7

THE scream was ripped from her lips before Alice could stop herself as the young Auror scrambled away from the crude weapon as the troll hefted back its arm and sent its club that was easily the size of a canoe barreling towards her. Her hands fumbled over the earth.

Alice was sure she'd never seen a creature so hideous and ugly before in all of her life. It grunted and growled, scrunching its bulbous nose, and curling the edges of its lips upward to reveal a surprisingly sharp set of teeth.

Her mouth opened to scream for Crouch again, but nothing was coming out except for a feeble, pitiful mewl.

She tried to force her body to flee the scene, to take refuge somewhere where this thing couldn't get at her, but quickly discovered her body would not obey her brain's furious commands to flee and hide somewhere.

The greenish-tinged mountain troll cocked his—or was it a she? Alice couldn't tell how to discern the difference underneath the wretch's loincloth, and she wasn't sure if female trolls had breasts, but it didn't matter now.

Whatever gender it was, it clearly wanted to kill her.

Its bulbous nose appeared squashed on its face like it had been broken a time or two in times past.

Its arms were far too long for its body and yet, despite the creature's hulking shape and size and slow lumbering movements that caused it to walk with a slight limp—had it been injured recently? — Alice could feel the bone-crushing strength of its grip as it seized her shoulder, almost hard enough to pop her arm right from its socket.

Alice forced herself to peek open one eyelid, not realizing she'd squeezed them shut to avoid looking at it while she waited for the inevitable skull-crushing blow of the blunt end of the creature's club to contact with her head, a move that was sure to kill her on the first impact.

Summoning every ounce of her inner Gryffindor courage down to the last inch, the novice Auror forced herself to look into the disgusting wretch's sickly amber eyes, that were currently beady and narrowed, glaring at her with such hostility that made Alice Longbottom shiver with gritted teeth as a cold sweat began to break out along her temples. It snarled and grunted at her.

Perhaps it wasn't able to speak. Could mountain trolls even speak at all?

With one strong appendage still clasped around the handle of his makeshift club, it jerked Alice forward, tossing her against the nearby trunk of a tree. Alice cried out as she felt a muscle in her back pull, if not break a bit.

White-hot flaring pain shot up against her spine as Alice finally managed to find her voice, crying out as hot, stinging tears marred and blurred her vision, causing the creature stalking its way towards her current position as she sat slumped against the ground frozen and unable to move at all, to become blurry and distorted. "Oh, god," she moaned, feeling the Forbidden Forest around her start to spin as her vision began to blacken at the edges.

Having never really fainted before until now, Alice wondered if the nauseating and light-headed sensation was something of a warning sign. It was then, as the Mountain Troll advance on Alice Longbottom for the third time, its club raised above her head, preparing to strike, that an odd thought entered her mind about her owl.

Does Hermia have enough food?

BARTY swore under his breath the moment Longbottom's scream reached his eardrums. He skidded to a halt as his ears strained for more sounds, struggling to discern where it had come from, sending a shower of dirt and pebbles everywhere as he looked to the left and right. No sign of Alice.

Gnashing his teeth in anger, he plunged his hand into the pockets of his robes the moment he heard the unmistakable grunt of what could only be described as a troll.

"How?" he swore, whisper-shouting it, hoping he wouldn't be discovered. "Mountain trolls don't come this far down so what's one doing in this part of the Forbidden Forest?" he snapped.

Though another shrill scream from Alice broke the startled Death Eater out of his thoughts, and that was all it took for Bartemius Crouch Jr. to begin to see red as he came upon a sight that he hoped never to see in his life.

"No!" he bellowed, as Alice did not realize the threat to her life until she had no time to react as the troll's club was raised high above her head, and with a flash so fast the creature's movements were almost a blur, the troll drove the blunt end of his club directly onto Alice's belly.

A burning rage flooded through the former Slytherin's bloodstream, hotter than any Fiendfyre or dragon fire could ever flame. The words were out of his mouth before he could stop himself from screaming them.

