Harry, Ron, Draco, Fred, and Ginny fell in a heap when the apparated into the alley down the street from Grimmauld Place. Ron and Draco hopped up first and quickly began dragging the rest up after them.
"Come up, come on." Ron hissed as he lifted Harry onto his feet. After a few steps Harry pushed Ron away so that he was standing on his own. Ron hesitated slightly as Fred, Ginny, and Draco pulled ahead towards Grimmauld Place. Harry nodded at his friend and took off running after them.
Within seconds Harry and Ron caught up to their friends. Grimmauld finally appeared and the teens dove through the door into another heap.
"It's about time you lot got here!" Mrs. Weasley said hysterically. He began dragging the teens to their feet and hugging each of them in turn.
"Mum…" Ron groaned as his mother kissed both sides of his face multiple times.
"Why are you crying?" Ginny asked.
Mrs. Weasley hugged her daughter for a second time. Harry and Draco looked at each other uncertainly and headed farther into the house. Dumbledore followed George and Hermione who both looked very pale, towards the new arrivals. Hermione dove into Ron's arms and cried into his shoulder. Tears poured down Ron's face as well as he ran his fingers through Hermione's hair. George was staring at Fred who looked concerned.
"What happened?" Fred asked.
"I arrived right before the Death Eaters did." George answered quietly. "There were so many I knew I couldn't take them alone. I grabbed Hermione and we got out of there but we couldn't help the rest of the tour group." He dug around in his pocket and handed Draco a letter.
"A black owl delivered it." He explained.
Fred pulled his twin into a hug as Draco unfolded the letter and read it aloud.
"Draco,
It seems you were able to figure out the last clue and saved the Mudblood. Fortunately in her place we now have ten young witches and wizards with whom we can do whatever we like. Starting from the moment the owl returns from delivering this letter you will have half an hour to turn yourself, Harry Potter, and Ronald Weasley over to the Dark Lord. If you choose not to follow through with this demand we will kill one of these students. You will then have another half hour until we kill the next one. A portkey in the form of a woman's dress shoe has been placed on the grave of Narcissa Malfoy.
This will be prove to be much more entertaining than simply torturing the Mudblood girl as we'd planned. Remember in thirty minutes one of these ten will die and rest assured a letter will be sent to their families explaining how the great Harry Potter refused to meet a simple demand that would have spared their son or daughter's life."
Draco looked up from the paper and found everyone staring at him as if it had been he who'd written the despicable words.
"What are we going to do? Those people are my friends. We can't just let them die." Hermione cried. Ron continued to hold her and whispered comforting words into her ear.
"We're going to turn ourselves over of course." Harry said. His voice startled George and Hermione slightly since they hadn't heard it since Harry's incident at the Burrow. Dumbledore and Mrs. Weasley however looked completely flabbergasted.
"Harry…" Dumbledore said, staring at his charge with extreme concern etched all over his face.
"It's not just his voice that's changed sir." Draco said. He reached out and snatched Harry's glasses away. Harry tried to stop him but was too slow.
Everyone gasped upon seeing his completely red eyes. Harry squeezed them shut and held out his hand until Draco gave the glasses back. Even with the glasses back on his face Harry didn't look at anyone.
"When did this start?" Dumbledore asked.
Draco and Ron took turns explaining everything that had happened, starting from the moment Harry blew up the prison house.
"And then when he threw the bed down the stairs at Moody and the aurors he collapsed again and this time there was even more redness but it wasn't this bad." Ron explained.
"I suppose the apparations did have some sort of effect on Harry even though it wasn't he who preformed them." Draco reasoned. At this point everyone looked at Harry who was sitting on the couch with his hands clasped in front of him and his elbows resting on his knees. The last apparation had started up his trembling again.
Dumbledore took a few careful steps towards the distraught teen.
"Harry." He said softly.
Harry ignored him and stared intently into the empty fireplace. He felt the couch sag slightly when Dumbledore sat beside him.
"Will you let me try to help you?" he asked.
Harry answered without looking at the man.
"How? We don't even know what's wrong with me." Harry grumbled. "Besides we should be focusing on helping the tour group students."
"Right now this is more important." Dumbledore argued. He turned to the fire and called out the name of his pet Phoenix, Fawks.
In an explosion of bright orange flames a handsome red-gold Phoenix appeared in the fireplace. He soared up to the ceiling before landing lighting on Dumbledore's shoulder.
"I am no healer but I believe that you may have suffered some nerve damage from the prison house. It is very unlikely that you escaped firing a spell as powerful as yours and having it rebound back into you unscathed. It is my hope that Fawk's tears might be enough to heal this damage." Dumbledore tilted his head towards the bird and whispered something to it. With a soft cry Fawks flew upwards again and this time landed on Harry's knee. Harry looked at the bird and smiled slightly.
"Hello Fawks." He said remembering the first time he'd met the magnificent creature back in his second year at Hogwarts. The Phoenix reached out with its beak and stole Harry's glasses away. Harry tried to snatch them back but Dumbledore stopped him.
"Lean back Harry." He instructed.
Not wanting to waste even more time arguing Harry did as he was told. He leaned his head all the way back against the couch so that he was staring straight up to the ceiling. Harry felt Fawk's weight shift as the bird moved up his leg to his stomach and his chest, finally coming to rest on Harry's shoulder.
"Keep your eyes wide open Harry." Dumbledore instructed.
Harry did so until a pearly tear drop rolled from Fawks' eye and landed in Harry's own. Harry blinked several times in surprise as a cool sensation flowed through his body. Then Fawks walked back down onto Harry's chest and then over to his other shoulder. Harry kept his eyes open again as another Phoenix tear dropped into his eye and spread an even colder feeling through his entire body. Fawks flew over to Dumbledore's shoulder. For a moment Harry felt almost too cold to move. Panic began to kick in when he couldn't even wiggle his fingers.
