A/N: Here is the next chapter written by Mezzo_E_Mezzo (fanfiction username: MMEEMM). Again, Throck and I thank her for all her work. This fic would not be getting finished without her.

Hope you all enjoy :)

Chapter 30 – Threats and Treats

The afternoon was nearly over when Harry finally came out of his room. The boy peeked from behind the door, looking for the tall figure of his Papa, then, assured that the way was clear, he silently stepped out of the shadows.

He was ready for the Halloween party. Albus had decided (with Harry's hearty agreement) that after all the months of tension and hiding, they needed a break, a carefree event without the constant reminder of Voldemort's menace. The ongoing dark atmosphere had even prevented the celebration of Harry's and Neville's tenth birthdays; the war was draining their lives of happiness. The party preparation had been long discussed between the adults; Minerva not so sure about the wisdom of relaxing, nor about the safety in leaving Hogwarts without the Headmaster and his Deputy (Albus didn't want to endanger the school by hosting outsiders there), but Rebekah heartily agreed that it could be very healthy for both kids and adults. Harry, with the experiences from his old life, was also well aware of the negative psychological consequences, and even though he knew precaution and isolation were necessary, he felt the same depression as his young, innocent friends. Eventually, it was decided that the Longbottom Mansion was the most secure location outside Hogwarts for a much-needed festive break, and Hogwarts would be left in the capable hands of Professor Bear.

The best part about the party was that Albus had managed to persuade all the others involved to show up in costume, like the Muggle Halloween tradition. If the adults were uncertain about the unorthodox celebration, the kids were eager to try this new experiment.

Harry was very proud of his costume. He had insisted on making it himself, half by hand and half by magic, mixing the sewing and wandless charms or runes. Now, in the soft light that came from the fire in Albus' office, the scales of his dragon costume were sparkling in a mix of blue, green and orange. He had feathers in his messy hair and a pair of orange lenses that changed the color of his eyes. Near the feet and the hands, there were a few tiny fake claws. Any uncovered part of his skin was diligently painted in hues of blue and green. Behind his back, a pair of beautiful papier-mâché wings were attached to his shoulders with laces and strings.

"What a beautiful dragon, Harry," commented the Headmaster from the entrance in a low, proud voice. Behind the painting on his face, Harry blushed. And then he gasped at the sight of Dumbledore slowly entering the room.

The Headmaster wore a large robe that seemed to brighten the entire room. It would be a very simple cloak, if not for the enchanted flames that danced all around the fabric. The orange, the red, and the yellow merged themselves in a moving pattern of spirals and feathers. On his perch, Fawkes gave an enthusiastic thrill of appreciation, recognizing himself in the costume. Albus smiled softly at his son's astonished expression, asking, "Do you like it?"

"It's… it's gorgeous!" exclaimed Harry, taking in the minuscule golden embroideries along all the brightening robes, and he tentatively touched the costume. The flames were just an illusion, and ran past his hands without burning him, while the fabric had the soft and fluffy consistency of the feathers. It actually felt exactly like petting a bird. Harry let go a broad grin of approval.

Harry had been so surprised by his Papa that he nearly missed Minerva's presence at the door. The witch's costume was at once sober and imposing: a white robe adorned by tiny ice crystals, so long that it covered her feet. Her skin was bluish, her hair was white, and she had the stylized symbol of an eye drawn on her forehead.

"Harry," began Albus with a pompous voice, "I am honored to introduce you to Beira, the Scottish winter Goddess."

Harry had some difficulty in remembering how to close his mouth. If the Deputy Headmistress had had some reservations about wearing costumes they were certainly gone now!

"Shall we go?" asked Minerva, embarrassed by the silence. The Dumbledores nodded.

O

They arrived just outside the anti-apparating wards of the Mansion, where Alice was patiently waiting for them. At seeing her, both Albus and Harry blinked in admiration. She wore just a simple lilac dress, but her hair had violet and silver sparkles and she emanated an aura of beauty and wilderness mixed in an unmistakable way.

"A Veela, I suppose, Mrs. Longbottom," breathed Albus, with a broad smile. "Very charming indeed." The witch smiled in response and blushed. "Thank you, Albus. Please, come in, it's quite cold outside."

They followed her into the huge garden of the mansion and over the great front door.

Once inside, Harry looked around and couldn't hold back a fascinated "oooh..."

