**Author's Note: All my apologies for the random spelling errors here and there—I'll admit, once I'm done with something, it's rare that I read back over it. I usually just let it go and continue on, intending to come back later and read over it. So… I'm not an idiot, only a bit careless. Happy reading**
"I see you…"
The voice whispered in her brain, drilled through the cottony swathes that sleep had cut across her mind, across her consciousness.
"Onesies, twosies, threesies-three, I see a birdie in a tree…"
She awoke without moving, her eyes opening wide in the dark room. She inched her hand out, breathing a sigh of relief when her fingers tangled with Remus's. No matter how ridiculous it was, the last thing she wanted was to be alone. She'd spent many years taking care of herself, looking out for herself, and though she was unaccustomed to being dependent, it was hard to avoid.
He did not wake, but his fingers curled around hers slowly, lending their heat and strength even in rest.
Dea shivered, hearing the voice in her memory, fading but persistent. Whose was it? Turning in, watching Remus's chest rise and fall steadily in the wavering moonlight, she allowed herself to fall back asleep.
And outside, yellow eyes watched sleeping crusaders, ready to report back to a master.
~~~
It looked different.
It looked so different upon approaching it by foot. Smaller, shabbier, more nondescript. Though it was undoubtedly an intentional disguise chosen by Voldemort himself, Severus thought it probably did a bit for Harry's self-confidence, and so he said nothing.
He normally Apparated just outside the small house's doors, and Disapparated as soon as he had stepped out of them, eager to wash off the filth accumulated simply by being inside. But as he led his companions up to the door, he felt sick to his stomach.
His mouth tensing, he held up one long, slim finger. "He knows," he whispered, the wind whipping the black cloth around his feet and strands of hair around his face. He turned eyes, wide and stark, to the two men with him.
"Yes, he knows," Dumbledore agreed, stepping slightly in front of Harry and staring intently at the front door of the cottage.
It blew outward, and without any warning, Severus was on his knees, his mouth contorted in silent pain. Shadows lurked in shadows beyond the gaping mouth of the doorway, and from those shadows a voice called out.
"Judas," it said hissingly, but its tone was more amused than anything else. "Oh, my beloved Judas. You set out to betray me but instead you brought my quarry to me."
An anguished cry tore itself from Harry's throat and he staggered, digging his fingernails into the skin of his forehead as though trying to rip out whatever writhed beneath the surface.
The black-hooded fiend flew from the shadows like a bat, the frog-belly white of his face flashing only briefly as he darted toward Severus. He moved quickly, but seemed reluctant to approach Dumbledore. "Such a sweet situation, Severus." He dipped his head like a cobra and Severus's back arched, the fingers of his left hand drumming into the ground. The Dark Mark on his arm grew red-hot, and the robes covering it burst into flames.
But still the Potions master did not cry out.
"Do something!" Harry howled, but Dumbledore held out a restraining hand, watching carefully as Voldemort picked which of the three he'd like to take on and effectively ignored the other two.
"Do you know they're killing her right now, Severus?" Voldemort hissed, and light burst from his wand, vile and mold-colored. But Harry, looking through scalding, pain-wrought tears, saw something amazing.
He saw Severus raise a twitching right hand and draw a memory from himself bare-handed, drawing it over him like a cloak, and Voldemort screeched, wheeling backward quickly.
"You!" he screamed at Harry, pointing the wand at the boy who was no longer cowering. "You and your foolish mortal emotions and mortal notions."
With a scream so high-pitched it was nearly inaudible, Harry shook his head, the scar on his forehead sending bolts of pure heat and hate into his brain. His wand arm shot out blindly, a blue-silver jet of light coming from it. Voldemort advanced as though unperturbed.
"Your Patronus does nothing to me, Potter." And then the bolt hit him mid-chest, not a Patronus at all but a memory, pure and strong, of Lily rocking her baby boy to sleep and singing.
"Horrible wench!" Voldemort screamed, shaking as though trying to rid himself of the memory that clung to him.
"Tom, it is far past time you gave up. There are too many who do not believe as you do." Dumbledore, looking older and sounding younger, leveled his wand on the writhing thing in front of him and shook his head sadly.
With a hiss, the physical form of Voldemort dissipated, and Harry felt again the presence that had invaded him in the Ministry, the presence of pure evil pulsing inside him. This time, however, instead of standing down, Dumbledore pointed his wand straight at Harry's head.
"Do it!" Voldemort screeched triumphantly from Harry's mouth. "Do it, do it, do it, old man!"
And Dumbledore muttered a single word under his breath, his hand steady as he sent his power straight at Harry.
~~~
A bird perched in Remus's window, its normally silent demeanor gone, replaced by a more insistent one. It was clearly a bird with a mission. It flew into the room and, perching on the foot of the bed, sunk its beak into the fleshy bottom of Remus's foot.
"Ow, dammit!" he yelled, jerking his foot back. "What are you doing in here, Buck—" But it was not Buckbeak who had bitten his foot, Remus could see.
It was Fawkes.
The brilliant bird leaned its head down, then flew to the window and looked to the north.
To the north, where the three travelers had headed.
When Fawkes turned back to Remus and an awakening Dea, tears glimmered in the bird's eyes.
"They're there," Remus said wonderingly, pressing the heels of his hands to his eyes and wishing, for a moment, that he did not know that particular fact, that the bird hadn't come like some macabre messenger of ill. He turned to the woman who had shared the night with him, looking more tired and older than he had when he'd fallen asleep. "Amadea, they're there."
"I know," she said simply, and she couldn't keep from picturing a straggly young boy holding a brilliant, smooth bowl of green.