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Replay

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Chapter Fifty

Under the Floor

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The carpet landed on the grass with a bump. Harry stared. It was as though the children had materialized from nowhere, even more silently than someone Apparating, and certainly with less chaos than a Portkey. Harry and Neville broke cover and dashed from behind the topiary, hugging the children happily. Unfortunately, this frightened them, since their Disillusionment Charms were still in effect, so the children seemed to be under attack from chameleon people.

"Sssh!" Harry said desperately. "Calm down, kids! It's me, Uncle Harry! Uncle Neville's here as well."

"Dad!" Ruby whispered jubilantly, hugging him quickly. He held his daughter closely for a split second before releasing her.

"How did you escape? Is this carpet what I think it is?"

"If you think it's a magic carpet, then yes," Rory said, also hugging him quickly. He kissed the top of her head, smiling and trying not to cry with happiness.

"Brilliant. Good job, everyone! All right, get behind this big ugly shrub here, it'll help prevent shadows, and then we can tell everyone else that you're all right. We can just make the carpet into a Portkey or something to get you all out of here."

He wondered fleetingly where Percy, Penelope and Shacklebolt were, and whether Crabbe and Goyle were all right, but another part of his brain said, They knew what they were getting into. They knew that the object was to save the kids.

Harry cried softly, "Expecto Patronum!" to send a message to Ginny, telling her that the children were safe.

"All right now, have you all used Portkeys before? It can be a little bumpy."

"Yeah, that's how they brought us here from the other house," little Percy said.

"But we can't leave yet!" Ruby cried. Harry hesitated.

"Why not?"

"Nate and Teddy and Julian are still inside!"

Harry squinted at the children in the moonlight. "Wait—this isn't all of you?"

Rory explained what had happened and Harry turned to look at the house, which seemed as much of a cipher as ever. "But now that you're here, Dad, you can just go in and rescue them, right?" she said, her voice shaking.

Harry shook his head sadly. "No, didn't Teddy tell you? I sent him a message. I can't get into the house. There's a charm on it." He explained the Fidelius Charm to the children. That explains it, Harry thought. He'd wondered why Teddy hadn't hugged him, like his sisters, putting it down to his age. But that wasn't it at all. Teddy wasn't with the other children.

He looked at the house, thinking how far they'd come, how close they'd been to rescuing all of the kids and protecting them from losing their magic.

But they still weren't close enough.

#/#/#

The wizard released Julian, thrusting him at Teddy and Nate, who caught him. Nate went to his knees, hugging his little brother, but Julian shook him off crossly. "I'm not a baby, Nate," he complained, extricating himself and rubbing his neck, which bore the white imprint of the wizard's hand, surrounded by red.

"Do you mean to tell me, Malfoy, that you put our prisoners in a room that contained almost nothing except a magic carpet?" Teddy had never heard a colder voice, yet it wasn't high-pitched, as his dad had always described Voldemort's voice. This voice managed to be cold and deep at the same time. Teddy shuddered at the sound of it.

"Well, I hardly expected them to find out that it's a magic carpet. I was just glad to see that Mum hadn't sold it. And shut up! You just called me—" He looked down at his hands and arms. "Oh, bollocks."

Teddy stared at him. A tall, thin blond man stood before them, his pointed chin shaking as he beheld the wrath of his cohort, despite the mask hiding the other wizard's face.

"You're Draco Malfoy, aren't you?" Teddy said. He would have known immediately who he was even if Harry hadn't told him and if Zabini hadn't just said his name. "I thought you were in Azkaban?"

Draco smirked in a way that made Teddy want to smack him. He recognised the expression from when he had still appeared to be Percy. "Yeah, well, don't believe everything you read, kid. I thought your dad didn't go after women twice his age, too, but you're here, aren't you?" He snorted. "Harry Bleeding Potter. Shagging away when he was sixteen. I think even if I'd seen it I wouldn't have believed it. Your mother must be some kind of—"

"I'd stop talking if I were you," Nate warned him in a low voice. Teddy glanced at Julian, who was turning quite red. He knew that Tilda was being insulted and that was good enough for him. Teddy wished that Nate hadn't warned Malfoy. Hopefully Julian's fury will be good enough to turn someone into a walrus, Teddy thought. Or a couple of someones.

