The Dead Village
That cryptic remark was met with horror by the Order of the Phoenix. Snape didn't look up. Harry's grip tightened. Ron, who had crossed the room in one stride, was in an embrace with his father. Remus clutched the back of his chair. The quill Tonks was holding dropped to the floor with a clatter. Mundungus began heavily smoking, clouds of thick smoke drifted across the room instantly, and Hermione nervously began adding more sugar to any teacup before her.
It wasn't often that Albus Dumbledore was so negative or so blunt.
"The pieces of black and white are moving across the board," he continued, "but grey is not – we have readied ourselves for situations worse than the ones we are faced with now – the Aurors and the Ministry are at our side and we-"
"-Will not be beaten." A rather thinner than usual Cornelius Fudge said, stepped out from behind Dumbledore, clothed in a long, extravagant plum coloured robe with matching bowler.
"I was going to say 'will stand together'," Dumbledore amended, smiling sadly.
"Oh! Dreadfully sorry!" He didn't look it.
Addressing the Order once more and assuming his seat at the head of the table, Fudge by his side, the Head Master began the meeting. "By Ministry reports the Muggle death toll in inner London has reached two hundred and twenty three. Which means, Voldemort," here a collective shudder ran through the room, "has at least that number of active followers…Severus, have you any information regarding numbers? Had we not presumed more than a hundred but less than two?"
Snape, who had been paying close attention to every grain of wood on the table, was holding an expression most unlike his usual death-glare.
"They will pick us off again, Dumbledore, one by one, until nothing and no-one, no not even you Potter," he snapped, "will stand in they're way."
The familiar uneasy silence filled a room so used to secrets, not a feather moving until, Hermione raised a tentative hand high.
"Miss Granger," Snape spat, feigning politeness, "10 points from… from your first child, if I have the unfortunate of teaching at Hogwarts for that long, for acting as though we – are – still – in – potions."
The girl, fading into the poorly lit back ground in a black tee shirt suddenly stood out, cheeks pink. "Draco Malfoy."
The ten most talked about and highly elusive wizards and witches this side of The Leaky Cauldron turned to face her.
Dumbledore took of his half moon glasses, the penetrating azure gaze cutting straight through Hermione like a knife.
"Draco Malfoy must have had a tracking spell on one of us," she pointed to herself, Harry and Ron, "since there was no other way he could have got into Grimmauld Place, but I read in Transportation Spells of the Last Century that it always works in reverse. Couldn't we make the spell go the other way?"
Dumbledore, who she had been speaking mostly too, looked at her neutrally. The adult members of the Order looked interested; Ron was mouthing 'still teachers pet' at her. Only Snape and Harry maintained they're sour expressions, perhaps the only thing they'd ever shared.
"It couldn't have been Harry," Lupin stated, looking towards him, "Albus made you Unplottable."
The headmaster eyes were suddenly alight with worry as he faced Hermione. "This will be a most dangerous task, Miss Granger."
- - - -
The knocking on her bedroom door wasn't answered.
Nor was it locked.
The heavy brass doorknob turned as Hermione sat, legs curled under her, leaning against the headboard facing it. A thick text book in her hands. She didn't make a move to stop it or call out.
But a young man, barely taller than her, hands clasped in front of glasses and what appeared to be closed eyes stumbled through doorway anyway. Piles of books hindered his path as he made his way to the edge of the double bed.
"Hermione? Are you getting dressed?" He veered around a particularly large stack of Jane Austin novels.
"Harry Potter," she scolded through a wry smile, "I can see you peaking."
Harry dropped his hands, an unamused smile that didn't reach his eyes on his face and sank into the bed, looking drained.
"Where's Ron?" Hermione asked, expecting the black haired boy's partner in crime to be the other side of the door.
"Gone back to the Burrow with Mr. Weasley for tonight. He wanted to see Ginny and his mum. He invited us too, but Dumbledore didn't think we should be leaving." he paused for a moment, "I guess you're on the Death Eater hit list too after this morning."
The small smile that had been previously playing across his lips disappeared as though it had never been there.
"I'm really sorry, Hermione, I don't know what happened. I didn't mean to scare you – or hex Malfoy," his voice cracked, "I'm so – so – sorry-"
"It's okay," Hermione said gently. "I don't blame you, really, you've seen and been through so much. But, Harry that doesn't mean you can use those kind of curses on anyone, Death Eaters or not. The Order doesn't – that's not the type of hex we fight with. That's what separates us from them. Even Aurors only use them as a last resort."
