Harry and Ron could hear Hermione screaming as Bellatrix treated her to another round of the cruciatus curse, when the curse was finally lifted the screaming was replaced by Hermione's pleading with the Deatheater and her promises and assurances that they had never been to her Gringott's Vault, much less taken anything from it. She even made claims that the sword they'd been discovered with was a fake.

"We have to do something, Harry. She'll kill her if we don't stop her soon!"

"Do you think I don't know that, Ron? But what can we do? We're down stuck down here with no wands. Why don't you try and think of some way to save her?"

"Harry?" Harry sighed and turned to look at the girl,

"What is it Luna?"

"They're sending someone down to get Mr. Griphook to check the sword. I thought maybe you-"

"We could ambush them when they open the door! They'd never be expecting that!" Ron had an excited look on his face but Harry glared at him,

"They'd never be expecting it because they've realised that even we are not that stupid. That's a terrible idea!" Harry turned to the goblin, "You have to tell them the sword is a fake! They'll kill her if they know it's the real one. Please." They didn't know what the goblin had decided to do when Pettigrew dragged him back up the stairs, they were going to have to just wait and hope he was on their side.

~#~

Up in the drawing room Hermione was panicking, the Deatheaters were about to find out that she'd been lying to them; how was she to know they happened to have a goblin locked away in the cellar? There wasn't anything she could to but brace herself for the inevitable pain that was surely going to be coming in a matter of minutes. She heard Bellatrix say something at the other end of the room, there was a squeaky reply which she didn't hear properly; all she could hear was her heart beating wildly in her chest and the blood rushing in her ears. Suddenly the roaring in her ears stopped and she was alone in the room and the fire was lit but before she could even begin to comprehend what had just happened she lost consciousness.

The boys in the cellar stopped their feverish whispers as the noise from the room above them ceased, there were a few beats of absolute silence before they heard Bellatrix's booming voice "Where is she?" Harry's head snapped around to stare at the others in the room; surely he hadn't heard correctly but they all looked just as perplexed as he felt, before any of them could speak Bellatrix shouted again, "Where did she go? How did she escape?"

There was a lot of movement above them as the Deatheaters tired to find Hermione; it had been decided that she couldn't have moved past any of the wards as no alarms had sounded and she couldn't have apparated away from the manor as you needed to be outside of the wards. While the Deatheaters gathered in the drawing room spread out throughout the house to find the girl, back in the cellar Luna had pointed out to Harry that he was standing in a puddle, warning him about some water dwelling creature her father had just published an article about.

By the light of the deluminator they realised that it was blood. Harry smacked a hand to his forehead, "How could I forget about Sirius' mirror?! I've been seeing that eye in it all this time, whoever it is could send help!" Ron grinned at him and motioned for him to be quick. Once Harry had given their location the two boys crowded back to the door so they could hear what was happening upstairs better.

~#~

"It appears our young Miss Granger is a lot more capable than we gave her credit for, I can't detect her anywhere in the Malfoy grounds; she must have slipped through the wards somehow. What's most impressive is it's almost like she were never here to begin with, there is a no trace of her whatsoever." After Bellatrix's first shout Snape had crouched where the girl had been and started performing all sorts of complicated looking charms in order to discover where she had gone, but he hadn't had any luck and would soon need to depart to get back to Hogwarts before he was missed. Bellatrix glared at the man,

"The mudblood does not deserve any credit. When we find her, and we will, I will kill her for attempting to make a fool of me!"

"It seems that she has succeeded in that quest. Just be grateful your sister had the idea to question the goblin before sending for the Dark Lord. That could have been disastrous." Bellatrix stalked towards him,

"We still have Potter; he is who really matters after all."

~#~

When they'd first heard Snape's voice in the hall above them they'd both been ready to pull the heavy door off its hinges to get to him, but they had shared a grin when he said Hermione has escaped the wards. "That's our Hermione! Now we just have to worry about getting ourselves and Griphook out of here."

"Griphook? Why would we bother with him? He would have gotten her killed!"

"I think we're going to need him." A loud crack filled the air and Harry spun around to face the room, his hand automatically flying to the pocket which usually held his wand, "Dobby? What're you doing here?" Harry sounded a little incredulous to see the house elf standing before him, "Wait, can you apparate here?" Dobby nodded enthusiastically,

"Elf magic is different to wizard magic." Harry nodded grinning,

Dobby get those three out of here and come back for Ron and me." Dobby bowed and took Luna and Mr. Ollivander's hands and motioned for Dean to take Luna's other hand. The elf looked like he was just about to leave when Ron blurted out,

"Take them to Shell Cottage in Cornwall. They'll be safe there." Dobby nodded once more and the three were gone the next second. Harry looked more worried that excited; how were they going to manage to get Griphook and out of the Manor alive, with no wands?

