Disclaimer: OMG I only have to say this one more time after this. I. Do. Not. Own. Harry. Potter.
A/N: I ended up editing all throughout the night, if you didn't guess by now. Eight chapters - I think that makes me awesome.
WARNING: THIS CHAPTER IS SCREWED UP. I'm not just talking about lemons. There's M rated torture that even bothered me a little bit to write. I don't want to give anything away, but if you want to skip past it, then stop reading after Marlene warns the Marauders and everyone's looking for Lily. Then start reading again once she see things about the Hospital Wing.

P.s. - And reviews, please :)

The seventh years had taken to sitting up late in the common room and studying together. Sometimes the conversation would weave into something much deeper, a remembrance of their friends lost, times had or the best pranks. Marlene wasn't sure why she continued to include herself in these increasingly regular nights, she hardly said two words to her old friends during the day, she was sure she had no right to their time in the night. They didn't reject her when she did choose to join them, always on Alice's left of the sofa, bundled between the nymph and the arm. All of the girls but Lily sat there, with James and Sirius in their arm chairs and Peter and Remus taking up residence on the hearth. Papers spread out on the floor around Lily. She picked through them, quizzing everyone for their last exams that took place on Monday. The mood seemed lightest that night when Lily sat up on her knees to swat at James for a crude joke he'd made. The peel of laughter drew Marlene's attention as James tugged Lily onto his lap, an adoring look in his eyes before he leaned over her, kissing her deeply. The red head pulled away, red in the face, but her emerald eyes sparkling all the same.

Lily and James had only been together for almost three months, but they'd quickly become the school's most talked about couple. It seemed like they'd been together forever and they were certainly a duo to be reckoned with. James and Lily had been cracking down on their head duties with exams taking place for the fifth and seventh years. James especially, though the occasional prank popped up once in a while. Lily had somewhat become part of the Marauders, always on James side though Marlene could have never imagined it. Sometimes James walked with Lily, Marlene, and Alice. Those days Marlene couldn't stand because James was all but determined to coax the old Marlene out. Sometimes both Lily and James would gang up on her, and then she'd avoid her friends properly.

With Lily in James' lap, things turned less studious and more joking. Sirius laid out a line of inappropriate jokes to make the Pope turn over in his bed. Alice added in after a moment, wriggling beside Marlene with all of her energy. Emmeline and Verity, a constant chorus of background laughter, didn't have much to say for once. Marlene continued to look over her notes, pausing only when fire whiskey was procured along with several blunts that were instantly lit against Lily's chiding. Everyone was in a good-enough-mood then; even Marlene, who'd taken to using both substances to everyone's surprise. Talk turned to plans after Hogwarts, elaborate plans that didn't include Voldemort or anything heavy hearted. Marlene could not enjoy in that light hearted mood.

"What about you, Marlene," Verity quipped; standing over papers, having demonstrates how she was going to dance professionally with half breed Veelas in France. She was breathless as she plopped lazily over Sirius. Marlene glanced away as Verity tossed an arm around his neck; she'd been hanging all over him for week. Marlene didn't know if they were dating, but she did know her and Sirius were doing a bit more than that in their free time.

"Come on, Mars," Alice said lightly, nudging her.

Marlene tipped a shoulder up and answered, "Just the academy."

"Everyone wants to be an Auror," Emmeline said, rolling her eyes.

"Not everyone, just half of us," Alice said to laughter.

"What about you, Remus?" Marlene said to change the subject. "What will you do?"

Remus glanced up below straw colored fringe, his smile looked forced as he said, "Maybe something with publishing, whatever I can do I suppose."

"I always figured you for working in the ministry," Verity said after a long pull from Sirius' blunt.

"Have you been around the past seven years? Moony has no affinity for rules, Verity," Sirius said.

"No thanks to you lot," Remus said, smirking around at his friends.

James smirked, ceasing in staring at Lily, "cheers to that."

"Peter wants to work in the ministry though," Remus said, glancing to his left.

Peter's cheeks pinked at being addressed.

"Nothing special, just a desk job; something easy," Peter mumbled.

"You always sell yourself short, Pete," James said. "You should be an Auror."

"Ah no," Peter said with a laugh. "That's yours and Sirius' bag."

"I think I'll work for law enforcement," Emmeline supplied.

"That's one tick away from being an Auror," Sirius said, rolling his eyes.

"I haven't good enough marks to be an Auror, not that I want to die so much anyway."

