A.N.: To those of you who have reviewed, I thank you. Your positive feedback has made this story even more enjoyable to write than it already was. Keep those reviews coming.
Oh, a vote is in order. How about a Ron/Buckbeak paring? Just kidding.
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Chapter 7
It was not often that Lucius Malfoy was to be found with a genuine smile on his face. In fact, the last time that one had made an appearance on that haughty countenance had been at the birth of his son, Draco, a male heir to the vast Malfoy estates. However, even as he was yanked around to face the whelp who had interrupted his little Muggle torture party and as he spat out the word "Potter", that unfamiliar gesture once again crossed his face.
It did not last long.
Malfoy opened his mouth to speak again, perhaps to voice a hearty laugh at his good luck, but then he got a look in the boy's eyes, and the laughter died on his lips as if slapped away.
Something about Potter was very different. He was still a very skinny boy with untidy black hair and round glasses perched atop his nose. He still had the distinctive lightning shaped scar over his brow, and he still had that infuriating expression of quiet strength on his face that had made the elder Malfoy want to whip out his wand and hex the boy in to the next century on countless occasions.
Only the eyes were different. They were calm, with a deeper look of understanding showing from their green depths than Malfoy had ever seen, save maybe in Albus Dumbledore and the Dark Lord. They made the boy look capable of almost anything, and the feeling made Malfoy react unconsciously. Thus it was that barely a second after he had spat out the boy's name like he had just swallowed hippogriff dung than his wand was lifting and he was bellowing "Stupefy!"
The jet of red light that shot from the wand tip was very powerful. Even so, Malfoy was astounded to see the boy, instead of reaching for his wand, merely raise his hand, palm outward, and move it in front of the jet of red light. For a split second, Malfoy had the wild fear that the brat would somehow be able to block the curse, but then the red light made contact with Potter's chest, lifting him off his feet and depositing him on his back, staring in surprise up at the ceiling of the Grangers' foyer.
Surprised, Malfoy bent over the boy to examine him. Sure enough, he was out cold. Sneering in satisfaction, he reached down, ignoring the funny-shaped handle attached to Potter's belt, and pulled the boy's wand from his front pocket. With a muttered curse and a quick wrench, the noble wand of holly and phoenix feather dropped from his hand, snapped in two, bits of feather protruding from each piece like accusing fingers.
Hearing a gasp of horror behind him, Malfoy turned back to the Grangers, smirk returning to his face. Now that he had Potter, he thought he might as well use this time for an educational purpose.
"Well, Mudblood, it appears we have our objective much sooner than expected. I know not how Potter knew we were here, but right now, I really don't care. As we have him, you and your worthless Muggle parents are of no further use to the Dark Lord. However, they may prove useful tonight. Clemens," this last was barked like an army general summoning his troops.
One of the shorter cloaked figures stumbled forward to stand in front of Lucius, bowing his head slightly.
"This is the chance for your first kill, the chance to show your loyalty to the Dark Lord's glory. . Put the Mudblood down!"
With no hesitation, the man called Clemens turned to face Hermione and her parents. At the same instant, his mouth opened, and he uttered the two most feared words in the wizarding world.
"Avada Kedavra!"
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Scott Granger was normally a brave man. He would not have thought twice about facing down an armed gunman if one had been foolish enough to attempt to break in to his house. However, dealing with these men, or heartless replicas of men, was a different story. He found it impossible to fight what he did not understand. Every since his daughter had received her Hogwarts letter, he had grown accustomed to the idea that there would always be things that he would never understand, aspects of his daughter's life as a witch that would constantly cause him to shake his head in wonder or amazement. However, he had not believed for a moment that it would contain so many perils.
After hearing of her adventures with Harry Potter and Ron Weasley in her first year, he had been proud of the part his daughter had played in the whole affair of the Sorcerer's Stone. At that time, his pride had easily overshadowed his caution as his daughter finally had friends, something she had sorely lacked previously.
His concern had started to mount a little more noticeably after the second year, and even years later, he still got a queasy feeling in the pit of his stomach at the thought of his daughter lying petrified and helpless at the mercy of some monster which even she did not understand fully. His wife, too, had been slightly reluctant to let their one and only child return to Hogwarts. But they had given in easily, seeing how much Hermione was enjoying her school and listening to her rave about how noble Harry Potter was, with occasional mentions of Ron thrown in as if in afterthought.
