a/n: i can't believe how long its been since i've updated but i also can't be sorry. Over the last month i've written a great deal for my original story and i'm a little proud. Plus easter was a total bitch to work. You'd have thought the world was ending the way people were buying groceries. Anyway, thank you so much to everyone who reviewed or showed renewed interest in this fic. Hope this chapter was worth the wait.

Chapter 46

There was a spider crawling up his right arm. He'd been watching its progress ever since it decided his wand looked like an interesting place to start its acrobatic performance. Six really hairy legs had since moved up the length of his wand, trailed casually over his fingers and made its way up his arm. It stopped for a bit of sightseeing around his elbow and sort of curled up as it took in the new and wonderfully warm world beneath it. Once it got bored, migration further north seemed acceptable and its current perch was right below his ear. Every time he breathed in a little hairy black leg brushed against the side of his neck.

He knew his limits and he wasn't afraid to admit it. He was three seconds away from screaming like a little girl. He closed his eyes and suppressed a whimper. Being able to hold in any sound of protest was at the moment the difference between a traumatised living and the long and excruciating Death by Voldemort. He couldn't see what was going on ahead of him; it's very hard to see anything through eyes screwed shut. He certainly couldn't hear anything over the pounding of his own blood in his ears. His heart was beating faster than it would have if he'd be facing three Death Eaters and his mother wielding a lethal looking broom.

There was nothing but the damp grass beneath him and the far too friendly great big hairy black spider setting up camp between his ear and shoulder. It was hard to care that he'd just laid his very own eyes on a restored Voldemort for the first time. He could guarantee that when he got back to Hogwarts the first story anyone heard would be about the huge freaky spider. He kept up an inner mantra constantly reminding himself that soon he would be able to move. Really, really soon he hoped.

There was a slight shift of motion to his left and the feel of a warm body pressed against his back. Small hands reached down and suddenly he was free. He barely waited for the weight to lift off his back before he was up and shuddering, dancing on the spot in complete disgust. Daphne smiled at him with her hands cupped around the hairy offender. She turned and deposited the spider in a nearby hedge and Ron took the time to get some more shivers out of his system.

'You're so manly,' Daphne informed him with a grin.

'Gah,' was all he could say in response, he could feel the ghost of little legs still working their way up his arm.

Daphne moved closer, replacing the feel of creepy arachnid legs with the feel of her hand gradually moving up his arm. She wrapped her arms around his neck and pressed her body nice and close. Hairy spider legs were becoming a distant and thankfully hazy memory. Still, even Daphne couldn't erase some memories.

'I need to shower.'

'Maybe I'll join you?'

Then again...

They made the trip back to Hogsmeade quickly, Apparating directly into the basement of Honeydukes rather than enjoying a slight evening stroll through the snowy village. Any plans they had for a shared shower vanished when they dropped down into the secret tunnel and almost tripped over an unconscious and heavily bleeding woman. Ron bumped his head against the ceiling when he stumbled and he let out a curse as Daphne crouched to get a good look at the woman.

'Merlin,' Daphne gasped. 'It's Bianca Days.'

'The reporter for the Daily Prophet?' Ron questioned, rubbing his head and crouching beside Daphne.

Days had a large greenish purple bruise on her left temple, a black eye and a split lip. There was dried blood and dirt all over her face and down her neck. She had several bite marks and scratches along her neck and shoulders and her clothes were filthy and torn. In the dim light of the tunnel they could see a dark stain across her stomach and when Daphne touched it lightly it was warm and wet. She was bleeding heavily from more cuts and stabs wounds along her legs and her right hand was broken badly.

'This is bad,' Daphne muttered.

Ron was already sending the emergency signal back along the tunnel before Daphne's words even hit his ears. He knew they couldn't afford to wait for Madam Pomfrey, not with the way Days looked and not with how long the tunnel was. They were going to have to move her and he knew from the way Daphne had straightened determinedly that she saw it too. Without speaking, Daphne conjured a stretcher and they eased her onto it. Ron lit the way with his wand and they took off running down the tunnel as fast as they dared.

They were three quarters of the way there when they met Madam Pomfrey sprinting toward them, bag full of supplies clutched tightly in her hand. She took one look at Days and ordered them not to stop. She ran alongside the stretcher casting diagnostic spells and one that would put pressure on the bigger wounds to hopefully slow the bleeding. There was no way they could get her up out of the statue and while they paused at the bottom Madam Pomfrey took another look.

'It's no good,' she cautioned. 'She needs a trauma healer from St Mungo's.'

'Then I'll get her one,' Harry said from behind them, surprising them slightly. He grabbed Pomfrey with one hand and the dying Days with the other and transported them instantly to the Hospital Wing. Ron and Daphne latched onto an elbow and caught a lift.

'Go!' Pomfrey ordered sharply.

Harry didn't need telling twice he flamed away the instant Ron and Daphne had released their grip.

'Not the way I thought tonight was going to go,' Ron observed.

