Chapter 10

Deathly Hallows

"It's all a bit batty, innit?" Ron asked Harry as they watched Hermione draft up what to next communicate with the portrait across the room.

They had concluded the previous night by calling it a victory and agreeing to talk more in the morning. When they awoke, their witch friend was pacing and poring over texts. They had agreed that the best move would be to reassemble the DA. She had spent all morning drafting up things to share with Professor Snape - basic spells she knew Ginny, Neville, or Luna could teach (the fact that they needed to bring at least Ginny in.) She came up with various meeting location and times based on the working schedules she, Harry, and Ron had planned for but would never get to live out. There were a lot of variables so she also generated some questions to ask - all while trying to figure out a way to phrase them so as not to arise suspicion in the portrait - though this portrait did not seem particularly cunning - maybe it was his age?

Harry shrugged. "I can't remember the last time I thought anything made sense. So I'm not sure that anything could surprise me anymore."

The young men had used their friend's preoccupation with planning for them to catch up. Harry was desperate for any news of the world outside their tent. Ron had shared with him that he had been with Bill and Fleur - he couldn't go home for the holidays and face his family knowing he'd abandoned Harry and Hermione. While Bill wasn't thrilled with Ron's choice, Shell Cottage was a much better safe haven than his home would have been after breaking the news. He wasn't sure who would want to kill him first. Ginny might be the quickest.

"So how did you and Hermione figure out the Taboo?"

"The what?" Hermione asked, looking up for the first time.

This being the first time she'd addressed him without any malice since he returned, the red head immediately straightened and cleared his throat, so as not to anger her by being too quiet or unclear. "You and Harry have stopped saying You-Know-Who's name," he clarified.

Harry answered for them, "Oh yeah. It's more like a bad habit we've slipped into. But I've got no problem calling him Vo-"

"NO!" Ron roared covering Harry's mouth with his hand. Both friends looked at him like he was mental. "I'm sorry," he apologized as he removed his hand. "But his name has been jinxed!" Harry and Hermione's expressions remained unchanged. "That's how they tracked people! It can break protective enchantments and causes some kind of disturbance! That's how they found us in Tottenham Court Road!"

"Because we said his name?"

"Yes!" Ron's expression turned thoughtful. "And it makes sense. The only people who open use it now are probably conspiring against him. All his loyal Death Eaters refer to him as 'The Dark Lord'."

"Fear of the name increases fear of the thing itself." Hermione chuckled mirthlessly. "He's literally made it impossible to treat him in such a disrespectful way." The thought of it made her feel warm all over. How dare he? How dare this... pitiful excuse for a human being do that? After all he'd taken from everyone? From her friends? From her? They weren't even free to discuss or plan in peace - they'd always need to watch what they said. All for what? So this Dark Lord could rob everyone of all sense of security? It just made her so angry she could...

"'Mione?" Harry called hesitantly.

Drawn up from her own thoughts, she looked up to come face to face with the copy of The Life and Lies of Albus Dumbledore.

The perplexed look on her face caused Ron to ask, "Are you doing that?"

She did voice her response, but merely shook her head. There was a warmth coming from the book - one that did not match the heat from her anger but felt more like the comfort of a fireplace. The witch reached out to touch it, and it slowly lowered itself to be level with her hand. Opening itself, Hermione's attention was immediately drawn to the signature the now-deceased headmaster's signature on a letter to Grindelwald. She wrapped her hand around her pendant and visualized the image. Along with it she asked, "Familiar?"

A simple, "No," came back. She was sure Draco was occupied and felt lucky to receive a response so soon. Though she had opened the door to communication, they couldn't let themselves get carried away.

"I want to go see Xenophilius Lovegood," she said as she finally looked up. Both of her friends had been starting.

"What was that, Hermione? That with the..." Ron gestured wildly at the book.

"I don't know," she said quickly. "But we have to go see Xenophilius Lovegood - Luna's father!" her voice was more urgent. She quickly stood up and started making her way toward them.

The boys exchanged a look and chorused, "Why?"

She lifted the book to them and pointed at the signature. "It's the same triangular symbol!" She handed off the book to Harry and ran to grab her copy of Beedle the Bard. "It's here, it's there, it was in Godric's Hollow, it's coming up everywhere! It has to mean something! Harry, you said that Mr. Lovegood wore this symbol at the wedding. He may know something."

The boys nodded, agreeing that it was their best lead.

