I am so sorry for the wait! I went to New York last weekend and then got caught up in trying to finish my Twilight fanfic that I completely lost where this chapter was going. Until I remembered this morning...about half of this chapter came into existance in the last hour, so I hope you like it!

Enjoy!

"Harry! Get the dittany! It's in my bag! Oh, Ron, I'm so sorry, just hang on a little longer, I'll make it stop hurting." Miranda could feel Harry, just a few feet away from her, rummaging through Hermione's beaded bag while Hermione was trying to keep Ron's life from flowing right out of a splinched arm. Her head felt like it was ready to explode so she didn't try to open her eyes.

"Harry?" Miranda called, pushing herself up, clutching the chain of the locket in her hand. They were in a forest, she could feel leaves under her hands. She walked slowly to the others, narrowly avoiding running into a sapling.

She knelt to where she thought Hermione and Harry were leaning over Ron. Harry put his hand on top of hers, "Are you alright?"

Miranda nodded, "My head hurts a lot, but I'll be okay. Is Ron..."

"He'll be fine now." Hermione said with determination, and Miranda believed her, the smell of blood and the sound of Ron's agonized screams were muted now.

"What do we do?" Harry said, his voice all business, "We can't go back to Grimmauld Place. Do we just wander?"

"That's exactly what we're going to do. We need to find the other horcruxes." Miranda said.

"Miranda's right, we would have left Grimmauld place after getting the locket anyway. We probably would have based out of it still, but we wouldn't have slept there every night anymore. We need to finish this!" Hermione exclaimed.

Miranda put an arm around the other girl, "Hermione, don't talk like that. We can do this, we just have to remain strong." Miranda felt Hermione nod in agreement and Harry squeezed her hand, "Alright, do you have any idea what the other horcruxes are?"

No one said anything, "You don't know what they are?" She assumed.

"No." Harry said. "We know what they could be, but, what's the matter with your eyes."

Miranda smiled, "Oh, my head hurts from the fall, so I was just keeping my eyes closed. I'll be just fine soon, my head's already feeling better."

"Miranda, your eyes are open." Hermione said.

The smile fell from Miranda's face. Her hands flew to her neck. The snake wasn't there, and the skin was sore, bruised. "No! It's gone." Yaxley must have grabbed it mid-apparation and yanked it from her neck as he had fallen into the subway.

"Miranda what's going on?" Harry asked, pulling her hands from her neck.

She just laughed, which soon became hysterical sobs. Everything was dark and she couldn't handle it. Harry wrapped his arms around her, pulling her to his chest as she had so many times before. "Hermione, what's wrong with her?" He asked, his voice rising in panic.

"Harry, I think she's blind." Hermione said softly.

"Hermione, that's nutters. She was perfectly fine before now." He rebuffed, brushing circles with a hand on Miranda's back; something he seemed to remember his mother doing when he had cried as an infant in one of his more detailed memories.. The sobs slowly reduced to faint hiccups.

"She's right, Harry." Miranda said softly once she had regained control of herself. "I am blind. I had a bracelet that allowed me to see. It's gone now though.

"Can't you just make another?" Ron said, his humor seemingly recovering nicely from his splinching.

"Ron, magical items of that nature are nearly impossible to create if you have all of the appropriate materials, not to mention immensely expensive to purchase. We're in the middle of a forest, without any materials, and one of us would have to be an immensely powerful and focused. It's just impossible." Hermione was obviously stressing out, and had returned to regurgitating the things she'd read in books and bashing Ron.

"My Papa made it." Miranda said, sitting up out of Harry's arms, but still sitting between his legs. "I'll be okay." She smiled bitterly, "I've been blind since the day I was born. I just need to get used to it again and then I promise I won't slow you down."

"What is there to get used to?" Harry asked.

She took the locket from around her neck, handing it to Hermione, "Take this. I don't want to lose it."

"Okay." The other girl said, "How do you get used to being blind though?"

"Well, when you're blind, your other senses compensate for it. I've gotten a bit out of practice, but it should only take a day or so for my balance to return and my senses to readjust. I can keep up after then, and I can still do magic."

"How can you aim?" Ron asked her.

Miranda winced, "That will take longer for me to learn. I hadn't learned any offensive magic before I got my sight, I will need to learn. I did learn to apperate blind though, so I'll be pretty good at getting out of the way."

"Blind apperation? That should be impossible." Hermione said.

"Not impossible, Hermione, just really difficult. My Papa wanted to make sure I could escape should the need ever arise. Like I said, he was a survivalist. I can feel what a room looks like, and then it's easy to move around in. I learned when I was thirteen to apperate without my sight."

"Your 'Papa' must have been barmy, teachin' all that stuff to a little." Ron said, and Miranda could tell that Hermione was helping him to sit up.

"He did it for my protection. I guess it's a good thing he did too. Otherwise I'd be a liability now. We should find some shelter, it's going to rain soon." Miranda chirped, standing up, only wobbling slightly.

"How do you know?" Harry asked, standing quickly to steady the re-blinded girl.

She touched her nose with a finger, "I can smell it."

"Can you tell how far?" Ron asked.

"Fifteen minutes." Miranda replied swiftly.

"Really?" Hermione asked.