Daphne smacked his arm lightly and went to help Madam Pomfrey.


When Hermione arrived at the breakfast table the next morning she knew that something big had happened. She'd gotten used to coming down to breakfast and seeing the whole ADADA seated around one end of the Gryffindor table but today things were different. Harry was missing, for one thing. His usual place at the centre of the ADADA circus had been filled by Ron.

What really made them stand out amongst the sea of black robed Hogwarts students was their muggle dress. Each and every member of the ADADA were dressed like she had seen when they were about to leave for a fight or some Death Eater tracking. They were drawing lots of weird looks from the other students but they didn't seem to notice. They were all deep in conversation and only occasionally did they look up in response to something said by a fellow housemate.

Hermione shot a look up at the staff table as she made her way toward her friends. Snape and Dumbledore were missing but both Martin and McGonagall were seated up there. Their heads were bent together and they were talking in frantic whispers. It didn't give her the greatest feeling in the world. The last time Hermione had seen the ADADA members like this they'd been about to crash a Death Eater party.

She slipped into an open seat beside Steven and asked him what was going on.

'Bianca Days turned up last night,' he told her in a whisper. 'We're raiding the house she escaped from.'

'Bianca Days? The Daily Prophet reporter?'

Steven nodded. 'Ron and Daphne found her in the Hogsmeade tunnel last night. She nearly died; Harry had to bring in a trauma witch from St Mungo's.'

Hermione gasped in horror and her eyes snapped to Ron and Daphne. 'Will she be alright?'

Steven shrugged and dropped a spoonful of scrambled eggs on his plate. 'She's unconscious now; she came round last night just long enough to give us a location.'

'Is that where Harry is?' Hermione demanded, a little disgusted by the way he could eat as he spoke of such horrible things.

'Harry's not coming; he and Snape are providing a distraction.'

Dumbledore, Hermione realised. Harry was throwing himself to the wolves in order to give his ADADA time to go on the offensive and take out a Death Eater location. Determined not to let her friend down, Hermione straightened and gave Steven a strong look.

'How can I help?'

Steven smiled slightly. 'Stephanie's coming with us; we need all hands on this one. We have one of the house elves watching the tunnels but we need you to run things from the ADADA room.'

'I can do that.'

An hour later, having watched as each and every one of the ADADA members vanished from the map of Hogwarts and emerged onto the larger one of Britain she wasn't feeling nearly as confident. She'd seen Stephanie handle this with ease and she was damned if she was going to fail.

A puff of feathers exploded before her and she snatched the faux owl out of the air. The note attached to it said simply that they'd arrived.

'Here we go.'


The world around her exploded in a shower of mud and burning remains. Splinters of the farm house rained down on the members of the ADADA and the Death Eaters they were fighting. Thick black smoke merged with dark clouds to blot out the sun and provide an even gloomier feel to the current events. The air was thick with smoke and the pungent fumes of some potions caught in the explosion. Beside her Tonks was taking a moment to pick a charred splinter out of her fingerless gloves.

Another explosion blew the roof off the old farmhouse and screams filled the air. With a quick word to Tonks, Ally shot out from behind the well she'd been using for cover and darted toward the house. As the most fireproof person there she was the best one to enter the house and drag out the people held captive. She made it to the first of the porch steps when a sickly yellow spell caught her in the side. She didn't know what it was and she never got to find out. The moment the spell contacted with her side it exploded against a blue barrier.

Now she knew what she was getting the twins for Christmas. She could see a prime location in Diagon Alley needing their names on it. If they kept up the good work she was tempted to offer them her next born. One of their inventions had likely just saved her from being a splattered mess on the ground. Instead, she'd temporarily lost her balance and nothing more. It was a good thing she was so in love with Harry or she might have been tempted to throw herself at one or both of the twins.

Unfortunately, while the twins had mastered what could only be called shield knickers (wear them everywhere you go) they weren't much good against solid objects. An explosion inside the farmhouse blew the front door outward. It smashed straight into her and threw her off the rotting porch. She landed heavily on her back with what remained of the door weighing down on her. To most she would have looked like an easy target and there was no lying, it had hurt like hell. That didn't stop her from shoving the damn thing off and stomping onward into the house, perfectly confident the ADADA had her back. She shot a heavy duty banishing charm at the Death Eater who tried to exit through the now open door and didn't even flinch when he was blown apart and out of her path.

Scattered around the outside of the house, ADADA members and a select number of Ministry officials were battling to capture the Death Eaters. They knew what they were doing but they weren't able to get inside the house, not with it spewing out fireballs every minute or so. Fireballs like the one she had to duck as she tried to make it through the front door. Whatever the Death Eaters had been keeping in the house, aside from the captive witches and wizards, was highly flammable. It didn't particularly smell welcoming either, more like burnt cabbage and the occasional sweaty sock.

