The three boys arrived outside the manor, on the far side of the gate, having successfully apparated one and all, once Draco had clued Harry and Ron in on exactly where it was they were going.

Arriving at a place by apparition was not the same as arriving via portkey; there was no loss of balance, no ungainly stumbling or falling to the ground- at least, not under normal circumstances. This time proved to be the exception to that general rule, however- thanks entirely to Draco who, the instant the apparition was complete, seized both Harry and Ron and yanked them, hard, before they had fully gotten their bearings, to the ground.

The result was that while Draco managed to drop into a crouching position with all of his inherent grace intact, Ron and Harry both went sprawling full-out on the ground. As they pushed themselves back up to their knees a moment later, Ron was snarling and looking as though there was nothing he would have liked more in the world than to launch himself at Draco. Harry put a restraining hand on his arm which Ron, furious, shook off instantly- but it apparently got the message across nevertheless because the volatile redhead restrained himself, though not without significant visible effort, from attacking.

"Precaution," Draco whispered, without the faintest trace of remorse. "I don't know what kind of wards or protections my father may have set up out here."

Ron muttered something incoherent- and probably blessedly so. Draco, for his part, cast about on the ground for a small rock and, finding one, tossed it through the gateway, pressing himself down even closer to the ground as if expecting- well, something. Some sort of adverse reaction. But nothing happened.

"Malfoy," Harry said in a low voice.

"Yeah?" Draco cocked his silvery head slightly in Harry's direction, but all his attention still seemed fixed on the gate, his brow furrowed in puzzlement.

"You said your father wanted you to come home, right?"

"S'right, Potter."

Well then- it wouldn't be too smart for him to go out of his way to make it difficult for you to do so, would it?"

Draco turned slowly, finally giving Harry his full attention.

"I mean," Harry continued, "I don't think it's getting in there we have to worry about. It's getting back out again that may be a problem."

Draco was silent for a moment, thinking this over. Then he nodded. "You're right, Potter," he muttered. "I knew I brought you along for something."

Ron gave a furious hiss. "YOU didn't bring us anywhere, Malfoy, you bloody arrogant prat, we-"

"Sh."

Surprisingly enough, it was Harry who shushed him. "Not now, Ron. Hermione, remember? Focus on Hermione. She needs us all. She needs us to work together. Nothing is more important than getting her out of here, nothing."

Ron blew out a harsh breath from between clenched teeth, clearly fighting for control. Finally he nodded, but his fingers were twitching…clearly longing to wrap themselves around Draco's throat.

"Fine," he ground out at last. "Now what?"

"I suppose now we just walk on in," Draco said thoughtfully.

The three boys stood, rearranged the cloak over themselves, stepped through the gate, and started up the incline toward the forbidding hulk of Malfoy Manor. True to Harry's prediction, they encountered no wards or protections whatsoever along the way.

00000

Standing in a dim, cavernous foyer nearly the size of the entrance hall at Hogwarts, the three boys faced each other silently under the cover of the cloak. Adrenaline was surging through all three of them; their breath came rapidly and they were all flushed to varying degrees- Ron's skin nearly matched his hair, while Draco was merely a whiter shade of pale with two bright fever spots burning high on his cheeks.

It was Draco who broke the silence, addressing Harry in a whisper. "Potter, I'm going to need this cloak to find Hermione and get her safely out. I'll need to hold onto the portkey too, in case-" he paused and swallowed hard- "in case she's not…well enough to safely apparate. Portkey wouldn't do either of you any good anyway. The two of you can apparate back."

"Wait just a ruddy minute," Ron interjected at this point. "Why the bloody hell should it be you who finds Hermione? And what are Harry and I supposed to do in the mean time?"

"It should be me because this house is vast, and I know its layout," Draco responded, as if this were the most obvious thing in the world- and, really, it was. "My father told me he was going to keep her in my old bedroom- well, I know how to get there from here. Do you, Weasley?"

Ron just glared.

"It should also be me, and only me," Draco continued, "because the idea is to get her out as quickly and quietly as possible and even with an invisibility cloak, let's face it, one person is less likely to draw attention than three. Besides which- and here's the answer to your other question- I'm counting on the two of you to provide a diversion."

Harry and Ron glanced at each other, then back at Draco as he continued speaking.

"And finally, Weasley, it should be me because whether you believe it or not, I bloody well love her and I will lay down my life before I let her come to any more harm. You have my word on that. Even if you don't believe my word has any value, you have it just the same. So let's stop wasting time and get her the hell out of here!"