The third year had done nothing for his nerves either. He had received the letter from the headmaster at Hogwarts shortly before Hermione had returned home. He had been shocked to hear of his daughter's run-in with the notorious murderer, Sirius Black. Even he knew that name. Had Black not been on the normal news quite frequently over the past year? To hear that his daughter had actually met the man and escaped with her life sent cold shivers of foreboding down his spine. When she'd gotten home that summer, he had, for the first time, mentioned his misgivings about her returning to the wizarding world; only to receive a shock! Not only had his beloved child met Sirius Black, but she, along with Harry Potter, had contrived his escape from the Ministry of Magic after learning of his innocence. This explanation had taken a long time, with Scott interrupting often with questions about Animagi and werewolves and other such magical terms. Although he had heard of werewolves before, he had been intrigued and slightly curious to have them described to see how much they actually varied from Muggle tales. After nearly half an hour of listening to Hermione talk about how much she had learned from her werewolf professor and how much he had done for her and Harry, he had idly wondered if he might ever have the chance to meet Remus Lupin.
His daughter's explanation had curved his apprehension somewhat, and he had relented in his decision to not allow her to return to Hogwarts.
How he wished he had stuck with his initial idea.
Two days before the last term of her fourth year ended, he had been visited by none other than Sirius Black. After getting over the initial shock of seeing the large bear-like dog turn in to a man right in front of him and remembering his daughter's tale of the man, he had invited the convict in for dinner. It was during this meal that he learned of the Dark Lord's return and the events surrounding it.
He did not have the same understanding of the impact that this could have on the world, wizarding and Muggle alike, until Black had explained about Voldemort's first rise to power. Before the Animagus left that night, his mind was made up. His daughter's life would be in enough danger without exposing her to the increasing hardships in the wizarding world. Without consulting his wife, who had been away at a dental convention in Brussels, he had gone and enrolled his daughter at the local high school. He would tell her at the end of the summer, he decided, not wanting to have her moping around during her vacation.
Now, it appeared as though he could lay his worries about her safety to rest, for the Dark Lord's servants had sought them out, all to try and get at the Potter boy. Now, it appeared, that her friendship with the lad was going to cost her the ultimate price.
He had nearly jumped out of his skin when the front door had been blasted in, then shocked once he had caught a glimpse of the masked and hooded figures that crowded in to his cozy home. His amazement over the turn of events had switched to horror as he was seized by an invisible hand and sent hurtling over the banister to crash on the tiled floor of the foyer several feet below along with his wife and daughter. That horror had only deepened when the blond-haired man had begun taunting Hermione, and peaked when the man had caused his wife to shriek in agony without even touching her.
He had been about to lunge at the man, wand or not, despite his followers, when the curse had been lifted. He had been even further relieved at the Potter boy's appearance behind the masked men, wondering distantly how in hell the boy had found them. However, seeing the boy blasted off his feet before he could do anything to free them brought the fear back to his throat, choking him like a lump of coal.
When he heard the order given for his daughter's death, all reasoning left him. He knew he could do nothing to these men, even if he had a gun, but he was not about to allow his daughter's death while he was still breathing.
So it was that as Clemens uttered the two words Scott Granger had never heard before, yet knew instinctually what they did, the man lunged from the floor, throwing himself across the helpless body of his daughter. Even as he did so, he saw the ominous green light heading toward him, knowing what it meant.
'Goodbye, Hermione. Goodbye, Haylee. I love you both."
He closed his eyes.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Hermione screamed as the two fatal words were spoken, then let out a muffled "ooomph" as her father's weight slammed in to her. Realizing what was going on, her eyes widened in terror as she saw the green light heading straight for them.
She was screaming again, sound muffled by her father's bulk. The Death Eaters were laughing raucously in anticipation of the kill.
And the snap-hiss caused five of the Death Eaters to whirl around, surprise evident in their stances.
Clemens did not turn; instead, he fell to the floor in two neatly cauterized sections, a hint of a sneer still visible beyond the mask that had slipped partially off as he was bisected. The green light too had been thwarted, green striking gold in a cataclysm of color and noise. The result was an enormous fireball which was swatted in annoyance at a second masked figure, causing him to go up like a torch. The sickening smell of frying flesh made Hermione regret the rather large roast beef dinner she had eaten earlier.
All of this, though it took a while to describe, happened in less than two seconds. By that time, the golden light was extinguished and the wand that Lucius Malfoy had been gripping was wrenched from his hand by an invisible force and landed neatly in the outstretched hand of Harry Potter.
Harry raised the wand at Malfoy, but before he could complete the Stunning Spell, Malfoy and the three other remaining Death Eaters had Disapparated.