With a few bothered glances in Marlene's direction the topic was quickly changed. No one was stranger to her little outbursts about the war being a lost cause. Marlene withdrew into herself after that, things became hazier until everyone began to slouch over from their inane laughter; passing out or falling asleep. Emmeline and Peter curled around the papers on the floor while Alice had pulled Remus onto the couch. Alice had fallen asleep, head in his lap, his head tipped over the back of the couch while he snored softly. James and Lily were curled into each other on their chair, fingers laced over Lily's stomach. Marlene wouldn't look at Verity and Sirius, the witch had been murmuring for some time but her voice had fallen away as Marlene's hands slipped on her homework and she began to drift off. A creaking startled her awake, her eyes fluttered open as Sirius knelt before her. He helped her from her sunken position in the couch and grabbed her hand to lead her up to his dorm.

She curled into his chest as they settled into his bed. He pulled her hair behind her ear. "I love you," he said so quietly she wasn't sure she heard him right through the haze of her high. She fell asleep afterwards, only to wake up alone in the streaming sunlight of the seventh year boy's dorm. Sirius' bed smelled like him. She curled into his pillow, reveling in it briefly before pressing herself up with a yawn. The door to the toilet creaked and James appeared shirtless, toothbrush in mouth. He disappeared, there was a spitting sound and then he reappeared, tooth brush dangling from his fingers.

"It's nearly noon, you do know?"

There was an irritation in his voice she couldn't place. She slid her legs off the bed and sat for a moment, the world tilting. Morning sickness; Marlene coughed on it for a moment, trying to keep it down before sliding off the bed to Sirius' waste paper basket. James moved across the room while she wretched, kneeling beside her and pulling her hair away. Panting, she offered him a thankful look.

"Do you need the hospital wing?" James asked in concern.

"No," Marlene said, wiping at her mouth. She sat back on her feet, hands tangled in her lap as James let her hair fall in a curtain around her face.

"Lily says you're pregnant."

Marlene froze, she glanced at him with fearful eyes, "what – she told!"

"I haven't told anyone," James said hurriedly, "but you know he's going to find out eventually."

Marlene felt an ache in her chest, "he can't know; James, I can't –"

"Why not?" James asked shortly. "What's so wrong with everything? What did Sirius do that you don't want to be with him?"

Marlene withdrew from James, shrinking into her shoulders. "It's complicated."

"Well I'm positive Sirius would like to know what' so complicated about it!"

"Look," Marlene said pleadingly. "I can't – hope for anything."

"That doesn't make any -"

"It makes perfect sense," Marlene said hotly, using the bed to pull herself up. "I don't want to lose anyone –"

"Marlene –"

"–and Sirius broke up with me, James. I told you that, remember?"

James blinked at her; he caught her arm as she spun toward the door. "He wants to be with you now and that's all that matters. You can't keep using that as an excuse."

"He wants me to tell him that I need him! That's selfish, James," Marlene snapped.

"He needs you to tell him that, because he needs you!"

"No he doesn't, he's said that before," Marlene said angrily. "He didn't need me very much when my parents were murdered."

"Calm down," James ceded, glancing at the door. "Just talk with me a moment. It wasn't like that."

Marlene jerked her thin arm away easily. "I don't want to talk about anything. There isn't anything to talk about. We are not friends, not me and you, not me and Lily, not me and Sirius. Leave me alone."

Feet carrying her far away from Gryffindor tower, Marlene ended up outside of Gourn's office. Regulus' appearance was instantaneous. He jerked Marlene into a side corridor before she could shout out. He pressed a hand over her mouth as he pressed her into a wall. Marlene's heart hammered as she stared at the side of his head fearfully. He was glancing out the mouth of the corridor the way they'd come, he turned frantic grey eyes on her a moment later.

"Your muggleborn friend is in trouble."

"Lily?" Marlene whispered back, paling.

"Gourn's going to take her. She's been helping to kidnap the muggleborns all year."

"What are you talking about?"

"Gourn's a death eater, Marlene."

Marlene felt sick, her stomach flipped in warning before she leaned over Regulus' hold and vomited. He stepped away, kneeling down to clean up the pool while she heaved a second time.

"You're pregnant."

"God damn it," Marlene snapped, "stay out of my head, Regulus."

"Does he know?"

"No he doesn't fucking know, and it's going to stay that way."

