Chapter Thirty-Seven: The Marauders Map

"Come in." Glory said as she walked around her wardrobe looking at different pairs of red shoes.

In walked one of her minions supporting another one hobbling at his side.

"Aww, Jinxy what happened?" Glory said as she abandoned her search for shoes temporarily and sat down next to the bleeding demon. She noted a large knife wound in his gut.

"Death Eaters. Most, Magnificent One, they have been attacking many of us in the Forest, in their search for the Key." The demon next to Jinx said, as Jinx groaned on her couch.

"What have you found out about it? Are you close to getting it for me?" Glory asked as she resumed her search for the right pair of shoes.

"Yes, most Highly Admirable One," The second minion said proudly, "We have found out that an attempt to steal the Key from that very school by Voldermort will be done soon, and we will be there to intercept it."

"No, I'll be there to intercept it." Glory corrected as she finally settled on a satin pair of heels and sat down to put them on.

"But, but we can not risk you getting injured!" The minion said but then quickly corrected himself, "Not, not that you would! Most, most H-"

"Shut up, Meat brain." Glory snapped, "I am sick and tired of waiting around here to hear the latest sitch about the Key, while Voldermort gets closer and closer to it! No, its time I take charge and finally go there and get the little brat myself."

The second minion raised his hand slightly, as if asking permission to speak, "A, a brilliant plan if I may say so, oh, most Spectacular One. Except, a wise idea would be to go about this secretly because once your presence is known, the Headmaster is a very advanced wizard and can construct powerful barriers to prevent you from entering the castle."

"Right, well then I'll just have to be discreet. But what do we know about the Keys disguise? What does it look like? We know it's a girl, what else?" Glory demanded snapping her fingers.

"Uhh, it is being taught in the sixth grade… we think." The minion replied uncertainly.

Glory sighed, "So, basically we know it's a girl. But that's okay, because we'll know more soon…" Glory smiled and with this she turned and advanced on the scared Death Eater held captive and chained in a chair.

The Death Eater screamed.

---

Nearly a week after Dawn had bailed on Harry, Ron and Hermione at lunch, she was still trying to avoid them when ever she could.

Dawn sat in the library and glanced at the clock.

6:00pm.

She'd been here nearly two hours and she still hadn't manage to finish her Astronomy assignment. She had to create her own birth chart, and Professor Sinistra was pretty strict when it came to handing in homework, kind of like Professor McGonagall.

She had done most of it; finding her exact moment of birth, converting to sidereal time and finding her rising sign, but it just took her longer than most of the other students because she had to take into account she hadn't been born in the UK, now she just had to identify her ascendant and draw it onto her birth chart.

"Hey Dawn." Someone said as they sat down next to her.

She gave a small yell and jumped in her seat, causing the librarian to glare at her.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to startle you!" Hermione said apologetically.

"No, that's okay." Dawn said.

"What are you doing?" Hermione asked, making sure to talk quietly so the librarian wouldn't kick her out.

"Astronomy." Dawn said, already knowing where this would end, and she was kind of grateful. She knew she had to tell them, and she was glad they weren't taking her cold shoulder as a sign of her not wanting to be friends any more. "I have to draw up a birth chart, and it's taking longer than I thought it would."

"Yeah, I remember doing one of those last year. Took a long time too." Hermione said sympathetically. "I was wondering, if you had time, we could talk?"

She really didn't want to have to explain everything here, in the library, and if she was going to tell it all, she didn't want to have to repeat it for Harry and Ron. She nodded and put down her quill.

"Yeah, you want to know about Draco, right?" Dawn asked Hermione, who nodded.

"Okay, but can we do it somewhere else? Some where inside but private where no one will disturb us?" Dawn asked.

"Yeah, I think I know a place." Hermione said picking up her books that she had been studying.

"Okay," Dawn said as she stood up and gathered her things, "But first, we should get Harry and Ron."

---

"So you walk back and forth three times, while imagining the room you want, them stop near that statue and the door will appear?" Dawn asked amazed that something this fictional existed. Although, she was going to a magic school with a powerful wizard and God after her, because she was a thousand year old Key who was made into a sister for the Slayer to protect.

"Yeah." Ron confirmed, "Pretty wicked ay?"

"Yeah, what's it called?" Dawn asked, watching Harry pace back and forth along the corridor.

"It's the Room of Requirement." Ron said, "Or the Come-and-Go room, which ever."

"How'd you find out about it? Does everyone know about this?" Dawn asked.

"Dobby, a house elf, found it for me two years ago, and no, not many people know about it." Harry said as he paced the corridor.

"A house elf?" Dawn asked surprised.

"Yes, they work here, in the castle, they cook out meals." Hermione said, "Its horrible, they don't get sick leave or paid! I've actually made this club, you can join! Its called SPEW, standing for-"

"Oh Hermione, give it a break, no one wants to join your stupid SPEW club, the elves are happy where they are!" Ron said.

"Ron, they are not, they're being taken advantage of!" Hermione began heatedly, "If we just-"

"Guys, will you just stop fighting!?" Harry said loudly to be heard, "some one will hear us! Now come on."

Harry held a large, old wooden door open for them to all enter and once they were inside, Dawn saw it was a comfortable room with lots of chairs and couches and a fire place. It looked like her common room but with different colours and no stair cases leading up to dormitories.