Hermione's monologue was only answered by the soft shuffling of Harry as he flicked through the book she had been reading.
"What is this?" he asked, pointing to the book and a particular diagram on page 156 of human anatomy, "what are you reading?"
"It's a science text book. Honestly, Harry, I thought you went to Muggle primary school," Hermione laughed softly as he turned the book around as to get a better look, "I never thought of you as the Boy Who Perved."
"Why are you reading Muggle school books?" Harry didn't return her smile; instead he shut the book and was looking gloomier than before, "is this about your parents?"
Hermione's face fell.
"I really couldn't expect them to be like they always were… I hadn't seen them nearly three years-"
"But they didn't turn up at your graduation; you don't blame yourself do you?"
"No, of course not," she replied a little waspishly, "but Hogwarts was something my parents could never understand, they tried, they always tried, but they just couldn't get how I could fight in a war and they could be completely oblivious."
"Then why the book?"
"The war won't last forever..." once Hermione had said it, she immediately regretted it. A painful expression was on her best friend's face - a mixture of pain, fear and longing.
"You mean when one of us is dead?" He snapped, a little too sharply.
"I mean," Hermione spoke earnestly, "there are far more important things than dying."
She got no answer.
"Like living."
Harry swallowed.
"My parent's can't face the fact that I want to become involved in something that chose me – but that doesn't matter to me, I'd follow you and Ron anywhere," she bit her lip thoughtfully, "after all you never did get me expelled. Here we are. Adults. Does being eighteen make you feel different?"
"Not really – I think somewhere I'm still eleven. 'Cept now I'm a bit taller." He smiled a shadow of his more careless younger self, and rubbed a bracelet on his arm absentmindedly. "Do you ever wonder where we'd be if we weren't magical?"
"Some where between Surrey Library and madness, I'd expect."
"Well, I'd still be looking for my head down a toilet of Stonewall High – my cousin and his friends were scary. Especially if he sat on you… except I always prevented him from doing too much damage. My first ever wandless magic was to escape him – ended up on the roof of my primary school," Harry grinned, somewhat proudly, at the memory, "what was your first wandless magic?"
Hermione looked guilty for a moment.
"What was it?" He pressed.
"Whenever I got particularly upset about something I had a tendency to set it on fire."
"You're kidding!" Harry looked slightly gleeful. "What did you burn?"
"It was only in extreme circumstances! And it was only that waterproof blue bell fire spell…"
"Only? Hermione! That fire burns through anything!"
The studious girl looked more than a little sheepish now, a flustered blush was creeping up her cheeks. "Yes… it took seven members of the Accidental Magic Reversal Squad to stop me burning down our kitchen."
Harry looked at her, mouth agape. "You never told us this."
Hermione wrinkled her nose. "Oh, because Ron would never let me hear the end of it."
- - - -
"I suppose technically you are meant to have three years of training to be suitable for this kind of – "
"You just focus on getting out alive, girl," the gruff voice of Mad Eye Moody called as he circled her. "The Disillusionment Charm's done. But that doesn't mean you're undetectable. Wherever that Malfoy boy is, it will most defiantly be guarded well. He Who Must Not Be Named keeps his secrets."
Hermione bit her lip and Tonks winked encouragingly as she performed her own spell.
"Now Granger, Tonks, Lupin, and I will be doing the work, you're just our ticket there. Once, and I repeat, once we are there you Apparate back here," he barked harshly and slowly, "always be on your guard and-"
"Moody, Hermione was the best student seen at Hogwarts for nearly a hundred years, and no matter how many times you say something, she won't forget it." Lupin's voice the other side of her said.
Dumbledore stepped forward towards the rippling mass of dirty cream wallpaper that now was Hermione, Lupin, Tonks and Mad Eyed Moody. "Good luck, Miss Granger, you are in excellent hands."
Exactly who was in whose hands she wasn't quite sure. Hermione was actually feeling quite self-conscious. Tight black clothes, which Moody had informed her, would be good for disguise purposes clung to her like a second skin. The fact that two of her former professors where clutching her hands tightly along with a witch who had to be bribed to change her pink hair and was wearing fishnet stockings. A black knitted hat was the only thing taming unruly curls.
