Hey guys ^-^ So for the past week or so I have been COMPLETELY obsessing over A Very Potter Musical and A Very Potter Sequel (does anybody know if there will be a threequel?) …and if you haven't watched those, then go do it right now because you are MISSING OUT! So I know that I've been skipping around with POVs a lot, but from now on, it should pretty solidly be either Harry's POV or Victoire's POV. Promise. Thanks to Yankeefan26, PsychoBrunette, and Princess of Flames for their reviews!
Victoire's POV"Oh, it's absolutely terrifying," Victoire Weasley explained to her younger brother Louis as she sat on the edge of her bed.
"Horrifying," exaggerated Dominique, Vic's 5th year sister. "They tell you that you only need a permission slip for Hogsmeade, but it's much, much worse."
Louis, the poor 13-year-old, looked up wide-eyed at his sisters from his cross-legged position on the ground. "Is it really that bad?" he asked.
Victoire nodded. "Absolutely. Hagrid takes you in to the Forbidden Forest. Not all centaurs are as welcoming as Firenze, I'll warn you. I had a nasty run-in with one during my own third year."
"You're getting off the topic, Vic," Dominique nudged her sister, barely holding in her giggles. It was too fun to mess with Louis, the gullible little guy.
Suddenly, large crashing noises sounded from downstairs. Dominique's eyebrows furrowed. "What do you suppose Mum's doing down there?"
Victoire stood up from her bed, the mattress springs creaking beneath her. "I don't know, but it doesn't exactly sound like she's making tea."
A pounding of feet was heard, and Victoire peeked out of her doorway to see her flustered mother running up the stairs. Fleur Weasley looked at her daughter with a begging look on her face. "Where is your father?"
Victoire's mouth made an 'O' shape. She'd never seen her mother so distraught before. Victoire thrust her arm toward the closed door at the end of the hallway.
Fleur scrambled her way to the door and began knocking on it furiously. "Bill!" She called to her husband. At this point, all three of the Weasley-Delacour children were poking their English and French heads out of Victoire's bedroom door.
Bill thrust open his office door. Fleur wasted no time with explanations. She simply barked, "Downstairs," and ran back down the staircase. Bill's puzzled expression suggested that he had no clue what was going on any more than his children did. Still, he followed his wife down the stairs.
Victoire turned to her brother and sister, put a finger to her lips, and crept slowly into the hallway, Dominique and Louis both following her lead. Vic took five steps down the stairs, making sure to skip the second one to the top, as the creaking noise it made sounded like something close to a dying cat. She squatted low by the wall and listened.
"Where's Ron?" Victoire heard her father say. Uncle Ron? That must've been who Bill was talking about. But why should Uncle Ron be in their house?
"I had to leave him back with Harry and Ginny," the broken voice of Vic's Aunt Hermione flowed into her ears.
Bill sighed heavily. He cursed softly, causing Dominique to giggle behind Victoire. Vic turned and slapped a hand over Dominique's mouth.
"We have to get them," Bill said.
"But Bill," Fleur said, "You heard Hermione, the place was swamped with Death Eaters." Death Eaters? Those were the followers of You-Know-Who, weren't they? Victoire must've heard wrong. You-Know-Who had been gone for 19 years. Anyone who'd followed him and lived had been sent to Azkaban, with the exception of the Malfoys, who'd narrowly escaped their sentence due to the fact that they'd left You-Know-Who during his final battle.
"What do you expect me to do, Fleur? He's my little brother, and I can't just leave him there alone." Bill's voice was viciously calm.
"Didn't you hear Hermione?" Fleur argued. "Harry and Ginny are there with him."
"Oh, yes," Bill scoffed, "and I'm sure Ron will receive plenty of help from a splinched witch and an unconscious wizard. My brother and baby sister could be dead and I'm not supposed to go help them?"
"Well, if they're dead, they won't need much of helping, will they?"
Silence.
For an entire minute, no one said a word. The only thing Vic could hear was her own shallow breathing.
Bill broke the silence. "Hermione, you have the Dittany?" Victoire couldn't hear a reply, but she assumed that Hermione had given some sort of signal that she did in fact have what Bill was asking for, as Bill continued by saying, "Then we need to disapparate now. You'll have to come with me, Hermione. I've never been to your mother's house. Do you have enough strength?"
