared above her, placid and patient as he grabbed her by the front of her shirt and hauled her off the floor, throwing her back onto the sofa.

"Don't be a fool, Thera," he said, a hint of warning in her voice as he regained his seat.

"What is this?" she asked, in the most even voice she could manage at the moment.

"A long overdue talk," he said pleasantly. "Don't worry. I'll be brief. Bella will be here soon, and I think it's best if you were gone before she arrived. I doubt she's very happy with you right now. Of course, killing her was necessary. Inevitable, even. She was standing in your way." He smiled. "Though I certainly won't tell her that."

Thera just stared at him, chest heaving, trying to figure out what to do.

Her father leaned back a little, studying her. "You needn't fear me, Thera. I'm only trying to help you." Right. Killing her with kindness. "In fact, I have a gift for you."

She shifted uncomfortably. "You really didn't have to get me anything."

"Nonsense," he said. "I meant to give it to on my previous visit, but time ran short. Besides, it's not really a gift. It should have been yours all along."

She wasn't sure what made her look down, but she noticed that she was clad in a wedding gown, just like the last time. A thrill of dread went through her.

"Before I give it to you, however," he continued, "I believe some explanation is required. You were, of course, entailed at birth."

Thera didn't find this terribly surprising. Only the most ancient pureblood families still engaged their children in the cradle - the rest having given it up sometime around the Middle Ages - but considering her mother had been entailed, it stood to reason that she had been, too. Not that it mattered at this point. The entailment only held if she was a virgin at marriage. "To Draco?" she asked.

"Obviously. A necessary measure for the spell to work smoothly," he said, waving an elegant hand. "Two to lead isn't exactly the most stable power relationship. That's why we decided that you'd be female, and that you'd be entailed to Draco. He'd rule, with you by his side."

Thera fought the desire to roll her eyes. She'd be by his side in the sense of smiling pretty and doing whatever she was told. Entailments usually included a whole host of other clauses, largely designed to make the bride a prisoner in her own home - quite literally. Assuming everything had gone to plan and she'd married Draco, she wouldn't have been able to leave the house without his permission. Knowing her father, she probably wouldn't have been able to take a piss without his permission. Of course, she would have been well used to it, since she'd have spent her entire pre-marriage life not taking a piss without her father's permission. Even at Hogwarts, she'd have been under a chastity charm - one stray hand below the belt, and she'd have gotten immediately transported home for a good, sound beating. Reina had some nasty stories about it.

I really need to send fruit baskets to the Aurors who killed this fuck, Thera decided.

"I'm sure your mother turned you staunchly against the practice," her father said in a bored tone. "But it's tradition, and what are we without our traditions, Thera?"

Normal? "Nothing?" she guessed.

"Traitors," he said quietly, his eyes blazing briefly. "Not only traitors to our bloodline and history, but traitors to the Dark Lord."

"Right," she sighed. Isn't that always what it came back to?

Her father picked up something from the table next to him. It looked sort of like a Remembrall, only it glowed softly pink instead of red. She clenched her hands together in her lap. There was no way it was something she wanted.

"Take it," her father said, holding it out to her. "It's your gift."

It was a split-second decision. Apparently time meant something here; he couldn't keep her forever. So all she had to do was hold him off until she woke up. Springing out of her chair, Thera dodged around him, dove into a somersault, snatched up one of the sharp pokers next to the fireplace and prepared to bash her father's head in if he came near her.

That was the plan, at least. In reality, she didn't even make it out of her seat. It was as if her ass had been glued to the sofa. All she managed to do was flail her arms and legs around while her father watched. Then he grabbed her hand and pressed the globe into it.

Her fingers tightened around it automatically and Thera braced herself. Merlin knew what the thing did. The ball was warm, and as she held it, the soft pink faded from inside, spreading warmth all the way through her. Under the circumstances, it seemed like a remarkably innocuous gift. "What is it?" she asked as the last bit of pink faded from the ball, leaving it transparent and empty.

"Congratulations," her father said. "You're a virgin again."

Thera dropped the ball as if it had bitten her. It fell to the floor without breaking and rolled under the sofa. "I'm a what, now?"

"A virgin," he said simply. "Pure and untouched as the day you were born. If I'd been alive, you would have remained that way, but your mother managed to spoil you. On purpose, I might add."

She felt her hands tighten into fists, her heart thudding in her chest. "On purpose?" she asked, her voice faint. Objectively, Reina hadn't been the greatest mother a girl could hope for, but Thera would have liked to believe that her mother would have been above orchestrating the forcible deflowering of her own daughter.

"Didn't she tell you?" he asked innocently. "The day you found out for sure that you were magical? She put that Muggle man up to it, you know. How old were you again?"

She didn't answer. The entailment. She supposed her mother's intentions had been good. Reina had done it to get her out of it - yet another instance of killing her with kindness. If they weren't a pair of fucking psychopaths, she'd be touched by her parents' dedication to doing what was best for her. As it stood, Thera just felt vaguely ill.

"The Dark Lord intends for the marriage to go forward on your seventeenth birthday, as is customary," her father said, smiling at her. "And now it'll actually mean something."

Thera found it hard to believe that she was actually a virgin again, but it didn't matter. Even if she was, she could certainly rectify the situation easily enough.

"I wouldn't recommend it," he said blandly, picking up his book.

"Recommend what?"

"What you're undoubtedly planning in that head of yours. The entailment extends to whomever..." her father rubbed his chin. "It's hard to find a delicate way to put this. Suffice it to say that the individual who divests you of your maidenhood wins the entailment. So you're more than welcome to spoil your virtue with anyone you choose, provided you don't mind giving that individual all of the powers that comes with it."

There are other spells...Dear Merlin. She hadn't thought of this, hadn't even imagined it.

"Powers over you," he clarified with a little smile. "Unless you kill the man, as your mother killed that filthy Muggle years ago. But from what I've seen, you haven't the stomach for things like that." He sent her a penetrating look. "Or do you?"

Thera rubbed a hand down her face. So it was a catch-22, then. Either she enslaved herself to Draco - and Merlin knew he'd have a bloody field day with that - or else she added another murder to her record, and a cold-blooded one, at that. Not on the Dark Lord's orders and not Bellatrix LeStrange. She wasn't certain she could even do it. That would be far worse than the others, and the others on their own were pretty fucking bad.

It occurred to Thera then that all over the world, sixteen-year-old girls were gossiping about boys and worrying about homework and she was sitting here parsing out her relative guilt in each of the murders she'd committed, or would commit.

It was a trap, sprung before she was even born, and there really was no way out of it. She and Draco had thought there was, treated it lightly as it increasingly became a fixture in their daily lives, but it wasn't. All of them - their parents and the Dark Lord - had prepared for any reaction the two of them might have, any rebellion they might stage, and they'd made sure there wasn't any way to get out of it. She and Draco would become what they were meant to be, either willingly or by being broken down piece by piece.

Thera doubted any of them really gave a shit how it happened, just so long as it did.

"Can I go back now?" she asked dully.

"I told you not to fight it," her father said. "I warned you."

"Yes, you did," she admitted. Frankly, she should have given him more credit.

"Go, then. I'll see you again soon."

Thera didn't even have time to worry about that before she awoke, gasping for air and clawing for purchase. She sat up, looking around wide-eyed. She was no longer in the cell, and the Dark Lord was in a very bad mood.