Miranda chortled, "No, I can't tell how far off or how much, only that it will. The air smells like lightening. It's very distinct. Like a person. Did you know that every person smells differently. I can tell you three apart..."

She continued to ramble on, and Harry looked worriedly at Hermione. "Think she's okay?"

"Probably just a bit in shock. We should get out of plain sight though. Harry, why don't you set up the tent. It's in my bag." Hermione said, setting herself to putting up the wards she had researched for this purpose.

"What about me?" Ron asked from the ground petulantly.

Miranda was quiet now, but not really there with them yet. Harry led her to Ron and pushed her down next to him, "Watch her, won't you."

Ron looked at the girl with disdain, "Do I have to?"

Harry just glared at him in response and began sifting in Hermione's bag for the tent, setting it up just a few feet from Ron and Miranda. He helped the newly disabled pair into the tent and Hermione entered soon after, lighting the area with little blue lights before tucking Ron into bed tutting like Molly would have.

"I'll take first watch." Harry said, exiting the tent.

He sat alone for nearly an hour, replaying the events of the day over and over again. It had been so good to see Ron's father that closely again, even if he had looked half afraid as he had spoken to who he had thought was Runcorn. And Miranda, she was so stubborn. She hadn't listened to him, but it had been okay. She had fit her plan more broadly to the inner workings of the Ministry than they had. And now she was blind for it.

"Is there room out here for two?" Said her soft voice from the opening of the tent. "I can't sleep."

He looked up at her and smiled, but his face fell when he realized that she couldn't see his smile, "Yeah, come sit."

She held out a hand as she walked closer and he took it gently when she got close enough, leading her to sit next to him. "Thanks." She whispered.

"Not a problem." Harry said, transfiguring the quilt in his lap to be large enough to cover her too. "Why couldn't you sleep?" He asked.

MIranda leaned her head against his shoulder, "Just thinking." She laughed softly, "I do that when I can't see. My brother used to say I thought too much. Used to drive him nutters when I went off chattering in the middle of the night. I'm going to just apologize now if I talk your ear off."

Harry laughed, "I think I'll be okay." He put his head on top of hers, unknowing that his closeness made her heart skip a beat, "How about you. Are you okay?"

She nodded as best as she could, "Yeah, it's just a shock. I've become so dependent on my sight that learning how to manage without it again is hard."

"You're strong." He said, his voice assuring her, "You'll be fine. If you don't mind me asking, how did you become blind?"

"I was born blind. If you'd asked me that when I was younger, I wouldn't have known why, but I did some research when I woke up. Leber's congenital amaurosis, it's a genetic defect resulting in almost complete blindness. My parents would have have to have both been carriers for em to have gotten it. I'm just thankful that it doesn't cause any sort of retardation. I would have been slaughtered in the orphanage. Speaking of the orphanage, tell me about the people who raised you." Miranda nestled closer to Harry, closing her eyes.

Harry sighed, and put an arm around her shoulders, "They weren't nice people. My aunt resented my mother for being a witch, so they tried to beat the magic out of me."

"That's terrible." Miranda said.

Harry just laughed, "I didn't even know about magic until my friend Hagrid came to take me to Hogwarts. It was a bit overwhelming at first, but it got me away from the Dursley's, so I didn't care too much."

"Tell me about your friends. You know so much about me, and I know so little about you. I want to know who you're fighting for."

"Why?" Harry asked, confused.

Sitting up a little bit, Miranda kissed his cheek, "Because, Harry, everyone I loved is dead. I'm fighting for you now. I think it's only fair I know who I'm fighting for."

Harry was happy that the blind girl couldn't see the blush that was spreading across his face. "Uh...okay. Well, there's Hagrid to start with, he's the one that brought me into the Wizarding world..." He talked for hours, telling her about his friends, Ron's family, Remus, Tonks, Oliver Wood, he told her what Ron and Hermione were like when they weren't on the run, he even told her about Sirius, and how badly losing him had hurt.

When he was done, the moon disappearing behind the trees, he realized how easy it was to tell all of this to Miranda, how easy it was to speak and not feel like he was being judged. To her, he wasn't the Boy-Who-Lived, he was just Harry. Not even Ginny had made him feel this way. Miranda had a smile on her face, regardless of his longwinded stories and the uncomfortable ground they were sitting on, "I think I'm ready to fight then. We've got a lot to lose." She had taken the Horcrux locket from around her neck, which was still red from the charm being ripped off, and pressed it into Harry's hand. "I think you or one of the others should keep hold of it. Seeing as I can't see it anymore, I think we'd be in a right spot if I were to drop it. We can't destroy it if we don't have it. Right?"

Harry took it from her, and put it around his own neck. "That's probably a fair statement. You should go inside, get some rest before the sun comes up."

"What about you? You've been up all night." She asked.

He shrugged, "It's all the adrenaline. I couldn't sleep right now if I wanted to."

Miranda stood with his help, but found her own way to the tent door, "Oh.." She whispered, turning back to look at him with her blank eyes. "Harry, I'm glad. I might not not be able to see now, but I'm glad I was able to see your face before my world went dark again." She left him stunned outside on his own, to process what had just happened before the others got up.

Like it? I hope so! I also hope you all liked my little Miranda/Harry moments, I know I did. :) The next chapter should be up in a more regular fashion. I'm off to post the last chapter of In Between!

Please review!

-Jenn