"I'm fine, Bill," Aunt Hermione said shakily. "Just shocked is all."
At that point, Victoire made the most impulsive decision she could have. She stood straight up and thumped her way down the stairs. What she saw was a room full with her mother and father, both standing in the middle of the room, and her Aunt Hermione and cousins Hugo and Rose, all covered in soot and sitting on the sofa. A strange woman sat next to Hermione. They had the same sort of build, so Victoire could only assume that the woman was Aunt Hermione's mother.
Hermione held a small bottle in her hand and Bill looked as if he was mid-stride, ready to walk to Hermione for a side-along apparition. The room was frozen as if it was a painting.
Victoire gulped. "I want to come with you," she said.
"Absolutely not," Bill shook his head. "You're not old enough to be put in this kind of situation."
"I'm seventeen!" Victoire complained. "I'm of age. I passed my apparition test and everything. I can use magic. I can help."
"The only way you can help is by staying here," Bill's voice rose. "You are not going in to battle at seventeen years of age, young lady."
"Why not?" Vic wailed.
Her father gave no answer.
"Mum," Vic pleaded, "can't you convince him?"
"Sweetheart, I have to agree with your father. At seventeen you should not be going in to battle."
"Uncle Harry went to battle when he was seventeen, and so did Uncle Ron and Aunt Hermione," Victoire countered.
"That's different," Bill fumed.
"It's not different at all!" Vic squawked.
"Vic," Aunt Hermione spoke up, "I'm telling you from experience that war at seventeen years of age isn't fun. War at any age isn't fun."
Vic leaned against the wall and crossed her arms over her chest.
Bill strode over to Hermione with three steps, and they joined hands. Vic straightened up. Hermione squeezed her eyes shut, sighed, and just as the two began to disapparate, Vic sprinted across the room, over a chair, and grabbed hold of her father. She heard a faint pop, and was then twisting through space. She landed on her back on luscious, green grass, breathing hard. She felt in her pocket for her wand. It was there.
A shadow stepped into Victoire's vision and she sat up, putting a hand over her head to block out the blaring sun. She took in her surroundings and realized that she was sitting on the damp grass of a backyard. Bill loomed over the petit blonde girl, his face furious. His voice shook with anger. "When we get back home, young lady—"
"Bill," Hermione broke in, sticking a finger to her right. Bill and Victoire turned to see where Hermione was pointing. Vic rested her eyes on a frail old woman who'd been watering her flowers. She'd obviously seen them apparate, as her mouth hung open and she was completely unaware that she'd been letting her watering can spill water onto her feet.
Bill stood, took out his wand, and whispered, "Obliviate." He began walking toward the house. "Vic," he said, "I want you to stay out here."
But of course, Vic refused to be left behind. She followed Bill and Aunt Hermione to the back door of the home.
Hermione put a hand on the doorknob and twisted, but it was locked. She let out an annoyed sigh. "Alohomora," she recited.
The trio crept inside the house, and, to Vic's surprise, she didn't hear any more complaints from her father. They all peeked their heads around a cramped hallway, each with their wands out. A sound of cabinets opening and shutting filled Vic's ears.
She squinted her eyes to see a man in a long black cloak and a white mask raiding the kitchen cabinets, facing away from them. Bill stepped forward first, but tripped loudly over something on the floor, landing with an "Eugh!" and a thump.
The man in the kitchen spun around and shot a spell at Vic and Hermione, who both ducked in time for the hex to hit the wall behind them, leaving a smoldering hole straight through it.
"Petrificus Totalus!" Victoire shouted. The man didn't have time to block the spell and fell rigidly to the ground, succumbing to the full body-bind.
"Thanks," Aunt Hermione muttered, and the two helped Bill up.
The trio walked carefully across the kitchen, ready for a run-in with another masked man.
"What do we do with him?" Vic asked, nudging her head toward the cloaked man.
"Nothing," Bill said. "He's taken care of for now."
Bill, Hermione, and Victoire turned into the main hallway of the home. Vic gasped. Before her were at least five dead and bloodied men, all wearing the same black cloaks.
"Ron must've gotten away then," Bill concluded. "But what about Harry and Ginny?"
"They can't have gone far," Aunt Hermione decided. "They were too injured." She still clasped the bottle of Dittany in her fingers.
