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Replay

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Chapter Forty-Eight

Honour Among Thieves

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Harry looked around at the others gathered in Blaise Zabini's drawing room and took a deep breath. "We have good news and bad news. The good news is that Crabbe and Goyle are on our side and don't want to see the kids hurt."

"Both of them?" Ron said, frowning sceptically.

"Yes," Neville said, nodding. "After Ginny and I were done talking to Goyle in the dining room Shacklebolt helped us take him down to the kitchen so we could talk to Harry and Hermione. Crabbe's the same."

"He really likes the kids," Hermione said, her voice shaking as Neville put his arm around her shoulders. "He doesn't want to help Malfoy hurt them."

"How is that good news? They aren't in the house to keep Malfoy from hurting them, so what's the point?" Ron demanded. Arthur put a gentle hand on his arm.

"What's the bad news?" Arthur asked quietly, glancing at Molly, who stood between Severus and Penelope, near the mantel. Penelope and Severus had just arrived on the Knight Bus with Tilda, who sat on the couch beside Luna, looking pale and drawn. She wasn't supposed to have come but Severus couldn't convince her not to, so they'd had to take the bus once leaving the Isle of Wight. Luna patted Tilda's hand consolingly, though she looked quite pale herself. Fleur sat on Luna's other side, her eyes blazing as she teetered on the edge of her seat, Bill standing by her side.

"Why are we seeting 'ere?" she demanded. "Deed they tell you where ze children are or not?"

"I was about to explain the bad news," Harry said, trying to be patient. "Wherever the kids are, it's protected by the Fidelius Charm, like this house was. Or still is, I reckon, except that all of us know the secret now, so we were able to come here. But neither Crabbe nor Goyle is the Secret Keeper at the other house, so we still don't know where the kids are."

"You're joking," Penelope said, pacing the hearth rug nervously. "They're at Draco Malfoy's house, obviously! It should be obvious, at any rate. Who needs to be told a secret when we can just guess the answer? Percy didn't say that clearly in the letter, but he said he was working for Narcissa Malfoy. Where else would he be doing that? The only reason he couldn't write it himself is that he's not the Secret Keeper. Honestly! We know where they are, so what are we waiting for?"

Fleur sprang to her feet, her hair whipping about her head, hitting Hermione in the face as Fleur pushed past her to grasp Harry's arm with a surprisingly strong hand. "Zen we must go to get zem!" she declared while Hermione sputtered and tried to get long blonde strands of hair out of her mouth.

Ron enthusiastically strode across the room to join Fleur and Harry. "Okay!" he said loudly, clapping his hands together. "Fleur's right! What are we waiting for?"

Hermione glanced at Luna before scowling at Ron. "What are we waiting for? I don't know, for the sun to set in the north and the moon to fly out of your arse?" she said acidly. "You seem to have forgotten that that's not how the Fidelius Charm works."

Fleur glared at Hermione angrily. "Don't be absurd. We merely need to go to ze house and retrieve ze children. Zere must be a record at ze Ministry of where ze house eez."

Arthur shrugged. "We don't need the Ministry for that. I could Apparate to the village where the Malfoys live in my sleep, I went on so many raids there. But just knowing where the house is won't do any good, my dear."

Fleur looked at her father-in-law more kindly than she had at Hermione. Arthur had the unique attribute, amongst the members of the Weasley family, of neither being held in contempt by Fleur nor subject to her considerable charms, as most of his sons were, married to her or not.

"Why won't it do any good?" she asked more calmly.

"It's as Hermione said. That's now how the Fidelius Charm works." Harry could see that Hermione was itching to give the explanation but a look from Arthur quelled her and he went on. "We could go to the Malfoy house and press our noses against the windows—"

"—and we wouldn't see a thing," Harry said hollowly. His eyes met Arthur's and he grimaced. "Sorry to interrupt. That's what I remember McGonagall, Flitwick and Hagrid saying when we overhead them talking about the Fidelius Charm that had been protecting my parents'—my house. They said Voldemort could be right there, looking in the windows, but it wouldn't matter if he hadn't been told the Secret."

"Precisely," Arthur said, putting his arm around Fleur's shoulders and giving her a sympathetic squeeze.