"H—HOW DARE YOU!" he shouted, his mind refusing to believe what his own two eyes had just seen, never mind that trolls were stupid and incapable of human speech. His shriek resounded over the troll's grunts. "THAT'S MY ALICE YOU MURDERED!"

His heart instantly rose to his throat as Alice slumped against the soft earth, immediately losing consciousness, and becoming unresponsive. Crouch's dark eyes flew even wider. It meant to kill her.

Before he could question his actions, or quite possibly come up with a more effective plan, his own soul be damned if it meant Alice would be mad at him for this in a little while, the Death Eater pointed his wand squarely at the troll's chest.

"Avada Kedavra!" he bellowed, the familiar flash of bright green light seeming to emanate and move in slow motion from the tip of his wand, making a beeline straight for the troll's broad chest.

He couldn't be sure, but even as the creature let out one final grunt and collapsed in a heap onto the ground with a thump so forceful it made the ground beneath his boots shake, he thought he saw Alice's eyelids flutter open for a second.

Barty's mind raced with dread as he sank to her knees beside her. How the bloody hell could he have let this happen? He'd bargain with Merlin Himself if he could, to make it him kneeling on the ground instead of his sweet Alice.

It was as if he felt every inch of that stupid troll's club as it had come crashing down on Alice's body.

For all he knew, she was going to have massive internal damage to her organs if he couldn't lead them out of this bloody forest and up to the Hospital Wing. If it had been his own body that had been pummeled by the troll's club, it would have been far less torture than seeing it so hatefully brought down on the witch he loved.

Breathing out a tired, relieved breath, Crouch knelt lower to Alice's level, careful to support her weight against his chest, and gingerly lifted her unconscious form in his arms bridal style, letting her limp head loll against the crook of his elbow. Her eyes were closed, and her delicate brows knitted together in worry and concern.

The brunette Auror's mouth, complete with a bleeding cut on her lower lip, was set in a slight pout and she looked quite pale. Almost too pale to be considered healthy, and if he were to believe the disgusting rumors that she was carrying Longbottom's babe inside of her, then a bastard child or not, he couldn't let his friend suffer.

He spotted the mouth of some kind of cave nearby. "That's where the wanker was hiding, no doubt," he growled, snarling through gritted teeth as he purposefully used the heel of his boot to stomp on the troll's face so hard that its left eyeball popped right out of its socket with a sickening squelch, made only more satisfying when Barty stepped on it, not minding the filth Barty was sure to have to dig off of his snakeskin boot in a little while.

Fortunately for him, as he ducked into the cave that reeked of troll bogies and made him scrunch his nose in disgust, the creature somehow had enough brain cells, even if they were the size of a pea, to light a fire, which saved Barty from having to do it so he could sit with Al and assess just how badly she was injured, and how long it would take them to get back up to the castle to see Pomfrey.

Slowly, using the rock foundation of the cave as a brace for his back, he lowered himself to the ground, careful not to jostle Alice too much, wanting to be mindful of any injuries his friend might have.

The Death Eater exhaled as he slowly, with trembling fingers, lifted Alice's coat and shirt and got a good look at the bruises that littered her abdomen, her skin more purple than pale.

Barty sighed as he closed his eyes for a moment. His Alice didn't deserve this. Not even on his wretched life.

Breathing in a shaking but a steadying breath, willing his anger at what that troll had done to his friend to cool a little, Crouch set back to work. Alice needed him to remain calm no.

There was no use in Crouch expending all his injury on an already dead troll in this exact second.

He had to keep a clear head so he could properly treat the Auror's injuries and check on the babe within.

Running his calloused hands carefully along the skin over Alice's bruised ribs to check for any broken bones, Crouch flinched as he realized how hot his love's skin felt.

Alice was definitely running a low-grade fever and being out in the Forbidden Forest in the middle of the night in her current condition certainly wasn't helping. But Barty knew a fever was the least of his concerns right now. He needed to check for more serious injuries before worrying about what was likely a virtually harmless fever.