Not a thought was spared towards the peril that possibly awaited at the end of the spell, least of all where and who with they would find themselves, except Hermione briefly prayed that she wouldn't end up in a shower with Malfoy as she called out the incantation –
"Inflecto Draco Malfoy!"
The short buzzing feeling of Apparating suddenly took affect and dozens of miles now separated the three members of the Order of the Phoenix from they're original location.
"Where is this place?" Called Lupin's voice from Hermione's left.
Where they stood, all holding onto various parts of the girl's bare arms was in fact in front of a near derelict pub; it didn't have any windows, just a large brown door. But all Hermione could see was black. Black and a vast amount of bottom-of-the-sea green.
Next to the old building was a large amount of heavy fern trees, blocking whatever was behind totally. Only an un-lit road pathed it's way through the dark. A small sign printed in peeling faded letters stood before them.
"Little Hangleton, eh? Doesn't look like there's much of anything left," he muttered, "be very quiet, girl, and follow us. Are you sure you said the spell right?"
"Yes. But isn't it meant to take us straight to Malfoy?"
Ignoring the question Moody's magically eye settled firmly on her. "Now, Granger – if one of us is killed go straight back to Grimmauld Place, got it? We don't break ranks for -"
Tonks' voice interrupted what Hermione suspected was a standard rant from the old Auror. "Don't be mad, Mad-Eye, we're not going to die."
Blanketed as they were in the star-less and moon-less night sky only the dim grey light to lead them as they stepped closer to the pub something felt horrible wrong.
Lupin held back, looking around intently.
Tonks looked at him. "What's wrong, Remus?" She asked, peering at him.
Moody turned back to them, holding his hand out and gesturing for the near invisible Hermione should stop.
"I smell death."
He strode past his companions and twisted the doorknob and disappeared behind the door, above which a traditional sign read 'The Hanged Man', the hinges squeaking un-welcome.
Following him and quickly drawing out they're wands they entered the black as pitch room.
Standing as much in the room as she dared Hermione couldn't see anything, but the smell was terrible. It reeked of rot and wood. And… something else.
"Why are we all standing about in the dark?" Tonks asked, her voice sounding far away.
A smash of glass against hard wood was heard.
"Lumos." Said all four of them.
Immediately, they all wished they hadn't. In the centre of the room was the glass that Tonks' smashed and around that was eyes.
Pairs of blank-staring eyes and they're forgotten corpses. Men women and children stacked on top of each other were piled around the sides of the expansive room. Dried sickly red blood stained the walls, the floor and the bar.
Horror and terror flooded through Hermione like a bucket of iced water had been thrown over her head. Bile rose in her throat and she longed to scream, call for help and cry out in frustration. Innocent Muggles had been slain, and some where, Draco Malfoy was here. And he was going to pay.
Tonks clutched the bar for support and even Disillusioned Lupin looked as white as the full moon. Moody was only slightly more composed, his marred face twisted was limping towards the other side of the room where large windows were. Covered in heavy drapes.
With a quick severing spell the curtains fell away leaving only black and a lot of glittering lights. The odd grey sky just illuminated an enormous graveyard in the heart of the village and few houses around it, although large daunting house sat atop a hill. Too far away to be seen clearly, there were hundreds of people.
People who rightly, didn't belong there.
The men and women clothed in long black cloaks, hoods drawn back were without a doubt not the original inhabitants of the village. They were Death Eaters.
Four of which were getting closer, and clearer as they approached The Hanged Man.
"Mad-Eye?" Tonks asked uncertainly.
"Right, Lupin and I will see if we can gather any information of what exactly has happened here," he grunted as his magical eye revolved, "and you stay and watch Granger. Wait for us here."
The formally pink haired girl frowned and stretched out a hand to take Hermione's. "Merlin, be careful…"
Once they had Apparated, presumably to the other side of the building where hundreds of Death Eater Lumos spells lit the sky like ominous star streetlights.
"Nox."
"Are you all right there, Hermione?" Tonks quietly asked the girl who was watching the window with a fascination as she too extinguished her wand although hesitatingly.
"Draco Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle, and I think, Marcus Flint are just about to come in here." Hermione replied in a matter-of-fact manner.
In a whirl Tonks' Auror training took over, throwing the younger girl towards the bar and horrifyingly close to a Muggle old woman, lying across the floor.
"Hide and don't come out, Hermione!" Tonks' voice whispered.
The opposite oak door creaked open.
Hermione froze in horror just in front of the bar.