*******

For Severus, it was automatic at this point to carry around a permanent cover story. Having been left out of the attack on the Leaky Cauldron - a development he found both surprising and worrying - he felt that he was entirely justified in entering the dungeon level. He was on his way to the amphitheater, where the Death Eaters would surely gather after the battle. That was all. He was not here on a half-baked assignment from Dumbledore to find Hermione Granger and somehow orchestrate her escape.

Still, it was odd that there was no guard at the door to the staircase. Severus whipped out his wand and walked silently down the stairs. The explanation for the unprotected entrance became immediately apparent as he saw Mulciber's son lying unconscious in the hallway. He found it difficult to be surprised, considering the boy was hardly swift on the uptake, but he still proceeded cautiously and silently down the hallway.

The caution and silence ended up being pointless. Inside the cell were the corpses of Bellatrix LeStrange and Thera Castelar. Severus frowned. He could understand the stunned guard, but corpses? Bellatrix was most definitely dead, and grinning to boot.

Castelar wasn't breathing, but she had a pulse. Severus figured she'd wake in a few moments. If the killing curse hadn't killed her outright, then...

He paused. Killing curse? Since when can Granger perform a killing curse?

Even he had to admit that the girl was gifted in magic, but for the average person, the main problem with the killing curse was intention. The curse wouldn't work unless you truly and honestly desired the other person dead, and...well, it seemed a bit strange that the resident advocate for the rights of house elves could manage that.

Before he could think on the subject too long, however, Mulciber began to rouse. Severus walked out of the cell at the same time he heard footsteps coming down the hall from below stairs. The Death Eaters had returned, and frankly, it wasn't a good idea for him to be found here like this. Dashing silently down the hall, Severus waited on the staircase just out of sight until he heard the murmurings of the Death Eaters making their way up the hallway, then gasps and yelling as they found the scene he'd just witnessed.

Bracing himself, Severus made his way back down the stairs. "A fine plan," he hissed at the gathering in front of the cell. "If anyone had bothered to inform me of tonight's attack, I could have told you about the wards Dumbledore had set up..."

One or two glanced at him, but they all seemed rather shell-shocked, and his cover story fell on deaf ears. "Bella!" Rodolphus was howling from inside the cell.

"Where's the Mudblood?" Avery asked dangerously. "Why isn't she here?"

"She escaped, you idiot," Macnair said, leaning down to help young Mulciber stand up.

"Belllllllaaaaaaa!"

"The Dark Lord isn't going to be happy about this," Nott said heavily. "And on top of everything else, none of us is getting out of here alive tonight."

"How the hell did she get away?" Dolohov asked, his head turning between the cell and the stairway. "You're telling me some teenage Mudblood did this?"

"She is at the top of her year and rather intelligent," Severus interjected.

"Rather intelligent?!" Rabastan LeStrange laughed bitterly. "She killed Bellatrix!"

"We're all gonna die," Pettigrew wailed. "This, after Lucius...we're gonna die!"

"Lucius?" Severus asked sharply. "What happened to Lucius?"

"He's dead," Nott said shortly. "And at least a dozen captured. The Dark Lord's in the arena, and he isn't happy. Told us to bring the Mudblood down to him."

And instead, they'd be bringing down a groggy guard, a dead Bellatrix, a soon-to-be-not-dead Castelar and no prisoner. Crucios would be thrown around with abandon, and there would be a serious scuffle for who got to be at the back of the pack.

"Beeeeeellllllllaaaaa!"

Thankfully, he'd had nothing to do with anything that had happened tonight. Unfortunately, the Dark Lord rarely cared about such things.

"Will somebody shut him up?" Portnoy demanded.

"Fuck," Rabastan sighed, putting his brother in a full body bind with a very necessary gag. "Let's just get this over with, shall we?"

*******

Ginny rubbed at her throbbing temples as her eyes were pulled towards the stairs of Number Twelve for the tenth time in as many minutes. Tonks was taking a long time, but she was hesitant to leave the kitchen when word might come in at any moment. Plus she had doubts about her ability to extract her hand from the death grip her mother currently had on it.

"Something's happened," her mother said in a whisper. "I just know it." Ginny wasn't sure that listening in on the Order's communications was any better than sitting here not knowing what the hell was going on. Before, silence had been the norm. Now, it meant everybody might very well be dead.

"Silence doesn't necessarily mean anything happened," Ginny said. "There might be absolutely nothing happening."

Of course, the moment the words came out of her mouth, the communications device sprang to life.

"Everyone down here, now!" Remus' voice yelled. "To the back door!"

More voices came on. Hestia Jones, Daedalus Diggle, Professor McGonagall and Professor Wellbourne were all asking what happened.

"Death Eaters at the entrance to Diagon Alley," Remus answered over them. "Harry's...well, you'll see when you get down here. They have Hermione."

Ginny flinched and her mother pressed a fist to her lips, stifling a cry. "Oh, dear."

"What on earth is going on down there?" McGonagall persisted.

"I don't even know," Remus said faintly.

Ginny's eyes strayed from her mother to the clock to the stairwell again as her head pounded persistently. Bloody headaches. They never seemed to completely go away. "D'you think Tonks is okay?" she asked.

"What, dear?" her mother asked distractedly. "Oh, I'm sure she's fine."

"She's been gone an awfully long time," Ginny persisted.

"Go check on her then," her mother said, shooing her out of the kitchen. Muttering under her breath, Ginny climbed the stairs to the second floor bathroom, where she finally found Tonks leaning against the doorway. The bottom of her dress was soaked and there was a puddle of something Ginny would rather not know about at her feet.

"Oh, Merlin," Ginny said fervently, rushing forward.

"I think my water broke," Tonks said, studying the puddle.

"Holy fuck, you're in labor," Ginny announced, horrified.

"Rather figured that," Tonks said with a goofy smile. "I haven't had a contraction yet, though, so I should have a while before..." Suddenly, she sagged against the doorway of the bathroom. Ginny leapt forward to hold up her somewhat-sister-in-law as Tonks made a guttural sort of groan, winced and held her belly. At which point Ginny panicked.

"Muuuuum!" she screamed, employing her best youngest-child-in-mortal-danger scream. When it came to childbirth, one couldn't be in better hands than those of Molly Weasley.

Ginny felt overwhelming relief as she heard her mother's footfalls on the kitchen staircase. "Ginny?" her mother called. "What's wrong?"

"It's Tonks!" she yelled back. "She's in labor!"

The footfalls came more hurriedly, and it wasn't long before her mother appeared, her face set, her tone brisk. "How long?" she asked Tonks.

"A few minutes, I guess," Tonks gasped.

"Good, good," her mother said, taking Tonks' other arm and easing her away from the doorjamb. "Any contractions yet?"

"Just one. They're going to get worse, aren't they?" Tonks asked worriedly.

"The sooner we get you to St. Mungo's, the sooner you get a nice, modified painkilling potion," her mother said soothingly. "Do you have your portkey?"

Tonks nodded, digging into her pocket. "Okay, then," her mother said. "You and I'll go on to St. Mungo's. Ginny, go down to the kitchen. Remus is on his way with Harry. When he gets here, tell him to run central command. He'll know what you mean. Then make sure he tells Bill to meet us at St. Mungo's."

"Yes, Mum," Ginny said.

"I'll be in touch," her mother said, smiling. "Your father will bring you all when it's time to see your new niece." She turned to Tonks. "As for the mother-to-be, I imagine you'd like some painkilling potion. Let's activate that portkey."