There was a brief but tense silence during which Draco and Ron glared fiercely at each other, doing battle with their eyes. Finally, Ron's expression softened- barely, but it did. "Bloody hell," he whispered, "I believe you, Malfoy. You still have a lot to answer for, treating her the way you did- but now isn't the time. All that matters now is getting her out of this hell hole, and if you can do it the quickest, then so be it. I'll trust you with her, though it isn't easy for me. But don't you fail her, Malfoy, don't-" he broke off, looking abruptly down and away, blinking hard.

"I failed her once," Draco murmured. "I'm not going to fail her again. I'll die first."

Ron gave a single terse nod, then, without another word, shrugged off the cloak, standing now fully visible and vulnerable in the shadowy foyer. Harry then followed suit, slipping out from the protection of the cloak as well. The two boys heard a faint rustle of material as Draco moved, then his disembodied voice floated to them from the vicinity of the stairs.

"Give me about ten minutes to find her, then create a diversion that will buy me another ten minutes or so. Then get yourselves back to the school. We'll meet up there- don't look for me again here; with any luck I'll get Hermione out quickly, quietly and invisibly. If we see each other again here, it will probably mean that…something's gone wrong, so let's hope that won't be the case." There was a slight pause, then- "don't underestimate my father. Take care of yourselves."

"You too, Malfoy," Harry responded quietly. "Take care of yourself- and Hermione. Take care of her for us."

"Will do, Potter," came Draco's response.

It was at this point that Ron spoke up, surprising all three of them, not least of all himself. "Malfoy," he called out softly.

"Yeah, Weasley?" Draco now sounded as though he were halfway up the stairs. His voice was tight, guarded.

"Be careful, all right?"

There was a pause. Then, "you too, Weasley. You too."

00000

For several seconds, Harry and Ron merely stood where Draco had left them, staring first at the stairs up which he had gone- or at least, up which it had sounded like he had gone- they hadn't actually seen him do so, of course- and then at each other.

"Right, then," Ron whispered at last. "Diversion."

"Yeah." Harry glanced around the foyer; in addition to the stairs Draco had taken, there were plenty of other routes to try. There were three large doors leading off in various directions, plus a long, dimly lit hall that appeared to terminate in an enormous, shadowy living room. Harry thought a moment longer.

"We'll go in opposite directions," he finally said. "We'll synchronize our wands into a ten-minute countdown, then wherever we are in the house when the countdown is complete, we'll both make noise. A lot of noise. Big as the house is, one of us is sure to attract the attention of its occupants. Move fast, get as far away as you can from this entrance hall before creating your diversion. We want to leave it clear for Draco to come back through once he has Hermione. That's…that's the best I can come up with on no notice. Sound good to you?"

"Nothing about this situation is good," Ron whispered grimly, "but I can't think of anything better. So what then? After we've done it? Made a great bloody lot of noise?"

"Then we get out, as fast as we can, from wherever we are. Go through a window if you have to- whatever's closest at hand. We'll meet back up beyond the gate and apparate together."

"So we're really not going to try to find Malfoy again? Help him get Hermione out?"

Harry considered, then shook his head. "No. For one thing, we don't know our way around- we'd probably just succeed in getting ourselves lost in extremely hostile territory. For another, Malfoy was right about more people attracting more attention. The last thing we want is to draw attention to him while he's bringing Hermione out. That's the whole point of this diversion thing- to draw attention AWAY from him. Besides which, Ron- I trust him to get her out of here. I don't like the way he treated her any better than you do, but I believed him when he told us why he did it. Seems just like him to hit on- on THAT as a solution. He was misguided, but…I do think he still loves her. I don't think he ever stopped. And when he says he'll die before he lets her come to more harm- I think he's telling the truth."

Ron was silent for a moment, clearly thinking this over. Then he nodded, though somewhat reluctantly. "You're right," he said quietly. "You're right. But I still don't like it. I don't bloody like it at all. It's-" he abruptly turned away, wrapping his arms about himself in an oddly protective manner. "I still love her, Harry," he whispered. "As much as ever. More, I think. And knowing that she's hurt and in danger- knowing that I can't be there for her now- It's hard. It's damned hard, mate."

He felt a hand settle gently on his shoulder. "I understand," Harry murmured. "Believe me when I say that I understand. And remember that what we're about to do is just as important- and just as dangerous- as what Malfoy's doing. Hermione needs us to do this. If it allows Malfoy to get her out of here safely…" he trailed off.

"I know," Ron said, shaking his head and turning back to face his best friend. "But Harry, I'm so scared. What if I never get to see her again, what if she's already-"

"She's not dead," Harry cut him off emphatically. "She's not, Ron. She's strong, she'll make it through this. We'll all make it through this. Now let's go do this thing." Without pause for thought, he pulled Ron into a quick, fierce embrace, then, releasing him just as abruptly, turned and made for the nearest door.

