Disclaimer In chapter 1
A/N Here it is. Thanks for all of the lovely reviews. I was too lazy to really edit this, so sorry if it's.... awful.
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Hogsmeade
Shouts of laughter met Harry's ears. Screams of terror were also heard, hidden by the rumble of talking. Harry found himself in a sea of black pushing past him on all sides. One of the Death Eaters grabbed his wrist.
"Come on, Harry. This way," Hermione hissed to him. She pulled him out of the way, and out into an alley in between what remained of two buildings.
"How did you know it was me?" Harry asked.
"You were the only one who looked lost."
"Where's everyone?"
"Dumbledore's finding them," Hermione answered, watching the crowd carefully.
"How'd you get here before me?"
"I've been Apparating longer than you. And stop asking so many questions; we'll look suspicious."
Harry complied and looked at his surroundings for the first time. The alley he was standing in had huge piles of rubble strewn across the ground, covered in melting snow. The thick atmosphere of the place released a musty scent that teased Harry's nose. On his left was a brick wall with a burned hole in it, probably created by a Reducto Curse. He could see into the inside where several Death Eaters were drinking rum and singing. A few of them were discussing what seemed to be the best way to murder a Muggle.
"I'd burn 'em alive," one with a deep voice said. "An' watch 'em wriggle and cry." There were a few shouts of gleeful laughter.
"Chop their 'eads off," another one said, "an' throw 'em at people."
"No. Watch 'em bleed to death!" There was a great cheer as the final man spoke, slopping a great stream of rum onto his cloak.
Harry looked away, feeling sick, and tried to block the horrible laughter from his mind. Hermione seemed to be ignoring them also.
He watched cloaked Death Eaters passing the alley until a group of them stopped. Harry could tell immediately that the tall one was Dumbledore.
"We're all here?" Dumbledore asked.
"Yes," Harry answered. It felt eerie, standing among hundreds of Death Eaters, and speaking to the only one who would have their master running for cover.
"Professor Snape is meeting us in a few minutes. He'll be coming down here. Now, don't speak to anyone until you are sure you know who it is. I want you to pair up. Stay close to your partner at all times. Never lose sight of them."
Neville paired up with Ron as Hermione and Ginny shuffled together. Harry stayed with Dumbledore.
"Why is Professor Snape meeting us?" Harry asked, spitting out the word 'professor.'
"He knows the locations of Draco Malfoy's body. He wishes us to give him a proper burial."
Harry nodded, and remembered with a twinge of pain the dream he had with the pool of water.
"Ah, yes, Severus," Dumbledore said. Harry turned and saw a cloaked figure prowling towards them.
"Headmaster," Snape said, inclining his head slightly. He turned to Harry. "You need not grip your wand so, Potter, no one knows it's you under that mask."
Harry released his hold on his wand which he had tucked into his robes, but had been keeping his hand on. . . just in case.
"Are you healed?" Snape asked.
"Yes," Harry answered.
"Good," Snape said as though he didn't think it was that good at all. He turned towards Harry's friends. "I take it this is your back-up squad, Headmaster?"
"We need as much help as we can get, Severus. They are fully capable of defending themselves. Mr. Longbottom fought off a dementor not 72 hours ago."
"Longbottom?" Snape hissed. He looked at the Death Eater who had just cowered.
"Ay! What're you doin' down there?"
Harry turned and saw a short plump Death Eater standing at the end of the alley peering at them.
Snape immediately turned. "My business is my own, Bingley," he snarled.
The plump man's face blanched. "Oh. . . oh yes, Severus. My apologies, sir. Carry on." He turned and ran out of sight.
Harry looked curiously at Snape.
"I see you have some authority around here, Severus," Dumbledore said.
"I am known to be in Voldemort's inner-circle. An 8th level Death Eater like Bingley wouldn't dare speak to me."
Harry could almost sense Snape's smirk.
"I have a secure location where we can talk. We won't be bothered there," Snape continued.
"Very well," Dumbledore said. "Lead us there."
They followed Snape out of the alley, into the swarming sea of Death Eaters. Harry immediately felt very nervous and vulnerable, and self-conscious that everyone there knew who he was. He felt a cold sweat coat his body as he tried his best to fit in. He followed Dumbledore, and when he looked behind him to see if the others were following them, he couldn't tell who was who.