They were in a huge hall completely decorated for the occasion, and Hogwarts' decorations were no less to be envied than these. There were dozens of carved pumpkins floating on the ceiling like orange clouds, each one with its candle inside. Sparkling cobwebs were hung near the windows as curtains, in which tiny spiders were happily scampering. Going closer, Harry noticed that the spiders were just enchanted liquorice candies. On the far wall of the room there was a long table filled with drinks, snacks and many varieties of candies. It seemed that the Longbottoms had cleaned out Honeydukes. The grin on Harry's face became huge and he approached the table and his friends who were already gathered near a bowl full of Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans, wondering about tempting their luck.

"Hi guys!" Harry happily greeted. Luna, Neville and Draco looked up from the colorful candies.

"Woah, Harry, that's a great costume!" exclaimed Neville, gaping.

"Yours too, mate," replied Harry with a smirk, "I'm glad you liked The Lord of the Rings so much."

Neville beamed, proud of his Ent costume. His clothes and skin resembled a bark with greenish and brownish hues, and there were enchanted leaves in his hair. Harry had given him Tolkien's books the past year as a birthday gift, and his friend had enjoyed the reading.

"He was about to hit me when I guessed he was a male dryad," complained Draco, frowning.

"That's because you lack Muggle knowledge," retorted Neville with a playful tone, "You really should broaden your horizons! If you're so proud in being a pureblood, you should know that your position implies a great amount of comprehension and inclusivity," declaimed the boy, sounding exactly as repeating some reproach heard from his Gran. Draco blinked incredulously. "This sounds a lot like something Grandpapa would say..." he commented, serious.

Harry stared intently at Draco's costume. He couldn't recognize it, but it seemed a sort of Samurai uniform, modified here and there. "And you are…?" asked the boy, perplexed.

Draco straightened up, proud, and took the mask that he had lifted on his head. "Wait! The mask is important!" And he lowered the monster-like mask with a huge mouth and horns. It reminded Harry of something, but he wasn't sure, so he decided to play dumb. "I am the ignorant one this time; what is it? Whatever it is, it's scary and great!"

Draco lift up again the mask, smirking. "It's a Oni, a Japanese demon! Grandpapa has given me this fantastic book about demons in all traditions, and this was my favourite!"

"Your Grandpapa isn't here?"

Draco frowned, as if Harry had asked about the world turning upside down. "No, he's left me here; he will come later to collect me."

Harry nodded, understanding, then he turned toward Luna. "What about you, Luna?"

Luna looked strange, but, for the first time since knowing her this time, Harry couldn't tell what was unusual about her. In the past two years she had begun to dress as… well, as he used to remember her from the future, with particular earrings and uncategorized accessories, despite her mum's presence in this timeline softening her father's influence and so the eccentricity. But tonight… She wore a creamy jumper, a plain black skirt, creamy hose, and had a pair of Mary Jane at her feet. Harry tilted his head, thoughtful, and Draco and Neville exchanged an amused look, knowing already what Luna's costume was.

"Can't you guess, Harry?" she asked, smirking, then, at Harry's puzzled silence, she burst out: "But, it's so clear, I'm a Muggle!"

Harry widened his eyes, surprised. "A Muggle?!"

"Of course!" retorted the girl, almost offended, "I've done some research with mum on Muggle Halloween Tradition, and THEY wear witch costumes, so it's natural that in the Wizarding World we should use Muggle costumes instead," she explained, nose in the air.

A delightful grin opened in Harry's face, and he laughed. "Oh Luna, you're absolutely right. And your costume is perfect." Now Harry could get what seemed strange about Luna. It was unusual to see her… without anything unusual.

"So, which Bean are we going to try?"

O

On the other side of the room, the adults spoke quietly, watching the children laughing and having fun. There was Albus, Minerva, Alice, as well as two Unspeakables: Jess, who was wearing a beautiful Banshee costume, with long greenish hair and a long, torn gown. Her skin was of the same color of the bark of willows, and on her bare feet she had placed a heating charm, of course. On the other side, Anna had taken the appearances of a playful Pixie, bluish, with large ears and a pair of impalpable dragonfly wings behind her back.

"The mansion is beautiful, Alice," commented Minerva.

"It was all Neville's and Frank's doing. They had so much fun setting it all up this morning," answered Alice, smiling.

