Percy and I whirled around, and in an instant, we registered one fact: Each of these wizards had his wand out, and every wand was pointing right at Harry, Ron, Hermione, Percy and I.

Without pausing to think, Percy and I yelled, "DUCK!"

We seized the other three and pulled them down onto the ground.

"STUPEFY!" roared twenty voices - there was a blinding series of flashes and I felt the hair on my head ripple as though a powerful wind had swept the clearing. Raising my head a fraction of an inch I saw jets of fiery red light flying over us from the wizards' wands, crossing one another, bouncing off tree trunks, rebounding into the darkness -

"Stop!" yelled a voice I recognized. Mr. Weasley. "STOP! That's my son!"

"Children?" called another. Mr. Brunner.

My hair stopped blowing about. I raised my head a little higher. The wizard in front of me had lowered his wand. I rolled over and saw Mr. Weasley and Mr. Brunner striding toward them, looking terrified.

"Ron - Harry" - his voice sounded shaky - "Hermione - are you all right?"

"Andy, Percy, how are you? Are you hurt?" Mr. Brunner's voice was shaking too.

"We're fine, just a bit shaken up." I replied.

"Out of the way, Arthur, Chiron," said a cold, curt voice.

It was Mr. Crouch. He and the other Ministry wizards were closing in on them. I got to my feet to face them. Mr. Crouch's face was taut with rage.

"Which of you did it?" he snapped, his sharp eyes darting between them. "Which of you conjured the Dark Mark?"

"We didn't do that!" said Harry, gesturing up at the skull.

"We didn't do anything!" said Ron, who was rubbing his elbow and looking indignantly at his father. "What did you want to attack us for?"

"Do not lie, sir!" shouted Mr. Crouch. His wand was still pointing directly at Ron, and his eyes were popping - he looked slightly mad. "You have been discovered at the scene of the crime!"

"Barty," whispered a witch in a long woollen dressing gown, "they're kids, Barty, they'd never have been able to -"

"Where did the Mark come from, you three?" said Mr. Weasley quickly.

"Over there," said Hermione shakily, pointing at the place where they had heard the voice. "There was someone behind the trees... they shouted words - an incantation -"

"Oh, stood over there, did they?" said Mr. Crouch, turning his popping eyes on Hermione now, disbelief etched all over his face. "Said an incantation, did they? You seem very well informed about how that Mark is summoned, missy -"

"Any large magical mark requires an incantation! It's one of the first things you learn in your first year of magical schooling!" I retorted

But none of the Ministry wizards apart from Mr. Crouch seemed to think it remotely likely that Harry, Ron, or Hermione had conjured the skull; on the contrary, at Hermione's words, they had all raised their wands again and were pointing in the direction she had indicated, squinting through the dark trees.

"We're too late," said the witch in the woollen dressing gown, shaking her head. "They'll have Disapparated."

"I don't think so," said a wizard with a scrubby brown beard. It was Amos Diggory, Cedric's father. "Our Stunners went right through those trees... There's a good chance we got them..."

"Amos, be careful!" said a few of the wizards warningly, as Mr. Diggory squared his shoulders, raised his wand, marched across the clearing, and disappeared into the darkness. Hermione watched him vanish with her hands over her mouth.

A few seconds later, they heard Mr. Diggory shout.

"Yes! We got them! There's someone here! Unconscious! It's - but - blimey..."

"You've got someone?" shouted Mr. Crouch, sounding highly disbelieving. "Who? Who is it?"

They heard snapping twigs, the rustling of leaves, and then crunching footsteps as Mr. Diggory reemerged from behind the trees. He was carrying a tiny, limp figure in his arms. Harry recognized the tea towel at once. It was Winky.

Mr. Crouch did not move or speak as Mr. Diggory deposited his elf on the ground at his feet. The other Ministry wizards were all staring at Mr. Crouch. For a few seconds Crouch remained transfixed, his eyes blazing in his white face as he stared down at Winky. Then he appeared to come to life again.

"This - cannot - be," he said jerkily. "No -"

He moved quickly around Mr. Diggory and strode off toward the place where he had found Winky.

"No point, Mr. Crouch," Mr. Diggory called after him. "There's no one else there."

But Mr. Crouch did not seem prepared to take his word for it. They could hear him moving around and the rustling of leaves as he pushed the bushes aside, searching.

"Bit embarrassing," Mr. Diggory said grimly, looking down at Winky's unconscious form. "Barty Crouch's house-elf... I mean to say... "

"Come off it, Amos," said Mr. Weasley quietly, "you don't seriously think it was the elf? The Dark Mark's a wizard's sign. It requires a wand."

"Yeah," said Mr. Diggory, "and she had a wand."

A/N: G'day, Chapter 15 done! After rewriting my previous chapters and editing them so that the chapters flowed the way I wanted them to, I started working on this chapter.

For the Guest that reviewed: Good story have you ever thought of pairing Harry with Percy? hope you update.

Yes, I have thought about that, but I am a Percabeth and Hinny fan all the way, so unless I make both of those couples break up, I won't be pairing them. A good idea, but I haven't seen many well-written Harry/Percy fics, and I don't think I would be good at writing that either.

Read your way around the world,

Miss Hourigan