Regulus looked like he was having an internal battle. He must have lost because he sighed and said, "You need to find her and tell her not to meet with Gourn."

"What do we do about Gourn?"

"Nothing, stay away from her, Marlene; she wants to hurt you too."

This was news to Marlene. "Why?"

"She's been playing with you all year, the dark magic, angling you with Sirius, getting you into trouble though you've hardly done anything wrong. She wanted you to turn against your family."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"I didn't know until recently. I didn't understand what she had against you."

"What does she have against me?"

There was a slam and then a feeling like an egg being cracked over Marlene's head as Regulus disillusioned the both of them. Clicking heals revealed Gourn a second later as she moved beyond the corridor in a rush of robes and angry features. Marlene felt light headed as Regulus helped her stand from where she'd been kneeling after getting sick.

"Find her," Regulus hurried.

Marlene took off running the opposite way of Gourn. It made her journey back to Gryffindor tower twice as long. Lily was not in the common room with the majority of students studying or in the dorm. In her panic she ran into James through the thick flow of traffic near the portrait hole.

"Where's Lily?" she questioned frantically.

"She had to talk to Professor Gourn," James said steadying her. Sirius appeared at his side.

"What's wrong?" Sirius asked, eyebrows drawing together.

"We have to find her," Marlene said anxiously between them. "Lily's in trouble."

James and Sirius exchanged a look as Remus appeared through the thick of the crowd returning from breakfast. "She might be in the library, actually," he interjected.

"We'll split up," Marlene said.

"No; if it's dangerous and if Lily's in trouble then we should go in pairs," James said. "What sort of trouble, Marlene?"

"Gourn is trying to kill her."

"Gourn?" the three boys chorused. Alice appeared next.

"Just explain to the girls what's going on," Marlene said, slipping past the group.

So pressed to get to Lily, Marlene took off toward where she'd thought Gourn had been going in hopes of crossing paths with the red head first. Pushing her body into the fastest run she'd ever managed, she practically flew down two flights of stairs. Leaping around a corner she fell into another student who grabbed her shoulders to steady her. Marlene inhaled dizzily as something hooked behind her navel; the world pressing in around them.

She landed with a sharp pain in her knees, dizzier. The combined feeling caused her to vomit the last of her previous meal. She was still vomiting, yellow bile, when someone jerked her upward off of what looked like a cellar floor. Marlene locked eyes with pretty dark ones. Gourn smiled at her.

Marlene exhaled heavily. "What did I do to you?"

Gourn had Marlene's wand in her other hand, somewhere in travel she'd stolen it. She snapped the wood in half. Marlene cringed at the sound. Gourn's tinkling laugh echoed around them. Marlene jerked backward as cords spun from the witch's wand and around Marlene. Gourn grabbed a gaggle of Marlene's hair and jerked Marlene to her level, eyes locking with crystalline blue.

"It isn't what you've done, it's what Michael's done," she said bitterly, smirking so wide it accentuated the manic look in her eyes. "I never thought I would have the opportunity to take you, but low and behold, Regulus has grown bored with his pet."

Marlene spit in her face. The witch crowed before slamming Marlene's head against the stone wall of the dungeon. Lights popped before Marlene's vision and then she swayed, crumpling into the hard floor beneath her. The ache in her head mounted until she lost consciousness, watching the pacing heels of her professor and listening to a distant muttering until it fell away.

Her eyes snapped open with a sharp throbbing pain in her temple and her face pressed into the cool of concrete. The smell of mold permeated the air, old water that had sat on the floors for far too long. Her hair was matted in blood against her face. She tried to reach for it but realized she was still bound. Sitting up, several chains clinked. She tried to force down her panic as she stared around the dark room.

She glanced around dizzily, trying to make out anything in the dark of the cellar. Her temple pulsed painfully, disorienting her while warm sticky liquid rolled down her cheeks. When she opened her mouth to shout she tasted it in the corner of her lips and hesitated, startled that she was bleeding so profusely. Jerking on the ropes was pointless, she wrapped her fingers around the rope encasing them, tugging.

"Diffindo," she muttered forcefully, focusing her magic into her palms, nothing happened. "Damn it," she swore, eyes pricking.

"I wouldn't try that if I were you," a wand tip lit. Gourn knelt down before her, smiling, "I'll have to kill you faster, and where would the fun be in that?"

"Screw off," Marlene spat.

"It's too bad he can't know I have you; to know you're suffering as I've suffered because of him."

