Author's Notes: Second chapter for you (as penance)!
Disclaimer: Was never mine, is not mine, will never be mine – except
for the plot -
"spoken"
'thought'
parseltongue
Mind-link conversation between Saskia and Harry
:: P a r t S e v e n ::They were falling, farther and farther, through the mist. At sometime during their fall, Harry had grabbed on to Malfoy's wrist so they didn't have another person to find.
He thought he heard a "Definitely going to kill Potter when we get out of this damn trap."
Harry smirked.
"Shit!" Harry heard his rival say. It was a statement that he fully agreed with a second later. They started spinning like they were in a cyclone; their senses were distorted from all the dizziness.
They crashed into the land.
Harry groaned and curled up into a ball. "Some get the licence plate of the plane that hit me," he moaned.
"Wrong Potter, it wasn't a plane, whatever that is, it was a magic carpet that hit us."
Harry laughed, "An aeroplane, Malfoy, an aeroplane."
"Crazy muggle-raised fool!" Malfoy muttered, glaring at him as he stumbled to his feet. "Dumbledore really has lost it, putting us together for this suicide quest."
"Actually, Lupin told me that it was a spell that grouped people together who worked well together," Harry replied.
"Wonderful, trust a crazy muggle-loving fool to use a spell to chose the groups."
Harry cocked his head to the side and said, "You gonna recommend that we both go to St. Mungo's for head treatment?"
"Definitely." They gave each other small smiles before realising who they were and where they were ... or at least what they were doing ... somewhere.
"So, which way d'you reckon?" Harry asked.
"How the hell am I supposed to know? You're the Gryffindor with the innate talent for these things!"
Harry smirked and turned in a full circle, taking in the choices. There was nothing but mist, clouding the paths that may or may not be there.
"You're the Malfoy with a taste for all things rich, which way does your senses tell you to go towards?" Harry asked.
Malfoy did a 360 turn and then pointed one way
"Then let's go this way." Harry said, pointing in the opposite direction. He started to walk.
Malfoy followed a second later, muttering about annoying Gryffindorks who thought it would be a good idea to fall down a cliff.
"See anything?"
"Yeah, there's gonna be lots of fog tonight," Harry replied.
"What?" Malfoy asked, looking at the Boy-Who-Lived.
"You asked me what I saw, and I told you. They'll be fog tonight. I'm afraid that's the scope of my divination talent." Harry replied, grinning. Despite the situation they found themselves in, this was the most fun he'd had in a while. His recent nature of solitude then was nothing more than a phase he was going through.
"Potter! I wasn't asking for you to divine the forecast! I wanted to know if you could see anything through this damn mist!"
"I know! I just was messing with you. It's not like we have anything else to-" Harry stopped suddenly, "-do," he finished lamely.
He cocked his head to the right.
"Did you hear that?" Harry asked.
Malfoy, instead of a smart reply, also cocked his head to the side. "Potter, you're imagining ... things." He had stopped in the middle of the sentence, like Harry had done.
"You did hear it then?"
"I heard something." Malfoy replied.
The sound reached them again.
"It sounds like ... someone." Harry said.
"Way to go, ace observation."
"Oh shut up, it could be Ernie."
"Or some idiot who is stuck in this cursed place."
"Like we are."
"Yes, Potter, like we are."
"So, we going find out what's making that sound?"
"Do we have a choice?"
Malfoy sighed and started walking in the direction the sound seemed to be coming from.
Harry shook his head and started to follow, trying to keep his senses alert, like Saskia had trained him to. The sounds increased slightly in volume as they began to be near the source.
"You got your wand ready?" Harry muttered.
"You got Slytherin badge hidden under your Gryffindor one?" Malfoy muttered back.
"Oh, you wouldn't believe me if I told you." Harry replied, mostly to himself.
The Slytherin looked at Harry oddly, and then stopped, flinging his arm out. "Do you think that this could be MacMillan?"
"I've no idea, but I'm gonna find out, Gryffindor thing and all," Harry said, moving around the arm.
"Oh, this is going to be fun."
Harry moved quickly through the fog.
"I can't believe I'm doing this, with you of all people," Harry heard Malfoy gripe; he turned to say something smart when he tripped and stumbled to the ground.
"Oh, great, really graceful Potter." Malfoy said and continued forward.
Harry smirked as he heard a smack into the ground and a heavy stream of curses. "Oh yeah, extremely graceful Malfoy."
"Oh shut it!"
"Do you know what you fell over?" Harry asked.
"No, you?"
"Nope."
They both closed at the same instant as the mist started to swirl around them, creating the same sort of cyclone that appeared when they fell through the second illusion.
The cyclone seemed to take forever to finish and Harry was beginning to wonder if he and Malfoy had been separated somehow, he couldn't see anything, or feel anything for that matter. The magic of the swirling winds saw to that.
"Malfoy? You still here?" He called.
"Yeah, Potter, I'm still here. I would ask the same back, but I know you lost your brain somewhere back with the muggles," came the aristocratic drawl.
Harry laughed, tensing the next second. There was a sensation of something on his leg, moving higher.
"Malfoy, please tell me that you are actually trying to feel me up and that it's not something else," Harry said.
"I am not trying to feel you up, just see where you are. I wouldn't want to have to find you afterwards. You'll somehow find yourself in a werewolf territory, save the missing daughter of someone filthy rich therefore gaining Gryffindor hundreds of points and a lot of gold. You think I want that to happen?"
Harry laughed once more, there was something about Malfoy's unintentional humour that drew him to his rival. "Tell you what, I'll keep the points, you can have the money if that happens."
The cyclone started to abate. Harry began to be able to use his senses once more. He could here the restless shuffling of a body and the huffing.
"You alright there Malfoy?" He called.
"Yeah, just suffering from the rock that I'm lying on."
"You're lying on a rock?" Harry asked curiously.
"Yes, and it's bloody uncomfortable!"
"Malfoy's and their comfortable lifestyles." Harry said, more to himself.
"And what would you know?!?" Malfoy said, sounding very offended.
"Oh, calm it. I just meant that it's probably unheard of, a wizard of your standing, lying on a rock in the middle of a magical cyclone."
"Oh, right," Malfoy said after a while. "You know, you have a decent standing yourself, being a Potter and all. You just don't associate with the right people."
"Screw you, I'll associate with who I will," Harry replied.
There came a short silence, which the pale wizard disrupted with a quiet snigger.
"Care to share the thought?" Harry asked.
"Just the Daily Prophet getting a picture of the Malfoy heir holding on to the Potter heir in the middle of these winds, lying on some rocks."
"I'm not lying on a rock though."
"Really?"
"Yeah, it's sort of squishy."
"Squishy?" Came the disgusted snort from Malfoy.
"Yeah." Mere moments later Harry was cursing. "I thought this was nearly over!" The wind shad once again picked up.
"This is all your fault Potter!"
"How is it mine?!?"
"You're the one who wanted to go this way!"
"Yeah but-" The reply died on Harry's lips as the winds stopped all of a sudden.
"Finally!" Malfoy exclaimed, "We can g-" He stopped mid-sentence and stared down.
The attention of both wizards were drawn downwards to the 'thing' they were living on. It wasn't a squishy rock at all but a living person.
"IS it dead?" Malfoy asked.
"Maybe we should turn it over?" Harry suggested, for they could only se the back of the person.
Carefully, the two wizards turned the body over to see the bruised and scratched up face.
"Shit." The blond aristocrat cursed once more. "Is that Patil?"