Boring author's note about being busy at work yada yada yada, you don't care anyway because you just want to read the new chapter. Enjoy!
(Just a little warning: I'm skimming over a large bit of the book because I don't think there's much to change. Hopefully it won't feel too jumpy)
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"Dobby, is this Shell Cottage?" he whispered, clutching at the two wands he had brought from the Malfoys', ready to fight if he needed to. "Have we come to the right place?"
He looked around. The little elf stood feet from him.
"DOBBY!"
The elf swayed slightly, stars reflected in his wide, shining eyes. Together, he and Harry looked down at the silver hilt of the knife protruding from the elf's heaving chest.
"Dobby - no - HELP!" Harry bellowed towards the cottage, towards the people moving there. "HELP!"
"Dobby, no, don't die, don't die -"
The elf's eyes found him, and his lips trembled with the effort to form words.
"Harry ... Potter ..."
And then with a little shudder the elf became quite still, and his eyes were nothing more than great, glassy orbs sprinkled with the light from the stars they could not see.
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Hermione's eyes fluttered open to be greeted with the kind face of Fleur. In her hands was the damp cloth she had been holding to Hermione's forehead.
"You were quite restless when Ron brought you in," Fleur said, "even though you were very weak, you kept saying things under your breath. But once we brought you up here, you settled down."
Hermione looked at her surroundings and realised that she was in a bedroom. The window was open a small amount, and she could hear waves crashing onto the beach in the distance. The sun was now high in the sky.
"How long have I been out?" asked Hermione.
"A couple of hours."
Hermione tried to sit up, but found herself unable to. It was like her body didn't want her to. It ached everywhere.
"Is everybody okay?"
/\
"Griphook, I need to ask -"
"You also rescued a goblin."
"What?"
"You brought me here. Saved me."
"Well, I take it you're not sorry?" said Harry, a little impatiently.
"No, Harry Potter," said Griphook, and with one finger he twisted the thin, black beard upon his chin, "but you are a very odd wizard."
"Right," said Harry. "Well, I need some help, Griphook, and you can give it to me."
The goblin made no sign of encouragements, but continued to frown at Harry as though he had never seen anything like him.
"I need to break into a Gringotts vault."
Ron and Hermione were staring at Harry as though he had gone mad.
"Harry -" said Hermione, but she was cut off by Griphook.
"Break into a Gringotts vault?" repeated the goblin, wincing a little as he shifted his position upon the bed. "It is impossible."
"No it isn't," Ron contradicted him. "It's been done."
"Yeah," said Harry. "The same day I first met you, Griphook. My birthday, seven years ago."
"The vault in question was empty at the time, snapped the goblin, and Harry understood that even though Griphook had left Gringotts, he was offended at the idea of its defences being breached. "Its protection was minimal."
"Well, the vault we need to get into isn't empty, and I'm guessing its protection will be pretty powerful," said Harry. "It belongs to the Lestranges."
"Then you have no chance," said Griphook flatly. "No chance at all."
/\
Draco was hiding in his room. There was one hell of a commotion downstairs. He was interested to know what the problem was, but the Dark Lord was currently in the drawing room. And when the Dark Lord was at Malfoy Manor, it never meant good news.
After the 'incident' that occurred a week ago, the Malfoys were not in his good books. Neither, unusually, was Bellatrix. Having Harry Potter in their clutches, but managing to let him escape? They were failures. But in Draco's eyes, they were a success. Hermione was safe. He hoped.
Since the Dark Lord had discovered what happened, Draco and his family had avoided being on the main floor of the house unless absolutely necessary. Draco had managed to take a large stack of books from the library and brought them up to his room, so that he had something to occupy him. It was better than sitting around doing nothing.
Out of curiosity, he left his room and went out onto the landing, hoping to hear what was going on from the top of the stairs. But someone had already beaten him to it. His mother was peering over the banisters, craning her neck in order to hear the loud voices coming from downstairs. She jumped as Draco stepped forward and stood next to her.
"What's going on?" Draco whispered.
"There's been a break in at Gringotts."
Draco was surprised, no-one got into Gringotts. But he knew, with a raucous like this, there was only one culprit.
"Potter couldn't manage it, could he?" Draco muttered under his breath.
"It seems he has," said Narcissa. "He broke in, and made his way down to the Lestrange vault."
"No!"
Narcissa nodded.
"Did they take anything?"
"I'm not sure, that's what they're waiting to hear, I think."
They stood in silence a while, listening to the shouts of various people. They began to hear 'Hogwarts' mentioned over and over again. After a while, Narcissa broke the silence.
"You might want to write to your friends," she said. "Write to them and tell them that this battle is coming to them."
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Hermione plunged feet first into the surface of the lake. She hit the water hard, and fell into a freezing, reed-filled world. She kicked towards the surface and emerged, panting, to see enormous ripples emanating in circles from where Ron and Harry had fallen. The dragon did not seem to have noticed anything: it was already fifty feet away, swooping low over the lake to scoop up water in its scarred snout. As Ron and Harry emerged, spluttering and gasping from the depths of the lake, the dragon flew on, its wings beating hard, and landed at last on a distant bank.
Harry, Ron and Hermione struck out for the opposite shore. The lake did not seem to be deep: soon it was more a question of fighting their way through the reeds and mud than swimming, and finally they flopped, sodden, panting and exhausted, on to slippery grass.
Hermione collapsed, coughing and shuddering. Her eyes were tight shut, but she sensed Harry and Ron falling down next to her. She could hear the gasps of Harry's breath.
Ron turned onto his back and pushed himself up, resting his elbows on the ground. He gazed across the lake at the dragon, who was still sitting, quite content, at the other side.