"St. Mungo's Maternity Ward," Tonks panted, and the two of them disappeared.

Suddenly giddy, Ginny skipped down the stairs. Aunt Ginny, and right in the middle of a battle, too. Her mother had always said that Weasley babies had interesting timing.

Not knowing how Remus was coming, Ginny stood in the entranceway so she could hear the floo and see the front door. She didn't have to wait long before the front door flew open, admitting Remus carrying an unconscious Harry, his face smeared with blood.

All other thoughts flew out of her head. "What happened?" she asked.

"He's okay. He's just stunned," Remus said, glancing around. "Where's your mother?"

"Tonks went into labor," Ginny explained quickly. "She said you should take over central command and tell Bill to meet them at St. Mungo's."

Remus' face brightened a little. Then he glanced down at Harry. "Let me take him upstairs first," he said.

Ginny followed. "Should I stay with him? I mean, is he hurt or anything?"

"Nothing major," Remus said as he laid Harry out on his usual bed. "I suppose it's okay if you stay with him. He should be out for a while. He's...well, if he does anything, come and get me, okay?"

"Does anything?" Ginny asked, puzzled.

Remus' face tightened. "Hermione...something might have happened to her. We're not really sure yet. Severus has gone after her, but Harry was quite upset about it."

Ginny's eyes snapped to him. Oh, Merlin. "What about...I mean, is everyone else...?"

"They're fine," he said firmly, turning to leave. "Please let me know if he wakes up."

"I will," Ginny promised, sitting down on Ron's bed. She couldn't sit still long, though. She took off Harry's shoes and his glasses and undid his robes where they were tight around his throat. Then she paced. She could probably go back to the kitchen, but she found herself hesitant to do so. Hermione...something might have happened to her.

She wasn't Ron and she wasn't Hermione, but neither of them were there at the moment, and something terrible might have...Ginny shook her head, unwilling to jump to conclusions. She just knew that in the absence of them, they'd want somebody to watch over Harry. And it might as well be her.

*******

The only thing Remus wanted to do when he went into the kitchen was sit quietly until his hands stopped shaking. Harry was okay. Well, he was alive. Okay might be another story. It chilled him to even think about the look on Harry's face when he'd walked out of the Leaky Cauldron. He'd been almost frightening.

Unfortunately, he had to take over Molly's job, get in touch with everybody and get them all back to headquarters. His first call was to Bill with the news.

"Oh, Merlin. Oh, Merlin. Oh, Merlin," Bill said, near panic. "I thought we still had two weeks! The nursery's not finished! She can't have the baby now!"

"Well, babies have a tendency to decide for themselves when to come out."

"I'm going to be a father. Oh, Merlin, oh, Merlin..."

"Go to St. Mungo's," Remus reminded him.

"Right. No, I've got to go to the flat and get the overnight bag. No, no, I can do that later. Or maybe someone else can..."

"I'll go by later on my way to St. Mungo's. Where you should be going right now."

"Yes, of course. St. Mungo's. That's where Tonks is. Of course."

"I wouldn't apparate right now if I were you," Remus advised.

"No. I'll floo. Oh, I can't. The floo's been shut off. Damn, blast...HAS ANYBODY HERE GOT A BROOMSTICK?!"

Remus dug a finger into his suddenly ringing ear. "Bill!" he said loudly. "Get your father. Have him apparate you to St. Mungo's."

"Good idea, Remus," Bill said, breathing heavy. "I'll do that. I'll...I just need to find my...I'm going to be a father, Remus."

Rather against his will, Remus smiled a little. "Yes, and wouldn't you like to be there to see it happen?"

"Yes, as soon as I...DAAAAD!"

At which point Remus clicked off, calling Minerva to have her organize everybody's return.

"Minerva here. William Weasley, I already told you that your father is out back with the Aurors. Now will you please let me...my apologies. Minerva here."

"It's Remus. Molly took Tonks to St. Mungo's. How does it look there?"

"Molly took...well that explains why Bill is in such a state. It's a madhouse here, Remus. They've agreed to let the children leave, but the rest of us are going to be here for a while, I'm afraid. I've just sent Ron back to headquarters. He's in even more of a state than Bill is."

Remus sighed. "I imagine he is. Any news on Hermione?"

"No, not yet," she said, her voice quavering a bit.

The front door slammed. "I think that's Ron right now. Keep me updated."

"I will." Remus set the device on the table and leaned his elbows on it, sinking his face into his hands. Ron didn't come down to the kitchen, and he felt secretly thankful. He wasn't ready to see anybody right now.

"...anybody here?"

His head snapped up. There was a voice coming from the front hallway, and it certainly wasn't Ron's. "Hello?" he called, striding up the steps.

"Professor Lupin?" she answered back, sounding relieved.

For one terrible, gut-wrenching moment when he saw her, he thought it was Vivian. Then she looked at him, and through the blood, he recognized Hermione Granger, leaning heavily against the front door, looking as if she were about to topple over at any moment.

He ran forward, helping her over to sit on the stairs so he could take a look at her. He didn't need to look very hard to figure out that she was beyond the Order's healing capacities. "Is everyone else okay? Harry?" she asked, holding on to his shoulder to steady herself. "What happened?"

"Everyone's fine," he said soothingly. "You need to go to St. Mungo's." He'd have to wait until Ron arrived, though. He couldn't leave headquarters.

"Can't I go to Madame Pomfrey?" she asked in a tiny voice.

Remus hesitated. "We really try not to bring her into stuff like this."

"I know. It's just that I don't know if St. Mungo's is a good idea right now."

"Why not?"

"I escaped."

"You'll be guarded," he said quickly. "Not just by Aurors. By us, too. You'll be safe."

She shook her head a little. "I killed Thera Castelar and Bellatrix LeStrange."

Remus felt his jaw drop as the front door opened again.

*******

Ron was all too happy to when McGonagall sent him back to headquarters. Hermione, Harry...he'd shoved them both to the back of his mind and run the D.A. He'd done what he'd had to do, which is to say what Harry had told him to do. And when it was all over, he'd told them to apparate away if they could or wait for their parents if they couldn't, and then he'd apparated back to headquarters, to his real purpose.

He was going to get Harry and his weird new mojo powers and they were going to go get Hermione and he didn't care if the Order and the Ministry and the Death Eaters and the entire rest of the magical world tried to stop them. They were going to get Hermione or die trying. Well, he would die. Harry would probably live, being Harry and all.

He wasn't going to trust Snape to get her out. He wasn't going to let what happened to Charlie happen to Hermione. What was probably already happening to Hermione, he thought, his rage flaring up.

And then he was going to get together with the twins and hash out the details of the Malfoy plan. That little fuck had been behind this; Ron just knew it. And Merlin knew what sort of plans the ferret had for Ginny. His rage flared higher, but he reined it in. The Malfoy plan could wait. Hermione came first.

Throwing open the front door, he stopped short as he saw Professor Lupin leaning over a familiar bushy head of hair, a familiar body sitting on the stairs.

"Hermione?" he asked, his voice cracking in a way that would have been embarrassing in any other set of circumstances.

She looked over at him. She looked bloody awful, even worse that Harry usually looked at the end of any given school year. But she was alive, and she was here.

