Chapter Two:
"Emergency portkeys, now!" Mum cried, before running off into the battle torn street. Michelle, Ashley and Peter didn't hesitate to activate their portkeys, and once they were gone, Taylor and Paul exchanged a look before running after Taylor's mum.
Taylor dodged a curse, throwing up a shield to deflect another one. She kept close behind Paul as they made their way through the ruins that were Diagon Alley.
"Stupefy!" Taylor called and her Stunner shot out at a Death Eater who had stepped around the corner.
"Expelliarmus!" Paul cried at the back of a Death Eater as he was mid curse. Taylor caught the Death eater's fallen wand, snapped it over her knee before stunning the cloaked man.
"Thanks," a voice said and Taylor realized that the Death Eater had been about to curse non other than Harry Potter. His friends, Hermione, Ron and Ginny where all standing beside him, wands out firing various curses at attacking Death Eaters, their bags and packages laying scattered and forgotten on the ground.
"Not a problem," Paul replied.
"Duck," Hermione cried and the four of them dropped to the ground.
Taylor threw her hand out in front of them and a bright pink orb shot out of her hands and surrounded them. It was instantly silent, all except for muffled shouts and the soft hum of her shield.
"Nice shield," Hermione commented, looking up.
"We need to get out of here," Ginny said.
"Yeah, I doubt Taylor can hold that spell forever," Harry said. Taylor blinked at him, honestly surprised that he knew her name.
"I have a portkey on my wrist," Taylor replied. "If we can all touch it at once, we can get out of here."
"Excellent," Ron said and they quickly grabbed their fallen belonging and touched her bracelet. Taylor brought her shield down and squeezed the heart charm dangling from her bracelet, feeling the familiar tug behind her navel as they were pulled to safety. All six of them were gone before a spell could touch them.
They landed with a thud on Taylor's sitting room floor, inches from where she had sat less than an hour ago. Paul and Ron had ended up on the bottom of the six teenage body pile and groaned from the weight. Taylor picked herself up and helped Hermione to her feet as each of the others got to their feet as well.
"Where are we?" Harry asked immediately, looking around.
"You're at my house," Taylor replied. At that moment Michelle, Ashley and Peter all came running into the room.
"Where have you been?" Michelle asked.
"Where's Mum?" Peter asked.
"The attack on Diagon Alley is all over the Wizarding Wireless," Ashley said.
"Why are they all in our house?" Michelle asked, looking at their guests.
Taylor sighed, annoyed and a bit embarrassed at her siblings.
"Michelle, Ashley and Peter, meet Hermione, Ron, Harry and Ginny. Hermione, Ron, Harry and Ginny, please meet my siblings, Gryffindor, Hufflepuff and to be determined at the sorting." Taylor's sisters smiled and said hi, even though Michelle was in the same house with the four newcomers. "Girls and Pete, we all needed a way out of Diagon Alley and my portkey came in handy."
"As did your wandless shield," Ron said, sounding impressed. "Where did you learn that?"
Taylor blushed. "Well, last year when we had that awful Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Umbridge,-"
"Please, lets not say the name," Ginny groaned.
"True," Taylor agreed and continued. "Paul and I decided that we didn't want to fail our exams, so we practiced Defense on our own. And the wandless stuff is genetic."
"Oh, I'm so sorry!" Hermione cried, clapping a hand over her mouth.
"Its not anything you could have controlled, Hermione. You see, it runs in my family and-"
"No, I mean for not including you and Paul in the D.A.!" Hermione exclaimed.
"The D.A.?" Paul asked.
"It's the underground Defense practice club we started last year," Harry explained. "We didn't want to fail our exams either and we wanted to prepare our selves for what was outside of school."
"Oh," Taylor replied. "I'd heard a rumor about that and thought that it was just that."
"But it didn't even occur to me to include either of you in it," Hermione repeated. "And you sleep in the same room as me! How could I have been that rude?"
"None of us thought about it," Harry said, turning to Hermione. "It's not just your fault."
"It's not that big of a deal," Taylor said. "Honestly, it's okay. I'm not exactly used to being included in things like that."
"You will be now," Harry said firmly. "Both you and Paul."
"And Claire Veca as well," Hermione said. "You all slipped my mind."
"Not a big deal," Paul said. "I was busy last year anyway, with Prefect duties and chess club, Transfiguration club and an Ancient Ruins study course. And this year will be worse, with N.E.W.T.'s and running the Prefect meetings and-"
"You're Head Boy?" Hermione asked and Paul nodded. Taylor beamed at her boyfriend. She already knew, of course, and could not have been prouder of him.
"We'll make D.A. work into your schedule," Harry said. "We owe you each that much for saving our lives."
"Really, it was nothing," Taylor repeated.
"It was amazing spell work," Ron said.
"Thanks," Taylor said, blushing again.
"You did a spell in Diagon Alley?" Ashely asked, her eyes growing wide. "You know you're not supposed to do magic out side of school, what with the Decree for Underage-"
"It doesn't count if it's an emergency," Taylor said to her sister, cutting her off.
"We should let someone know where we are," Ginny said.
"Oh, our Floo gets shut off when one of our emergency portkeys gets activated," Taylor explained. "And the house becomes unplottable, and about fifty more wards get activated, and all incoming mail is redirected. And on a normal basis, you can't Apparate or Disapparate in or out of the house. Mum is an Auror and a bit paranoid."
"Yeah, you could say that," Ron replied.
"But outgoing mail still works," Taylor suggested. "You can use my owl."