"Are you telling me to shut up?" Draco said incredulously. "Ha! You are Percy Weasley's kid, aren't you? Think you're everyone's boss, everyone's superior."

"That does not matter," the tall wizard said, taking down his hood and removing his mask. Teddy was surprised to see an ordinary man, though not unattractive, with dark, curling hair. He was nothing special after all, though his mud-brown eyes were the cruellest, deadest eyes Teddy had ever seen. "Since I am going to be everyone's superior."

"Wh-what?" Draco sputtered. "Just a minute! I know we don't have as many kids—"

"Because you allowed them to escape with a magic carpet," the tall wizard said, as though he had all the time in the world.

"—but the plan was to make me the next great Dark Lord, not you, Zabini. And, well, even though I haven't been very certain lately that that's what I want—"

"That is just as well," Zabini interrupted, "since you are not going to be the next great Dark Lord, and never were." Without another word he pointed his wand and Draco went shooting across the room backwards, hitting the wall very hard and crumpling to the floor in a heap. "You must be," Zabini said, addressing Draco's unconscious form, "the stupidest person I have ever met. And I know Crabbe and Goyle."

"Erm, Blaise? Erm, Lord Zabini, I mean, erm, what do you want us to call you now?" Crabbe said uncertainly, looking in Draco's direction and presumably not wanting to join him.

"Zabini is fine. And you can take those bloody stupid masks off. It's not as though it matters. These three aren't getting out of here alive. They can't tell anyone about this."

The hulking wizards took down their hoods and removed their masks. Teddy tried not to think about the words These three aren't getting out of here alive and tried instead to remember his dad's message, telling him that Crabbe and Goyle were allies. I hope Dad's right, he thought fervently.

"Goyle, go to the window and see whether you can still spot the children who escaped," Zabini instructed him.

Goyle obliged and strode to the open window. He looked up into the dark sky, shaking his head. "I don't see nothing, Zab—er, my Lord. Least not on this side of the house."

Teddy's heart sank into his shoes. If Goyle was on their side, he was doing a damn good job of appearing otherwise. He didn't seem to have the brains to do much in the way of acting.

Zabini shrugged. "I thought as much. Very well. My power will still be increased four-fold with the addition of the power these three have, and I can always acquire other wizarding children. It was just rather delicious to have those particular children." He gave Teddy, Nate and Julian a rather disturbing smile. "These three will do rather nicely, though. Harry Potter's very own bastard, and the bastards of two spies. Funny how three metaphorical bastards all had literal bastards."

"Meta-what?" Crabbe whispered, frowning. Zabini appeared not to have heard him.

"Get back here, Goyle," Zabini ordered him. Goyle seemed to have been looking at the terrace below the drawing room. "You two, open the trapdoor. It's time."

Crabbe looked at his watch. "It ain't midnight yet," he told Zabini.

There's another one for their side, Teddy thought dispiritedly. They're just out to protect themselves. We have no allies here.

"I know that, idiot. It's time to go down to the chamber to prepare for the ritual. It shall be midnight soon enough."

Teddy stared into the darkness when the door was opened, remembering what Ruby and Marguerite had said about the locked doors in the corridor. I wish they'd managed to get one open, so we'd know what we're up against, he thought, swallowing as Goyle grasped his elbow rather tightly and guided him down the stairs. Crabbe followed, grasping both Nate and Julian's arms and Zabini followed, well behind.

What Teddy was not expecting was for Goyle to lean over as they walked through the dank corridor, holding his lit wand aloft, and whisper in Teddy's ear, "Don't worry, kid. We came back to help youse. Your friends' mum is here to help, too. And an Auror and Percy Weasley. The real Percy Weasley." Teddy jerked his head up, trying to tell whether the hulking man was kidding. Goyle nodded and gave him a small smile.