Swearing softly, and still fighting off the last lingering effects of the Stunning Curse, Harry stumbled woozily over to the grangers who lay on the ground, goggling at him in stupefaction.
"H-H-Harry. What did you do," Hermione asked in utter amazement, and with a little trace of fear evident in her voice.
Coughing slightly, Harry knelt down and peered in to her face to check that she was not harmed. As he gazed in to her depthless brown eyes, he felt something equivalent to an electric shock course through him. It was only a moment, but during that endless time between heartbeats, he forgot everything around him: the fact that her parents were slowly getting to their feet, Mr. Granger assisting an obviously injured Mrs. Granger; the fact that he had just killed two men, even though one had been unintentional; and, most important, the fact that the fire was spreading at an alarming pace around them.
He was brought back to his senses when Mrs. Granger moaned in obvious pain. As he moved to assess the other two in the room, he wondered if the slightly dazed look on Hermione's face meant that she had felt it too.
"Mr. Granger, Mrs. Granger. Can you both walk? We must get out of here immediately. Can you both walk?"
"Now see here, young man," Hermione's father began. "We can't just rush away from here. The police must be notified and---"
He broke off coughing, and looked around in confusion and growing despair.
"Our house," Haylee Granger wailed weakly, following her husband's frantic look around.
"Mrs. Granger, I have little doubt that those men who were just here have gone for reinforcements. We must leave here immediately. I am sorry about your house. I never intended for this to hap---"
"Of course you didn't intend for this to happen, boy," Mr. Granger shouted angrily. "You never intend for things to happen."
He might have gone on, had their not been an obvious groaning from several of the supports in the entrance hall. With a noise between a growl and a sob, Scott Granger picked his wife up in his arms and stumbled shakily from the house. Trying not to let his sorrow at the turn of events and the despair he felt at not being able to save the Grangers' home suffocate him as surely as the smoke was starting to do, Harry carefully bent down, scooped Hermione in his arms, with a little help from the Force, and followed her parents out of the dwelling, trying his best to ignore the sounds of destruction rising in volume behind him, trying to ignore the guilt attempting to force him to his knees, and most of all, trying to close his eyes against the sight of the once elegant structure now being consumed by the flames of the magical fire which continued its accelerated work with emotionless glee.
TBC
Oh, a vote is in order. How about a Ron/Buckbeak paring? Just kidding.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Chapter 7
It was not often that Lucius Malfoy was to be found with a genuine smile on his face. In fact, the last time that one had made an appearance on that haughty countenance had been at the birth of his son, Draco, a male heir to the vast Malfoy estates. However, even as he was yanked around to face the whelp who had interrupted his little Muggle torture party and as he spat out the word "Potter", that unfamiliar gesture once again crossed his face.
It did not last long.
Malfoy opened his mouth to speak again, perhaps to voice a hearty laugh at his good luck, but then he got a look in the boy's eyes, and the laughter died on his lips as if slapped away.
Something about Potter was very different. He was still a very skinny boy with untidy black hair and round glasses perched atop his nose. He still had the distinctive lightning shaped scar over his brow, and he still had that infuriating expression of quiet strength on his face that had made the elder Malfoy want to whip out his wand and hex the boy in to the next century on countless occasions.
Only the eyes were different. They were calm, with a deeper look of understanding showing from their green depths than Malfoy had ever seen, save maybe in Albus Dumbledore and the Dark Lord. They made the boy look capable of almost anything, and the feeling made Malfoy react unconsciously. Thus it was that barely a second after he had spat out the boy's name like he had just swallowed hippogriff dung than his wand was lifting and he was bellowing "Stupefy!"
The jet of red light that shot from the wand tip was very powerful. Even so, Malfoy was astounded to see the boy, instead of reaching for his wand, merely raise his hand, palm outward, and move it in front of the jet of red light. For a split second, Malfoy had the wild fear that the brat would somehow be able to block the curse, but then the red light made contact with Potter's chest, lifting him off his feet and depositing him on his back, staring in surprise up at the ceiling of the Grangers' foyer.
Surprised, Malfoy bent over the boy to examine him. Sure enough, he was out cold. Sneering in satisfaction, he reached down, ignoring the funny-shaped handle attached to Potter's belt, and pulled the boy's wand from his front pocket. With a muttered curse and a quick wrench, the noble wand of holly and phoenix feather dropped from his hand, snapped in two, bits of feather protruding from each piece like accusing fingers.