"Which is why," Harry said slowly, looking around nervously, "we've talked to Crabbe and Goyle about going back in as our spies, to save the children."

Those who hadn't been speaking to the prisoners stared at Harry, Ginny, Neville and Hermione as though they'd gone mad. Ron started laughing, in a way. It sounded more like choking. "You've got to be kidding! Why should we trust them? We're going to send our two prisoners back and believe that they're going to try to rescue the kids?"

"And even if they are really on our side," Bill said, frowning; "how in Merlin's name are they supposed to overcome Draco Malfoy and Blaise Zabini and Narcissa Malfoy—"

"—and Pansy. She's there, too, though Percy has her wand now," Hermione added with a shudder. She looked at Harry, her expression saying, We didn't think this through.

Harry sighed, running his hand through his hair. "That's what Crabbe was worried about too, Bill. Their wand-work was never exactly brilliant when they were in school."

"Having incompetents on the other side isn't a bad thing. Good intentions aside, incompetents on our side could be worse. Neither of them can even Apparate," Neville groaned, sitting on a footstool and putting his head in his hands, as if he were also sorry he'd agreed to the plan.

Ginny's mouth twisted. "Plus, they'll have to explain how they somehow managed to overcome all of us to escape. Malfoy will never buy that," she said softly, chewing on a thumbnail as she always did when she was trying to work out a problem.

"They'll be spotted as spies right away," Neville agreed, head still in his hands so that his words were muffled.

"There has to be a good reason for them to go back," Hermione said, frowning fiercely and pacing the hearth rug.

"A hostage," Luna said softly from the couch. Everyone turned to look at her. She shrugged. "If someone went as their hostage, that could do it. They can say that they escaped with a hostage."

"I'll do it," Harry said right away. Ron made a scoffing noise.

"Are you mad? Malfoy would kill you on sight. Once Crabbe and Goyle are back they don't need you to stay alive. And how are they to get Malfoy to believe that they overpowered you?" Ginny grasped Harry's arm possessively, nodding her agreement with her brother.

Neville stood and said, in a very official voice, "I'm an Auror. It should be me."

Ron snorted again. "I think Draco Malfoy would get even more pleasure out of killing you, and killing Harry would make his life. Not you either, Hermione," he added. "It can't be anyone he hates or he'll just kill them as soon as look at them. And it can't be anyone Malfoy knows could take Crabbe and Goyle blindfolded."

"Me. It has to be me." Everyone turned to look at Penelope. Severus appeared to be very cross. "Don't look at me like that, Severus! Yes, I know he did a despicable thing to masquerade as Percy, but that's why it needs to be me! He may have a bit of a soft spot for me. I doubt he'd kill me as soon as look at me. The rest of you—well, why should he want to let any of you live? We've got to play the odds here. Plus, he doesn't think of me as a threat, magically. He knows that I've been living as a Muggle for years, so he probably thinks I'm out of practice when it comes to magic. And another thing," she added, "I won't be a hostage. I'll be a traitor."

When Penelope explained her plan everyone but Severus looked as if they were satisfied with it. He frowned deeply, his hands in his pockets, staring at the carpet, while Tilda glowered at Penelope. Harry wasn't happy about the plan either. "Are you certain about this, Penny? There's no guarantee that Malfoy won't kill you, either. I'd feel a lot better if you let me go in. I could use one of your hairs and put it in some Polyjuice Potion so they think I'm you."

Neville looked up, surprised. "Polyjuice Potion? You've got Polyjuice Potion on hand, Harry?" he said hopefully. "I didn't know that. Is it because you and Ginny teach Defence?"

"Erm, no, Neville," Harry sputtered. "I—I assumed that the Ministry would have some on hand. For Aurors."

Neville looked at him as though he was mad. "No offence, Harry, but you're not an Auror. Yeah, you're Harry Potter and all, but the Ministry doesn't just give out Polyjuice to anyone who asks for it, even if you've had a year of Auror training. I could probably get some, but frankly, I think Penelope's right. It has to be her. We don't know how long any of this will take. If I take the potion and it wears off, I can't very well help Crabbe and Goyle get the kids out. I'll be dead. And I could be dead well before the potion wears off if Malfoy asks Penelope about something that happened between them, something only she would know. There's too much ground to cover. She can't tell me everything I would need to know, nor could she tell you. We haven't time."