The first room she entered was missing an entire wall and a bit of the ceiling was caving in. The fireplace on one of the walls was the only thing in the room that was wholly intact which suggested that not all of the damage to the house was due to the attack. That probably should have been more surprising but Ally had met the type of Death Eater who Voldemort put in charge of these things. They never really screamed clean and tidy, more often than not they screamed scrambled out of the sewer.

A little more searching and she found a staircase leading down off the kitchen into a large basement. It was far too big to have come with the farmhouse and it still bore some of the signs of magical expansion.

She crept down the stairs slowly, wand held steadily in front of her. There was a crumpled form at the foot of the stairs and it was easy to see that one of the prisoners had lost their life trying to escape. The further she got the more bodies she found. A long wall was lined with small cells constructed of nothing more than stone and metal bars. Each cell, each cage really, contained another lifeless form. There were a dozen witches and wizards chained to the wall with heavy manacles and they were all dead.

Some looked to have died from wounds similar to those Bianca Days had been sporting when she arrived, others looked like they'd been lucky enough to be on the receiving end of the Killing Curse. Ally didn't know what was worse, to have had no chance at fighting back or to have experienced the pain that resulted in the opportunity of fighting back.

She made sure to check for survivors before she returned to the stairs. There was nothing more she could do for them but hand them and all of the evidence over to the right members of the Ministry who would eventually use it to the advantage of those fighting against Voldemort.

She turned her attention to saving the house and preserving the evidence. The ADADA would handle the Death Eaters and what they couldn't the Ministry people would.


Harry wasn't aware he'd been walking so stealthily until Hermione jumped a foot in the air and screamed. He didn't know whether to tell her off for being so girly in her reaction or to laugh. He went with scolding her slightly for reacting with a scream instead of a curse and then asked about the ADADAs progress.

'It's no good,' Hermione told him sadly. 'They were too late to save the others. Ally found twelve dead in the basement, she thinks the Death Eaters killed them when they realised Days escaped.'

'And the Death Eaters?'

Hermione pointed to a section of wall to which she'd pinned up copies of profiles Daphne had made while working with Abby and Emmy. There were eight Death Eater profiles pinned to the wall with purple pins and another six with black ones.

'Six dead and eight captured?'

'So far,' Hermione confirmed, though she sounded somewhat shocked that she was stating something so horrible so easily.

They stood in silence for some time merely watching the coloured dots on the map. Very little changed on that level but it was something to do. Harry didn't mind the silence but every few minutes Hermione would shift restlessly and he knew she wanted to fill the silence. Not that he should have been surprised, this was the first time in a while it had been just the two of them.

'Are we doing the right thing?'

He didn't answer immediately, taking his time to think about a truthful response that would give her the answer she both wanted and needed to hear. He wasn't completely done hiding from her but he wasn't about to miss an opportunity to give her more of a reason to trust him over Dumbledore.

'Yes, we're doing the right thing,' he told her eventually. 'I know that it doesn't seem right going out and attacking Death Eaters but I also know that Fudge will continue to let Voldemort get away with so much death.'

'Are we any different?'

Her words gave him pause, not just because she'd included herself in that statement but because she was questioning whether or not stopping Death Eaters made them like Voldemort. He couldn't go with the argument he'd given Ginny, Hermione didn't know enough or anything about what he was but he could give her a sensible answer.

'I've killed people, Hermione, more than any one person should have to but it doesn't make me like Voldemort or his Death Eaters. It doesn't make me the kind of person you think it does. I'm not a good man but I'm not bad either. I've done what has to be done so that people like you don't have to. I killed those Death Eaters so that people like Lydia don't have to.'

'Harry,' Hermione began but he interrupted.

'I don't need you feeling guilty for me,' he told her firmly. 'I don't regret a single life I've taken. I know this isn't what you want me to say, I know you want me to sit back and be the normal teenage wizard while Dumbledore handles Voldemort but I can't. I won't. This isn't what my parents would have wanted for me but it's who I've become. I like what I've become, Hermione, I'm at peace with it.'

Hermione's chin quivered and she bit her lip in an obvious attempt to avoid crying. He wrapped a comforting arm around her shoulders and pulled her into a hug.

'I'm just worried.'

'I know,' he acknowledged. 'I also know it's not just me you're worried about. He's killed too, I'm sorry it had to be that way but he made a choice. He looked at the facts as they were presented to him and he made the decision he could live with.'

A single tear spilled down her cheek and Harry knew there was one more thing he had to say before she could believe him.

'I don't expect you to do the same. That's not you, Hermione and I'll respect that, I'll be proud of you for finding other ways.'

She sniffled a little and smiled weakly at him. He squeezed her gently and went back to watching the map. He didn't remove his arm but he figured the conversation was over.

'Do you think that's why he likes her?'

Harry had to refrain from banging his head against a wall. How had she managed to turn concern over his moral wellbeing into a reason Ron had chosen Daphne? His reply was blithe and meant to set her at ease; unfortunately, as he wouldn't find out until Ginny later hit him, it did the exact opposite.

'She kills spiders.'