"You're sick."

"I suppose he'll have to settle for finding your dead body, in fact I might even find you in the castle and hand you over to him. I'll finish the search."

"I should have listened to Regulus," Marlene said, gritting her teeth together but relenting as her head throbbed in warning.

"Probably," Gourn sighed bored. "That's just affection getting in the way again. It's weak you see – love." Gourn folded a knee beneath her as she leaned forward, brushing Marlene's hair from her cheek. "I never would have known that until I found the Dark Lord; he saved me you see."

Gourn sighed, she stood up and began to pace. Marlene watched the witch's wand, dangling from her fingers tips while she motioned with the other hand. "I clung to it, hoping it would save me from my Father." She laughed humorlessly. "You think you had it rough – I did you a favor, anyway."

"What?" Marlene asked distractedly, fingers working through the chains around her wrists. As she thought through her concussion she remembered something Marc had always warned her of. If she'd ever been captured she should play dead, and if she didn't have that option she should make her captor talk. Marlene didn't know where they were or how much time she had, but by the way Gourn was pacing she knew it wouldn't be long before that sort of energy had to go somewhere.

"Even if you get those chains undone," Gourn said with her face suddenly in Marlene's. "No one's coming to save you."

Marlene inhaled, meeting the witch's eyes, "you think so, anyway."

"I know so. I spoke to that idiot Marcus long enough to figure out that Maize was on a mission in Wales. The way his mind works is extremely nauseating; a constant revere of the four of you like he has nothing else to worry for."

"What do you mean?" Marlene asked sharply, fingers pausing. Her chest clenched tight as she began to piece together something she should have known all along.

"Well I knew you see." She brushed her fingers over Marlene's shoulders, knocking the hair there over them. Marlene swallowed, as Gourn whispered, "it was only a matter of time before I had you. You're weaker than the rest of them. Once I had you twisted around Sirius Black, I just had to wait for him to do something stupid enough to bother you into bits." She smiled evilly. "And then I knew you'd wander off alone."

"I almost killed Maxim but of course you had to come around. I could have killed you then, but I didn't want to take the risk of you getting away – that would have ruined everything." She licked her lips. "Your parent's were surprisingly easy since I didn't have to deal with them at all." She smiled wickedly. "That was the deal anyway. He promised he would help me kill Michael if I gave him them," she breathed, "but I wanted him to suffer first."

"You attacked my parent's?"

Gourn scoffed, "I see him in you – so trusting and stupid and ignorant. You didn't even know I was picking your brain, not for everything you gave me about where they were and what they were doing –"

"You can do it too, then?" Marlene affirmed.

"Who do you think taught Regulus?" she asked, blinking as she saw the answer in Marlene's eyes. She replied swiftly after that, "Snape is an imbecile; he might have helped, but he knows only a fraction of the craft that I do. I traveled the world for years, studying. It was the only way I could leave home without marrying Michael and Michael wasn't very interested in that so…. As it was, I didn't like having the shit beat of me on a daily basis," she spat. "So I tried to get away from them – men who were supposed to love me. I never could get away from my Father; I was plagued with the hope that Michael would change his mind. He would take me away and I would never have to be under that man again. The dark lord found me at my worst, and he promised me I would never suffer again in the name of love. He's kept his promise. For all of my hate I have seen justice and I will see it again."

"While I could not find a way of doing the Dark Lord's bidding he required of me to spy for him, so I waited for a position to open at Hogwarts. It never did happen, and I became impatient with waiting for the justice I knew I deserved. I murdered that teacher because I knew I would find something in teaching. I knew he had siblings, younger ones and older ones, and of course you were the first I met." Gourn stood up. "You were so pretty and smart and reassured. It was like I was in school again, watching from the outside while Regulus fell for you." She gritted her teeth as she stared down her nose at Marlene. "I told his parent's to force your hand, wanting you to have to do what Michael was never forced to, but your idiot father wouldn't accept the request. I was angry then of course, not until I noticed your interest in Regulus' brother and your aptitude for recklessness. I began to think." She started to pace. "I began to understand your brother's had a deep possessiveness over you. Where Michael was incapable of romance he certainly had an unbelievable amount of love for you." Her eyes darkened. "I wanted to take you away from him; it wasn't just good enough to murder him. I knew I could make him suffer then, and I knew I could ruin his family. I wanted to kill all you."

