Chapter Ten

Ron made them tell them what they had been up to while he was away before he dove into his story. Harry and Hermione explained how long they waited for him, their nightly trips to Athens and their horrific visit to Godric's Hollow. Harry admitted his thoughts about Dumbledore, that had Ron just nodding. Hermione added what they had learnt, which was actually very little once she got talking.

"Do you mind showing me the symbol?" Ron offered. "I might recognise it." The amazing thing was that he actually did. "I mean, I don't know what it is or anything, but I remember seeing Luna's father wearing it around his neck at the wedding."

Hermione pondered that for a moment, not too sure what to make of that new piece of information. Eventually, she set it aside and paid attention to Ron as he prepared to detail his adventures over the past few weeks.

"First of all, can I just point out that my lone wolf exploration appears to have turned up more than your double visit to Godric's Hollow?" Ron said, laughing at his own joke. "Just putting it out there."

Hermione was not amused. "Tell us what happened," she prompted.

The three of them opted for the floor. It was an unspoken decision as they all settled on the carpet in the middle of the tent's common area. Hermione shifted until she was comfortable, even removing the scarf from around her neck.

Ron's eyes immediately settled on the bruising on her neck. "Merlin, Hermione, what the hell?"

"Oh," she said, clearly embarrassed. "We may have played down the whole destroying of the Horcrux. It turned out to be a lot more taxing than either of us anticipated."

Ron just stared. "That looks like it hurts. A lot."

Hermione shook her head. "It really doesn't. It looks a lot worse than it really is. Honestly."

Ron seemed to accept that, even risking a smile. "For a moment there, I thought Harry had given you a love bite to make the entire world jealous."

Harry shot him a look, which only made Ron laugh.

Then, more seriously, Ron asked, "Do you think he knows? Do you think You-Know-Who knows we're hunting Horcruxes; that we're actually destroying them?"

It was a question directed at Harry and he would be the one to answer it. "No," he said, strongly, rather confidently. "I would know if he knew."

Hermione shifted uncomfortably in her position at the sound of his words. She continually told him to keep Voldemort out of his head but he consistently chose to ignore it. It hurt him, she could see, whenever Voldemort accessed his mind but what really bothered her was that, if Harry could see what Voldemort was doing; surely he could as well.

"Then at least we've got a one up on him there," Ron said before he exaggerated a sigh. "So, let me finally tell you what happened. When I left, I headed straight to Charlie's," Ron finally began. "To say he was surprised to see me is quite the understatement. He thought that I had just left you guys and didn't intend on coming back. How crazy is that idea? I could never just leave you guys, no matter how frustrated I get."

Hermione touched his arm with her hand.

Ron continued. "So I ended up spending a few days with him. It was only going to be like a week, tops, I swear, but then we got news of what happened at Hogwarts. I din't know if you heard but Ginny, Neville and Luna got caught trying to steal the Sword of Gryffindor, which incidentally isn't even the real one, because the real one is right here." He took a breath. "Anyway, Mum wrote to Charlie about it and he wanted to go. The Ministry was planning a punishment for them. And if they caught on to why they were trying to steal the Sword, the punishment could have been a lot worse.

"I ended up going to stay with Bill and Fleur for a while, just to make sure the family was all safe. It was so weird again; they both thought I had abandoned you guys. I mean, is that the kind of person I appear to be? Why is it that everyone thinks I would just leave? Do you guys think that?"

Harry was quick to respond. "No, Ron. Of course not. This whole thing has been hard on all of us. We're all going to complain and want to go home, but we're in it for the long-haul. We just have to keep going."

Ron nodded. "Exactly. As long as you both know." He seemed to relax. "Once I was sure everyone was safe - well, as safe as they could be with the brewing war around them - I left. I stupidly had this craving for Butterbear," he admitted, sounding embarrassed. "So I headed to this pub, and I lost track of time because it was too late to head to our meeting point. Or too early. I don't even know. The whole time difference thing can really mess with a person's head.

"So I ended up spending the night, you know. But at some point this rowdy group came in. They were talking about Muggle-borns and the latest one they'd caught. I knew I had to get out of there, you know? So I snuck out the back, but they managed to get me."

"Were they Snatchers?" Hermione asked, her eyes widening.

He nodded. "They're everywhere," Ron explained. "Dirty gangs trying to get gold by rounding up Muggle-borns and blood traitors. They're getting to be as bad as Death Eaters, the entitled pricks."

Hermione blinked a few times. "How did they get their hands on you?"

"I discovered the hard way about the Taboo curse on You-Know-Who's name," he said, visibly remembering. "I was hiding out in an abandoned building, and I guess I must have spoken his name. Charlie had mentioned it to me before, but I didn't quite understand the severity when he said that the name is jinxed."

"Jinxed?" Harry queried.

Ron nodded. "Using his name breaks protective enchantments," he further explained. "It causes some kind of magical disturbance, and it alerts the caster as to where the speaker is located. It's why Kingsley Shacklebolt is on the run right now. They've been tracking Order members like that. And I heard on the radio, they're referring to You-Know-Who as Chief Death Eater now. Better to be safe."

"You got caught by Snatchers?" Hermione had to ask for clarification. At his nod, she leaned forward. "Oh my God, are you okay? What did they do to you? Did they take you to the Ministry? How did you escape?"