Teddy tried to remember to breathe as he, Nate and Julian walked uncertainly through the damp-smelling corridor far under the Malfoys' drawing room, flanked by Crabbe and Goyle. He was aware of Zabini's footsteps behind them. You'd think there would be something we could do! he thought desperately. We've got him outnumbered five-to-one. On the other hand, he wasn't sure how quick Crabbe or Goyle were with their wands and he, Nate and Julian were unarmed. Perhaps if he could get a wand. Harry and Ginny had started teaching them the rudiments of duelling during the winter term and Teddy had done rather well, though he'd initially been reluctant to attack Ginny. When they'd started duelling with classmates he was less restrained, and both Harry and Ginny had rewarded him with smiles of approval. To the surprise of everyone, Donna had been the best in the class at duelling, while Teddy and Nate came next and were fairly evenly matched. Enika performed admirably but she was always reluctant to attack Teddy. She definitely lacked Donna's 'killer instinct', as Harry called it.

Teddy grimaced, wishing Donna were with them and then amending this thought, because he wouldn't have wished this on anyone if he had a choice. He wondered now whether he and Nate would ever see Donna again, or Enika, or his mum or his sisters, or his dad. Which made him think, What would Harry do?

He glanced over his shoulder for a moment at Zabini, who had acquired a huge old leather-bound book from somewhere. What would Harry do? Even after being taught Defence Against the Dark Arts by Harry Potter for almost four years he had no idea what The Boy Who Lived would do in a situation like this. He also wasn't convinced that Harry had ever had to contend with a wizard like Zabini. He glanced to his left and right, at Crabbe and Goyle, hoping that they were better with their wands than their slow speech suggested.

They finally stopped at a door that didn't appear different from the doors they'd already passed. Holding the huge old book in one hand and his wand in the other, Zabini pointed his wand at Goyle, ordering him to open it before ordering Crabbe to lead the boys through the door. Zabini was the last to enter the dark chamber, flicking his wand as he did so. Teddy had felt a draft whirling around him the moment he'd stepped through the ancient-looking, metal-bound wooden door, and as serpentine magical torches sprang to life on the damp, roughly-carved walls, he saw that this was because of the sheer size of the chamber.

The only sounds in the huge underground cavern, which seemed to have been hewn from the solid rock a very long time ago, were their echoing footsteps and the hissing of water on the walls closest to the torches as the flames turned the moisture to steam. Teddy was glad that the torches were lit. If Goyle had walked forward with the boys three more steps they would have plummeted to the bottom of the cavern, which was lost in darkness. When they'd entered the chamber, some pebbles had become dislodged from the rocky ledge on which they stood and Teddy watched them fall over the edge, waiting for the sound that would tell him that they'd reached the bottom.

Silence.

The ledge on which they stood was exactly wide enough for two people to walk abreast. It clung to the cavern in a steep spiral and Teddy could see where the path continued one level below, but if it went farther down that was also lost in darkness.

"Walk, idiots!" Zabini snarled at Crabbe and Goyle. "Take the brats down. You first, Crabbe, and you behind, Goyle."

They obeyed wordlessly, marching single file down the spiralling ledge, more torches springing to life on the curving walls above their heads as they descended, accompanied by more hissing from the moisture coating the walls evaporating. It was as though they were descending into the bowels of the earth on the back of an enormous cobra, coiled against the perimeter of its basket. If Teddy closed his eyes for a second the hissing sounded convincingly serpent-like. But he didn't want to shut his eyes for more than a split second and risk coming too close to the edge of the precarious path. He peeked over his shoulder for a moment to see whether Goyle might be close enough to Zabini to push him over the edge but Zabini was keeping his distance from the rest of them, his wand out and ready for anything, even as he continued to grasp the old book under his left arm. How on earth are they going to save us? Zabini seemed far too in-control for that to be possible.

Teddy wasn't certain how long they'd been descending when something finally hove into view in the middle of the large open area in the centre of the chamber. It appeared to be an island, if the emptiness between it and the path could be considered a small sea. As they drew closer, Teddy saw that it held nothing but a long table that looked disconcertingly like an altar, and there was precious little space to walk or stand around this table. There also didn't appear to be any sort of bridge connecting the perimeter path to the altar. Teddy hated to think what would happen if someone tried to leap across the distance and miscalculated.