He felt a smile cross his face, a prickle of tears behind his eyes. That's my girl, he thought proudly. Only Hermione could manage to escape a Death Eater stronghold before he even had time to put together a decent rescue effort.

"Ron," she said faintly, and he didn't think he could have gone another second without making sure that it was really her, and that she was really alive.

"Be careful," Remus warned, stepping to the side.

It was a wise warning. Her hair seemed safe, so Ron touched that, brushing his fingers down it. Gashed up and broken as she looked, it was a good sight better than she had coming out of the Department of Mysteries. At least now, her eyes met his, and they were clear, bright and snapping. Everything else aside, Hermione was in top form.

Wasn't she always?

"Can you take her to Hogwarts?" Remus asked.

"Hogwarts?" Ron asked, puzzled.

"It's better that way." His eyes were on Hermione as he said this. She nodded slightly.

"Okay," Ron said slowly, bending down to help her up. He would have liked to have scooped her into his arms instead of helping her painfully manage the stairs, but a man had to know his limits. He could lift Hermione. His record for holding her was about thirty seconds.

Maybe he needed to go on Harry's fitness program. Speaking of which...

"Where's Harry? Didn't you bring him back here?" he asked Remus.

"Yes. He's upstairs resting."

"Is he..."

"He's fine," Remus interrupted, sending him a look that even he couldn't misinterpret. Don't talk about that in front of Hermione right now.

"He was...out there...in the back...with me..." Hermione panted.

"Some scrapes and bruises. That's all," Remus said, rather convincingly.

"Oh...okay..."

By the time they reached the fireplace, Hermione was seriously flagging. Ron put all his strength into holding her up as he stepped into the fireplace. Remus stepped forward, grabbing his arm. "Stay with her," he ordered.

Ron paused. "I was planning to."

Remus nodded shortly. "Don't let anybody near her except Madame Pomfrey and Order members," he said in a low voice. "Not unless Dumbledore tells you otherwise."

"Okay," Ron said, hiding his puzzlement as he threw down the powder and flooed them both to the Hospital Wing at Hogwarts, catching Madame Pomfrey by surprise.

"What on earth?!" she screeched, leaping out of her chair and diving behind it, wand out.

"It's Ron Weasley," he said before she hexed him. "I have Hermione Granger here. She needs help." She did, too. He wasn't entirely sure she was conscious anymore. Her lead lay heavily on his shoulder and his two arms were the only things holding her up.

Yanking on a dressing robe, Madame Pomfrey sprang into action, levitating Hermione to the bed nearest the door. He tried to follow, but Madame Pomfrey stopped him, charming a curtain around the bed. "Wait outside," she said primly.

Ron sank down on another bed, staring down at his hands, the freckles standing out starkly against his skin in the moonlight. There were a lot of things that had happened tonight that he didn't understand. Knowing what Harry would eventually have to do, he hadn't really put a great deal of thought into how he might do it, but after what he'd seen tonight, Ron couldn't help but wonder if Harry hadn't known exactly how all along, even if he hadn't realized he'd known.

That doesn't even make any bloody sense. The fact was that he couldn't think clearly right now. He couldn't until Harry and Hermione were both back to normal.

Harry was okay. Remus would take care of him. And he'd look after Hermione. The panic he'd been in earlier was gone, but the aftereffects were just beginning to sink in. Ron knew quite frankly that he loved her, that she amazed him, that the sight of her furrowing her brow over a book softened something in his chest.

He'd never told her, and wasn't sure he ever would. He didn't know if she loved him back. He just knew that he loved her, and that he had for so long that it was a fact of life, like his hair being red, or his freckles.

"Are you planning to stay the night?" Madame Pomfrey asked suspiciously, coming out from behind the curtain.

"I'm supposed to stay with her," he said, not raising his eyes.

She paused a moment. "No funny business," she said, returning to her rooms. As soon as the door shut, Ron rose from the bed and pushed the curtains aside.

He'd expected Hermione to be asleep, but she wasn't. "Hi," she said softly, a smile crossing her newly-healed face. Ron felt himself relax inside. Her arm was in a sling and she seemed rather stiff and tired, but otherwise okay.

"How do you feel?" he asked.

"Groggy," she said. "She left me a sleeping potion, but I haven't taken it yet."

He said lightly on the edge of the bed. "Why not?"

"I wanted to talk to you."

He raised an eyebrow, smiling. "About the tale of your grand escape?"

She raised a hand and rubbed it over her eyes. "I'd rather wait until I can tell Harry, too, if you don't mind. I have a feeling I'm going to be telling it a lot over the next few days. What happened, anyway? Did the Death Eaters attack?"

"Yeah, they blew up the entrance to Diagon Alley. Malfoy dragged Harry inside." His voice hardened at the sound of the ferret's name. "To cover his tracks, no doubt."

"But Harry's okay, though, right?"

Ron shrugged. "Beat up a little, but he seemed okay. I gave Malfoy a good slug for leaving you outside," he said, grinning a little.

Hermione gave him a look. "Thanks," she said dryly. "What happened then?"

"Well, that's when things got really weird," he said, launching into the story. When he finished, Hermione was staring at him thoughtfully.

"I bet that's what he was learning in all his lessons with Fox," she said. "How to do that sort of stuff. Wandless magic and battle tactics. It makes sense."

"But why didn't he do any of that stuff in Little Hangleton?" he asked.

"I don't know," she said, furrowing her brow. "Maybe he couldn't."

*******

While the rest of the Order sorted things out with the Aurors, Vivian found herself ensconced in the upstairs room with Balder and Dumbledore, more or less letting them duke it out while she played the part of silent spectator.

"And of course it would have killed you to let me know about the trap you'd set for the Death Eaters," Balder was saying sarcastically.

"It wasn't a trap," Dumbledore answered. "It was a protective measure. The students were perfectly safe inside the wards, but I felt that our presence was a necessary precaution. It hardly seemed like a matter for you to concern yourself with, when - as you can see - we were perfectly capable of handling them ourselves."

"I see," Balder said stiffly. "Shall I assume that you're also perfectly capable of obtaining Miss Granger from the Death Eaters, too? Or are you just mentally preparing the speech to her parents?"

"Miss Granger," Dumbledore said, eyeing Balder levelly, "will be returned."

Balder eyed him back. "How, exactly?"

"I have one of my most trusted people on the job as we speak."

"As trusted as Mundungus?" Vivian muttered under her breath. Mundungus Fletcher had been charged with watching the back door. He'd needed to visit the loo. He hadn't called for someone to cover him while he was gone. And now their Head Girl was Merlin-knows-where in the custody of Bellatrix LeStrange.

Dumbledore glanced at her. "I have spoken to Mundungus," he said in a voice that made her very, very thankful that she wasn't Mundungus.

"Headmaster..." Balder began.

"Please," Dumbledore interrupted, holding up a hand. "I have every intention of pursuing a partnership with the Ministry, so long as we are both working towards the same end. But I believe this partnership cannot work unless we understand each other's strengths and weaknesses. There are certain things the Ministry is capable of doing that the Order cannot even dream of accomplishing. But there are also things the Order is capable of doing that the Ministry cannot."

Balder looked at him for a long time before speaking. "I'm not the Ministry, Dumbledore. I will do everything in my power to perform the duties of my job to the best of my ability. I perform my duties on behalf of the Ministry, but I'm hardly blind. Suffice it to say that I'm not stupid enough to let the Ministry know everything I know."