~#~

There wasn't much time to think before Dobby was back with another loud crack, Harry's eyes narrowed; "Can you do that without the noise?"

"Oh, yes Harry Potter, when Dobby worked for the Malfoy family he never made a sound." Harry nodded looking thoughtful,

"Would you be able to go upstairs silently to see how many are up there? It'll be handy to know what we're up against." Dobby was gone and Harry smiled, "that's handy." Ron nodded his agreement with another grin.

When Dobby returned he looked pleased with himself, "Only the man with the silver hand and Dobby's old young master are there."

"The rest must be searching the house for Hermione. Did either of them see you?" Dobby shook his head, his ears flapping,

"Dobby made sure no one saw."

"Good, take us up there, as close to a wand as you can." Dobby nodded and took their hands.

~#~

They appeared silently behind Draco, who was standing guard over Griphook with his wand held loosely in his hand; Pettigrew was standing at the top of the cellar stairs guarding the door. Harry grabbed the wand out of Draco's hand and had stunned him before he had even turned around.

Pettigrew was startled by the sound of Draco's body slumping to the floor and his eyes widened when he saw Harry step towards him with a wand in his hand. "H- Harry, my dear boy. Your parents wouldn't want you to hurt me." Harry saw Pettigrew's wand inching towards his left forearm, where the dark mark was poking out of his shirtsleeves.

"I don't think so Peter. You owe me a life debt; you wouldn't want to be calling Tom tonight. Accio wands." Hermione and Ron's wands sped into his hand, along with the Pettigrew's and the one Ron had taken from the snatchers before he found them. It was good to have the spare, even if Draco's wand did seem to be working a lot better for him that the other had. Pettigrew seemed to be struggling to press a finger to his mark; his hand didn't seem to be cooperating with his wishes and was soon wrapped around his neck.

Harry turned away, not wanting to witness whatever was about to take place, but unwilling to stop it from happening. He joined Dobby and Ron over where Griphook was laying prone on the ground, picking up the sword along the way. "Let them know we're leaving Dobby, nice and loud." The crack they disappeared with was loud enough that it seemed to shake the walls of the manor.

~#~

Bellatrix, Lucius and Narcissa all abandoned their searches and ran full-speed back to the hall to find Draco on the floor in a heap, Pettigrew being choked by his own hand and the goblin and the sword both gone. Narcissa went straight to Draco and cast a quick enervate and thanked Merlin when his eyes fluttered open straight away, with a slightly sheepish look on his face. His aunt stooped down in front of him with her face close to his, "What happened here Draco?" her voice was unnaturally and unnervingly calm and he knew that was probably dangerous.

"I don't know, I was guarding the goblin and someone came up behind me, took my wand and stunned me. I didn't see anything though. It must have been Granger, maybe she just disillusioned herself and waiting until you were all gone. She's always been too smart for her own good! But now she's stuck here somewhere and we'll find her! Filthy little mudblood!"

Lucius had managed to stop the silver hand from killing Pettigrew, but only by casting a body bind and prising it away from the man's neck; he was almost certain that as soon as the spell was lifted the hand would continue. "His only chance is to keep him frozen until the Dark Lord comes, maybe he'll save his pet rat." Bellatrix stalked over to the two men,

"Mobilise his mouth, maybe he saw what happened here." Lucius did as his sister-in-law told him and Pettigrew took a few gasping breaths, filling his lungs with air again, "So Pettigrew, tell us what happened."

"Potter appeared out of nowhere and got Draco's wand, he was standing over the boy about to kill him so I tried to call the Dark Lord but he did something to my hand and disapparated with the Weasley boy, the goblin and the fake sword."

"The fake sword we never actually confirmed was a fake?!" Narcissa had started to speak at the same time as her sister,

"Why did you not do anything to stop the boy yourself, even if you had managed to call the Dark Lord he would never have gotten here in time before the boy disapparated. Draco could have been killed!" Bellatrix glared at her sister, clearly having more on her mind than the life of her only nephew. Narcissa could see that the rage building in her sister would soon become dangerous to her family if something wasn't done about it but bringing the Dark Lord would only make matters worse now that their prisoners had escaped. There was nothing she could do so she just looked down to the floor and didn't say another word as Bellatrix rounded on Pettigrew again.