Any number of Longbottom's bones could have been broken the instant the stupid troll hit her stomach.

Barty continued to carefully run his fingers over her ribs, frowning when he noticed just how small his Alice really was. Her bones didn't feel or appear to be broken, thank Merlin, but that didn't mean Alice wasn't injured.

Maybe she was still in a state of shock, it was hard for him to tell. Due to the way the two of them were positioned, with the campfire that the troll had started, and the dimming light behind Barty, it was likely that Alice could merely only see Crouch's tall, towering shadow, a silhouette.

"Alice? Love, can you hear me? It's Barty, it's me, Alice," Crouch spoke in what he hoped was a calm voice, though he swallowed down hard past the swelling lump in his throat as he recognized just how cracked and faltering his reserved voice sounded.

He felt anything but calm right now. In fact, he was furious right now, though not with Alice, never with her, but at the troll who had needlessly hurt an innocent woman, and one who was pregnant. Crouch sneered.

Alice could have been killed.

Crouch wanted to wrap his arms around her waist in a tight embrace and not let this young witch go, though he didn't want to traumatize and scare poor Alice any more than she already had been, so for now, his hands remained firmly resting on her arms. "Y—you're alright, Alice," he murmured, whispering it into the shell of her ear.

"I—I've got you. Deep breaths, nice and slow, that's it. You're safe. No one is going to hurt you. It's dead, it's gone and dead. The troll that scared the hell out of you, it's dead. I killed it. It won't hurt you, love, I promise. Not anymore. I'm here with you, love."

"Huh? Barty? Is—is that you?" Alice managed to choke out in a breathy little squeak in an uncertain and heart-wrenchingly weak voice that made his stomach churn before practically barreling him over with her one good arm into Barty's chest, in a pitiful sort of half-hug, at least, as well as she could manage with only one working arm.

Alice immediately began to sob into Crouch's shoulder.

She sobbed into his chest unceasingly, hands clutching at Crouch's black leather jacket. A tiny lapse let her pull away for a second, blinking lashes heavy with tears before she would collapse again, her wails of misery worsening.

The pain must have come for her in waves, minutes of sobbing broken apart by short pauses for recovering breaths, before hurling her back into the outstretched arms of her grief.

"It's all right, Alice," Crouch soothed, resting his chin on top of her hair, attempting to reassure the woman that he loved as he rested his hand softly against the back of Alice's head and pulled her as close as he dared, careful to be mindful of her injuries.

Barty swallowed, not entirely certain if his friend's tears were a result of the immense pain of her injuries, fear, relief that she was relatively unharmed, save for her dislocated shoulder and wrist, and the bruises on her face, or a combination of all three, or maybe it was something else bothering Alice entirely.

But whatever the reason or reasons were, all Crouch knew was that he wanted to bottle and keep whatever grief and other negative feelings were causing Alice so much inner turmoil and anguish.

Alice needed to know that she was going to be just fine. That Crouch wasn't going to let her out of his sight again, not even for a second, come hell or whatever, no matter who came after him.

Let Frank come, Crouch thought meanly through gritted teeth. I'm the one Alice should be with. Not him!

Alice needed to realize that she was going to be just fine and that no further harm would come to her while Crouch was by her side. She also needed to know that Barty would be there to help her heal from whatever torture poor Alice had just endured and suffered. Her shoulders wracked with heaving sobs as another choked cry, muffled by Crouch's shoulder, echoed through the forest clearing the two found themselves in.

Her poor cries sounded so pained, like just drawing in breath was an effort.

"Thanks, you...you saved my life...it...it tried to...it tried to..." Alice managed to whimper in between heaving, gasping sobs and frantic, shaking breaths. If the young Auror had intended to say anything else, whatever it was that she wanted to say to Barty was lost as more uncontrollable sobs followed her.

"Hush, you're hurt. Don't try to speak, Al, just save your strength for now. I'm not going anywhere," he soothed, his fingers curling onto the back of her shirt as he clung to her tightly, moving the fingers of his other hand through the short stray strands and wisps of her hair, wincing as he felt a good-sized lump the size of an Occamy egg at the base of her skull.