When they had drawn level with the rocky platform, Teddy could see that it was not thrusting up from the floor of the cavern, wherever that was, but was floating in space. He looked at Zabini, standing a good three meters behind Goyle, searching for some clue in his face as to what he intended, something that could tell Teddy how the five of them—two borderline but well-intentioned idiots and three unarmed children—could overpower him.

He looked at Goyle, then at the platform, and mouthed the words, What now?

"Pay attention there!" Zabini barked. He waved his wand at Julian and Nate; they were pulled to the wall, pinned there by Zabini's spell, spread-eagled. "You two will have your turn, don't worry," he said, his mouth twisting with amusement. Turning to Crabbe and Goyle, he pointed at their shoes with his wand, evidently putting a non-verbal spell on them before saying, "Put Potter's bastard on the altar."

Crabbe and Goyle looked at each other uncertainly, as though also at a loss for how they were going to rescue anyone. They gazed down at Teddy, their faces helpless and apologetic. Teddy glanced back and forth between the two of them, his stomach in knots. It wasn't going to work. It didn't matter that Crabbe and Goyle were on their side. They were equally helpless before Zabini.

The two hulking wizards each picked up one of Teddy's arms, suspending him between them. His mouth immediately leapt into his throat when, in unison, they stepped off the edge of the walkway and into the space between the path and the floating platform. To Teddy's surprise, they didn't plummet to their deaths, or to their eternal boredom, falling endlessly down what seemed to be a bottomless chasm. Instead, Crabbe's and Goyle's footsteps were slightly buoyed on the empty air, as if they were balloon-shod. Teddy tried to reach down with his own feet, to see whether he could feel the same spongy surface on which they were walking; there was nothing but air beneath his trainers. Only his two reluctant assistants were safe from falling. If they released him he would immediately drop.

When they reached the platform, Crabbe and Goyle loosened their grip on his arms, which had been quite painful, but Teddy didn't mind too much as it had meant not dying. Yet. They eased up on the pressure on his arms and he looked up at each of them, whispering, "Thanks."

Goyle grimaced. "Sorry, kid," he said softly. "Don't know what else we can do. Zabini's—well, he's a lot more—and we're just—"

Teddy nodded. "It's not your fault." He tried to think more about the position they were in than his own situation, because if he thought about what was about to happen to him he'd run the risk of wetting himself from fear, and he didn't want to give Zabini that satisfaction. Instead he thought about how it would feel to try to rescue someone and fail. Of course, that was what had happened to him with regard to Nate and Julian, but he tried not to focus on that, either.

"So, now you know why you are here, and that Draco Malfoy was with your mother," he said to Nate and Julian, "not Percy Weasley. You also know that Malfoy was delusional enough to think that I was planning to make him the next great Dark Lord," Zabini said in his smooth, oddly persuasive voice, the words ringing against the hard stone of the chamber. Teddy found it very hard not to listen to him, not to want to listen to him, to want to hear what he had to say next. "I knew that this house was where the book was likely to be that held the secret to my future success," he added, nodding at the ancient tome he'd been carrying. "I wasn't wrong, but the trick was gaining access to it. I could simply have overpowered Draco's mother, killing her and ransacking the place. However, I knew that it would be far better to have help, not to mention a convenient patsy in Draco.

"As you guessed, I wasn't particularly fussed when you were arrested by the Ministry," he went on, speaking to Crabbe and Goyle now, "as I had told you to tell anyone who asked that the plan was to make your old friend Malfoy a great Dark Wizard. I admit that I didn't count on Weasley's slag trying to martyr herself, but it's good to have you back, Crabbe and Goyle. Especially as you did not tell the Ministry that Malfoy was the one behind it all and thus need to be punished."