Ginny nodded. "Yes. Goyle told us that Malfoy will want to do the spell to take the kids' magic tonight. He'll start a ritual at midnight. We're working against the clock." She put her hand on Harry's arm. "We'll still go to the Malfoy estate. We can wait nearby, so when they get the kids out of the house and they're no longer protected by the Fidelius Charm we can take them to safety. But only Crabbe and Goyle can get into the house, and only Penelope could pass as the traitor who helped them escape without Draco Malfoy killing her on sight. Probably," she added, looking hopefully at Penelope. "You're certain about this, Penny? You could still be in great danger. You'll probably be in great danger."

Penelope looked rueful. "Draco Malfoy could have hurt me any number of times since he's been pretending to be Percy. I've been thinking a lot about it and I believe that the reason he's been distancing himself from me a bit is because he was starting to care a little and Pansy Parkinson didn't like it. Once I could have sworn he called me 'Pansy' instead of 'Penny'. It was close enough that he insisted he'd said my name. I have to assume that if he's concerned about being faithful to his girlfriend, even though he's escaped from prison and is part of a conspiracy to kidnap our children, there might be some hope for him."

"At that rate," Hermione said, frowning, "there's a danger that Pansy could try to kill you."

Penelope gave Hermione a small smile. "Then it's a lucky thing that Percy has her wand, isn't it?"

She looked round at everyone and Harry saw her hands shaking as she folded her arms across her chest, trying to look cool and unflappable. "It's settled. I'm going in. I've got a good cover story: I'm a mother. If my boys are going to be killed I want to see them one last time, even if it means being killed myself," she said softly, a small choke in her voice.

Harry suddenly felt that his own throat had tightened considerably. "Yes," he said to her quietly. "That's what a mother would do," he added, remembering the first time he'd heard his own mother's voice asking Voldemort to kill her instead of him, offering up her life, unable to step aside and watch her child die without doing something.

"Penelope," Severus started to say.

"No. The discussion is over," Penelope said in a hard voice, staring at the carpet. She wouldn't look at him. Harry couldn't help thinking that he probably wanted to be the one to go in, but if Malfoy was likely to kill Harry, Ron, Hermione, Neville, or Ginny on sight he was certain to kill Severus Snape. Bill, Fleur or Luna wouldn't work either, because of their connection to Ron, which also eliminated Molly and Arthur. For the first time Harry could almost picture Severus Snape and Penelope Clearwater as a couple, which he'd never tried to picture before, even once he knew about Julian Snape, but that was because he tried to avoid disturbing mental images whenever possible.

They went over the story of Penelope's betrayal of the others in extreme detail, though to Harry it seemed very rushed. They had no choice. She and Crabbe and Goyle needed to return to the Malfoys' in time to rescue the children, before the midnight ritual began and any of them lost their magical power, let alone their lives.

"What about me?" Tilda asked suddenly. "What am I to do? I assume that I'm not being permitted to come to Wiltshire to wait outside the house, as I'm not a witch," she grumbled, crossing her arms.

Harry looked pleadingly at Molly. "Molly will take you back to their house, won't you? You're not going to be waiting at the Malfoys', are you?" he said to his mother-in-law, raising his eyebrows.

Molly's mouth was twisting rebelliously but Arthur patted Tilda on the arm and quickly jumped in. "That's right, my dear. You go back to The Burrow with Molly. Let the others take care of this. Neville, Harry, Bill and Severus know what they're doing, and so do Fleur, Hermione, Luna and Ginny. I won't be fighting either, I expect; I just need to show everyone how to get there. And Shacklebolt will be going as well."

Ron cleared his throat meaningfully and Fleur rolled her eyes. "Oui, and ze reportaire is so much more experienced zan an Auror and two Charm Breakers and two Defence Against ze Dark Arts professors, and—"

"You'd be surprised," Hermione said stoutly, partly to Fleur and partly to Arthur. "He gets a lot of people refusing to be interviewed and reacting a bit violently, to say nothing of the reactions of people he has written about."