"Relax Harry focus on the tears reaching every nerve." Dumbledore said smoothly.
Harry squeezed his eyes shut and concentrated as Dumbledore had said. Unlike the time in his second year when the tears mended his arm in a flash, this seemed to be taking quite a lot longer. Finally the iciness gave way to a flood of warmth. Harry opened his eyes and looked at his hands. They were completely still. He looked up at Fawks.
"Thanks." He said.
"What about your eyes?" Hermione asked.
Harry slowly reached up and took his glasses off. He could practically feel the disappointment from his friends. He quickly put the glasses back on.
"Why are they still red like that?" Ron asked.
"I do not know." Dumbledore admitted.
"Can you do magic?" Draco questioned.
Harry looked around and aimed his hand at a chair sitting in a far corner. He took a deep breath and concentrated.
"Accio chair." He said.
The chair flew towards him and stopped a few inches from his knees. Harry waited for pain to surge through him but felt it only in one area. His hands flew to the sides of his head.
"Damn it." He said through clenched teeth but the pain passed quickly. He looked at his hands and saw they weren't shaking.
"Wellt hat's defiantly an improvement." Harry said.
"But…" George started but Harry cut him off.
"This isn't important right now, let's concentrate on coming up with a plan." Harry said firmly. His friends reluctantly agreed and sat down around the living room.
"How much longer do we have?" Harry asked. Fred looked at his watch which Draco had returned to him.
"Well we can't know if the owls returned from its delivery yet or not but if we go from when it left here we've got less than twenty minutes." Fred explained.
Everyone nodded.
"Does anyone have any ideas?" Ron asked.
At first everyone was silent and then all at once they began spewing ideas left and right. Dumbledore raised a hand to silence them.
"Let's try this one at a time." He said. "Molly."
Everyone took a turn sharing a plan but someone else always found a way to poke a hole into it. Finally all the ideas were spent and everyone fell silent.
"Well we're not going to get anywhere like this." Fred said needlessly as he looked at his watch.
"Ten minutes."
Hermione looked around wildly.
"We have to do something. If even one of those people get killed because we couldn't come up with some sort of plan." She said, struggling to keep her voice even.
"Normally I would suggest calling in more help but unfortunately with the newspaper articles that have been circulating I cannot guarantee anyone would be willing to help us." Dumbledore said. Harry, Ron, and Draco nodded in understanding.
"Well so far this is what it looks like to me." Ron said. "We've been called to go to You-Know-Who's lair where he's more than likely going to, let's be honest, kill us. He's holding ten, newly graduated students hostage to make sure we actually show up. What's to say he's actually going to let them go once we show up?"
"Ron's right. We're going to have to figure a way to get them out first." Draco agreed.
"I'll bet they'll be under really heavy security after what happened when Ron and I visited Draco in the dungeons." Fred said.
"So it might not work out to try and show up unnoticed, free the tour group and then once they're out we can take care of…of whatever else we need to take care of." Ron said.
There was a thoughtful pause.
"What if you three showed up and kept the Death Eater's and You-Know-Who busy?" Ginny suggested suddenly. "Fred already knows the way around the dungeons right?" she asked her brother.
Fred nodded.
"That's right." He said.
"Well while Ron, Draco, and Harry are doing what they need to do Fred can lead George, Hermione, and I around in the dungeons. We can lead the tour group out in groups so that it will hopefully be a little less noticeable!" Ginny said excitedly.
"What about the guards in the dungeons?" Mrs. Weasley asked.
"We can take care of them." Fred and George said together. They looked at each other and grinned evilly. Fred looked at his watch.
"We've got a few minutes." He said, the smile melting off his face.
"How are you four going to show up unnoticed?" Harry asked.
"Invisibility cloak?" George suggested holding up the silvery cloak.
"Not all four of us will fit under there, three maybe but not four." Ginny reasoned. "I don't like it but I think I'm going to have to stay behind. Fred knows the dungeons, George is a better dueler then me, and Hermione the tour group will know they can trust you so it'll be easier to get them to follow if you're there."
Mrs. Weasley hugged her daughter wordlessly.
"Alright Fred and George, get whatever you need for distractions." Harry said, "Hermione you'll come with us to the portkey so that you can track us because I don't think it would be smart for us all to arrive at together in case they're waiting for us."
Fred and George leapt up and rushed for the fireplace. Dumbledore told them to wait as he removed the block he'd put on it so that no unwanted visitors could pop in. Finally they disappeared. Harry looked at Dumbledore and Mrs. Weasley when he stood.
"Could you two be ready at Hogwarts? I think that's where we should take the tour group. It's the safest and if you can get a hold of Madame Pomfrey she'll be able to help them if any of them are hurt."
"Harry we've got to go." Ron said from the door. Draco and Hermione stood beside him. Harry nodded.
"Be careful all of you." Dumbledore said. Mrs. Weasley brushed tears out of eyes as she waved them off.
The group rushed to the apparation point.
"I'll get the portkey and come back here since none of you know where my mum's buried. "
Without waiting for a comment from his friends Draco disappeared. Just as he left Fred and George appeared. Each held a small bag of stuff presumably from their shop. Hermione explained that they would be following after Harry, Ron, and Draco portkeyed away. Suddenly with a soft pop Draco reappeared. He held out the shoe. Ron and Harry each put a finger to it. Fred looked at his watch.
"Alright be careful you three." He said.
"Same to you." Harry said before he felt the familiar tug around his naval and the alley around him disappeared.
Heartfelt thanks to those of you who've reviewed especially Dezra! This stories almost over but I'm still open for suggestions on how you think it should end or anything else you want to see before I wrap it up. REVIEWS MAKE MY DAY