"Just keep going. We're here," Hermione whispered. Harry didn't turn back around for the rest of the walk. They walked past a charred building that used to be Honeydukes, and up a hill that lead to the Shrieking Shack. Several Death Eaters were lounging by the gate, rum bottles on the ground surrounding them.
"What?" one of them said, giggling slightly.
"I said," the second one said, slurring his 's,' "someone's coming."
"What?"
"Someone's coming."
"Oi! Shut up, Nott, someone's coming!"
"You idiot. That's what I was saying."
"No you wasn't!" At this point the first Death Eater was clutching the fence to keep himself standing, he was laughing so hard.
Nott turned to the approaching group. "Need some privacy?"
Snape didn't spoke, he merely nodded.
"5 galleons."
Harry had almost reached for his pocket before he realized that he didn't have a knut on him.
Instead, Snape gave Nott the money.
"Pleasure doin' business with you," Nott said, bowing. He opened the gate, and Snape lead them up towards the Shrieking Shack. As they reached the front door, they heard the other Death Eater lose his grasp on the fence and crash to the ground, still laughing madly. Snape reached for the doorknob. Harry noticed that the boards had been peeled off of most of the house, the ones that had kept all the villagers out of the Shrieking Shack for years.
They entered the house, and immediately removed their masks and lowered their hoods. The place looked more or less the same as from when Harry last saw it three years ago. There was still a thick layer of dust on everything, but there were more footprints branching off in all directions, and some candy-wrappers and rum bottles littered the ground. They walked in silence upstairs to a room at the end of the hall Harry recognized all too well. The last time he had been here, it had been dark, but he recognized it instantly. Ron and Hermione recognized it too. Both of them had glassy looks in their eyes as they remembered the night they had met Sirius.
"I was over there," Ron said, pointing to the bed. "You came in, Harry, and I told you it was a trap. . . ."
"This was where I first met Sirius," Harry said, his voice flat. "He was over there," he pointed to the wall, "and I almost killed him. I—I thought he'd killed my parents. . . ."
"Oh, do be quiet, Potter," Snape said, his lip curling. "No one wants to hear you reliving your brief encounters with your late godfather."
"Have a heart, Severus," Dumbledore said.
Harry moved further into the room. Just near the bed, there was a smear of blood on the floor. He pointed at it and looked to Ron.
"From my leg," Ron said, smiling. "Sirius did that, remember?"
"Because you'd run off to chase Scab—Wormtail," Hermione said.
"Scabbers was Wormtail?" Ginny asked.
Ron nodded.
"But he slept in our dormitory!" Neville exclaimed.
"Until he ran away," Ron said. "We'd thought it was because of Crookshanks, but it was really because of Sirius. Stupid rat."
"Buckbeak's trial was that night," Hermione recalled. "We'd gone down to see Hagrid. I found him in the milk jug, remember?"
They quieted as they remembered that night.
"We have issues to attend to," Snape said, interrupting their thoughts harshly.
Harry nodded and sat with Ron, Hermione, Neville, and Ginny on the bed.
"This is a secure premises, Severus?" Dumbledore asked.
"Yes, headmaster. Nott found a way inside not too long after he returned here from Azkaban. He uses it so that Death Eaters can get privacy from the Dark Lord."
Dumbledore nodded. "Good. Do they know the passage to the Whomping Willow?"
"No," Snape answered. "After Hogwarts was taken, I came down here and hid the opening to the tunnel. I thought it might come in useful."
"And it has. But hasn't Peter Pettigrew disclosed the location of the tunnel to Voldemort?"
"He tried. They went to try to find the tunnel at the Whomping Willow. I cast a spell on the entrance so that they couldn't see it. Avery lost an eye to the tree." Snape smiled to himself as though recalling a sweet memory.
"Very well. Now on to business. We are here to gain possession of Draco Malfoy's body, as well as rescue any victims of this war. You know the location of the corpse?"
"Yes," Snape replied. "They took him out to the Forbidden Forest, and covered him with a cloak. To the best of my knowledge, he is still there, perhaps frozen beneath several feet of snow."
Everyone in the room shivered at the thought.
Dumbledore continued. "And do you know of any people we can help? Perhaps in hiding?"