Fleur's pale brows flew up and she eyed Ron with amusement. "Did you get a new wife and neglect to tell ze family?" Fleur insinuated. Harry saw Ron swallow and look away from her, his face furious.

"Okay," Harry said a little too loudly, "Molly will need to take Tilda back to The Burrow while Arthur comes with us," Harry said to his father-in-law, "since we can't risk anyone seeing us with Crabbe, Goyle, and Penelope. They should take the Knight Bus. We'll have to go separately."

"I usually Apparated to the courtyard of the Green Dragon in Alderbury and had a broom with me to fly north to Clarendon," Arthur said, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. "The Green Dragon is a Ministry-approved safe Apparition point. No danger of Muggles seeing."

"The town of Clarendon? Is that where the house is?" Hermione asked.

"No, Clarendon is the house. That's its name. Used to be Clarendon Palace but the Malfoys moved it years ago. That's why almost nothing is left of it where it used to be. Muggles think it tumbled down. It was just moved, magically. The Malfoys have always been very powerful in Wiltshire. The first one to come to this country was William the Conquerer's court wizard, and a Malfoy was also very tight with the Plantagenets. Not sure when they got tired of working for Muggles," he said softly, frowning, "but that's probably at the heart of the Malfoy anti-Muggle feeling. Could be why they simply made off with the palace and turned it into the Malfoy home." Arthur sat wearily on the arm of the sofa. "The house is actually in Clarendon Forest itself, surrounded by a large park that's edged with anti-Muggle charms." Suddenly looking like he'd forgotten something, Arthur added, "And we need to be careful at the Green Dragon. It's owned by an old friend of the Malfoys, Septimus Flint. We need to hope that he stays inside and doesn't happen to be wandering into his courtyard. Don't know if he or his son are in on this with Malfoy, but you never can tell."

"Flint!" Ron exclaimed. "As in Marcus?"

"That's the one. Septimus is Marcus's father. Lucius Malfoy's old haunt, that pub. The wizarding half of it, anyway. It can't be seen behind the Muggle pub of the same name. At any rate, a lot of us at the Ministry used to speculate that Lucius named his son after his favourite pub, just to make his wife cross. I shouldn't be surprised. We'll Apparate to the courtyard behind the pub, take brooms with us, and then fly north. It's a little hard to spot the house if you don't know what you're doing."

"Is it Unplottable?" Harry wanted to know.

"Probably. Which is why we have to do it this way. Can't Apparate to a place that's Unplottable unless you've got a sort of password for getting around that, but you can fly there if you know what you're doing. It takes skill not to be fooled by the shifting landscape. It'll look like it's moving about a bit as we get closer, like. As if it's not sure where it belongs. We'll land nearby and walk the last stretch. Otherwise we could overshoot, because of the Unplottable spell." He sighed. "I'm remembering now why it was always such a bloody chore to raid the Malfoys."

"And we'll have to use Disillusionment Charms when we fly, so Muggles won't see us," Hermione said grimly, looking a bit pale. Harry knew she'd been very glad to get her Apparition licence, as she'd never liked flying much.

"And Crabbe and Goyle and I actually have to get the kids out of the house," Penelope said weakly, looking even paler than Hermione.

"We need to work on their story with them," Harry said, nodding, wondering how well the two Slytherins would be able to remember what they had to do.

"It'll work. It's a good plan," Luna said calmly. "We've finally got hope." Everyone looked at her when she spoke but no one dared to agree or disagree.

Yes, Harry thought, looking around at the others. We need all the bloody hope in the world.

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Teddy and Nate closed the trap door together and the other children helped them to roll the carpet flat once more, after which they all sat down to eat the evidently drug-free food. The sandwiches disappeared all too quickly and Teddy realised, too late, that they should have saved some for Ruby and Marguerite. The other children were yawning and beginning to tire, stretching out on the carpet, which was the only real comfort the room offered other than a small horsehair footstool and the old sofa, which was so lumpy the floor was more comfortable. Julian thumped the floor through the carpet. "I wish this was a giant cushion instead of a carpet," he grumbled, lying down again.