Behind him, Ron headed off down the short hallway toward the huge, gloomy living room beyond. Just before they passed out of one another's sight they paused, turned back toward each other, and synchronized their wands. Then they were moving away from one another just as quickly as they could while still maintaining any measure of stealth.

She WILL make it through this, Harry was repeating to himself, attempting to fight off the horrible feeling of foreboding that was growing like a cancer deep in his gut. We all will. We all will.

How wrong he was. And even as he repeated those three words over and over like a mantra, deep down, he sensed it.

00000

Draco's feet slowed as he neared his bedroom. He had been moving quickly through the enormous house- not running, exactly, but moving as fast as he could while keeping relatively silent, and he knew that time was of the essence- but he couldn't help slowing down now; he was so damn scared of what he would find on the other side of that large, dark, imposing door.

"Please don't be dead," he whispered in a cracked voice as he approached the closed door, feeling as though he were swimming through air as thick as water. Feeling dread sitting low in his gut; a large, cold, heavy ball. "Oh God, please- my bookworm- my brown eyed girl- please don't be dead."

And then he was reaching for the handle- watching his hand rise toward the polished gold- and yes, it WAS pure gold- knob with a numb, detached sense of horror, fearing the worst as he tried the handle, found it to be locked, laid the tip of his wand against it, whispered "Alohomora," heard the soft, yet distinct click that meant the spell had worked, turned the knob, and pushed open the door.

And sagged against the doorframe, nearly falling to his knees, so overcome was he by grief at the sight that met his eyes.

"Mione," he choked out, and his vision started to blacken around the edges; for it looked, from the doorway, as though his worst fears were confirmed. Shaking his head to clear it, he pushed himself bodily away from the door and stumbled toward the woman he loved, unclasping the invisibility cloak and letting it slip to the floor as he went.

"No," he croaked, reaching her. "Please, no."

She was dangling by her wrists from the canopy bar at the foot of the bed. She was suspended high off the floor; her wrists actually bound to the canopy bar itself, rather than suspended from it by a length of chain as she had been in the past. Her bare feet, though grazing the edge of the mattress, were not supporting her; her knees were bent, her body completely limp, supported only by the cuffs on her wrists. She was facing away from the bed, away from the door; away from him as he had entered the room; her head was bowed forward, hair spilling across her face, and as she was clad only in her pleated uniform skirt, he could clearly see the dozens of lashes that criss-crossed every inch of her back.

Her back was scarlet with blood.

Climbing onto the bed, he stood close behind her and with a flick of his wand vanished the cuffs that connected her to the canopy bar, catching her easily as she fell backward into him without a sound, without a sign of life, her wrists still bound to one another though no longer to the bed. He turned her in his arms so that as he eased her down onto the mattress, she was lying face-down, allowing him access to her bloodied, ruined back.

He gave a sick moan, though he was not consciously aware of doing so. The sight of her like this- there was no worse torture, no worse pain he could feel- it was his darkest nightmare come true.

It also brought back vivid memories of a thousand, thousand lashes he had borne himself- by rights, he should be covered in scars just like the ones that now marred the once flawless skin of the woman he loved. It was only thanks to his mother that he wasn't- she had vanished his scars, always, at monthly intervals when he was a child and then later, after he had begun attending Hogwarts, at the end of every summer and Christmas holiday, just before he had returned to school. She had done it always in a brisk, matter-of-fact manner, without the slightest hint of maternal tenderness, and Draco had known, even as a very young child, that it wasn't something she did out of concern for his well-being, but rather to keep up appearances- as everything his mother did was about appearances. It would not do at all to have it discovered- especially by a meddlesome fool such as Dumbledore- that the heir to the Malfoy estate, the scion of one of the wizarding world's oldest, wealthiest, and best-known families, was covered in welts just like a common servant boy or house elf, now would it?

It had always struck him as deeply ironic that such a cold, detached woman should be gifted with such strong innate healing powers, but there it was- his mother was a born healer and to what use did she put her gifts? To the sole purpose of concealing her husband's abuse of her only child from the world at large, so as to continue to present the illusion of a perfect family. He was not grateful for it. In fact, he was and always had been rather resentful. He had bloody well earned those scars! They were the product of hours of torture- of blood, sweat and tears. Well, not so much tears. He hadn't cried as a result of his father's ministrations since he had been very, very young. But still- every time his mother had vanished the scars he had felt a perverse sense of loss. No matter, though- they were still real in his mind, every single one of them- and they always would be.

But enough dwelling on the past. He needed to focus on the here and now.