"Right, what about Frank? And Augusta?" asked Dumbledore.

"Frank was called to work, unfortunately. He was so proud of his Demiguise costume..."

"But isn't the Demiguise the one that makes himself invisible?" inquired Jess, perplexed.

"Indeed," replied Alice with a knowing smirk. "… And about my mother-in-law… she had another invitation for tonight, but I suspect she escaped for the fear of having to wear a costume."

"Oh, but why?" asked Anna. "I find this tradition to be real fun! We should make something like this every year! We have so much we can learn from Muggles..." she added, with a flutter of her translucent wings.

They were distracted by the sight of an undefined violet mass entering from a side door, carrying a mountain of bat-like biscuits and putting it on the table, almost stumbling in the process. The thing had a furry tail and a pair of golden, disproportionate billy-goat horns.

"What in Merlin's name..." began Minerva, but Alice came to her aid.

"It's Xenophilius. He has been a blessing, helping us since early afternoon, even preparing a scavenger hunt. He, Luna and Neville had turned the whole mansion upside down," sighed the witch, half in amusement, half in exasperation.

"Where's Rebekah?" asked Minerva, thinking about the unfortunate wife. She seemed so normal compared to him….

"Oh, she'll join us later. Xeno mentioned some problems with a mermaid tale," Alice shrugged, smiling. Meanwhile, the Xenophilius-violet-thing approached the children, giving some pieces of parchment to each of them .

"But... what is his costume about?" asked Albus, adjusting his spectacles.

"Oh, it's a Crumple-Horned Snorkack. I suggest you don't ask him for proof of the existence of it - not if you don't want to start a fight," replied Anna, with the tone of one that had tried exactly the same thing.

They were interrupted by Harry and Neville, who ran to them, eyes sparkling.

"The scavenger hunt is about to begin! Take your first riddle!" exclaimed Neville, excited, distributing a piece of parchment to each one of the presents.

O

[In the meantime, at the Ministry]

Seth hid behind a marble column and directed a hex toward the nearest Death Eater. Damn. Why didn't the alarm go off?

"Curt!" he shouted through the hallway, "What about Jess?"

Curt was crouched down behind a fallen desk that they had taken from an office and used as a barrier, and he was trying an elaborate spell to assess the situation in the whole Ministry structure. He snorted: "I tried to contact her, but our communications can't reach the Longbottom Mansion. Looks like the Death Eaters put up a massive interferencing spell that disturbs all the messages I try to send out. The Patronuses don't even work!"

Suddenly, a dark figure approached Curt dangerously from behind the desk and seemed about to shoot something. However, he was interrupted by David, who came out of the shadows and hit him with a minuscule dart gun held in his left hand, while with the right hand, he conjured a shield between Curt and the Death Eater with flowing wand gestures. The tiny weapon made a whispering sound and shot out a thin dart that plunged into the Death Eater's shoulder, taking him by surprise. But the most surprising thing came a moment after, when the wizard tried to continue what he was originally doing, but he made just a step toward Curt and slipped on a fallen sheet of paper on the floor. He tripped and hit the head against the corner of the desk. Hard. He didn't get back up.

Curt gaped, appalled, now looking at a smirking David. "Was that… what I think it was?" asked Curt.

David nodded, proud, lovingly caressing the gun in his hands. "My dear Infelicitas, with anti-luck darts, graspable only by her daddy; she does her work wonderfully well," he said, and pointed the dart gun against another Death Eater that was approaching from the opposite side of the room.

He shot and the wizard was caught in the chest, but he shook off the little needle with a gesture of superiority, grumbling "What is this? You are ridiculous if you think that you have hurt m-" He was cut off in half-sentence because his companion behind his back was about to send a curse toward Seth, but suddenly sneezed while the spell was leaving his wand and the curse instead hit the first Death Eater. He fell on the floor, screaming, holding his swelling leg.

But the Unspeakables had no time for triumph. From the shadows at the end of the hallway, more hooded figures approached.

"Curt, go upstairs, you have to find a way to communicate!"

"You're not serious! I won't leave you-"

"Curt, now! David and I can handle these idiots!" spat Seth.

Curt nodded and bolted away.

Seth gnashed his teeth. There were another three Death Eaters at the end of their visual field, and they were already throwing curses toward him and David.

It was his turn to try a new weapon.