Once they were all seated, they all looked expectantly at Dawn.

"So," Dawn began after no one spoke. "You want to know what I've found out about Draco?"

All three nodded, eager to know what Voldermort was plotting.

Dawn sighed, she knew now, there was no way of chickening out. "Get comfortable, this'll take a while."

---

"And, that's it." Dawn said, after telling the very long tale for the last half an hour, "Now, I cant go outside because of the constant threat of being snatched and Buffy, Dumbledore and Spike keep assuring me they'll 'figure something out', but… I don't know."

She looked at her three friends who seemed to be frozen and staring at her, with Rons mouth hanging half open.

"So, uh, we okay?" Dawn asked, wishing some one would say something.

"Great, now we got another Loony Lovegood on our hands!" Ron exclaimed.

"Ron, I think she's telling the truth." Hermione said, never taking her eyes off Dawn.

"Bloody Hell." Ron said, sitting back into his chairs and shutting his mouth.

"So, Voldermort's looking for you?" Harry asked, still taken aback.

Dawn nodded.

"I, I knew there was something about you." Hermione said, sitting back into her chair, "All those times you ignored questions about your last school and, and your past and a few days ago, when we asked about what you found out about Draco. It all makes sense now, you were scared about telling us who you were."

Dawn nodded, still hoping her fears of telling them were all for nothing.

"But, why?" Ron asked, honestly confused.

Dawn gave a small laugh at how naïve Ron could be, "Because, I was scared of how you'd all treat me when you found out, how you'd look at me."

"Dawn, we're you're friends, you should know we'd never treat you differently about something like this." Hermione said earnestly.

"Yeah, I know, you're right." Dawn said, giving a small laugh out of relief.

"What I don't get is how you're so good at magic, you said you've never done any before." Ron said confused.

"Well, yeah I have done some magic, just not this kind." Dawn explained, "And this isnt all new to me. Like potions is really similar to a class I had in High School, chemistry, and muggle studies is easy, and astrology isn't exactly new to me either. Defense against the Dark Arts is pretty easy at the moment, Buffy's taught me all that stuff before. The only real hard ones are Transfigurations and Charms."

"Wicked." Ron said excitedly, "God, it must be so cool to have a sister who's a Slayer. And a friend who's a vampire!"

"Uh, yeah, I guess." Dawn said uncertainly. "So, we are cool, right?"

"Yeah, of course." Harry said, giving her a smile.

"Dawn, you should of known we'd never judge you for something like this." Hermione said earnestly.

"Oh God." Ron groaned, "There's not gonna be a girly group hug is there?"

"Just cause you have the emotional capacity of a lamp." Hermione retorted as they made their way to the door.

"Guys, hang on." Harry said as he looked at an piece of parchment, with what looked like a map drawn on it.

"What's that?" Dawn asked as Harry folded it out.

"That's the Marauders Map. It's a map of the whole school with everyone's where abouts." Hermione told her, "I still think he should hand it in though. Rons brothers swiped it from Filch's office. We shouldn't even have it."

"God Hermione, will you grow a back bone." Ron said as he opened the door.

"That's really cool." Dawn said as Harry handed it to her for a closer look.

"Yeah, its helped us loads." Harry said.

Dawn noticed the map proceeded far into the Forest, and noticed that some names were shown.

"Oh my God, this has the names of the wizards hiding in the forest!" Dawn said pointing out a few names, one of them being Lucius Malfoy, who was walking out of the forest.

She also noted that Buffy and Spike were making their way into the Forest to patrol, except Spikes name read 'William'.

"You're right. Hey, that's your sister, right?" Hermione said pointing out one of the two pairs of footsteps heading into the forest. "Who's William then, is that Spike?"

"Yeah." Dawn said, still amazed that this was a map to every Death Eater hiding in the Forbidden Forest, if only she could borrow it, this might let her even go outside. She really missed practicing Quidditch since she had to tell Harry she couldn't anymore because of school work. "This would be really useful if they could use it on patrol. Do you think I could borrow it, just for a little while…"

"Oh, yeah, of course. I mean, I don't really have much use for it, you need it more." Harry said as he began to fold it up.

"Really? Oh my God, thanks so much!" Dawn said happily.

"That's okay, now, when you want to look at it, tap it with your wand and say 'I solemnly swear that I am up to no good'. And when your done, tap it and say, 'Mischief managed.'" Harry told her as he cleared the map and handed it to her. "Keep it safe and hide it well."

"Okay, thanks again, really." Dawn said as she put it into her inside pocket of her school cloak, "One question though, if this map is showing all the Death Eaters in the forest, could we give it to like the Ministry of Magic and show them so they could lock them up before they try anything?"

"Uh, no." Harry said, giving a short laugh, "The Ministry are deeply stupid when it comes to issues about Voldermort. He's been around for ages and they only just recognised that he's back, their still in denial. Tried to make me and Dumbledore look like we were lying when we tried to tell everybody."

"What Harry's trying to say is that they'd need proof that they were Death Eaters, and loitering around a Forest really isnt much from their eyes," Hermione said, "And they'd also try to say that that map isnt real or is some cheap knock off from a store. It really wouldn't do any good to tell them about this, they'd probably just confiscate it."

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