Suddenly it was as though the carpet had been inflated with feathers and down. They all gasped as one, feeling the carpet carefully, experimentally pushing against what should have been the wooden floor, through the carpet, but was instead a soft, yielding cushion.

"Bloody hell," Teddy breathed, testing the carpet with his hands and finding it uniformly soft.

"It must be a magic carpet!" Nate said in awe, lying back and sighing in comfort.

"I wish this carpet were lying flat on the floor again," Teddy said experimentally. With a thud, the carpet went back to its original thinness. The other children complained bitterly and little Charlotte started to cry. Teddy shushed them, trying to explain. "I always thought magic carpets could only fly. This one seems to grant wishes. One of the things it might be able to do is fly, so this could be our way out of here. Hold on tight, everyone, we're going to test this." He took a deep breath and said, as authoritatively as he could, "I wish this carpet would rise two feet off the floor."

The little ones cried out again when the carpet obligingly rose two feet above the floor. Unfortunately, the weight of the children caused it to be unstable and little Cedric rolled off one corner. Where each of them sat on the carpet a dent was created. It didn't sit flat, like the flying carpets Teddy had seen in films and cartoons. Cedric climbed on again with help from Nate and sat closer to the centre this time, though that was developing into a pit, with most of the smaller children creating a large dent that made contact with the floor, rather than being elevated two feet in the air. Teddy was finding it difficult to prevent himself tumbling into that pit or off the edge.

"All right, I wish this carpet would move us toward the fireplace and stop front of it," he said. The carpet moved forward, making the other kids squeal with delight and uncertainty. This time Rory tumbled off the edge, holding onto little Diana, whose fall was broken by her cousin.

"Not a very good form of transportation, is it?" Rory grumbled, rubbing her bottom.

"It's too heavy with all of us on it at once," Nate said reasonably. "It's probably not meant to take twelve people."

"There are only ten of us right now," Rory pointed out. "How's it going to take two more?"

Teddy didn't know how they were all going to get out at once. He looked at Nate and knew the answer: They weren't. Some of them would have to stay behind. And even those who got out…

He wished for the carpet to go back to where it had been. He walked to one of the tall windows, opened it and peered down again at the stone terrace far below. If the kids who did ride the carpet to freedom rolled off the edge and fell…

"We need to find out how many people can safely ride the thing," he said, his heart in his throat. "There'll need to be more than one trip."

"And we need to hope they don't kill whoever stays behind while waiting for the carpet to come back," Rory said ominously, making her brother glare again.

"Yes," Teddy said through gritted teeth, leaning wearily on the windowsill and staring at the ground again.

Caught up in their conversation, they didn't notice the doorknob turning. When the door to the drawing room suddenly opened and Percy Weasley stepped in everyone was jolted, including Teddy. Percy's eyes went wide when he saw Teddy at the open window.

"Don't jump!" he cried, sprinting across the room and pulling him back from the opening. Teddy tried to prise his hands from his arms but a moment later the hands were released. Nate had unceremoniously leapt onto Percy's back and wrapped his legs around his waist. He had his arm across the older man's neck, threatening to cut off his air.

"You are not my father!"

Teddy stared in shock at his best mate. Nate rode on his father's back with his legs wrapped around Percy's waist and his arm across his throat, making Percy produce gagging noises as he struggled to breathe. They were overbalanced and Percy fell backwards on top of Nate, who grunted in pain when he hit the floor and had a much older and heavier body land on top of his. Percy quickly got to his feet and pulled out his wand, backing up and pointing it at each of the children in turn before smirking at his son in a rather un-Percyish manner.

"No, I'm not your father. Took you long enough to work it out, yeah? You've never actually met your father. And now you never will," he added, moving his wand back to Nate in a rather menacing fashion, making Teddy wonder whether he was going to kill Nate with all of them looking on.

Not if I can help it, he thought, preparing to hurl himself at Percy—or whoever he was—if it would save Nate's life.

At that moment, however, the door opened again and a tall robed figure strode into the room, waving his wand imperiously at the candles on the walls and in the chandelier, so the room was no longer cloaked in twilight gloom. He wore the same sort of mask Crabbe and Goyle had worn in the other house but he was obviously neither Crabbe nor Goyle. Despite his revealing not an inch of his person, he had an air of authority about him, and Teddy realized that they were, for the first time, seeing the ringleader of the kidnapping scheme. The ringleader was certainly not the Percy-pretender.