"Magiae vim exstinguo!" mumbled after a complex wand movement, pointing at the nearest enemy.

The spell darted toward the other one, who was casting a blasting hex in their direction.

Seth's spell hit the wizard. He made a muffled sound, and then he began panting, like someone experiencing a panic attack. The blasting hex evaporated before hitting its target. The wizard trembled, became pale as a sheet, and his wand fell from his grasp. He fell on all fours, with a shocked sob: "W-wha-what have you done to me, you bastard?!"

At the same moment, Seth breathed out, holding on to the column. He felt dizzy. The spell had probably worked and by now the Death Eater was a Muggle, but it had drained Seth of all his energy. In the past months, Seth had researched and experimented on the anti-magic grenades that the vampires had used in the attack against the Dumbledores at Diagon Alley, eventually isolating its essence in a new spell.

Maybe it had been not the best idea to test it in a moment like this, he thought helplessly.

He thought he closed his eyes just long enough to blink, but when he opened them, a group of vindictive Death Eaters stood before them.

O

[In the meantime, at Longbottom Mansion]

Harry was intrigued. He had always loved every kind of game (perhaps due to his not-so-playful childhood), and scavenger hunts were the best. He thought he probably had always lived in a sort of scavenger hunt. When he was at the Dursleys, it was all a game of hide and seek and secret scheming to find just a little more food, or to try that videogame without Dudley noticing. More and more from the moment he learned he was a wizard: the Philosopher's Stone trials, the finding of the Basilisk and the Chamber, his godfather, the Triwizard Tournament, the Horcruxes… no wonder he loved scavenger hunts. They were his LIFE. And he took them really seriously, so he had completely muffled the bond to Albus and had admonished him about any possibility of cheating. He had already a very unfair advantage in playing a game being more than twenty years older than he was supposed to be, he couldn't in any case take ulterior support in an unconscious clue through the bond.

So here he was; he had already solved three riddles scattered in the whole house (Mrs. Longbottom had given them permission of going anywhere in the mansion, save for personal places -such Mr. and Mrs. Longbottom bedroom- they had set temporary wards), and now he was exploring the attic. He had imagined it would be dusty and full of piled up stuff, but maybe he had underestimated the Longbottom House-Elves. The place was clean and ordered, and immersed in a peculiar quiet. He easily found the container of his next riddle, a beautiful, small chest with a decoration representing a girl on a seesaw. He opened it, and found a series of colorful vials and a piece of parchment. He smirked.

'This one reminds me of a certain riddle about potions in my first year…'

The riddle in fact spoke about colors of mythological beasts, and how to exclude all the vials apart from one. With a grin of triumph, Harry uncorked the vial and drank its content without hesitation.

And then all became fuzzy, and a tall figure approached him.

"W-w-whaat?" blurred the boy, blinking in confusion.

"I'm really, really sorry, Harry," said the figure with a sorrowful, familiar voice.

O

Jess was not at ease. Something was really off with the scavenger-hunt thing. Anna had informed her that she had sensed strange feelings from Xenophilius (although the man was an accomplished Occlumens, and she hadn't had much time to get a better understanding of what felt off). It shouldn't be something too bad or dangerous, because they were absolutely certain of what side Rebekah's husband belonged, but Jess had been bugged by an unspeakable foreboding that made her feel obliged to keep an eye open.

So, although with a little embarrassment, Jess had pretended she was following her riddles (each participant had had their own path of clues) when she was actually monitoring the man. And at some point he had entered the attic, where she couldn't follow him without being discovered. So she had hidden herself near the entrance, waiting for him, but then she saw HARRY going in. Could it be a coincidence?

She focused on the boy's magic, which was easy due to their mysterious connection. And she held her breath when, some minutes after the boy's entering, she sensed a notable change in Harry's magic. She entered the attic, forgoing the game, and heard the man saying something: "... really sorry, Harry."

And then she came upon Harry, with an empty vial in his hand and a numb look, and Xenophilius about a meter from the boy. The older wizard had a VERY guilty expression on his face.

"What have you done to him?!" she snapped, quickly approaching Harry.

"I think he has… uh, taken the wrong potion from the stack. It's nothing to worry about, Jess." The lie was so weak that the man's voice was actually trembling.