"You're psychotic," Marlene breathed.

"I knew entrusting you would offer me some benefit though I had to wait until January for you to give me what the Dark Lord had wanted all along." She rolled her eyes. "He did manage Malcolm's idiot brother, so I suppose it was something. It didn't matter." She smiled cruelly. "I've had fun corrupting you. I can just imagine his pathetic worry over the most trivial –" She huffed, shaking her head. "Bad grades, boys, and detentions – those are the things that bother your brothers. Not me – not me dying at the hand of my father."

"He didn't know."

"He didn't try to know me," she said angrily, her shrill voice echoing around the dark dungeon. "But he'll know me now. Once I've killed all of his brothers – except maybe Marcus – no matter with that however, the Dark Lord wants him as well. Once he finds out we have you here he'll come running. He worries about you the most you see." Her smile fit to her maniac eyes, glistening with what Marlene could only assume was joy. "With any luck Maxim will be dead within hours and the dark lord will return with Maize's head." She clapped her hands together with a little laugh. "And then he'll find you dumped off somewhere. Oh this will be fun."

"I trusted you."

"That's what you get for believing in someone," Gourn said softly, kneeling just before Marlene again, her breath flitting over Marlene's face.

Marlene pulled her knees up protectively, turning her face away. "Don't do this," Marlene said, hoping against what she knew was true. If Marc did come, he would be doomed. Her fingers gripped around the chains on her wrist. "What will you do when it's over?"

"I'll be free," Gourn said, a glassy look taking over her eyes. "When he's dead my Father will betroth me to someone else – don't you see?"

"I thought you didn't believe in love anymore?" Marlene met Gourn's eyes fearlessly.

"I'll believe in anything that gets me away from him."

"I think you'll have difficulty with that," Marlene hissed. "You'll never find anyone to take you."

Gourn grabbed her knee with sharp nails, pressing one flat. Marlene leant back as Gourn leant over her, wild eyes just before Marlene's. Gourn grinned, and just when Marlene was sure her torture would begin, that Gourn might break some bone, then Gourn kissed her. Marlene bit down on Gourn's lip, blacking out as the witch smacked her and she fell sideways.

"Brat," she spat, her fingers hiking up Marlene's skirt. "You're going to feel this."

Marlene clamped her knees together, screaming out as Gourn shoved her skirt around her middle and her sharp fingers clutched around her panties. Her bare backside smacked against the cold stone floor as she tried to send her knees up at Gourn's lowered face. The witch cried out when Marlene hit her target. Marlene rolled onto her stomach, pressing up onto her knees until Gourn barreled into her, falling over Marlene with one hand on her student's face, the other holding her shoulder down as she bit into Marlene's neck and sucked hard. Marlene screamed into her ear but the Professor seemed oblivious.

"It's okay Michael," she whispered against Marlene's bleeding neck. "I won't hurt you."

Her hand slithered over Marlene's stomach so Marlene drew her knee in, stopping the witch's path as her fingers went lower. Gourn growled and jerked Marlene suddenly by the hair, dragging her against the stone floor for a moment until Marlene was on her back staring up hopelessly at the witch.

"Crucio," Gourn said, flicking her suddenly drawn wand.

Marlene squeezed her eyes shut as pain stabbed through her with such an intensity she wished for nothing but death. Her own voice deafened her as she screamed. The pain ended with a hard kick into her side.

"Shut up," Gourn said pitilessly.

Marlene turned her face into the floor, feeling fogged, her vision refused to straighten as her head continued throb. She curled into her side, crying out when Gourn kicked her hard in the stomach. The second kick came quickly before the third. Gourn was unrelenting as Marlene tried to find a deeply needed breath of air. She rolled onto her back, panting as Gourn paused, coughing on blood as it rose in her mouth. Gourn stomped her heel into Marlene's stomach. Marlene drew up around it with a screech, pain ebbing through her gut and between her legs.

"Took care of that problem then," Gourn said, smirking.

Marlene tried to look at her but she was passing in and out of consciousness. "Go to hell," she managed.

Marlene closed her eyes against the fading black of the world but was reawakened by Gourn's repeat spell. The witch bent over her face when Marlene had fallen still again, a scream on the tip of her tongue as Gourn whispered, "I wish you'd stop fighting me, love."

"No," Marlene snapped.