Crabbe and Goyle stared at Zabini with open mouths, making them appear, if possible, even dimmer than usual. Zabini's laugh was deep and resonant, filling the chamber. "Did you think I bought that nonsense about our Miss Clearwater helping you to escape so she could see her widdle boys one last time before their deaths?" he said, distorting his mouth into a pout and using a rather annoying, babyish voice that reminded Teddy of the way Harry had said Bellatrix Lestrange used to taunt him and Uncle Neville.

Zabini waved his wand again, pointing once more at Crabbe's and Goyle's feet. They clearly felt the effect immediately, bouncing up and down on the balls of their feet—or trying to, but finding that the buoyancy had left them. Teddy knew that the spell had been removed that had allowed them to walk across the empty air. If they stepped off the rocky platform now they would simply fall. All three of them were trapped.

Zabini laughed again. This time Teddy shook himself crossly, feeling as though he had come out of a strange waking-sleep. The world was clearer somehow, sharper. He no longer felt mesmerised by Zabini, compelled to hang on his every word. Instead he saw Zabini for what he was: a madman. As the maniacal laughter continued, Teddy could only stare incredulously.

"Are you for real?" Teddy said before he could stop the words coming out of his mouth.

Zabini's laughter stopped abruptly. In a split second he had raised his wand and pointed it at Teddy, whose body was completely and utterly consumed by pain more quickly than he could speak or think, pulling a scream from his throat that he never knew was in him. He threw off Crabbe's and Goyle's hands, writhing, falling backward toward the stone table, against which he struck his head. The pain from that was nothing, however, compared to the sensation of every cell in his body catching fire and being stabbed with a very sharp knife simultaneously. Teddy had never imagined that he could want death, but he wanted death now, he wanted anything other than this unbelievable agony…

When it abruptly stopped the jolt was very nearly as painful as when it had begun. Teddy lay on the platform, panting, staring into the darkness above him, swallowing to ease his raw throat, not wanting to sit up and see Nate and Julian. He'd never felt so ashamed. They'd witnessed him losing control, though they didn't know that he had wished for death to end his suffering. For them to know that would be worse.

"Sit up," Zabini ordered him, and suddenly Teddy found himself doing so, as if pulled by an invisible string. He met Zabini's eyes, realising that the man had used another spell to do this. Crabbe and Goyle had been thrown to the edges of the platform—by him?—and looked terrified, slowly inching their way toward the centre, lying on their stomachs and pulling themselves forward, sweat running down their faces.

"I think, young Potter, that you'll find that I am very, very real," Zabini snarled, his dark eyes maniacally focussed and cruel. "You'll very likely find me to be particularly real when I take your magic from you and add your power to my own."

Teddy took a deep shuddering breath and said, "My name isn't Potter. It's Harrison. And I think you're the most ridiculous person I've ever met."

Zabini's face darkened with anger as he pointed his wand at Teddy again.

#/#/#

"Weatherby!"

Percy stopped his pacing. He'd been trying once more, unsuccessfully, to leave the house, but every time he tried to step toward the kitchen door he suddenly felt the urge to scrub the sink, or polish the floor, or black the stove, or reorganize the silver. Each time he managed to stop in disgust, but this meant that there were myriad unfinished kitchen tasks piled around him and still he could not leave the Malfoy house, to his utter frustration.

Pansy entered the room slowly, dragging Draco Malfoy, holding him under his arms, his shoes' heels creating black trails on the half-polished floor.

"Betray… Zabini… traitor..." Malfoy mumbled as Pansy struggled to drag him to a chair. Percy ran to help her, but Malfoy's body didn't want to stay in a sitting position and he kept falling to one side or the other. Finally, Percy tucked the chair under the kitchen table and put Malfoy's head down on the scrubbed wooden surface, turned to one side so he could breathe. Pansy looked desperate about his condition and Percy wondered why she hadn't simply levitated his body until he remembered that he had her wand and she possessed only a useless wooden spoon handle.

"What happened?" he asked, peering at Malfoy's disoriented face.