"No chance, my arse." he smiled.
After they spent a few minutes catching their breath, the trio pulled themselves to their feet. They were wincing as they dabbed essence of dittany on to their many injuries. Hermione handed Harry the bottle, then pulled out three bottles of pumpkin juice she had brought from Shell Cottange and clean, dry robes for all of them. They changed and then gulped down the juice.
"Well, on the up side," said Ron, finally, "we got the Horcrux. On the down side -"
"- no sword." Hermione muttered, angrily.
They sat in silence again, pensive.
"Where next?" asked Ron.
"Hogwarts." Harry's voice was confident and decisive.
"But how are we going to get in?"
"We'll go to Hogsmeade," said Harry," and try to work something out once we see what the protection around the school is like. Get under the Cloak, Hermione, I want to stick together this time."
"But we don't really fit -"
"It'll be dark, no one's going to notice our feet."
The flapping of enormous wings echoed across the black water: the dragon had drunk its fill and risen into the air. They paused in their preparations to watch it climb higher and higher, no black against the rapidly darkening sky, until it banished over a nearby mountain. Then Hermione walked forwards and took her place between the other two. Harry pulled the Cloak down as far as it would go, and together they turned on the spot into the crushing darkness.
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Hermione's feet touched the street, she looked through the cloak to see the achingly familiar sight of Hogsmeade High Street: dark shop fronts, and the outline of black mountains beyond the village, and the curve of the road that led off to Hogwarts, and the light spilling from the windows of the Three Broomsticks. Before she could even relax her grip on Ron and Harry's arms, it happened.
The air was rent by a scream, and she knew immediately that it was their appearance that caused it. Even as she looked at the other two beneath the Cloak, the door of the Three Broomsticks burst open and a dozen cloaked and hooded Death Eaters dashed into the street, their wands aloft.
"We know you're here, Potter, your little cloak won't save you now! Spread out, he's here."
Six of the Death Eaters ran towards them: Harry, Ron and Hermione backed, as quickly as possible, down the nearest side street and the Death Eaters missed them by inches. They waited in the darkness, listening to the footsteps running up and down, beams of light flying along the street from the Death Eaters' outstretched wands.
"Let's just leave!" Hermione whispered. "Disapparate now!"
She and Ron took Harry's arm and he raised his wand. They turned on the spot. But nothing happened. The Death Eaters had cast their spells well.
Hermione began to panic, hearing the voices on the high street become louder. They edged further down the side street, but before they could decide what to do next, there was a grinding of bolts nearby, a door opened on the left-hand side of the narrow street and a rough voice said "Potter, in here, quick!"
They obeyed without hesitation: the three of them hurtled through the open doorway.
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Hermione didn't know how they did it. It seemed people were definitely had their backs. Saved by Aberforth Dumbledore, reunited with Neville, and walking through a new secret passageway to Hogwarts before they could even stop to take it all in.
They turned a corner and there ahead of them was the end of the passage. Another short flight of steps led to a door just like the one hidden behind Ariana's portrait. Neville pushed it open and climbed through. As they followed, Hermione heard Neville call out to unseen people: "Look who it is! Didn't I tell you?"
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The enchanted ceiling of the Great Hall was dark and scattered with stars, and below it the four long house tables were lined with dishevelled students, some in travelling cloaks, others in dressing gowns. Here and there shone the pearly-white figures of the school ghosts. Every eye, living and dead, was fixed upon Professor McGonagall, who was speaking from the raised platform at the top of the Hall. Behind her stood the remaining teachers, including the palomino centaur, Firenze, and the members of the Order of the Phoenix who had arrived to fight.
"... evacuation will be overseen by Mr Filch and Madam Pomfrey. Prefects, when I give the word, you will organise your house and take your charges, in an orderly fashion, to the evacuation point."
"Hey, Granger!"
Hermione, who had been standing with Harry and the Weasleys, spun around to see a girl in Slytherin robes hurry towards her.
"Greengrass?"
"Yeah, Daphne," Daphne smiled, greeting Hermione like a friend, something that she was quite surprised by. "I got a message from Draco earlier, just thought you should know."
Hermione's heart leapt at the mention of his name, but she managed to stay composed.
"What did he say?"
"He said he was fine, except the Dark Lord was planning an attack on Hogwarts. State the obvious, much? Anyway, they'll probably make him fight so -"
But her final words were drowned as a different voice echoed throughout the Hall. It was high, cold and clear: there was no telling from where it came; it seemed to issue from the walls themselves. Like the monster it had once commanded, it might have lain dormant there for centuries.
"I know that you are prepared to fight." There were screams amongst students, some of whom clutched each other, looking around in terror for the source of the sound. "Your efforts are futile. You cannot fight me. I do now want to kill you. I have great respect for the teachers at Hogwarts. I do not want to spill magical blood."
There was silence in the Hall now, the kind of silence that presses against eardrums, that seems too huge to be contained by walls.
"Give me Harry Potter," said Voldemort's voice, "and none shall be harmed. Give me Harry Potter, and I shall leave the school untouched. Give me Harry Potter and you will be rewarded.
"You have until midnight."
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I thought you'd like to know that I only plan to write one more chapter. The end is coming! I'm going to strive to get it done before the week is out, because I'm going back to university my new house won't have internet for a month. I don't know how I'll survive. Am going to walk around town with my laptop and find the free WiFi...
For people who have also read my story, A Lovesick Rose, they'll know my policy on writing Fleur's (and other French characters') accent. I feel like it just reads a bit strange so I stick to writing it normally. I also apologise for quite a quote-heavy chapter.
Anyhoo, thank you so much for reading, I'll give you more to read soon x