"An intelligent philosophy, in times like these," Dumbledore said.

Balder stood. "I'll be in touch then." Giving her a brief, unreadable look, he left.

"He's not terribly happy with me right now," Vivian sighed.

"I am sorry that you were caught in the middle of this," Dumbledore said, frowning. "You know as well as I do that he is on our side. I merely disagree with his tactics."

"Unfortunately, a lot of people prefer his tactics over ours."

His frown deepened. "I'm well aware of that." His communications device went off, and he answered it. It was Remus.

"Are you free to return to Headquarters yet?" he asked. "I'd like you to be here when Harry wakes up, and...Hermione's back."

Dumbledore looked as surprised as she felt. "Severus works fast," she commented.

"I'm on my way," the Headmaster said, putting the device away and looking up at her. "I imagine Minerva can handle things here. Would you return with me, please?"

"Of course." They found Remus in the kitchen, alone. "Where's Molly?" Vivian asked.

"Tonks went into labor," he said, smiling a little. "Apparently the baby decided that tonight wasn't nearly complicated enough already."

"Where's Hermione?" Dumbledore asked.

"I sent her to Poppy," Remus answered, right back to business. "She didn't want to go to St. Mungo's. Ron is with her." His eyes focused on Dumbledore. "She escaped from Shirag Castle. On the positive side, that means Severus won't have to put his cover in danger. On the negative side, however..." his mouth tightened. "She says she killed Bellatrix LeStrange and Thera Castelar."

Vivian and Dumbledore both stared at him. "That's impossible," Vivian said automatically. Even as an Auror, she'd never managed a decent killing curse, even when the higher-ups had given them leave to use it. She'd hated Death Eaters quite a bit, too. Apparently just not enough. But Hermione...

"I agree," Dumbledore said.

"So do I," Remus said, looking a bit relieved. "She was badly hurt. Perhaps she didn't realize what she was saying."

"Or maybe it wasn't the killing curse. Maybe something else happened," Vivian said, her mind working. "Anyway, it doesn't really matter. Thera Castelar can't even be killed, and as for Bellatrix LeStrange...personally, I vote we have a party."

"We'll have to wait until Severus returns to see what happened," Dumbledore said. "Shall we see to Harry, then?"

"What happened to him?" Remus asked carefully.

"He has a great deal of power in him," Dumbledore said quietly. "Anyone who has ever met him realizes that. It's power he shouldn't have, power he's never really been able to tap into, much less use. Tonight, finally managed to."

"But...how?"

Dumbledore shrugged, his eyes twinkling a bit. "He was finally ready to."

*******

Harry awoke and sat up, squinting in the low candlelight, utterly confused. Dumbledore was sitting on the bed next to him. Ginny, Remus and Professor Wellbourne stood behind him, watching him with trepidation. He was in Number Twelve, only he hadn't been here before. He'd been in the Leaky Cauldron, and...

"Hermione," he remembered, coming fully awake.

"She's fine," Dumbledore said soothingly.

Harry stared at him, his mind not quite up to full speed yet. Hermione had been taken by Bellatrix LeStrange. How the hell could she be fine? How long had he been out?

"Where is she?"

"In the Hospital Wing at Hogwarts," Dumbledore said.

"How does your head feel?" Remus asked.

Harry was trying very hard not to think about how his head felt. "Fine," he said quickly. "Can I see her?"

"I don't suppose we can heal that, can we?" Remus asked Dumbledore, his eyes directed at Harry's forehead.

"I don't think it's a good idea to risk it," Dumbledore said. "It cuts right across his scar."

"There's no need to talk about me as if I'm not here," Harry said, annoyed.

"Sorry," Remus said, stepping forward and tipping his chin up to study his forehead. "I hate to break it to you, Harry, but it looks like you're going to have another scar."

"Once it heals up, it might look kind of dashing," Ginny said, tilting her head and studying him. "You've got the lightning bolt, then a straight one cutting right through it."

"Great," Harry said dully.

"Do we have any of that Muggle stuff that prevents infection?" Professor Wellbourne asked. "And a really big bandolier or...what the hell are those things called again?"

"Band-aids," Remus said, stifling laughter. "Ginny, can you check the medicine cabinet in the bathroom?"

Nodding, Ginny trotted off, returning a few moments later with a white bottle, some adhesive tape and enough gauze to turn him into a mummy.

"Good," Remus said. He cleaned up the wound and taped some gauze over it. "Well," he said, "it's not pretty, but at least it's covered up."

"Are we done now?" Harry asked impatiently.

"Yes."

"Good," he said, standing. "She's at Hogwarts?"

"Harry, I don't know if it's a good idea for you to leave right now," Remus said.

"Don't worry," Dumbledore assured him, his eyes on Harry. "I'll take him."

"But what about...?" Remus asked, sounding worried.

"He'll be fine," Dumbledore promised. They flooed to the Headmaster's office, and Harry immediately made to leave. "A moment of your time," Dumbledore said, adding, "Please." Gritting his teeth, Harry turned.

"I don't know where it came from," Harry said, stuffing his hands into his pockets. "I didn't even know I could do that stuff. Or I didn't until I did it, if that makes any sense."

"It makes perfect sense," Dumbledore said, smiling. "It's the power that has been inside you since the night you first defeated Voldemort. The power that makes you his equal."

Harry nodded. He'd rather expected something like this, especially since he'd had such heightened awareness of Fox, of what she'd do, that she'd know how to follow his instructions. "Where's it been all this time?" he asked. "How come it only came out now? How come I couldn't use it before? Because it would've come in handy more than once in the past few years, you know."

"Guardian power molds itself to the individual who wields it. That is its nature. It is a great deal harder for a mortal to wield it, however. It took Voldemort decades to figure out how to use it. It has taken you sixteen years, and you managed to control it fairly well, considering the circumstances. You couldn't use it before because you weren't ready to. You might never have been ready to, or you might never have learned to control it once you accessed it, if Fox hadn't spent the last year preparing you for it."

"So there was a point behind it all," Harry murmured, recalling the days of Fox calling him girls' names and doing everything in her power to piss him off. He had eventually figured out that he had to forget his anger, focus and fight, and was suddenly glad he had.

He had a sneaking suspicion that he might have blown the Leaky Cauldron to smithereens if he hadn't.

"Yes, there was," Dumbledore said, a little ironically. "Contrary to popular belief, I do occasionally know what I'm doing. Now, I believe Hermione is still awake," he said in a gentler tone. "Please give her my regards. Goodnight, Harry."

Somewhat chastened, Harry bid the Headmaster goodnight and made his way up to the Hospital Wing, to find Hermione completely recovered. Or he figured she was, considering she and Ron were snogging ferociously.

They sprang apart as he shut the door, and Harry couldn't hold back the smile that spread across his face as he covered the distance to her bed and bent down to give her a careful one-armed hug.

"Getting captured by Death Eaters is supposed to be my job, you know," he said into her ear. She gave him a look as he pulled back. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine. What about you? What on earth happened to your head?"

"A brick," he said, touching makeshift the bandage on his forehead. "It's nothing. It's just that it goes across my scar, so Dumbledore didn't want to heal it magically."

"Why not? Did he think you'd turn evil or something?" Ron asked.

"It's a scar from a dark curse," Hermione said academically. "They're very unstable."

"In other words, he thought Harry would turn evil or something," Ron said, a little exasperated. "Do you lot actually listen to what I say, or do you just nod politely?"