"Hermione," he whispered, smoothing her hair away from her face so that he could see her in profile, bending close over her, his hand still tangled in her thick, unkempt curls. There was no response. "Hold on, okay?" he said, over a lump in his throat, not knowing at that point whether she was even still alive, just hoping desperately; hoping against hope. "I'm here now. I'm gonna fix this, love. I'm gonna fix this and then I'm gonna kill him. I'm gonna bloody fucking kill him."

He dropped a gentle kiss on her temple, then began passing his wand slowly over her mangled back, murmuring healing spells as he went.

He wasn't able to heal the gashes that covered her back completely; it would have taken someone with Madam Pomfrey's level of expertise- or his mother's- to do that- but he was able to close them, clean the blood away, and place a pain reduction charm on her that he could only hope would work- could only hope there would be a NEED for it to work, because at least that would mean she was still alive.

Oh God please, I'm not a praying man, but please- I'll do anything, GIVE anything- just please let her still be alive!

Slowly, carefully, he turned her onto her back, his eyes sweeping her body, registering the bruises and abrasions that covered her from head to toe. He felt tears stinging the backs of his eyes, noting the discoloration on one cheek where she had clearly been struck across the face; the purple, finger-shaped bruises on her arms, her throat, her breasts, her thighs.

"Kill-" he whispered brokenly- "kill…him…gonna…fucking…" and then trailed off, his attention arrested by something else; something that made him go weak with relief where he knelt on the bed beside her- her bare chest was rising and falling rhythmically with breath. It was so faint as to be barely noticeable, but it was there- she was breathing. She was alive.

"Sweet, merciful God. Thank you. Oh God, thank you." He bent his head and placed a tender, chaste kiss on her swollen, dry and slightly parted lips, then, pulling back only a little, patted her cheek, trying to bring her around. Had he been thinking clearly, he wouldn't have bothered trying to wake her. He would simply have scooped her into his arms and run with her, run from this evil place, and waited until he had reached the safety of Hogwarts to revive her.

But he wasn't thinking clearly.

When confronted by the sight of a loved one as grievously injured as Hermione was, who appears to be skating a razor thin line between unconsciousness and death, anyone's first impulse would be to want that person to WAKE UP. Draco was no different.

"Hey bookworm," he whispered hoarsely, his vision suddenly blurring as he began to lose his battle against the impending tears, "wake up. It's over. I've got you, you're safe now- wake up, love. Please?"

No response. There was only one other thing for it.

Pressing the tip of his wand with infinite tenderness just over her heart, he whispered "Ennervate," in a voice choked with tears.

00000

Harry had nearly reached the end of a long, wide gallery with many doors leading off of it. He was tightly hugging the wall, moving quietly and cautiously, when his wand signaled, through a silent shower of sparks, that the countdown had ended. It was time to create his diversion. Somewhere else in this colossal house, Ron was getting ready to do the exact same thing.

What Harry couldn't know was that the long, straight, wide hall in which he found himself ran directly beneath Draco's second-floor hall, and the rooms which opened off it were nearly identical to Draco's rooms above. Where Draco had a library upstairs, Lucius had his library down here. Where Draco had a recreation room upstairs, Lucius had his billiard room down here. Where Draco had two guest rooms upstairs, Lucius had removed a wall to create one massive fencing room down here. And where Draco's palatial bedroom sat upstairs, spanning over a thousand square feet at the end of this wing of the manor, Lucius had his study down here. A study outside of which Harry was currently standing, unaware that Lucius himself was sitting at his desk- a desk with more surface space than Harry's four-poster bed at Hogwarts- just on the other side of the door.

The idea behind this diversion had been to bring Lucius and whoever else was currently in the house running to the source of the noise, thus keeping him far from the central foyer through which Draco was going to pass on his way out of the house with Hermione. Harry had assumed that in a house this big, it would take a minute or two at the very least for Lucius to reach the site of the diversion- crucial time that he could put to use escaping. He would surely have rethought this plan had he known that all that separated him from Lucius was some twenty feet of space and a single door.

But then, of course, he didn't know.

Glancing about, his eyes fixed on a huge crystal chandelier above him; the entire long gallery had been lined with these enormous light fixtures, giving off a dim, flickering, greenish sort of light. This nearest one would do nicely, he thought. Pressing himself even flatter against the wall so as to be out of its way when it fell, he pointed his wand upward, at the chain which anchored it to the ceiling, wondered briefly what Ron had decided to do to cause noise on the other side of the house, wondered more briefly still which of the two diversions would catch Lucius' attention, then gritted his teeth, steeling his will-

And with a few muttered words and a flick of his wand, brought the chandelier down with an almighty crash.

Lucius was on him, of course, before he even had a chance to gather his thoughts and decide which way to flee- bursting through the study door with his wand out and, his coldly furious eyes lighting on Harry, who was caught completely off-guard, snarling, "Potter!"