With a quick glance at the parchment in the small chest and at the colored vials, including the one in the boy's hand, Jess knew the truth in an instant. The right vial was the one chosen by Harry, no mistakes.

She crouched down in front of Harry, putting her hands on his shoulders, trying to make eye contact.

"Harry? Can you hear me? What's wrong?"

The boy seemed a thousand miles away. His eyes were unfocused, foggy. His magic was tightened around him in a protective way, as if its wielder was in a vulnerable state.

"Crap! What has he drunk?" asked Jess, angry. What kind of joke was this? Perhaps Xenophilius knew how brilliant Harry was and wanted to prevent him from winning, giving a fair chance to his daughter? That seemed too strange, even for him.

But the man's answer caught her by surprise.

"I'm- I'm sorry Jess. I had no choice. T-they've t-taken my Rebekah," whispered Xeno.

And then it all happened in a moment.

Someone was behind her, someone that was not there before.

"Here you are... Oh, what about you, beauty? Let's play together." A rough and malicious voice said near her ear. And she would have reacted immediately, but Harry was faster than her.

Unfortunately.

O

[In the meantime, in another room]

Dumbledore was quite nervous. Something was not right. He couldn't say what precisely, but he could feel it clearly. He had wanted to feel Harry's emotion through the link, but the boy had been really stubborn about the fairness of the game and the need of muffling the bond. Even now that he was trying to force the muffling, he couldn't sense anything but a strange numbness on the other side, evident sign that Harry was not letting him in.

'Come on Harry! This is important!' the Headmaster thought bitterly.

And then it happened. He heard the high and evil voice of Voldemort outside:

"DUMBLEDORE!"

His breath caught in his throat and he searched a wall for support as he tried to comprehend what must be happening.

"What a beautiful party! But I'm offended I didn't receive the invitation, this was very unfair of you… here with me I have your dear McGonagall… do you mind if I take my revenge on her?"

The rage and the terror reached instantly every cell of his body. "RIDDLE! Don't you DARE…"

"I dare everything I want, old codger, unless you lift your wrinkled ass and stop me! Come out, Dumbledore, it's just you and me, now!"

The wizard tried to think fast. Voldemort had somehow found a way to break their wards. Had he really taken Minerva? Or was it a trick?

Suddenly Harry's silence across the bond had a new meaning. Has he been taken? But if so, why didn't Voldemort brag about it too? He would have certainly sensed it if the boy had been seriously harmed. Could he take the risk and go out of the mansion? What could happen, at the end, that he could not handle? What if instead Minerva was REALLY out there?

And this thought, above all, moved him out of the mansion, with a forced apparation out of the wards.

But once he was in the wide garden around the mansion and just next to the wards, his heart sank.

There were vampires, but no Voldemort. He had been lured out of the mansion, as had Alice and Minerva who were already fighting.

Minerva looked at him, shocked. "Albus! You are here! Riddle… I heard him saying that he had you and Harry and wanted me to try to stop him!... But… it was a trap! We can't get back into the mansion!"

Albus gaped. He tried to re-enter in the wards, without success.

They had been cut out. And he had no clue about Harry's situation.

O

[In the meantime, at the Werewolves' Liaison Center]

"Withdraw what you said, pitiful being, NOW!"

"Oh, I am certain that Ms. Umbridge didn't intend to mean that-"

"Oh no, dear! I meant EXACTLY what I said; in fact the Magical Law has a specific section for the bestial beings and the inferior and inhuman races..."

"Do you hear her? She's doing it again!"

Lupin was exhausted. The argument had been going on for at least half an hour. In the middle of the scene there were Lupin and Provo, who were poorly trying to restrain the werewolf from jumping at the woman's throat. Dolores stood stiffly in her usual pink uniform and rattled off insults with a bureaucratic and impersonal voice without looking directly in the eyes of the werewolves. It was exactly the disturbing scenario that Lupin had foreseen, and it had been like that every hour of every day since the beginning of the "Werewolves liaison center" project. Lupin was highly strung.

Rita and Colin looked at them from a distance. They really didn't envy Albus' friends.

All of a sudden, something changed. The wide hall, full of werewolves of all ages, was shaken by a shudder, and then it fell in an abrupt, creepy silence. The last ones who felt it were Lupin and the few around him, too busy in arguing for perceiving the thing.

Eventually, even the shouting werewolf shut up without warning, his sense on guard.