"Our—friends are back. And they've brought someone with them. She needs to see you as you are now, so don't waste more time here. Come on—"

"—before the potion wears off that makes him look like Nate's dad? Yeah, we know it isn't really him. He told us," Teddy added, pointing at "Percy". The ringleader turned slowly. Through the eyeholes in the mask Teddy could see that he was gazing directly back at him. Teddy shuddered. Whoever he is, he's dangerous. Very dangerous.

"He did?" came the slow, smooth voice—a voice that was used to being obeyed. "That is of no consequence now. Come," he said to the Percy-impersonator again. "She doesn't know that you aren't Weatherby. We need to find out what she and the others are up to."

"Who's she?" Teddy yelled at their backs as they left, locking the door after themselves again. He wasn't surprised that they ignored him but he thought it was worth a try anyway. Nate still sat on the floor, somewhat stunned after his painful landing and his impromptu tussle with the father who wasn't really his father. He put his head in his hands.

"It must be my mum," Nate said in a muffled voice. "Who else would need to believe that he's really my dad? Perhaps his mum, but I can't picture Nana coming." He groaned as he stood, then leaned on the windowsill, as though leaping down to the hard terrace held some appeal. "I didn't really mean… When I said that he wasn't my dad, I just meant—if he were my son, I'd say, You're no son of mine! I meant it like that. Like disowning. No dad of mine would collaborate with kidnappers and dark wizards."

Teddy put his hand on Nate's shoulder and looked out at the darkening landscape. "The problem is, you were right about that. No dad of yours would do that. On the other hand, at least you don't need to hate your dad. That's not him," he said, hoping this would be some small comfort to Nate. As many times as he'd wished someone other than Harry Potter were his father, he'd never thought he was evil. It was just a stupid longing to be a nobody, to be like any other kid at Hogwarts, a typical student who didn't look just like the most famous wizard of the last fifty years. "At least they didn't notice that Ruby and Marguerite aren't here," he said. "That's something."

Nate nodded. "But what about my mum? She must be trying to get us out. What if they kill her, too?"

Teddy tried to maintain the hopeful outlook, but it was growing more and more difficult. "Since whoever's been impersonating your dad could have hurt your mum any time since he came back, I'd guess that she's safe, for now. Maybe he'll even listen to her, negotiate or something."

Nate sat on the floor and took off his glasses, rubbing his hands over his face wearily. "He's made her so unhappy. She'd really hoped they could get back together, but he didn't want to. I should have known it wasn't him. She should have too, I reckon, but she wanted it to be him so badly…"

"So did you," Teddy told him bracingly. "And so did Ginny and the twins and Nana and Granddad. No one wanted to see the things that were wrong, the things that didn't fit."

Nate lifted his head suddenly. "Does that mean that my dad's really dead?"

Teddy thought for a moment. "Maybe not. He'd need bits of your dad to put in a potion, to look like him. They must be holding him prisoner, too. Mad-Eye Moody likes to talk about Death Eaters and other stuff from when he was alive. He said he was held prisoner by a Death Eater once for the same reason. The Death Eater had to keep him alive because the hair he was putting in the potion he was using to look like Moody would have been worthless if he were dead. You can only use bits of people who are still alive for that."

Nate looked hopeful again. "You think he's here, then?"

Teddy drew his lips into a line. "Maybe. Hard to say. Maybe he was in the other house. Or maybe Ruby and Marguerite will find him in a dungeon below the house or something. We'll have to wait and see."

He stood and walked to the door, putting his ear to it but hearing nothing. "Wherever they are they don't seem to be on the other side of the door. Or else they've Imperturbed it, so we can't hear anything. Let's hope they're too busy to come right back." He looked at his watch. It had been more than twenty minutes since his sister and step-cousin had gone into the secret passage and he worried that they were worried that they'd been forgotten.