"About half and half," Hermione deadpanned.

Ron scowled briefly, then sat up. "So Harry's here now. You said once Harry was here, you'd tell all about your big escape."

"Oh. I don't know," Hermione said, looking down and running a hand through her hair. "I suppose I have to, anyway." Her hand drifted down to toy with the sheet. "It's just..." she looked up at them anxiously, "there's what really happened, and then there's what I'm going to say happened, and I think the Ministry might buy the second version, but I'm not sure the Order will, so I might have to tell them the truth, too. Only I think I made a tacit promise that I wouldn't, and I'm not really sure what to do and..."

"Hermione," Ron said, putting a hand on her shoulder to cut off the babbling. "What the hell are you talking about?"

She winced. "I'll start with what's going to be the official story."

Harry shared a look with Ron, wondering what was going on. "Okay."

Hermione took a deep breath. "I woke up in Shirag Castle, in the dungeons. Bellatrix LeStrange and Thera Castelar were there."

In retrospect, Harry should have expected Thera to be involved in this, but it still jumped out of nowhere and kicked him in the stomach. So that's what she's doing nowadays.

"What happened?" Ron asked sharply.

Hermione gulped. "I grabbed the wand out of Thera's hand and killed her. Bellatrix and I struggled. She tried to kill me, but the curse missed. Then I killed her. The guard heard the commotion, so I hid behind the cot, stunned him and escaped."

Harry gawked at her, and saw Ron doing the same thing. He didn't quite know what to make of that. If that was the official version, it wasn't very good.

"So what really happened?" he asked.

Hermione glanced at him. "Thera killed Bellatrix and helped me escape."

"So she got you out?" Ron asked disbelievingly.

Hermione bit her lip. "Yeah, pretty much."

"Why?" It was a fairly legitimate question, in Harry's mind.

"She said she didn't like killing people she knew, but I'm not sure if she was serious."

"You would've exposed her," Harry said flatly. "If Bellatrix had gotten you to talk, the Death Eaters would have found out about everything. That's why she did it."

Hermione scrubbed her hand across her eyes. "Maybe. I don't know."

"Why else would she have done it?" Ron asked derisively.

"I don't know," Hermione bit out. "What does it matter?"

And...it didn't really. Hermione was back and she was safe, and that was all he cared about. "You're tired. I should go," Harry said, feeling more confused than ever. He was ninety percent certain that what Malfoy had told him earlier about Thera's actions was bullshit, but that still left ten percent undecided. And as much as he felt that believing the worst about her was the most intelligent way to go, he wasn't entirely certain that it was the fairest. He didn't exactly have a fucking guidebook about to assess her motivations.

He kissed Hermione on the forehead and left the Hospital Wing. Ron followed.

"You're going to contact her, aren't you?" he asked, sounding resigned.

"Yeah," Harry said, seeing no reason to lie yet feeling a bit sheepish at the same time. It was hard to look at Ron. "I mean, there's this whole thing, and Malfoy said some things earlier, and I won't know what's really going on until I talk to her."

Ron's eyes seemed to bore right into the top of his head. He was getting to be like Dumbledore with that stuff. "She didn't come back into the fold for Dumbledore, Harry. She did it to get to you. She's using you. I just hope you realize that."

"I do," Harry said, finally looking at his friend. "Don't worry."

Ron didn't quite look convinced. "No offense, Harry, but you tend to be a bit idealistic about women. Just remember that they can be evil, too. She's a prime example."

"She's hardly evil," Harry argued. "Acting out of pure self interest maybe, but so long as her self interest works in our favor and saves Hermione's life, I'm all in favor of it."

"Me too," Ron said. "Just watch yourself." He reached out and squeezed Harry's shoulder before turning around and walking back to the Hospital Wing.

*******

It was a stiff, sore, angry group of Death Eaters that made their way slowly up the stairs out of the dungeons. The effect of several Cruciatus curses on the nervous system was somewhat comical. Limbs seized up unexpectedly. Arms flailed. The Death Eaters would be drinking tonight, but not in celebration. Aside from nerve tonic, alcohol was the only thing that allowed one to sleep without one's legs frog-kicking all night.

Eschewing the main party - such as it was - Thera dragged her ass up to her room and plopped down in front of the toilet. Her stomach was roiling, but nothing seemed to be coming up. "Come on," she muttered. "Let's just get this over with already."

"Thera," she heard faintly from her bedroom. She groaned in response.

"Thera," she heard again, and she lifted her head, confused. It sounded like Harry. In fact, it was Harry. He was calling through the mirror.

Swearing viciously, she crawled over to it, largely because she had a feeling it was faster than trying to stand up at this point. "What is it?" she asked, picking the mirror up. "What the fuck happened now?"

Harry's face appeared, with a big bloody makeshift bandage on his head. He recoiled when he saw her. "Merlin, Thera. You look like shit."

At least her exterior matched her interior. "You really know how to compliment a girl, Harry. She saw the stone wall behind him and sat up. "Are you in the dungeons?!"

"What? No, I'm at Hogwarts."

She relaxed a little. "So what's the emergency?"

He looked confused. "There isn't one."

"Why are you calling, then?"

"I need to talk to you," he said, his voice resolute.

Thera's stomach lurched. "Right. Can it wait until after I hork my guts up, please?"

He blinked. "Oh. Yeah, sure."

Putting down the mirror, she leaned forward and did just that all over the floor. Thank Merlin for magic. Thera cleaned up the mess, then poured herself a drink. Or...tried to, at least. "Fuck it," she decided, picking up the bottle and directing it in a rather uncoordinated fashion towards her mouth, thankful that there was nobody around to witness this. She took a nice big gulp and sighed. Much better.

Leaning against the bed, she picked up the mirror again. "Harry?"

His face reappeared. "So...still alive, are you?"

"Me? Oh, I'm a cockroach. I'd survive nuclear winter. What's up?"

He'd obviously spent some time putting together a speech. "First of all, thanks for what you did for Hermione. I owe you. We all do."

Thera sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose. "Granger has a big fucking mouth."

"She only told me and Ron. Everyone else is going to get the official story."

"They'd better," she snarled. "There is a way in which these things are done, you know. If someone saves your life and asks for one teensy-weensy little thing in return, you should at least be able to go twenty-four hours without fucking them over."

"She didn't fuck you over, she told me and Ron. And she would've had to anyway, because neither of us would've believed the cover story. Frankly, I don't know if the Order will, either."

Thera felt a spurt of anger. "Well, she'll just have to employ a few acting skills then, won't she? Sorry if the story's not iron-clad enough for you, but I had about ten seconds to come up with a plan, and that's the best I could do."

"I'm just telling you what's what. Don't jump all over me about it."

"Sorry. I mean, you're right," she admitted, taking another swig, trying to focus enough to think it all through. "At least the Dark Lord bought it."

Harry looked surprised. "He did?"

"Yeah." After she'd spent a good hour or so convincing him, at least. "Maybe it doesn't matter if she tells the Order the truth, so long as she tells the Ministry the cover story. That way I won't look like the big fat traitor I actually am. And I'm all in favor of the Ministry operating under the misconception that I'm dead."

"Yes, I can see how that would be useful," he said with a touch of asperity.

Thera had never been less inclined to indulge in a game of Beat Around the Bush. "Harry, I'm tired and I feel like I've just been run over by the entire fucking Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. If you're pissed off at me, yell at me. You're not being subtle; you're being passive aggressive. There's a difference between the two."