Hearing a gasp of horror behind him, Malfoy turned back to the Grangers, smirk returning to his face. Now that he had Potter, he thought he might as well use this time for an educational purpose.
"Well, Mudblood, it appears we have our objective much sooner than expected. I know not how Potter knew we were here, but right now, I really don't care. As we have him, you and your worthless Muggle parents are of no further use to the Dark Lord. However, they may prove useful tonight. Clemens," this last was barked like an army general summoning his troops.
One of the shorter cloaked figures stumbled forward to stand in front of Lucius, bowing his head slightly.
"This is the chance for your first kill, the chance to show your loyalty to the Dark Lord's glory. . Put the Mudblood down!"
With no hesitation, the man called Clemens turned to face Hermione and her parents. At the same instant, his mouth opened, and he uttered the two most feared words in the wizarding world.
"Avada Kedavra!"
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Scott Granger was normally a brave man. He would not have thought twice about facing down an armed gunman if one had been foolish enough to attempt to break in to his house. However, dealing with these men, or heartless replicas of men, was a different story. He found it impossible to fight what he did not understand. Every since his daughter had received her Hogwarts letter, he had grown accustomed to the idea that there would always be things that he would never understand, aspects of his daughter's life as a witch that would constantly cause him to shake his head in wonder or amazement. However, he had not believed for a moment that it would contain so many perils.
After hearing of her adventures with Harry Potter and Ron Weasley in her first year, he had been proud of the part his daughter had played in the whole affair of the Sorcerer's Stone. At that time, his pride had easily overshadowed his caution as his daughter finally had friends, something she had sorely lacked previously.
His concern had started to mount a little more noticeably after the second year, and even years later, he still got a queasy feeling in the pit of his stomach at the thought of his daughter lying petrified and helpless at the mercy of some monster which even she did not understand fully. His wife, too, had been slightly reluctant to let their one and only child return to Hogwarts. But they had given in easily, seeing how much Hermione was enjoying her school and listening to her rave about how noble Harry Potter was, with occasional mentions of Ron thrown in as if in afterthought.
The third year had done nothing for his nerves either. He had received the letter from the headmaster at Hogwarts shortly before Hermione had returned home. He had been shocked to hear of his daughter's run-in with the notorious murderer, Sirius Black. Even he knew that name. Had Black not been on the normal news quite frequently over the past year? To hear that his daughter had actually met the man and escaped with her life sent cold shivers of foreboding down his spine. When she'd gotten home that summer, he had, for the first time, mentioned his misgivings about her returning to the wizarding world; only to receive a shock! Not only had his beloved child met Sirius Black, but she, along with Harry Potter, had contrived his escape from the Ministry of Magic after learning of his innocence. This explanation had taken a long time, with Scott interrupting often with questions about Animagi and werewolves and other such magical terms. Although he had heard of werewolves before, he had been intrigued and slightly curious to have them described to see how much they actually varied from Muggle tales. After nearly half an hour of listening to Hermione talk about how much she had learned from her werewolf professor and how much he had done for her and Harry, he had idly wondered if he might ever have the chance to meet Remus Lupin.
His daughter's explanation had curved his apprehension somewhat, and he had relented in his decision to not allow her to return to Hogwarts.
How he wished he had stuck with his initial idea.
Two days before the last term of her fourth year ended, he had been visited by none other than Sirius Black. After getting over the initial shock of seeing the large bear-like dog turn in to a man right in front of him and remembering his daughter's tale of the man, he had invited the convict in for dinner. It was during this meal that he learned of the Dark Lord's return and the events surrounding it.
He did not have the same understanding of the impact that this could have on the world, wizarding and Muggle alike, until Black had explained about Voldemort's first rise to power. Before the Animagus left that night, his mind was made up. His daughter's life would be in enough danger without exposing her to the increasing hardships in the wizarding world. Without consulting his wife, who had been away at a dental convention in Brussels, he had gone and enrolled his daughter at the local high school. He would tell her at the end of the summer, he decided, not wanting to have her moping around during her vacation.
Now, it appeared as though he could lay his worries about her safety to rest, for the Dark Lord's servants had sought them out, all to try and get at the Potter boy. Now, it appeared, that her friendship with the lad was going to cost her the ultimate price.
He had nearly jumped out of his skin when the front door had been blasted in, then shocked once he had caught a glimpse of the masked and hooded figures that crowded in to his cozy home. His amazement over the turn of events had switched to horror as he was seized by an invisible hand and sent hurtling over the banister to crash on the tiled floor of the foyer several feet below along with his wife and daughter. That horror had only deepened when the blond-haired man had begun taunting Hermione, and peaked when the man had caused his wife to shriek in agony without even touching her.