Ron waited a moment before he began his reply. "The fact that I'm here right now means that I'm fine," he said. "They roughed me up a little, you know. They wanted to know why I had said their Master's name and, for the life of me, I couldn't come up with anything good. I managed to give them a fake name but they wanted to check it out before they bothered the Ministry with me. Apparently, a red-headed wizard is quite the puzzle.

"They took me to this old house and locked me in some room. There were two others being held there; both Muggle-borns. I'm apparently what they call a blood traitor. Anyway, I was there for a few days before they moved us to a new place. You won't believe this but I swear I heard Snape's voice at some point. Mental, right? The new place was a lot bigger and Trevor, Rebecca - the other prisoners - and I managed to come up with a plan to escape. We failed the first time, mainly because there was a guard change because of some issue with The Quibbler."

"Isn't that the paper Luna's father writes?" Harry asked.

Ron nodded. "He's been stirring up quite a lot with what he's writing. Bill mentioned that Dad was going to visit him before things got out of hand. It's too dangerous to say whatever you want about You-Know-Who." He nodded thoughtfully. "So the day after the guard change, we implemented our plan. It wasn't anything special but I reckon you'd both be proud," he said, sitting up straighter. "The whole of Dumbledore's Army would be proud. We stunned our way right out of there, after luring the dim-witted guard into the room. It was beautiful."

Hermione just shook her head at how excited he appeared. "All three of you managed to escape?"

Ron's eyes darkened. "Trevor took a nasty hit. Rebecca Diapparated with him immediately after that. They left, but I knew I had to get my things. I don't know if they're okay. I hope they are. But I managed to nab a few things on my way out," he said, reaching for his bag and starting to dig through it, searching through his clutter. "Got a few wands here, Harry," he said. "Nothing special, I'm afraid, but one of them'll have to do." He pulled out three wands, each of them smaller than Harry's usual one.

Harry picked one up. He was about to test it out when Hermione put a hand on his knee to stop him.

"Not inside," she warned, and he put it back down.

Ron continued searching through his bag. "Got some sweets as well, believe it or not. And, the best part, just for Hermione, an actual book." He pulled out quite a large book, and Harry just caught sight of the cover as he handed it to Hermione. The Life and Lies of Albus Dumbledore by Rita Skeeter. Harry couldn't help but grimace at the sight of that woman's name.

Hermione immediately opened the book, flipping through the pages. She would give it a proper read through later. She just wanted to see if there was anything particularly useful in any of the pictures or copied letters.

Harry watched the pages go by as well, as Ron's persistent search for whatever was hiding in his bag faded into the background. It went on for a few seconds, before Harry shouted, "Stop," to Hermione. "Go back a few pages," he said quickly, moving closer to her so he could get a better look.

Even Ron stopped what he was doing and leaned forward to see what was going on.

"Right there," Harry said, pointing at a portrait of a young man on page two hundred and twenty seven. "Who is that?"

Hermione read the name in the fine print at the bottom of the page. "Gellert Grindelwald."

Both Ron and Hermione turned their attentions to Harry, awaiting some form of explanation. "He's the man I saw in You-Know-Who's thoughts," Harry began. "He stole something that You-Know-Who really wants. His picture was in Bathilda's house."

Hermione took that in before she skimmed the information on the man in the picture. "It says here that he is Bathilda's great-nephew."

"Bathilda?" Ron said. "The woman that turned into a snake and tried to kill you?"

"She was already dead, Ronald," Hermione said. "The snake disguised itself as the woman."

Ron shuddered. "As if that makes it any better."

Hermione sighed. "But yes, you're right, I do mean that Bathilda. That's probably why his picture was in the house," she said to Harry. "But I just don't understand where he fits into all of this. What could he have stolen?"

Harry had no clue. He could sometimes feel the desperation Voldemort felt over not knowing where whatever he was searching for was. At least the Dark Lord knew what he was looking for. The trio still had no idea what else could be a Horcrux.

Hermione turned the pages as she read, eventually coming across a letter written to Grindelwald, from Dumbledore. What interested her was the fact that the letter was signed with the same symbol from her book, and from Luna's father's chain. It had to mean something.

"Look," she said, showing the boys. "It's the mark again."

"It keeps popping up," Ron said.

"It was even in the graveyard in Godric's Hollow," Hermione added. "Remember, Ignotus Peverell."

Harry's breath caught as he remembered. "And in You-Know-Who's thoughts. It was there as well," he said. "Outside Gregorovitch's wand shop. It's where Grindelwald found whatever he stole."

Ron rubbed his face with his hands, feeling a bit overwhelmed. "Yeah, but what does any of it mean?"

Nobody had answers. The truth was that they were merely the blind leading the blind. They had no idea where the next Horcrux was, nor what it actually was. But the mark definitely meant something. It was at least a piece of something they could pursue, and hope it answered questions rather than left them with more.

Hermione eventually mentioned what they were all thinking. "We're going to visit Xenophilius Lovegood, aren't we?"

Ron beamed. "Luna!" And then stopped abruptly. "Oh, right, she's probably at school, isn't she?"

Hermione shook her head. "It's still the holidays. Isn't it Easter?"

His smile was back, wider than before. "It seems I came back just in time."