"I found him in the drawing room. He'd been knocked out and was lying in a heap on the floor!" Pansy whined, rounding on Draco Malfoy and putting her arms around his shoulders. Percy watched her for a long moment before making a decision. "Don't just stand there, Weatherby! Do something!" she barked half-heartedly, still with a whine in her voice.

Percy sighed. "Please stop calling me that. I—I haven't been completely honest with you. I know that I'm not a Muggle called Weatherby. I know that I'm Percy Weasley and I know what Zabini and Draco Malfoy are up to. It doesn't surprise me that Zabini turned on Malfoy. I wouldn't have trusted him for a minute. I think he used Malfoy—er, Draco, to get what he wanted. But I can't help you unless the charm on me is lifted. I can't leave the house. If I help you to revive Draco he needs to take the spell off me after that. And then we'll see about rescuing the children and convincing the Ministry to show leniency to the pair of you for helping them catch Zabini."

Pansy straightened up and stared. "What are you talking about? What children? And how long have you been pretending? You let me—" she started to say before stopping and turning deep red. Swallowing, she looked at Draco and said, "All right, whatever you say, just help me. I don't know what I'd do if I lost him again."

He could see the genuine affection in her expression as she regarded the helpless Draco and he nodded, running around the kitchen to fetch various ingredients that he knew would result in a revivifying potion. He put a small cauldron on the cooker and lit the fire under it, adding the ingredients a little at a time, very carefully, filling her in on the kidnapping of the children as he did so, as she had evidently been kept in the dark about this.

"Jus' call me 'Daddy'…" Draco said when she confessed that she'd known that Draco had been pretending to be Nate's father. Percy nodded again and decided not to bring up Draco sleeping with Penelope, as he needed her to continue to feel charitably toward Draco. He also didn't want to dwell on that so that he would continue to want to help Draco. He didn't tell her that he was in possession of her wand, either. When the potion was ready she helped him prop up Draco's head, giving him a small taste of the concoction from a teacup. Draco grimaced and clamped his mouth shut, his eyes squeezed into slits.

"What that?" he mumbled. Pansy tried to coax him to drink a little more, but after only a drop or two had passed his lips he sat up significantly straighter and opened his eyes. "Tryin' poison me?" he slurred suspiciously, his eyes moving back and forth slowly between Percy and Pansy. Percy wasn't certain whether it was the potion or the desire to avoid having more of it that was reviving him.

"Would you rather have some tea?" Percy offered. His head in his hands, Draco managed to nod. While the kettle came to a boil, Draco had progressed to holding his head up unassisted. He peered into the cup of potion and shuddered.

"No drinking anymore," he said, pushing it away.

"No, no," Pansy agreed, tossing the cup into the sink. It shattered, gooey greenish-brown potion spattering the sink's interior. Percy winced. "Of course you don't need to drink that, Draco, dear. You're awake now. How do you feel? How's your head? Can you tell us what happened?"

Draco explained, haltingly, that Zabini had never been planning for Draco to be the next great Dark Lord. He wanted all of the power for himself. He'd just been using Draco, and his mother. Percy noticed that Draco didn't mention the children nor the theft of their power.

"Disarmed me," Draco said as Percy poured hot water into the teapot. "Probably kill me when he has a free moment."

"Or just let you take the blame for it all at the Ministry," Percy said grimly, taking a seat across the table from him while waiting for the tea to steep. "But that doesn't have to happen. I can go to get help, and you can recover properly at St Mungo's and then give evidence against Zabini. Just take the charm off me, so I can leave the house."

Draco's eyes were coming into focus now. He stared at Percy, as though seeing him for the first time. "Weatherby? What in Merlin's name?"

Percy grimaced. "I've known for quite some time that I'm Percy Weasley. I also know that you've been impersonating me, but the Ministry will probably overlook that if you help them catch Zabini. Do that and they'll probably let everything else pass, even the escape from Azkaban, as that wasn't your idea."

Draco continued to stare. Suddenly he exclaimed, "Bloody hell!" and slapped himself on the brow. "How long've you known?"

Percy shrugged. "I don't even remember how long now. Listen, are you going to take the spell off me or not? We need to get Aurors here to sort out Zabini."