"I'm not pissed off at you," he said in a tone that made it clear that he was lying. "I talked to Malfoy earlier. Or rather, he talked to me. Is he your new champion, then?"

"Not that I'm aware of," Thera said slowly. "Why? What did he say?"

"He went on about all this stuff you two have been doing."

"Well, we have been busy, what with the extendable ears and the bugs and everything. I haven't been able to get back up to see Yuri Dashkin, though..." And now she couldn't, she realized. At least not until she sorted out what the fuck had happened earlier with her father, if anything. She was not going to enslave herself to Erskine, for crying out loud. "But I will," she said, shoving it out of her mind. "I just have to think up a good plan."

"What did you do last time? Or do I not want to know?"

"You don't want to know," Thera muttered, taking a drink.

*******

Harry had actually had a plan for this conversation, namely getting a few questions answered. He hadn't asked any of them, and wasn't entirely sure how to go about it. At Hogwarts, when she'd come back from a Death Eater meeting and looked the way she did right now, he usually took care of her. It was hard to actually face her and conduct an interrogation. All the same, if this whole set-up was going to work, they were going to have to trust each other, and he told himself that he couldn't trust her unless he got his questions answered.

The problem was that when it came down to it, he couldn't figure out a way to ask her anything anything non-Dark-Lord-related without sounding like a whiny ponce: 'Did you really screw around on me, or did you just tell me that to get rid of me? Did you think it was fun sometimes, even if we were just pretending? Do you kind of miss it a bit, too?'

"Is that all?" Thera asked, looking like she really hoped it was.

"No," Harry said, sucking it up. "Can I ask you something?"

"You can ask," she said, smirking a little. Harry felt his mouth twitch. It was, after all, her standard response.

"How about this. If I ask you something, will you at least either answer it honestly or not answer it at all?"

She thought about that for a moment. "I'll do my best."

"Thera," he said, growing exasperated. Fucking impossible.

"Oh, be fair. Sometimes not answering a question is an answer in and of itself."

"You know, when all of this is over, I think you'll have a brilliant career in law."

"Harry," she said honestly, "I'd rather be a Death Eater for the rest of my life than a lawyer for one day. Go on, ask your infernal questions. I'll answer as truthfully as I can, provided I get to ask a few questions of my own in return."

It was, he realized, the best he was going to get. "Fair enough." Figuring he might as well start safe, he went with what was probably Malfoy's biggest whopper. "Did you really try to drive the Ferrari off a cliff?"

She rolled her eyes. "Malfoy has an even bigger mouth than Granger. That was completely blown out of proportion."

This was going to be like pulling teeth. "So you didn't?"

"I suppose I did, sort of. It was more of a game of chicken than anything else. It wasn't going to kill us, for crying out loud. Draco's a big drama queen."

Harry tried to process that, and couldn't, really. "Huh?"

"I came close," she said simply. "I chickened out. Plain enough for you?"

"Sure, okay." He had a feeling it was one of those events that had become so convoluted that it wasn't even worth trying to find the truth anymore. He wasn't sure he wanted to open the next can of worms, but there wasn't much avoiding it. "Why did you help Hermione escape?"

She shrugged. "Isn't that what I'm supposed to be doing?"

"Thera..."

"I don't know," she said exasperatedly. "Because I could."

"Because you could?"

She took a long drink before answering. "The circumstances allowed me to. The other Death Eaters were still gone, and the dungeon guard was distracted. If that hadn't been true, I wouldn't have been able to. But I was, so I did."

Harry absorbed that. "Why did you kill Bellatrix, though?"

She grinned. "Same reason."

"You could've just stunned her and obliviated her or something. It would've been more believable."

"And I would have passed up the perfect opportunity to rid the world of Bellatrix LeStrange," she pointed out. "Don't tell me you wouldn't have done the same thing, if you'd had the opportunity."

Opportunity hadn't been the problem. After his failed Cruciatus in the Department of Mysteries, he simply hadn't thought he'd be able to do it. But Thera had done it. And gotten away with it, to boot. It occurred to him that it wasn't just about having an operative inside the Death Eaters, it was about having an operative who was willing and able to do things the rest of them couldn't - or wouldn't - do. It wasn't a good thing, certainly. But it was necessary. Ugly, but necessary.

"Is that all?" she asked.

He shook his head, bracing himself. It was now or never. "At Hogwarts, when you dumped me, did you..." he faltered. "Were you really fucking around?"

She sighed. "Draco has an astoundingly large mouth."

"That's not an answer," he informed her.

"Yes, I'm aware of that," she said, reaching a hand up to rub her eyes. It struck Harry how strange it was to talk to her again, especially after everything he knew. Ron didn't really understand this - that in person, Thera didn't come off as even remotely capable of anything she'd done or been accused of doing. "Well, I suppose it doesn't really matter at this point, anyway. No, I wasn't. Is your ego assuaged now?"

"It wasn't ego," he said scowling.

"What was it, then?"

If there was a name for it, he couldn't think of one. "I just wondered, is all."

"Even if I had, it would've been your own fault, you know. You should've rubbed your scent all over me so other men would smell it and know that they'd have to best you in a bare-knuckled fight before laying claim to..."

She was off and running wouldn't stop unless someone forced her to. "Shut up, Thera."

"Yeesh," she finished up. "It's like National Geographic with you lot."

"I'm finished," he said loudly. "It's your turn."

"Right," she said, quickly switching gears. "I only have two questions. Do I have to give you the same big speech about honesty or...okay, I think it's safe to say that I don't."

"I'll do my best," he said sarcastically.

She sent him a repressive look. "Did you forgive me?"

Harry blinked at her. "For what?"

"Nice that I have to clarify this, but when I called you on the phone. I ran out of coins..."

He nodded. Little Hangleton. He remembered now. "Yeah, I did."

Thera seemed surprised at that. "Oh."

"Did you think I wouldn't?"

She took a disturbingly long drink before answering. "I didn't think anything."

Harry watched her a bit worriedly. She'd been back to normal for the past few minutes, but now she seemed like she was about to be sick again. "Are you okay?"

"Fine," she said hoarsely. Then she picked up the bottle and took another drink.

"Isn't that a sign of alcoholism?" he asked. "Drinking alone?"

She coughed a little before answering. "I'm not alone. I'm talking to you."

"I think making up excuses is another sign."

"Piss off," she said, taking another drink with the pure intention of spiting him.

"What's your other question?"

Thera cocked her head at him. "Did you really kill Lucius Malfoy?"

Harry felt his mouth drop open. "Lucius Malfoy's dead?"

"I guess that answers my question."

He couldn't seem to make himself believe it. "He's dead?"

"As a doornail," Thera said happily. "I wonder who did it, then? You obviously didn't."

"No, I didn't. I wasn't even...how the hell did I get blamed for that?"

"That's the story I heard. It's the story the Death Eaters heard, too. And the Dark Lord."

"Oh, no," he said in fake fear. "They're not all going to come after me again, are they?"

"Not any more than usual," she said. "But you might want to watch out for Granger.
They'll want revenge for Bellatrix."

Harry reached up a hand to scratch around the tape on his forehead. "I didn't even think of that," he said worriedly.

"Neither did I," she admitted. Then she perked up suddenly, her expression urgent in a way that made Harry perk up, too. "How protected are her parents?"