As Ginny sent a letter to her mum, Taylor led everyone into the kitchen.
"Is anyone hungry?" Taylor asked. "I could have Babbin fix us up something to eat."
"Babbin?" Harry asked.
Taylor nodded. "She's our house elf."
"You have a house elf?" Hermione asked and Harry and Ron rolled their eyes. Luckily, Taylor knew what was coming.
"Yes, and before you ask, she has always been free and paid. Her family has been working free of obligation for my family since… well, since around the time Hogwarts was founded, and they have always been free."
"You do realize that you just prevented her from giving information on her favorite cause," Harry said.
"Yeah, spew," Ron added.
"Its not spew, Ron," Hermione said. "It's S.P.E.W."
"And I paid up my galleon right away," Taylor said.
"Something to eat sounds like a good idea, actually," Ron said, and Taylor laughed to herself. She knew her house mate would never pass up a meal.
"Do you know how long it will take for someone from the Order to get here?" Harry asked.
Taylor shrugged. "Mum can reverse the magic that the emergency portkeys activated. She should be home soon."
"Unless she has to work for a while now," Michelle said.
"If that's the case, then the Floo will reactivate within twenty four hours," Taylor said.
"Which means that I should send an owl to my mother as well," Paul said as Ginny came back into the room.
"We might be here overnight?" Ron asked, and Taylor put on an expression of feint insult. "Not that it would be a bad thing, I just…"
Taylor laughed. "We have plenty of rooms, and showers and food. Besides, I doubt it will come to that. Mum should be back ay time now."
But Taylor's mother did not return. After they had filled themselves with Babbin's excellent cooking, Taylor began to worry a bit. The headache forming between her eyes and an odd fuzzy sound in her ears did not ease her fears.
She gave them all a grand tour of their house, which was not overly large, but it still boasted six bedrooms, eight bathrooms, and three floors. They all settled into the sitting room, and Paul took up Ron's chess challenge.
"Finally, someone else for him to play with," Harry said to Taylor as Ron and Paul began moving their pieces across the chess board in Taylor's sitting room. Each set was polite enough to their masters, but still argued a bit.
"So your brother is starting at Hogwarts this year?" Hermione asked, sitting next to her on the sofa.
"Yes," Taylor replied.
"He seems sort of…" Hermione began, but stopped unable to find the correct word.
"Unpleasant?" Taylor supplied for her. Hermione looked at her, not sure to agree or not and Taylor laughed. "It's all right, Hermione. He is very unpleasant. I highly doubt he will get sorted into Gryffindor. He's not the type."
"And your sisters?"
"Michelle is a Gryffindor third year," Taylor replied. "And Ashley is a Hufflepuff third year."
"And they're twins, right?"
"Yeah, but they don't get along at all," Taylor said, glancing up at the ceiling again. Peter had sulked off to his room, and the girls had said something about finishing up summer homework before heading up the stairs.
"Your house is amazing," Ginny said as she came into the room and took a seat opposite Hermione. "And this room, it sort of reminds me of-"
"The Gryffindor common room?" Taylor asked.
"That's it!" Hermione exclaimed. "That's it exactly, I could figure it out before, but this room defiantly had a strong resemblance to the common room."
Taylor shrugged. "This house has been in the family for ages, about as long as Bibben's family has worked for us. I'm sure it hasn't been updated since Hogwarts was founded."
Ginny had a shocked look on her face, and Hermione looked like something was dawning on her. Whatever it was she kept to herself and looked back at the game Paul and Ron were now completely engrossed in.
As the clock chimed quarter till midnight, Taylor became even more worried. Bibben came in and suggested that they all needed a hot bath and a good night's rest. The six teenagers agreed and followed as Bibben showed Hermione and Ginny to their room and Ron and Harry to theirs.
"Don't worry about your mum," Paul said putting his arms around her. "She can take care of herself."
"I know," she sighed into his chest.
"Besides, all the incoming communications are shut off," Paul explained. "She may be trying to let you know that she's had to work and you just aren't getting the message."
"But do you remember when my grandmum died before I went to Hogwarts?" Taylor asked. "Mum and I both had horrible sounds of lions roaring in our ears. This was before the news of Grandmum's death reached us."
"I remember," Paul stated.
"Well, I have this horrible headache between my eyes," Taylor said. "And my ears are killing me. It feels as though something is roaring right in my ear. I mean it makes sense, mum had said that as each heir dies, the others below feel a pain that only the heirs can tolerate."
"Taylor," I'm sure your mum is fine," he said, putting his hands on her shoulders and looking her square in the eyes, which was difficult for him as he was at least six inches taller than her. "It's just in your head. Get some sleep."
Taylor nodded and watched him walk back down the stairs to sleep on the couch. She had already informed him that it wouldn't be a good idea if her mum came home late at night and found them sharing a room, much less a bed. Boyfriend or not, her mother was still a bid old fashioned.
Taylor changed for bed and wrote a note to her mum, leaving it on the table for her to read when she came home. Taylor thought it was best not to be present when her mother found out that she had four unexpected house guests.
As she lay down to sleep, her head resting on her pillow she sighed and tried to ignore the steady roar in her ears, which was now a bit louder than it had been before.
"Godric Gryffindor," she whispered to the darkness. "Why must you cause this noise in my head? After a day like to day, I need some sleep. Please Godric, make it stop so I may rest." Slowly she drifted to sleep, the sound slowly lessening, allowing her to fall into a deep peaceful sleep.