Bill shoved his way through the hallway, stepping on top of the unavoidable bodies. Hermione and Vic followed his lead. Each time Vic stepped on a limb, there was an audible crack that made her sick to her stomach. The trio finally reached the stairs, treading their way slowly and quietly up them. When they reached the top, Bill took a right and strode to an open door at the end of the hallway.
"Stupefy!" Victoire heard a voice shout, and Bill went down.
Hermione sprinted forward, "Ron!" she sobbed, "Oh, thank Merlin." And she dashed into the room.
Victoire inched forward and stood over her father's still body. He's only Stunned, Vic told herself. She peeked into the room and saw Aunt Hermione standing against a wall with Uncle Ron's wand at her throat. A red-haired figure laid unconscious on the bed at the far end of the room. Victoire's eyes drifted to the figure standing with his wand out at the end of the bed. The glasses and messy black hair were a dead give-away. "Uncle Harry," Vic started forward.
"Don't move," Harry pointed his wand at her chest.
"What's going on?" Vic asked. She stood still, but turned her head toward Ron and Hermione.
"Our seventh year at Hogwarts," Ron said forcefully, his wand still at his wife's throat. "How did we get into the Chamber without Harry?"
Hermione grinned. "You used Parseltongue and told me that Harry talks in his sleep."
Ron stuffed his wand back into his pocket and embraced his wife.
"What the bloody hell just happened?" Victoire practically screamed. Harry's wand was still directed toward her.
Hermione and Ron broke apart. "It's her," Hermione said convincingly. "She apparated here with me from Shell Cottage."
Both Ron and Harry's shoulders relaxed and Uncle Harry lowered his wand.
"Will somebody tell me what's going on?" Vic screeched.
"Don't lose your temper, Vic," Uncle Harry consoled her. "We had to make sure you weren't imposters." He then turned to Aunt Hermione. "We tried using the muggle first-aid kit on her," he said, referring to Aunt Ginny, who Vic had concluded was the unconscious figure on the bed. "Ron's completely drained. He used too many powerful spells. I'm too weak to heal her with magic right now."
For the first time, Vic noticed her Uncle Harry's wobbling knees. What had happened to him?
"I have Dittany," Hermione went to Ginny's bedside, and Victoire turned away as the healing process began. She noticed her father stirring on the floor in the hallway and went to him.
"Dad," she said, "They're all fine and they're healing Ginny." Bill nodded and stepped into the room, closing the door behind him and leaving Vic out in the hallway. She tried the doorknob, but Bill had already locked the door. "Alohomora," she tried. No such luck. The door stayed locked and Vic plopped down on the hallway floor, eavesdropping as best as she could.
"…into a whole lot of Death Eaters," Uncle Harry was saying. "Lily was absolutely terrified, and before I could stop her, she began running. Which, obviously, only made matters worse for me. It's impossible to keep an eye on your daughter and fight off Death Eaters at the same time."
There was that name again. Death Eater. Uncle Harry had used it twice. How could Death Eaters possibly be back? Did that mean that You-Know-Who was back too?
Harry began talking in a hushed voice. "I thought I was done for. They were standing over me, about to finish me off, when something jumped at them from out of nowhere. I scrambled backward on my hands and knees and hid myself in the bushes. I found Lily there. She had my snapped broom and she was crying like I've never seen before.
"I looked for what had gotten the Death Eaters, and all I saw was a big black dog retreating into the woods on the other side of the street."
"Oh, Harry," Aunt Hermione whispered. "You don't think…It isn't possible."
Vic pressed her ear to the door.
"He's been dead for twenty-one years, mate," Ron said. "It was probably just a rabid dog."
"But I saw—" Harry tried to argue.
"I know, mate, I know," Ron said. "But if he were alive, he would have come to see you by now."
There was a series of whispers that were too quiet for Vic to understand. She pressed her ear as hard as she could to the door. She shifted to her knees, but banged her elbow against the doorframe while doing so.
All conversation inside the room stopped. The last word she heard before Bill muttered the muffliato charm was one she knew she'd heard before, but couldn't quite recognize. "Horcrux."
PHEW. The longest chapter of the story yet. Review, please! Reviews = motivation. Motivation = MORE CHAPTERS. More chapters = hopefully satisfied readers?