Snape bowed his head. "The Death Eaters have destroyed the town and the villagers who lived there. They were under orders to leave none alive. . . ."
Everyone sat in silence.
"But, there still could be someone, right?" Harry asked. "Someone we can help?"
"Switch out of hero mode, Potter," Snape snarled. "There's no one to save now. There's nothing left."
Harry stood up. "I won't believe that. I can't believe that. There's someone here, I know there is; we just need to find them."
"We don't have that kind of time, Harry," Dumbledore said sadly. "We cannot linger here too long."
"But then what was the point of coming here?" Harry yelled.
"To retrieve the body of an innocent, Harry," Dumbledore said.
Harry clenched and unclenched his hands. He stood, breathing heavily, looking from one face to another.
"There has to be something we can do," Harry said, urging, almost pleading.
"The best we can do is survive," Dumbledore said. "And try to find the end to all of the darkness."
Harry sought some comfort from his headmaster's eyes, but found only lost hope and sadness.
And then, Snape gasped, his right hand flying to his left forearm, and Harry's forehead seared with pain.
"He is calling us to him," Snape said. "I must go. You must go. Now."
Without hesitation, Harry tried to Apparate back to their hide-out. The world faded from view, and then quite suddenly snapped back, and he was still in the Shrieking Shack.
"Voldemort's put up anti-Apparition wards," Dumbledore said. "We must find another way out."
A door downstairs crashed open. By this time, Hermione was clinging to Harry's sleeve, and everyone had their wands drawn.
"Get out! Everyone!" Nott's drunken voice said. "The Dark Lord is summoning us!"
"Nott, you idiot!" Snape yelled. "We have the Dark Mark too, remember? We felt it!"
Harry tugged his mask back on and pulled his hood up. He saw a last glimpse of Hermione's terrified face before it was hidden by the mask.
"My scar hurts. That hasn't happened for a long time," Harry said.
"Your connection to Voldemort must be fading. Perhaps it will only hurt when you are near him now," Dumbledore said.
"It didn't hurt too much when I was in the dungeon," Harry went on.
"Maybe Voldemort would rather you'd suffer a different type of pain around him for once."
"Where are we going?" Neville said. "We aren't going to see Him are we?"
"We can't!" Ginny exclaimed, her voice desperate. "We can't go to Him! Harry's here, we'd be handing him over!"
"Forget about me!" Harry said. "What about you guys?"
"We could hide in the tunnel," Ron suggested hopefully.
Nott stumbled into the room, followed by several other Death Eaters. "Hurry up."
So their fate was decided. They couldn't risk stunning the Death Eaters, or their cover would be blown; and they couldn't try to get into the tunnel without being seen. So Harry hid his wand in the folds of his robes, and walked in silence down the stairs.
Out into the chilly air, the Death Eaters trouped. Harry could see hundreds, if not thousands, of Death Eaters making their way to the castle from Hogsmeade. It was a scary experience, walking amid them. But somehow, Harry felt like they were all experiencing the same thing; fear of what was coming.
As they neared the castle, Harry's scar began to burn unbearably. They made it to the gates of Hogwarts, where Death Eaters were showing their Dark Marks to a squat Death Eater with a silver hand. Harry was the first of his group to reach the gates, and the man he knew to be Wormtail seized his wrist.
"Who are you loyal to?" Wormtail asked harshly.
Harry didn't know whether or not to say 'Voldemort' or 'The Dark Lord' or something else. Thankfully, Snape stepped forward and helped. "He is loyal to the Dark Lord, Pettigrew, as are you and I."
Harry could feel the silver hand's grip on his wrist tighten. "He does not need you to answer for him, Snape."
"I am loyal to the Dark Lord," Harry said. He pulled his sleeve up and exposed his fake Dark Mark. "Here is the proof."
Harry awaited Wormtail's reply. Instead, the Death Eater peered at him through his mask. "Your voice is so familiar," he said slowly. "Have we met?"
"We just did," Harry said.
"Oh, yes, of course," Wormtail said, bowing slightly.
"You're holding up the line, Pettigrew," Snape said. "Could you perhaps hold this happy little chat some other time?"
"Mind your manners, Snivellus," Wormtail said. Snape took a step towards Wormtail, towering over him.