A shadowy figure appeared behind the gap, hood apparently drawn over its head.
Turning back to the scene, wand drawn Hermione was about to yell out a spell-
"NO!" the bodiless voice yelled, the sound echoing around the darkened walls.
The shadow's wand was now reflecting what little light was in the room.
"Petrificus Totalus!" shouted Tonks', stepping forward, no longer chameleon like under the spell, "GET OUT OF HERE!" she called to Hermione, looking fanatically around the room for signs of the girl.
Once she had yelled it, Crabbe, Goyle and the past Slytherin Quidditch captain burst through the door, blasting it, and the large panelled window out of the way with what looked like boulders.
The force of the explosion blasted everything from where it stood and as Hermione landed the other side of the bar, hit the wall and possibly a lot of long forgotten glasses, black slowly enveloped around her.
More spells were exchanged and reflected.
Through the mist, as she was sliding down the wall, she saw another explosion, which was far the most unforgivable and unforgettable thing she had ever seen.
Green light.
Unleashed as though it was never contained, it struck the intended target with finesse of carefully trained lightning. The last thing Hermione saw, as she felt blood run down the back of her neck and her knees buckle was a hand stretching out to clutch her and… Tonks falling backwards.
Dedicated to Talon, the reviewers and of course, the wonderful posters at the L&L fictionally board.
Sobbing Authors Note: It was less choppy, right? It was appallingly hard to write. Appalling. Since I set in all out in a nice little notepad and I had to just write around the bullet points. Originally it didn't end quite like that (there was another scene) but I thought I'd pause it until next chapter. Oh yes, the suspense. Most of these scenes are started half way through them, since as you can probably tell, I'm hopeless at small talk. Unless it's marginally witty. Please pay attention to the Harry/Hermione conversation. It has plot points I promise. And as for the usual Sidekick!Ron, he won't be boring… that much. Sorry about the attempt at angst. Will burn it, I promise.
Sobbing Authors Disclaimer: Must… kill… JK… heh. Joking.
(Thank you one and all!) Sobbing Reviewers:
SilverCoin aka Veronika- Thank you! I try so desperately hard to make them not-that-ooc. Some times it even takes 3 or 4 drafts. Ah, yes, a lot happens in the first chapter so its a little confusing...
Black*Draconis - wow, thanks! Death threats already, huh? LOL I feel just like Sir Arthur Conan Doyle!
Black Rein - I'm glad :D
Thalion1 - you want to share Draco? *splutters* well I suppose since you like my fic you can have him Mondays, Wednesdays and we can alternate Saturdays :)
LoveSpell - *blushes* why thank you O_o
bessorla- thanks for the CC, its my first fanfic, so I need all the help I can get lol, I adored your "Chocolate" fic
Menace of Mine - thats the funniest death threat I've ever heard :D Yes, Harry has gone loco, maybe we can redeem him. Or kill him. Ah! Plot bunny!
Dark Raven - thank you :) Ah! the pressure!
a la sombra - Don't worry, I will defiantly continue. At the rate of a very fast snail.
Aurora - Yes expect muchly more D/Hr action *cheery wink*
Caprigrrl Lannoire - oh, I'm really glad you think so... the Hermione/tea cup scene was very much inspired by me talking to my coffee cup after seeing The Ring so it was all very bleak. Did I use 'Mione' too much? Ack!
Caprigrrl Lannoire(take two) - oh... my. That is without a doubt the biggest compliment anyone has ever paid me. I think that is probably the best line I've written *grin* glad you like it - Voldemort has so much going for him to write as a character. That evil git. Thanks again. Please review any time you'd like.
SkYdIvE_babe - thank you, ah yes, nothing does quite beat the bouncing rat... except for jeans!draco *swoon* *glare* and I did learn from the best *coughmrhullet* and all that huxley ... original works of fiction. your fic better be coming along, girl, or Draco is mine MIIIINE (and sam - maybe we could get him to wear leather pants to work)
pencil gal - Draco is always on the winning side. Therefore he is on the Draco-side. Everyone is asking for answers, but honestly, if I gave them all too you in the first 2 chapters I'd be a terrible author. After all, you get 20 chapters into OotP and you *still* don't get answers.
glacial - thankyouverymuch. As Black As Hell As Dark As Night has been deleted, because quite simply it was crap. I hope you enjoy this one much more though... it has a plot and *holds out green and silver present* DRACO