"Just as stupid as your foul idiot brothers," Gourn said, pressing Marlene's knotted hair from her forehead. "I wish I could have been the first one for you," she seemed to be passing in and out of characters, one torturing Marlene, the other lovingly touching someone who Gourn thought Marlene wasn't. Marlene whimpered as Gourn's hand slipped over her thigh, "you're going to cry for me."

"Stop," Marlene pleaded through clenched teeth. Her vision wavered as her head throbbed and tears streamed down her face. "I don't love you and I never will, you're pathetic, and I would never date someone so worthless. I'm a McKinnon," Marlene said, hoping to play with Gourn's illness. "You're below me, I don't want you; you're ugly."

Gourn screeched and clawed at Marlene wherever she could. Marlene pressed her knees together, arching her back as she cried out. The pressure in her lower gut and back disappeared as a fist smacked into her face and then finally, a wand tip poked against her chest. Gourn said something in a foreign tongue and Marlene's heart ached, either out of fear, exhaustion, or from whatever Gourn was doing. Crawling began beneath her skin; it turned into a warm sort of pain that turned searing within seconds. Marlene cried out as Gourn cut the chains from around her middle, unbinding her arms while cutting into her skin. She continued to make wild slashes with her wand even as Marlene began her decent into death. The pain became so immense it was beginning to ebb away. Everything in her ached dully as Gourn ripped Marlene's cardigan off, cold hands slid beneath Marlene's camisole. Her eyelids were heavy as a weight pressed over her skull. She was dying.

Gourn giggled. "He's going to be so upset." Marlene thought she heard Gourn say. "His perfect little sister -"

"You have to go back for the mudblood," someone said from somewhere far away. Marlene couldn't place his voice, she didn't know him. "The dark lord has ordered it."

"In a minute, Regulus," Gourn said, hands tightening around where she pinned Marlene's limp arms to the ground, biting into the skin around Marlene's breasts and leaving great marks all over her stomach.

"He hasn't the patients," Regulus said darkly.

"Fine," she breathed childishly as she leant away from Marlene. "She's nearly dead anyway." It was the last thing Marlene heard anyone say.

And then Marlene's eyes fluttered open, staring into dark stormy grey. "Hold on," he said quietly, relief was overtaking the numbness in her limbs. "I have to reverse this curse," he muttered.

"You sent her after Lily," Marlene said weakly.

"She would have killed you, Marlene," Regulus said darkly, he inhaled. "You're bleeding," his hand brushed over her thigh.

"I'm dying."

"No you aren't," Regulus said frantically. "Evanesco," he continued to say.

"I'd rather die for Lily."

"Shut it," Regulus said in a pained way. His hand touched to her thigh again. "I don't know how to stop this," he said anxiously.

"It's going to happen anyway, you've said yourself I'm fighting a losing battle." She managed a smile at him.

Her heavy eyes lids drooped as Regulus undid the binding on her ankles, a chain fell away with a clank and then the silky smoothness of her underwear slid up her thighs, over her bottom. She felt the fabric of her shirts rolling over her aching abdomen and chest. She was losing feeling to one pain and then the next before she could settle on any certain one. The greatest seemed to be at her core, which cramped outward in nauseating waves as Regulus moved her gently. Her skirt was tugged down before she was lifted easily from the floor. Her head settled against Regulus' dark robes, his heart beat erratically through them. Her forehead stuck against his chest where the dried blood stuck; her thighs pressed together, warm liquid sliding between them.

"Where are you going Regulus?" Someone hissed as Regulus carried her up two flights of stairs and down a dark corridor. Everything was fading away again until she became cognizant of many whispering voices, one high and chilled.

"What is this?" it said.

"My lord, Gourn has taken a student for torturing. The old head of the Auror department's daughter."

"McKinnon's," the voice inquired with little interest.

"Yes my Lord, I have prevented Gourn from murdering her. We can use her to lure out the rest of the family but she needs a healer."

"My Lord," someone shouted, drawing the room to a deathly silence, "we have imposters."

"Seize them, get me their names, torture them if you'd like," the cold voice said uncaringly. "Take the girl to our healer then, keep her alive," the cold voice said after a long moment.

"Yes my Lord," he said, bowing out of the room and starting down a corridor.

"Who's here?" Marlene breathed, catching brief glimpses of high arched ceiling and dark detailing.

"I don't know, probably my idiot brother and his lot. Now I've got to figure out a different plan." Regulus paused and cursed, "Imperio."

"Regulus," a familiar voice hissed.