"What do you think?" Harry asked Hermione as she watched Luna's father hurry downstairs and out to their garden. She took a moment to process all that he explained - the Deathly Hallows, the stone, the cloak, the wand.

"I think he's right."

Ron shook his head with a pondering look on his face. "I don't think so. Hermione, it's just one of those stories parents tell kids to teach them lessons. Old superstitions. 'May-born witches marry Muggles.' 'Jinx by twilight, undone by midnight.' 'Wand of the elder never prosper.' Surely you've heard them?"

Harry shook his head. "Hermione and I were raised in the Muggle World, Ron. We were taught different superstitions."

"According to Muggles, all of this - us - these are superstitions, Ron. Don't forget that." Although she had usually been one to dismiss fairy tales, she had reminded herself many times over the past months that she was living in one. Magic wasn't supposed to exist. The whole Muggle world was slumbering, unaware of the true peril it was in. "But we're here. This is real. All superstitions are based somehow in reality." She found herself believing the words of Xenophilius the more she spoke. "All V-" she stopped herself. "All You-Know-Who has ever wanted was to stop death - immortality. Even if the Deathly Hallows doesn't exist, it's very possible that he believes in it and might be searching for all these items. Real or not, as long as You-Know-Who's goal is to elude death, we have to treat this as a real possibility."

"Harry?" Ron questioned.

He shrugged. "I said this morning, nothing would surprise me anymore."

Ron gave a dejected sigh, "When did I become the rational one of us three?"

"We're not being irrational. You do know there have been hundreds of stories of time about extra-powerful wands over centuries, don't you?"

"There have been?"

Hermione launched into various tales of wands with different names - The Deathstick, The Wand of Destiny. The boys grew more and more intrigued and eventually they had all reached the same conclusion - all those wands were the Elder Wand called different names, they had the Cloak of Invisibility made by Death, and You-Know-Who was after those and the Resurrection Stone.

Luna's father came in holding a tray of tea. Hermione had been so deep in her thoughts that Harry's question jarred her back to reality.

"Where's Luna?" Harry asked.

"She'll be in any moment," Xenophilius replied. It was a lie. There was something in his voice.

She could feel Harry tense. "Then why have you only made four cups of tea?"

"I-" but the older wizard was quickly interrupted by Hermione.

"She hasn't been here at all, has she?" she asked quietly, rising from her seat. She took a few steps toward the center of the room and looked up toward the ceiling as if she were looking through it searching for Luna on the next level. There was no trace of her on the ground level at all. "I can't feel her magic."

A nervous giggle seemed to escape the man and the tray in his hands began to shake. "Luna had told me that you were widening your horizons, Miss Granger. Not as narrow minded or as rigid as when she first met you."

Hermione could see the water welling in his eyes. "Where's Luna?"

"They took her from me! They took my Luna!" he cried out. "As punishment for writing in support of Harry Potter!" he wailed. "But if I... If I gave them Harry Potter, they would have to give her back to me! I'm so sorry, I can't lose Luna. I- I-"

"You told the Ministry we were here?" Harry leapt to his feet.

Hermione grabbed Ron and pulled him to his feet. "Run!"

They bolted for the staircase but Mr. Lovegood dropped the tea set and threw himself in front of it.

"Mr. Lovegood," Hermione pleaded. "We love Luna, we'll get her back. But we can't do that if we're locked up at the Ministry."

The white-haired wizard lifted his wand. "I'm s-sorry," he let out in a shaky voice. "My Luna..."

He launched a Stunning Spell that rebounded around the room as the trio launched in different directions to avoid it. The spell rebounded, hitting what Hermione had previously identified as an Erumpent horn - causing the entire room to blow apart. Mr. Lovegood was knocked down the staircase and everything was in rubble.

All three of them were coated in some kind of white-grey debris. Down below they could hear the Death Eaters enter the house, berate Luna's father, and son there was a feeling a magic sweeping through them as they heard, "There's definitely someone up there." They could hear them struggling to climb the steps over the debris.

Hermione quickly hatched a plan to get them out safely and protect Luna's desperate father.

"Harry," she whispered. "Give me the cloak." He handed it to her wordlessly. "Ron, put it on."

"But-"

"Now," she hissed. She grabbed Ron's invisible hand as she turned back to Harry. "Do you trust me?"

He nodded.

She held his hand and waited until she saw Xenophilius's paper white face come up over the top of the sideboard. "Obliviate," she yelled pointing at the older man. Then, "Deprimo!"

She grabbed Harry's hand, still holding the wand and Apparated them out.