"W-what… what's going on?" asked Dolores Umbridge, used to conflict and not prepared for that strange tension.

And then Lupin felt it. He shot up his head and locked eyes with Colin. They shared the same thought.

"Vampires," whispered Lupin. "We're surrounded by dozens of Vampires."

He looked around in the hall. The werewolves were in a great number, but weakened by the distance from the full moon. There were many children and other peaceful werewolves not used at any battle. That was a problem.

He had no time left to think.

The attack began.

O

Harry was floating in a strange, scary nothingness without space and time. It seemed that someone had stolen his glasses, but sight was not the only sense blurred at the moment. He heard only traces of words and sounds around him (someone was surely calling out his name), but collecting them in a sensate pattern seemed an impossible task.

He had no memory of who he really was, or no, wait, he had too many memories. How was that possible? It certainly made little sense. Has his enemy tried to obliviate him and made him believe in another truth?...

What about two childhoods in different places, with different guardians? How was that possible? Was he ten years old? Or twenty-five years old? Or was it the sum of the two?

Time seemed to slow while he tried to think as fast as he could. He could feel he was in danger, he didn't remember exactly which danger this time, but they were probably huge troubles. His magic reacted in response to his emotions, tightening around his vulnerable master.

Ok. Let's use logic. And take support of the memories he was sure were true.

He was Harry Potter indeed. No mistakes there, although he often desired he was not. His enemy was Voldemort. Easy there, too. He was a wizard, he had to protect people. There seemed not to be objections to these realities.

But now the double set of memories. He had a vague hint of a discussion of time travel, that could explain a lot of things. But that seemed, oh, just too easy, didn't it?

His suspicious self instead was more prone to believe that the second set of memories was a fake one, created by someone who was deceiving him, or by himself, a wonderful daydream about him getting free from the Dursleys and being raised in the Wizarding World AND by Albus Dumbledore, no less. Too good to be true.

He was dwelling on this internal conflict, fluctuating between the two truths, when all of a sudden he heard a scary, familiar voice too near him, a voice that made his hair rise and that sent a huge shiver down his spine. The abrupt fear washed part of the numbness away and allowed him to hear the words:

"... Oh, what about you, beauty? -"

Oh.

He was thrown without warning in a precise moment of reality. That voice. THOSE WORDS. He knew them and he knew he was in incommensurable danger.

No wonder he felt confused, the Death Eaters had just casted an overlaid Confundus on him.

The two of them were on the Westminster Bridge, they were running. But they had been surrounded by Death Eaters. Reinforcements were coming, but too late. They couldn't apparate. He was weak and couldn't cast. And SHE had that awful idea of the ward.

"Harry, I found this spell on an old book, this will protect you, don't worry,"

"Hermione, DON'T! I don't need protection, you will be vulnerable, you can't..."

"I CAN and I'm DOING it, Harry, we can't lose you, not now. YOU are the important one here. Besides, it should resist even if… even if I don't."

"HERMIONE!"

Before Harry could do anything, Hermione had cast, and a bluish dome had appeared around him, leaving her outside its protection.

And then the Death Eaters had reached them. And HE was in the front row.

Harry hit the dome with his fists. He took his wand from his cloak, but his mind stuttered and he couldn't remember a single spell. The wand fell from his grasp like a useless wooden stick. The dizziness made him sway, and he stumbled upon his own feet, leaning on the curved surface of the dome - solid and cold like an ice slab.

"Hermione..." Harry tried again, but it was too late.

"... Oh, what about you, beauty? Let's play together," said Greyback, his malicious eyes devouring Hermione already.

"Stay away, you beast!" Yelled the witch, but the wand was trembling in her hand, as was her voice: she was clearly exhausted from the dome spell. In fact, when someone among the ranks of the hooked ones directed at her an "Expelliarmus", she couldn't help but watch her precious wand fly away from her.

And then the Death Eaters noticed the dome.

"What the hell is that ward? Finite incantatem!"

"Scutum Exstinguo!"

They tried and tried to break the protection of the dome, but the more they tried to scratch it, the more it seemed to solidify, angering the enemy.

"Damned little mudblood! Take off that spell!"

"Put it off now!"

"Hey, Coward-Who-Lived, always shielding yourself with women?"

"Get out, Potter, or you will see her die!"