He got help from the other kids moving things off the magic carpet and rolling it back from the trap door. Together, he and Nate lifted the door and swung it back to sit on the rolled-up carpet again. To his relief, Ruby and Marguerite were sitting on the lowest stairs, but no ball of fire sat in Marguerite's hand. As the girls wearily climbed back up to the candlelit drawing room, Marguerite looked around and said, "This room isn't bad with some candles. I put out my light while we were waiting," she explained. "It's rather tiring for me to do for a long time and I reckoned I could give us light again if we needed to do more walking around."

Teddy nodded at her, grateful for this strange veela gift. "Sorry we took so long. We had a little visit from Nate's dad—except that it turns out he isn't."

"What?" Ruby said, frowning.

Teddy explained to them what had happened while they were in the tunnel. As he talked they all worked to close the trapdoor again, roll back the carpet and replace the meagre furniture where it had been. He also told them that the carpet was no ordinary carpet, fully expecting Ruby's blasé reaction to this news.

Ruby flopped on the lumpy couch and whistled through the gap between her front teeth. "That's good, because we didn't find out anything useful down below. There are a lot of doors opening off the tunnel, but all of them are locked. And it's hard to tell, but we think the tunnel just goes in a circle. We felt a breeze but couldn't tell where it was coming from. It might be a way out or it might not be. We didn't get far before we had to go back to the stairs. Even if there's a way out down there the carpet sounds like a much better idea."

Teddy agreed, but when he walked to the window again, gazing out at the darkness, he wondered again how they would all escape at once. Then he wondered whether they should all leave or whether he and Nate should stay behind, since Nate's real dad might be a prisoner in the house and his mother may have entered the den of thieves to try to save both Percy and the children. He caught Nate's eye and could tell immediately that Nate was thinking the same thing as he walked to the window and stood beside Teddy. Nate gave him a small nod.

"We get the little kids out," he said quietly. "And I'll stay to look for my mum and dad. My real dad."

Teddy looked at him grimly, also nodding. "Right. Except that I'm staying to help you," he whispered. Nate grimaced but also looked thankful.

"I was hoping you'd say that, but I didn't want to volunteer you. I reckoned you'd do it anyway," he said, grinning at his best friend.

#/#/#

They Apparated to the courtyard behind the Green Dragon in twos. Bill and Fleur arrived first and went to stand by the pub door, holding their brooms like spears. Ron and Luna followed, then Hermione and Neville. Harry and Ginny arrived with their broomsticks in tow as well and quickly moved out of the way for Severus and Arthur.

Molly and Tilda had already hailed the Knight Bus in the street outside Blaise Zabini's London home and left for the Burrow. They decided that Shacklebolt should go into the Malfoy house undercover. Hermione was the best at Transfiguration who was on hand. For a moment Harry wished he'd contacted Theo, who wasn't worked up because his child had been kidnapped, but Hermione quickly had Shacklebolt turned into a small grey mouse. He immediately started squeaking noisily, but this became muffled once he was deep in Penelope's pocket with a biscuit to keep him occupied.

Ron watched Hermione do this, suggesting that they all be Transfigured and enter the house in this way. Hermione made a scoffing noise. "Did you hear how noisy he is? You don't seem to understand, Ron: he's a mouse now. As in no longer human, with a human's mind. All he knows is squeaking and eating and pooping. One mouse Penelope could easily control and keep secret from Zabini and Malfoy, but nearly a dozen? Are you mad? Besides, Shacklebolt thinks Zabini smuggled Draco Malfoy out of Azkaban as a ferret. This is his sort of thing. If he catches on to Penelope having even the one mouse he'll probably work out that she's not a traitor and he'll kill her, Shacklebolt, Crabbe and Goyle in a trice. This is risky enough."

"All right, all right, Professor Granger," he grumbled. "I don't need a bleeding lecture."

They took turns putting the Disillusionment Charms on each other in the courtyard of the pub. Only Snape and Arthur hadn't yet been concealed when the pub door suddenly opened. Harry assumed that the figure standing in the doorway was Septimus Flint, backlit weakly by the magical candles in the pub and using his wand to levitate a very drunk-looking wizard he was evicting from the premises.