"Idiots," Regulus snapped, sounding far away again as Marlene allowed the blackness to begin its ebbing all over.

"What the hell have you done to her?"

"I wouldn't hex me if you want to get out of here alive," Regulus said while Marlene passed arms.

"They disarmed us," Alice hissed.

"Of course they did, what did you expect coming here?"

They were walking along briskly, "Is Lily here?"

"No, Gourn went back for her –"

"We ambushed her," Alice provided, "we took the port key."

"Clearly," Regulus said somewhere ahead of Marlene now. "Marlene needs a healer immediately."

"Mr. Black," someone said, appearing before the group, "the prisoners are to come this way."

Regulus curled an arm around Sirius' arm, glaring at is brother in warning as they led the group back into the dungeons they'd just emerged from. Regulus took Marlene back, glancing around the lot of seven Gryffindors while they were chained. The guards left seemingly, though they only stationed themselves at the door above.

"Where are you going?" James and Sirius chorused in a hushed whisper of outrage.

"She needs a healer."

"If you leave us here, they'll kill us," Sirius hissed.

Regulus glanced up the stairs where the death eaters stood listening. He couldn't risk them overhearing otherwise. "That's your problem," he said, wincing at the look his brother gave him.

"Imperio," Marlene thought she heard Regulus mutter again once he'd jostled her to consciousness in climbing a flight of stairs. "Make a port key for them, send them back to Hogwarts," Regulus ordered in a whisper. "And then kill yourselves."

Regulus was nearly to the healer when shouts began. The walls lit up, wards a bright blood red as they shattered. Regulus ducked into an alcove as the doors of the small manse burst open, a gathering of at least twenty surged inward with his headmaster at the forefront. Marlene was still in his arms, indecision won out as he dropped her onto the floor, pressing her into the open with his foot before disillusioning himself.

He paled as the Gryffindors emerged from the side door leading to the dungeon. Everything was swept up in chaos as someone found Marlene and grabbed her up, one of the good people with Dumbledore. The Gryffindors predictably joined the fray, drawing their wands that they'd obviously retaken from the death eaters previously cursed to take them back to the school. Regulus groaned inwardly.

He slipped through the crowd to do damage control, past several people as he slipped into the dungeon to find both death eaters stunned. He reawakened them and ordered them to kill each other, which they did only after answering his questions. In their stupor they'd released the students and then were ambushed just after. Regulus glanced around as thundering footsteps sounded behind him, he spun to face the well known Auror Alastor Moody.

"Good job boy," he said surveying the scene, "Now lets get ya back to the castle."

Regulus didn't object as he was jerked along the stairs. In a handful of minutes he was in the hospital wing, staring at a white faced Marlene as she lay motionless at the mercy of the school healer's help. Her red headed friend was at her other side crying silently, holding her hand.

Marlene's eyes fluttered open as he slipped out of the hospital wing. She didn't see him though she glanced toward him. Her body ached in its entirety. The pain in her pounding skull was subsiding.

"She's miscarried," Pomfrey was saying to Lily, drawing Marlene's legs apart. "We can force labor."

Marlene moaned. Pain stemmed through her lower half as she turned her head weakly to look at Lily. "You're okay," Marlene managed.

"I was trying to find you," Lily said. "We must have been one step off – I can't find the others, Marlene/ I think they've gone – they went after you." She wiped at her eyes.

"Professor Dumbledore will handle things," Madam Pomfrey said, moving about Marlene's battered form, pulling the hangings briefly before slipping Marlene's shirt up. "Oh my," the Healer muttered. Marlene hissed as Pomfrey gently prodded over one of the several bite wounds. "That devil woman," the healer muttered.

"You have to keep Sirius away – he can't know," Marlene whispered anxiously, gripping Lily's hand tightly through the spots dotting her vision.

"He won't stay away," Lily said.

"Then don't tell him," Marlene pleaded, closing her eyes against the salve being applied over the several bite marks littering her chest, neck, and abdomen.

"Privacy, please," Pomfrey said from far off, having slipped away to address someone as the hospital wing doors burst open.

"She's my sister."

"I don't care if she's your sister Mr. McKinnon, right now she is my patient and she is indecent."

It was the last thing Marlene heard before she became unconscious again. She struggled to return to Marc's voice, to warn him about Maize, but darkness took her. She should have been grateful, for the pain doubling in her lower abdomen was nearly unbearable as she passed out.