And Greyback began. His features switched in an awful mix between human and beast, and he grabbed her, bit her, over and over. Hermione tried to swallow her screams but failed. And Harry was only able to focus on her, he shouted and cried and tried to make the dome disappear, but he couldn't.

It lasted an eternity.

When the Order members finally reached them, the Death Eaters had fled.

The lifeless body of Hermione rested on the ground, horribly disfigured.

When finally Albus managed to dissolve the dome, inside it they found Harry. He lay immobile, frozen, the face turned towards her, wide eyed, the hands covered in his own blood for he had tore his nails down trying to get off the dome.

" -Let's play together."

The memory lasted an eyelash, and it lasted one hundred years.

Harry blinked and Greyback was in front of him, talking to a woman dear to him.

And this time he would not take her from him.

Without even a breath, he released his magic.

O

David opened his eyes slowly in the surrounding darkness. He could feel the cold stone floor under himself, and the metallic taste of blood in his mouth.

He had been taken.

A sudden, close noise made him immobilize. He heard a familiar voice. "S-Seth?..." he asked in the dark.

"David!" answered his friend. He was a short distance from him, on the floor.

Damn, THEY have been taken.

"Why haven't they killed us?" whispered Seth, voicing his own confused question. But he had a foreboding, horrible doubt that was eating up his stomach.

They heard some voices arguing beyond the door.

"I told you, Mark was hit by that spell, and his magic is gone..."

"This is something big, mate, if we give this spell to the Dark Lord he will reward us..."

"But who of the two cast it? The one with that dart gun?"

"I don't know, but I hope it's the other one. My brother has tried to use that gun, but the moment he touched it he had a heart attack… I want to make him cry."

O

Anna was shocked. One moment they were having a party at a friend's house, the next moment they were being attacked.

Jess was nowhere to be seen, nor any other adult. In the hall, there were just Anna and three of the children: Neville, Draco and Luna. She had been shamefully disarmed, caught by surprise, and now stood between the children and their enemies (Death Eaters, vampires, and even dementors!) in one corner while holding onto the trembling Draco as best she could. Bloody dementors! Their sickening breath echoed in her head, combining with the fears of the children in a slurry mess that made it difficult to muster her legilimency in any useful form.

The Death Eaters hadn't attacked after disarming her. They were clearly waiting for something or someone.

Where were the others?

A loud bang startled the children (and Anna herself, if she was honest). Sounded like an earthquake in the upper part of the ancient mansion. A ward? Protection? Enemy reinforcements? Whatever it was agitated their captors, but then Anna heard someone approaching the hallway behind the wall over her shoulders.

The two Death Eaters spoke so loudly that she managed to overhear.

"Jeff, what happened? The brat?!"

"I don't know what happened in the attic, but the brat, the idiot, Greyback, and a woman were there, unconscious. Some accidental magic stuff, I suppose."

"A woman?"

"Yeah – a brunette, she was holding him. I portkeyed them both through our wards to the Dark Lord, the brat being the important thing, she could be a surplus."

Anna heard them laugh, and her stomach ached. Jess! Were she and Harry alright? They had been kidnapped! Greyback was there, too! She knew the werewolf and couldn't suppress a shudder. And what did they mean with "our wards"? Had they isolated the mansion? Could it be that the others were confined outside? And at last… who was "the idiot"? Could he possibly be…

A door slammed near her and the two Death Eaters entered the room carrying a man that Anna instantly recognised, if only for the unmistakable costume. They tossed him without care next to her and the children.

"Dad!" cried Luna, shocked, hugging the unconscious man.

At the gentle touch of his daughter's hand, he woke. "R-Rebekah..." Slipped from his lips, before he gained full awareness of who was next to him. And Anna understood.

The strange absence of the woman. The dark thought haunting Xenophilius. They had taken her. They had used Xenophilius to break the wards and sneak into the mansion.

She had a hundred questions for their unwilling traitor, but was interrupted when a hooded figure entered the room. Despite the cloak, Anna recognised her immediately.

She was clearly their leader; she spoke in a low voice to the Death Eaters and the Vampires, giving orders, then she turned towards them.

"Draco," she whispered, lowering her hood.

The boy lifted his face and looked at his mother with fearful eyes.

A/N: We're nearing the end. Just two more chapters and the epilogue :)

Thanks everyone for reading and reviewing.

I hope this has been a nice escape from current events.