Flint looked remarkably like his son, who Harry hoped was far away and not inside the pub, with his enormous jaw, teeth that looked too big for his mouth, and nose twisted slightly to the left. Harry had always thought that Marcus Flint's face was due to an unfortunate Quidditch injury and hadn't realised that it was hereditary. He would have sworn that it was Marcus Flint were it not for the fact that Harry had just seen him at the Quidditch final, before the Easter holiday, when Slytherin were playing; he'd come to see his son play. Marcus Flint had had a full head of hair still when Harry had seen him at the match. His father had no hair on the shiny dome of his head, only around the back and sides, hanging greasily onto his collar. Harry wondered how anyone in the pub could accept a drink or food from someone who seemed unaware that soap had been invented.

He held his breath and gripped his broom with one hand and Ginny's arm with the other; four of them stood on either side of the courtyard. If they didn't move, Flint might not detect them standing against the crumbling old walls, blending in with the brick and lichen, and they might not need to worry about whether Flint was likely to return to the pub and get on the Floo network to warn anyone at the Malfoy house. But that didn't solve the problem of Severus and Arthur.

"Weasley?" Flint said, squinting at Arthur in the semi-darkness as he used his wand to direct the drunk into an old horse trough half-filled with muddy water. "And Snape?" he added in confusion. "What in the name of Merlin are you doing here? With him, of all people?"

"Well, ah," Snape began unconvincingly. He looked more than a little startled by Arthur throwing his arm around his shoulder.

"Haven't you heard, Septimus? Severus has a fine son, and his son's half-brother is my grandson. We're practically family! We were having our Easter dinner together, in fact, when I thought it would be nice for us to get away and have a drink somewhere I knew Severus would feel comfortable. I immediately thought of your establishment."

Flint squinted suspiciously at the unlikely pair. The drunk splashed about in the trough, trying to get comfortable.

"You ain't never set foot in my pub in your life, Snape. You neither, Weasley. Only used my courtyard to Apparate here before going up to the Malfoys' place to make trouble, if I recall," he said slowly, his hand still clutching his wand firmly.

As he started to raise his wand toward the pair, the door to the pub suddenly slammed shut and a quiet voice said, "Stupefy!"

It was Neville. Harry could vaguely see his body moving toward Flint where he lay on the ground. The charm made Neville blend in now with the door of the pub, now with the path leading to the door. "Sorry, you two. Didn't seem worth the risk. Next thing we knew he'd be insisting that you both actually come in for a drink and stay a while."

Harry agreed. "Neville's right. Here, let me put the spell on you both."

He camouflaged his father-in-law, but Snape sneered in Harry's direction, saying, "I think I would prefer for Arthur to put the spell on me."

Harry bristled and backed up, glad that the charm made it difficult for Severus to see the face he was making. How does he do that? Harry thought crossly. Always makes me feel like an incompetent little first year.

When Severus and Arthur were concealed and standing against the wall with the others, Neville revived Flint and Harry immediately memory-charmed him. Flint looked around the courtyard dreamily, blinking, before focusing on the drunk lounging comfortably in the trough.

"Right, then, you. No more of your tricks. Don't know what you did to me but you can bloody well cool your heels out here. I wouldn't Apparate yet, though, if you don't want to Splinch yourself." Flint evidently thought his disorientation had to do with the drunk hexing or jinxing him in retaliation.

The old drunk was quite cheerful and non-confrontational, however. He waved his hand and gave Flint an unconcerned crooked-toothed smile. "Thass alright, Seps-muss. I can talk to the wallsh. Theys vay nice."

Harry froze, wondering whether Flint would investigate the courtyard 'walls', but he rolled his eyes and turned back to the pub door, opening it. When the door was securely closed again, Hermione put a locking spell on it. He could vaguely see her moving her arm if he squinted, but it was hard to tell whether it was a trick of the moonlight.

The old drunk lifted his head and looked around the courtyard, smiling sunnily. "Nice wallsh. Talkin' wallsh. Mulsh nicer than inshide. Bloody unsociable wallsh in dere. Never a nice word for anyone."

Harry whispered to Arthur, "Will he be a problem, do you think?"

"I shouldn't worry. He won't remember this when he sobers up. We should just go. Everyone get ready to kick off!" he said, raising his voice.

"Kick off," echoed the drunk, splashing about in his trough.

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