"You're going to be all right, Alice. I promise. I'm not going anywhere," he added, noticing how Alice's fingers of her one good, uninjured hand seemed to cling to the fabric of his jacket, as though afraid the Forbidden Forest would play another cruel prank on her and cause Barty to vanish again and separate them for a fourth time, afraid that in a split second, she would be left to her own devices once again.

"You're safe," Crouch reassured her in a quiet and calm voice, though he felt anything but calm at the present moment, pressing his lips to her forehead, visibly cringing as he pulled away at how feverish her skin felt, and how clammy she looked.

He offered her a curt nod of his head that Alice missed, given that she had buried her head in his shoulder and made a muffled, half-choked sobbing sound at the back of her throat.

"I'm not going anywhere, Al. I won't let you alone. I promise."

And this time, he thought through clenched teeth as he held her, he aimed to keep that promise.

"Undo the buttons on your shirt, love. I need to take a look." Recognizing his voice sounded curt, he sighed and lifted his chin to meet Alice's gaze, and when he saw the nervousness and trepidation laced through Alice's dark eyes, he felt something within him shift. "It's just you and me out here, love. Alone."

She nodded, after some hesitation and relented, fumbling with the buttons on her simple red collared shirt and showed no hesitation in exposing what Crouch had already seen for himself to him for a second time, though this time, in better lighting.

Barty felt his frown deepen as he took a better look at Alice's wounds. Her chest and abdomen were covered in blackening blue and purple bruises, one of them near her pelvis in the shape of the club's end where the troll had whacked her, which sent his temper aflame in his veins for a third time in one night, though Crouch tampered it down.

Though it was her dislocated shoulder that was worrying Barty the most.

"I need to…I need to pop your shoulder back into place, Alice, it'll do you no good in its current state," he suggested, carefully wrapping his fingers around her arm, biting down on his bottom lip.

Alice let out a tiny moan and squeezed her eyes shut.

"Ngh! It's going to hurt, isn't it?" she guessed with a pained grimace, peeking one eye open to look at him.

She exhaled a tense breath through her nose and jerked her head towards her arm. "I guess it can't be any worse than anything else I've had in the past. Just do it."

Barty nodded and offered Alice what he hoped was a sympathetic smile.

"It will, love, but not any worse than leaving your arm untreated as it is. You feel ready?" Crouch watched as Alice offered the tiniest of nods, clenching her jaw shut and squeezing her eyes tightly, holding her breath as Crouch gripped her dislocated arm as gently as possible and with a sickening pop, set it right again.

Alice let out a whimper and allowed a single tear to roll down her cheek as her fingers gripped onto fistfuls of Barty's jacket sleeve for support as her shoulder was popped back into its socket, her body rocking and forth with the pain, though her movements became still after a moment, and she opened her eyes, letting out a tense and relieved breath, her eyes wide and huge as she stared at Barty. "Th—that wasn't so bad. Th—thank you, Barty," she whispered.

"There. Good as new." Crouch forced a smile, though he knew it did not reach his eyes. Alice had no idea, the profound effect she had on him, on the others.

How she had worried him not even five minutes ago, and he was going to have to come up with some way to make her understand that she had been in the wrong, going off on her own like that.

Crouch frowned as he helped her up, draping one of her arms over her shoulder, though not before conjuring an arm sling with his wand and helping Alice ease her dislocated shoulder into it.

"You'll have to wear this at least a couple of days. I'd try not to move it around too much if you can, Alice."

Alice nodded mutely, biting down on her bottom lip as she allowed Crouch to take her by her uninjured hand now not in the sling, and guide her back further into the cave to take shelter for a couple of hours to try to get what sleep she could.

She could sense the irritation and anger emanating off him in waves. Though the Death Eater wasn't coming outright and saying what was bothering him, Alice knew that she was the root cause of his agitated, fretting state of mind.

And somehow, Alice knew that accident or not…it was all her fault.