"Simply because you are the Dark Lord's right hand man doesn't mean you can tell me what to do," he hissed. Harry caught the reference to Wormtail's silver right hand and smiled.
Wormtail, however, wasn't cowering. "I was never afraid of you, Snape."
"That's because you had Potter, Lupin, and Black to hide behind," Snape snarled.
"I never hid behind them. Those three gits begged me to be friends with them, and then they didn't treat me right. I showed them in the end, though, didn't I? I watched Potter and his wife die, and then his son, come to think of it. I made Black go to Azkaban, and then he snuffed it. The Werewolf got off easy, but it's his turn next. His time will come. . . ."
Harry, without thinking, launched himself at Wormtail. Snape caught him around the middle, and held him back. Thankfully, a distraction was caused by the Dark Mark burning again, and Harry completely forgot about Wormtail when the pain from his scar nearly blinded him.
"Hurry up, the Dark Lord cannot wait!" Wormtail called. Snape held Harry by the scruff of his neck and dragged him through the gates. He only released him when they were a ways from Wormtail.
"Do you ever use your brain, Potter?" Snape said.
Harry straitened his robes. "I'm going to get that rat. Someday."
"Best not be a day when you're dressed as a Death Eater and supposedly dead," Snape said.
Harry rubbed his forehead and said nothing.
"And stop rubbing that blasted scar of yours."
Harry ignored him.
They were soon joined by the rest of their group. Hermione whispered in Harry's ear.
"Just ignore Wormtail, Harry. He'll get what's coming to him soon enough."
"It would have been easier if you'd taken him down just now," Ron muttered on Harry's other side. Harry silently agreed.
They were nearing the castle entrance. Harry could see the icy lake, and the Quidditch Pitch in the distance. He remembered his Firebolt which Sirius had given him in his third year. He had lost that when Hogwarts was taken. It sickened him to think of some Death Eater riding around on it.
"So," Ron said in a would-be casual voice, "we're really doing this?"
"Just do not speak, Voldemort knows each of his supporters. He won't recognize us, and he'll know what's going on," Dumbledore said. Harry wondered how his headmaster sounded so determined, but then he looked up at the castle; really looked at it for the first time in a while.
It had used to be his home. It used to be his sanctuary, but now. . . . Now it meant death, in Harry's eyes. All he could see in it now was death, hatred, and an ever-lasting sadness. Every happy memory Harry had in this place came tumbling back over him; seeing his first ever broomstick being carried to him by an assortment of owls at breakfast, befriending Hermione and Ron, and the feeling of them by his side as he went to save the Philosopher's Stone, winning the House Cup, winning the Quidditch House Cup, his Firebolt rolling out of the packaging onto his bedspread, a snowball fight by the stone steps in his fourth year.
Instinctively, Harry looked across the grounds to a small, wooden cabin just by the edge of the Forbidden Forest. The curtains were drawn, and snow had piled up around the door. Hagrid had left Hogwarts with everyone else, leaving behind his home.
A pang of pain shot through Harry's forehead. He gasped.
"Your scar?" Hermione asked.
Harry nodded, willing himself not to rub his forehead with his fingers. "He's mad about something. Voldemort's mad." The emotions were coming to Harry just as they had in his fifth year.
Hermione was silent. They were going up the stone steps now, a horrible sense of foreboding washing over Harry. He couldn't go in there, they'd get caught! It was suicide!
He turned, and tried force his way back through the sea of black, but once again Snape stopped him. "Please do not make a spectacle of yourself. You've drawn enough attention to yourself already."
Harry's heart was beating uncontrollably in his chest. They were at the top of the steps now. His knees were weakening. He had to get away! But Snape's arm was still there. They were at the door.
"No!" Harry muttered, his scar burning upon his forehead.
He was dimly aware that Hermione had grasped his hand, squeezing it comfortingly. Ron was muttering in his ear, "It's all right, mate," though not sounding totally reassured himself.
They stepped over the threshold, entering the castle once again.
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A/N Next chapter probably won't be up for a week, sorry! It's just the way my schedule has been working out. I can give you the title to the next chapter, though. "Hogwarts." Boy, that gives away a lot, doesn't it? Oh yeah, I named the Death Eater 'Bingley' because I'm reading Pride and Prejudice right now. lol. peace felony melanie