Pansy glanced nervously at Draco. "I don't think that's possible. For one of us to take the spell off you, I mean. I think I remember Draco telling me that Blaise is the one who put it on you, so either he needs to take it off you voluntarily, or—"

"—if he dies, it'll die with him," Draco said listlessly. Pansy was grim and tight-lipped. Percy felt as though he'd been stabbed with an icicle. Trapped. He'd be trapped here forever if Zabini somehow got away or didn't take the spell off him.

#/#/#

"When I have the power of the five of you, I shall be six times more powerful than any other wizard in the world!" Zabini proclaimed, his words echoing around the cavern. "And then how difficult do you think I will find it to acquire other innocent children whose power I can also take?"

Teddy lay on the stone next to the altar-like table. "But—you don't know what having that sort of power will do to you," he said, stalling for time. "Maybe human beings aren't meant to have that much power. Maybe it'll kill you or make you self-destruct or something. You don't know."

As Zabini laughed, Teddy whispered to Crabbe and Goyle out of the corner of his mouth. "Can't you two do anything? Stun him, at least?"

"Those two couldn't stun a crippled salamander," Zabini said, pointing his wand at the three of them, "much less me. And you seem not to realise that the acoustics are excellent in here, young Potter."

"Harrison," Teddy said again through gritted teeth. "My name is Theodore Harrison, my grandfather was James Harrison, my mother is Matilda Harrison…"

"All of that hardly matters," Zabini said, flicking this information away carelessly, "as you'll be dead as soon as I can take your power. However, I think I'll warm up on one of your friends…"

Teddy looked desperately at where Julian and Nate were pinned helplessly to the chamber wall. "No! Leave Julian and Nate alone! If you want to take my power, take it, but—"

Zabini laughed that very disturbing laugh again. "Idiot! I wasn't talking about them. I meant the two beside you there. Which shall it be?" he mused, a smile pulling at the corner of his mouth as he looked at Crabbe and Goyle. The pair lost all colour in their faces and looked at each other with wide eyes.

Suddenly, Goyle pointed at Crabbe and said, "Him! Take him! I won't do you no good, I was with Millicent Bulstrode once, in seventh year."

Zabini threw back his head and laughed. Teddy frowned. It really was as though Zabini were trying to adhere to all of the Evil Overlord clichés. "You expect me to believe that? Very well. You may thank Goyle, Crabbe, for—saving you. Well, temporarily, at any rate, as I am still going to take your power. Because he tried to give up his best friend, he will have the honour of going first. Get on the table," Zabini ordered Goyle, who stared at him, open-mouthed, otherwise not moving. "I said get on the table!" Zabini repeated, his face turning red. "Or would you like a taste of the Cruciatus Curse as well? The kid withstood it, but somehow I don't think you'll do as well."

Goyle immediately scrambled for the table and lay down on it. He seemed very nervous, and Teddy suspected that he hadn't actually been with the girl called Millicent at all. "Does—does the spell kill me?"

"No, idiot, the Killing Curse does that, after I take your power. Be still! Let me concentrate," he said, opening the large tome he'd been carrying. With a wave of his wand he caused the book to float in mid-air, as if it were on an invisible lectern.

They all seemed to be holding their breaths. When Zabini lifted his wand, Goyle turned his head and whispered to Crabbe, "I'm sorry, mate. I—I can't excuse what I done. But I'm sorry."

Teddy gazed at Crabbe, who nodded at his friend, his mouth drawn into a line, knowing that he was going to be next. Teddy saw again the grim resignation on Goyle's face. It doesn't matter that they failed to save us. They came back anyway, knowing it was risky, knowing they could fail. They could have been safe in prison but now they're going to lose their power—and their lives—because they wanted to do the right thing.

As Zabini started to speak, Teddy slipped from Crabbe's grasp.

"Nooo!" he cried. Teddy threw himself in front of Goyle as Zabini finished speaking and a crackling orange light from his wand arced across the space between him and the rocky island, striking Teddy full in the chest.