"They're under a Fidelius charm," he said. "Have been since Voldemort returned."

She nodded slightly, looking away. "The Death Eaters are desperate right now, and that means they're going with a full out scorched earth policy when it comes to you. They're going to do every single thing they can to draw you out, and every single thing they can think of to fuck with your head, and they're going to kill everyone they can in the meantime."

"So until now, they've been holding back?" he asked sarcastically.

"Until now, it's mostly been about covering their asses. It isn't anymore. The Death Eaters are fighting for their lives at this point, so I sincerely hope that they weren't exaggerating about these freaky new powers of yours."

"They weren't," he said. "At least, I don't think they were. I don't know. I'm still a bit weirded out by them myself."

"Guardian powers?" she asked her mind obviously working at full speed on this.

"That's what Dumbledore said," Harry shrugged.

"Could you mentally reach into this mirror and strangle me to death like Darth Vader?"

"I haven't the faintest idea," he said distastefully.

She gave him a small smile. "That's why you have it, you know. All that power."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"You don't want it," she said. "You didn't ask for it. And you'd give it back in a heartbeat. That's why you got it."

*******

They all sat up as Bill walked into the waiting room. "Is she here yet?" Ginny asked excitedly. "Can we see her?"

"Yes, she is," he said, grinning. He held out a hand. "Come on."

Ginny took it and the rest followed them to Tonks' room. She was propped up on pillows, looking tired yet happy, her hair platinum blonde. A little bassinet held a bundle of blankets. Bill went over and picked them up, beaming down at his daughter proudly.

She was so tiny. "Can I hold her?" Ginny asked, in awe.

"Of course," Bill said. "Here." He carefully placed the bundle in her arms.

"Hi, Charlotte," she said softly, pulling the blanket away from the baby's face so she could see her new niece. She was bald, her skin pale white. Her nose was a pair of slits. The baby opened her gleaming red eyes and Ginny screamed bloody murder.

"Gin! Ginny, wake up!" George was shaking her shoulder. Ginny opened her eyes and sat up to find her brother watching her, owl-eyed. She wasn't at St. Mungo's. She was in the kitchen of Number Twelve, waiting with Fred and George for news. She must have fallen asleep. "Bad dream, I take it?" George asked. "Can't say I blame you."

Ginny couldn't repress a shudder. Her headache was back full force and her mouth felt dry. She got up to dig some headache potion out of the cabinet.

"What time is it?" she asked.

"Nearly four," Fred said, his head in his arms, his voice muffled.

"No baby yet?"

"We'd have woken you up if there was," George yawned, sinking back into his chair.

Ginny downed the potion, sighing as her headache faded into the background. "Want some fairy wine?" Fred asked without lifting his head.

"I thought you said this was girly stuff," Ginny said, picking up the bottle in front of him.

"It is," George said. "It was all we could find."

"We really need to talk to Harry about the state of his liquor cabinet," Fred groused.

Figuring it couldn't do any harm, she took a drink. It was fizzy and fruity and...rather good, actually. "How alcoholic is this?" she asked, taking another drink.

"Only slightly more than butterbeer," George said dryly.

Still, when Professor Wellbourne shuffled in, Ginny put the bottle down on the table with an incriminating thunk. "Oh," the professor said, pulling her dressing gown tighter, as surprised to see them as they were to see her. "I thought everyone was at St. Mungo's."

"Mum told us to stay here," Ginny said, meaning that Mum had told her to stay here and made the twins stay with her.

Professor Wellbourne hummed. "Any news?"

"Dad called about an hour ago and said it shouldn't be too much longer."

"Guess there's no point in going back to sleep, then," Professor Wellbourne yawned. "I suppose I might as well get some work done while we wait," she said in a rather martyred tone as she shuffled over to the door. "You lucky kids can help me, if you want."

Ginny waited a moment, then followed after her. "Professor?"

"Hnh? What?"

They turned up the second stairwell, to the library. "Do you know anything about recovering one's memory?"

"Well, there are lots of ways to remember things," Professor Wellbourne said. "From Remembralls to Memory Building Charms to the Instant Recall Potion..."

Ginny dismissed the first two and honed in on the third. "Instant Recall Potion?"

"Having taken it, I don't recommend it," Professor Wellbourne said, gathering up a stack of parchments to take down to the kitchens. "For a few minutes after you take it, you can't lie. And what's worse, you just keep babbling on and on about the truth."

Ginny made a face. That was a side effect she wasn't terribly fond of. "But you remember everything?"

"Pretty much. I'm not Severus; I couldn't tell you how well it matches up against a memory charm or anything, but it's pretty potent, to say the least."

It was often highly useful to be friends with Hermione Granger. She probably knew how to make Instant Recall Potion, and even if she didn't, she'd do it just to see if she could. Ginny was beginning to see that there was a way to find out what had happened in the Chamber of Secrets without involving her parents, and she was all in favor of it.

Professor Wellbourne added a book to the top of her stack. "Why d'you ask?"

"I've been thinking about becoming an Obliviator," Ginny lied.

"You'll need N.E.W.T. Charms," Professor Wellbourne said conversationally as they started back downstairs. "Did you get in?"

"Yeah, I figured I'd stay with Potions and Transfiguration, too."

"And Defense Against the Dark Arts, too, of course," Professor Wellbourne said, smirking at her as she walked into the kitchen and dumped everything on the table.

"Of course," Ginny said, snagging a butterbeer from the icebox, silently plotting. She'd have to wait until they went back to Hogwarts; Hermione would probably need the library, and if they did it at the Burrow, her parents might find out. She found her mind tapering off as she was drawn drowsily to the motion of Professor Wellbourne's quill.

The floo flared to life, nearly knocking all of them out of their chairs in surprise. Her father stepped out, holding a handful of cigars, his eyes shining with unshed tears.

"Charlotte Ann Weasley," he said shakily, "is here, healthy and absolutely beautiful."

Ginny felt pure joy well up in her, brushing sleepiness aside as they all mobbed her father with hugs and congratulations. "They're all asleep, even Bill. We can all go over in the morning. Mum's on her way. Here," he said, dazedly happy, handing out cigars to everyone, including Ginny. "They wouldn't let me light these up at St. Mungo's."

*******

"Voh-dee-mort," Sakura sang, appearing a few feet away in a full geisha outfit, sucking on a lollipop. She opened her fan with a flourish and made a kissy-face at him.

"I'm not in the mood to be trifled with," Voldemort snarled, his red eyes glowing.

"Poor Voh-dee-mort," Sakura purred, fluttering her eyelashes. "Your sillllly attack did not go as you hoped."

"No, it didn't," he said, a bit sulkily. "I thought we had an agreement."

"We do," she said, sucking loudly on her lollipop in a way that got on his nerves like nothing else. "But the others fear that you are making pllllans of your own."

"What do you mean?"

Gazing at him over top of her fan, Sakura's smile suddenly took on a decidedly terrifying edge. "There are many stories about humans who try to outsmart the Gods. They do not ever end wellllll for the humans."

"I'm not trying to outsmart anybody," Voldemort said in his silkiest voice. "And in any case, you aren't Gods."

Sakura snapped her fan shut abruptly, her smile growing. "Aren't we?" she asked. She sucked on her lollipop in a pornographic manner for a moment, then disappeared.

"No, you're not," Voldemort said quietly, "and you're not infallible, either."