He had been about to lunge at the man, wand or not, despite his followers, when the curse had been lifted. He had been even further relieved at the Potter boy's appearance behind the masked men, wondering distantly how in hell the boy had found them. However, seeing the boy blasted off his feet before he could do anything to free them brought the fear back to his throat, choking him like a lump of coal.
When he heard the order given for his daughter's death, all reasoning left him. He knew he could do nothing to these men, even if he had a gun, but he was not about to allow his daughter's death while he was still breathing.
So it was that as Clemens uttered the two words Scott Granger had never heard before, yet knew instinctually what they did, the man lunged from the floor, throwing himself across the helpless body of his daughter. Even as he did so, he saw the ominous green light heading toward him, knowing what it meant.
'Goodbye, Hermione. Goodbye, Haylee. I love you both."
He closed his eyes.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Hermione screamed as the two fatal words were spoken, then let out a muffled "ooomph" as her father's weight slammed in to her. Realizing what was going on, her eyes widened in terror as she saw the green light heading straight for them.
She was screaming again, sound muffled by her father's bulk. The Death Eaters were laughing raucously in anticipation of the kill.
And the snap-hiss caused five of the Death Eaters to whirl around, surprise evident in their stances.
Clemens did not turn; instead, he fell to the floor in two neatly cauterized sections, a hint of a sneer still visible beyond the mask that had slipped partially off as he was bisected. The green light too had been thwarted, green striking gold in a cataclysm of color and noise. The result was an enormous fireball which was swatted in annoyance at a second masked figure, causing him to go up like a torch. The sickening smell of frying flesh made Hermione regret the rather large roast beef dinner she had eaten earlier.
All of this, though it took a while to describe, happened in less than two seconds. By that time, the golden light was extinguished and the wand that Lucius Malfoy had been gripping was wrenched from his hand by an invisible force and landed neatly in the outstretched hand of Harry Potter.
Harry raised the wand at Malfoy, but before he could complete the Stunning Spell, Malfoy and the three other remaining Death Eaters had Disapparated.
Swearing softly, and still fighting off the last lingering effects of the Stunning Curse, Harry stumbled woozily over to the grangers who lay on the ground, goggling at him in stupefaction.
"H-H-Harry. What did you do," Hermione asked in utter amazement, and with a little trace of fear evident in her voice.
Coughing slightly, Harry knelt down and peered in to her face to check that she was not harmed. As he gazed in to her depthless brown eyes, he felt something equivalent to an electric shock course through him. It was only a moment, but during that endless time between heartbeats, he forgot everything around him: the fact that her parents were slowly getting to their feet, Mr. Granger assisting an obviously injured Mrs. Granger; the fact that he had just killed two men, even though one had been unintentional; and, most important, the fact that the fire was spreading at an alarming pace around them.
He was brought back to his senses when Mrs. Granger moaned in obvious pain. As he moved to assess the other two in the room, he wondered if the slightly dazed look on Hermione's face meant that she had felt it too.
"Mr. Granger, Mrs. Granger. Can you both walk? We must get out of here immediately. Can you both walk?"
"Now see here, young man," Hermione's father began. "We can't just rush away from here. The police must be notified and---"
He broke off coughing, and looked around in confusion and growing despair.
"Our house," Haylee Granger wailed weakly, following her husband's frantic look around.
"Mrs. Granger, I have little doubt that those men who were just here have gone for reinforcements. We must leave here immediately. I am sorry about your house. I never intended for this to hap---"
"Of course you didn't intend for this to happen, boy," Mr. Granger shouted angrily. "You never intend for things to happen."
He might have gone on, had their not been an obvious groaning from several of the supports in the entrance hall. With a noise between a growl and a sob, Scott Granger picked his wife up in his arms and stumbled shakily from the house. Trying not to let his sorrow at the turn of events and the despair he felt at not being able to save the Grangers' home suffocate him as surely as the smoke was starting to do, Harry carefully bent down, scooped Hermione in his arms, with a little help from the Force, and followed her parents out of the dwelling, trying his best to ignore the sounds of destruction rising in volume behind him, trying to ignore the guilt attempting to force him to his knees, and most of all, trying to close his eyes against the sight of the once elegant structure now being consumed by the flames of the magical fire which continued its accelerated work with emotionless glee.
TBC