#/#/#

Percy thought about being trapped in the Malfoy house forever, wishing Mrs. Malfoy had never found him in Gibraltar, where he had had a quiet, uneventful life as a Muggle.

"Help… help me, please…"

Percy's head whipped around. "Who's that? Do you think one of the kids got away from him?" He ran for the kitchen door, fumbling in his pocket for Pansy's wand but reluctant to take it out in her presence. Pansy started to follow, but when Draco attempted to stand, his legs folded under him and he fell to the floor in a limp heap, causing Pansy to round on him, crying out in concern. Percy felt both irritated with them and glad that he might be on his own and able to use the wand without their witnessing it.

"Pansy, take care of Draco. I'll find out who was calling for help."

"But you're unarmed!" Pansy exclaimed. "You might know that you're not a Muggle, but you might as well be one without a wand!"

He didn't feel like correcting her about his being armed, so he grabbed a heavy cast-iron pan hanging from a rack next to the cooker and brandished it as if it were a tennis racket. "It may not be a wand, but you can't say that I'm not armed. Take care of him," he added, nodding at where Draco lay crumpled on the floor yet, scrabbling impotently for the table to pull himself up.

He ran into the corridor, uncertain about where the voice had come from. Was it the drawing room? No, Pansy had retrieved Draco from the drawing room and would have seen another person in there. As he drew closer to the dining room he heard the faint cry again and he put his left hand on the knob, iron pan in his right, ready for whatever he might find.

"Penny!" he cried as soon as he had swung open the door, dropping the pan onto the table as he ran to where she was bound to a chair with magical ropes. He took out Pansy's wand and removed the ropes, then pulled her into his arms. She recoiled, however, and looked at him strangely.

"What? Why are you—? Draco, I know it's you, that you're still impersonating Percy. You can stop pretending."

"No, Penny! It really is me!" he said desperately, grasping her arms and casting about for how to convince her. "Draco Malfoy is in the kitchen with Pansy Parkinson. Zabini disarmed him and knocked him out and Draco knows that he was just a pawn in Zabini's plans all along. So was I. They found me in Gibraltar and brought me back here so that I could provide them with hair to put into Polyjuice Potion, so Malfoy could impersonate me and gain the trust of my sister and brothers and parents and you and the kids. It was all so that Zabini could steal the children's power!"

She nodded, tears in her eyes. "Yes, I know, that's why I'm here. To try to do something about the children. I got your owl." She slid her left arm around his neck and lightly touched his unshaven cheek with her right hand. "It is you, isn't it?" she whispered in wonder.

Percy could contain himself no longer. He gazed at her only a second longer before pulling her to him and kissing her at last, holding her as tightly as he dared, feeling her thin frame tremble in his arms as she returned the kiss and twined her arms around him. He ran his lips down her jaw and neck, murmuring, "I've missed you so much, Penny, so much..."

She sobbed into his neck, finally managing to say, "It never—it never felt right, being with anyone else…and then when you came back, it didn't feel right being with you, either, but that wasn't really you…"

"No, it wasn't. This is me," he whispered, bringing his mouth to hers again, caressing her back and relishing the solid reality of her. She continued to cry as she kissed him, holding his face with both hands, then pulling back to gaze at him with wonder in her eyes.

"I should have known. I should have known it wasn't you. I'm so sorry, Percy. I should have known."

He pulled her to him again, putting his cheek on her hair. "Don't fret over that, Penny. Why would you have thought it was anyone but me? Don't blame yourself. It's over."

"But—but if I'd worked out that it wasn't you, he couldn't have taken the children…"

He snorted. "No, it just would have been more difficult for him to take them. And if you should have worked it out then shouldn't my own parents have known? Or my brothers and sister? Did Malfoy ever come into contact with Hermione Granger? Surely she should have noticed it wasn't me. Don't be so hard on yourself, Penny. Of course you all thought it was me. What else were you to think?" he said, smiling at her and cradling her face in his hands.

"I—I have something to tell you, though," she said haltingly. "I have another son. Julian. He's—he's—"

"Severus Snape's son."

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