~#~

Ron's brother Bill met them at the door to Shell Cottage, "I must say, I was expecting at least one of you to be injured."

"How are the others; we didn't really get to talk to them."

"Ollivander is exhausted, dehydrated and needs a good meal but other than that everyone's fine. Where's Hermione, she isn't..?"

"No, she got away somehow, before we did. She disappeared when they started to question Griphook. Snape said it was like she'd never even been there." Bill's eyebrows rose at the mention of Snape, and the excitement in his brother's voice while talking about his best friend being missing. The two younger boys told him the story with so much pride in their voices and grins on their faces that Bill couldn't find it in him to bring them down, Fleur didn't have such an issue as she listened with a frown on her pretty face,

"But where is Hermione now? How will she know where to find you? She does not know about this place." Harry's face dropped and his eyes widened; he'd never even thought of that.

"She'll think we're still at Malfoy Manor, what if she goes back there for us? They'll kill her for escaping, if not just because we managed to. She's already been under the cruciatus curse for so long. We have to find her!"

~#~

Dobby gasped as he entered the drawing room to light the fire; there was a girl sleeping in the middle of the room. He went as close to her as he dared, his master was away from the manor and the mistress hadn't told him that any guests were expected, not that they would have a guest sleep on the floor of the drawing room. He didn't know what to do, he wavered next to her for a few minutes before he made the decision to go and get the mistress. He appeared silently outside Narcissa's bedchamber and knocked before entering; she had already been woken by one of the female elves and was sitting up in her bed reading.

She looked up when the door opened and was surprised to see Dobby standing at the foot of her bed, he wasn't meant to be in this part of the house, "What is it? You know you are not supposed to be here." Dobby caught hold of one of his ears and tugged on it,

"Dobby is sorry, Mistress Malfoy but there is something he needs to tell you."

"Well, get on with it then."

"There is a girl- in the drawing room. Dobby thinks she is sleeping." Narcissa had set her book to one side and was getting out of bed,

"What do you mean? How could there possibly be a girl in the drawing room? We have wards on the house and grounds. Take me there." She placed her hand on the elf's shoulder and he apparated them back downstairs.

~#~

Narcissa gaped when she saw that Dobby had indeed found a girl asleep on the drawing room floor. She sank down next to the girl's head and waved her wand over the girl doing a simple diagnostic charm. "Go to Hogwarts and fetch Professor Snape, she's going to need a few potions in order for her to heal properly. I believe she has been put under the cruciatus curse for some length of time." Dobby nodded and disappeared straight away, returning minutes later with a disgruntled and slightly bleary looking Severus Snape."

"I do not appreciate being woken by house elves at this hour on a Saturday Narcissa. Your elf told me I was needed along with an array of healing potions, what's the matter?"

"This girl was found this morning, I believe she has been tortured."

"And you brought her here?" Narcissa shook her head,

"No, Severus, she was found here."

"A pretty young girl has been tortured and left in your drawing room, yet you sent for me rather than asking your husband about it." Narcissa pursed her lips into a tight line,

"I do not like what you are implying Severus, but in any case Lucius is out of the country this week so she in nothing to do with him. Now if you please, I do think this girl needs some help." Severus rolled his eyes and knelt down on the other side of the girl to Narcissa, repeating the wand movements she had made earlier before making a few more complicated ones.

"I think you are correct Narcissa, but there doesn't seem to be any lasting damage; all she needs is rest, to give her body time to heal. I would suggest you move her to a bed in one of the more remote room of the manor and I will question her when she awakes. If you will permit me to stay until then? I would not feel comfortable leaving you and Draco here alone with her until we know who she is and how she got past the wards." Narcissa's eyes widened as she looked from Severus to the girl as if it hadn't even occurred to her that she might be dangerous. Severus barely managed to refrain from rolling his eyes at the woman but Narcissa didn't notice.

"Dobby, take the girl and do as Professor Snape has said. Stay with her until she wakes and come and get us when she does." Dobby nodded and disappeared with the girl, Narcissa turned to Severus again, "Would you like some breakfast while you're here? You'll have missed it at the castle by now." Severus nodded and followed her to the dining room.

Upstairs Dobby was fussing over tucking the girl into the bed, he was worried about what reaction she would have when she woke up and decided she should at least be comfortable, and securely tucked under the sheets, just in case of a bad reaction to her surroundings.