A/N: I think this may be the longest chapter I've ever written. The next one will be almost the same length, so enjoy!
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO: Playing The Hero
Time had lost all meaning for Harry. Whether days or weeks had passed he didn't know. He didn't even have the luxury of knowing what time of day it was, not that it would have done him any good to know. His captors would come to visit him three times a day. In the beginning, at least one of those visits would have been spent throwing the Cruciatus at him for hours. They would ask him questions during those sessions, but he would shut them out just as he was trying to do with the pain. Over time, he didn't know if it was because he had just gotten used to it or he had actually succeeded in blocking it out, but whenever they used it on him now he was only dimly aware of the searing pain ripping through his body and mind. He didn't even cry out most times anymore.
The cell he was kept in was just that – a cell. Rusted bars made up the frame and his arms were shackled behind him. On one of his first days, a Death Eater he knew the voice of all too well had explained why he wasn't being held in place by magical means. Magical binds tend to weaken after a while, and since we don't know how long you're going to be staying here, I thought it best to be extra cautious, Lucius Malfoy had said with a malicious grin.
With nothing to occupy his time in between the visits from the Death Eaters, he had thoroughly observed his surroundings, trying to figure out where they were holding him. With what little strength he had, he surmised it was probably a very old building, maybe even a house, judging by the spiraling set of stairs leading upstairs. If it was a house, he was definitely being held in the part that had been used as a torture chamber at one time. More shackles and chains hung loosely from the ceiling. The air was stale and stank of mildew. He was anything but warm being slumped against a concrete floor.
He heard a door creek open and a set of heavy boots descend the stairs. He had already had his three visits for the day, so he wasn't sure what to expect from this one.
Lucius Malfoy stared directly inside his cell, saying, "how are you feeling today, Potter? I do hope Bellatrix wasn't too tough on you during your last session."
From his knees, Harry stared back at him, but said nothing.
"I have a feeling she wasn't since you seem to have an abnormally high tolerance for pain. I would ask if it's something Dumbledore has been working on with you, but we both know you won't answer that."
Still Harry said nothing. He never answered their questions. In the beginning, he feared that he had given something up and not remembered because he would black out after his sessions. But they kept coming back and asking him the same questions, which told Harry he had revealed nothing so far.
"Since you seem to have no difficulty with your own pain, I think it's time we try something new," Malfoy went on. "How long do you think you can watch an innocent being tortured?"
Again, Harry stayed quiet, not wanting to play into his hand.
"What about your friends?"
Something in Harry's eyes blazed but he forced himself to remain calm. Malfoy was bluffing.
"I see I've finally got your attention," Malfoy noted with satisfaction.
"I know you're lying," Harry finally spoke, his voice ringing with confidence. "You don't have them. If you did, you would have brought them here already."
"I know you've instilled some of that obnoxious hero complex of yours in Weasley and the Mudblood. They won't stay away."
"It's going to be a long wait," said Harry, giving a bitter laugh, "because my friends aren't coming for me."
"We'll see which one of us is lying." Those were Malfoy's last words before he left.
Harry could see right through his bluff. Hermione was safe in Luxembourg and he knew there was no way Dumbledore or anyone else would allow Ron to leave the safety of Hogwarts. Even if Moody or someone managed to find him, at least his friends would be safe. For once he would be able to keep them out of danger instead of plunging them head first into it.
Ron awoke much earlier then he would have liked after a fitful night of tossing and turning. The antibiotic cream Hermione had put on his knuckles last night was finally started to wear off, causing his hand to throb again.
It came as no surprise when he walked downstairs and found Hermione already in the kitchen, grabbing a slice of toast from a stack the middle of the table and spreading marmalade across it.
"Morning,' his mother greeted him as he joined Hermione at the table. "What would you like for breakfast, dear?"
He opened his mouth but a strangled cry from his mother cut off his reply.
"What happened to your hand?" She began to inspect the hand he had smashed against Hermione's bedroom wall in a motherly way that was rather embarrassing, made even more so by the person who was sitting across from him. Hermione was doing her very best not to laugh and failing rather miserably.
"Mum, I'm fine," he insisted, trying to wretch his hand free from her grasp.
"How did this happen?" She asked again.
He thought quickly for a plausible excuse. "It was that bloody over-sized dresser in my room. I didn't have the light on and I banged my fist right into it."
Mrs. Weasley wasn't thick by any means. She had raised seven children and had developed a knack for knowing when one of them was lying.
"You should let me do a healing charm on that," she said to him.
Ron finally managed to wretch his hand free from her careful inspection. "It's fine. Hermione put something on it last night."
Hermione's smile vanished, now that she had been dragged into this and Mrs. Weasley was staring at her expectantly.
"It was just something to help bring the swelling down," she explained. She didn't see the need to talk about using it to stop the bleeding.
Though she was still not convinced that her son had told her he truth about her injury, she let it go for the time being, knowing he wasn't going to tell her how it really happened.
When she want back to cooking and her back was to them, Hermione kicked Ron under the table for bringing her in as some sort of accomplice. She wasn't really angry but she did it nonetheless. Ron just sent a smirk her way and moved his legs where she wouldn't be able to reach him again.
"Where is everyone?" He asked his mother.
"Your father's at work, and I'm not sure where everyone else is," Mrs. Weasley responded.
Just as Mrs. Weasley had developed a sense for telling when her children were lying, her children had learned that same trait in regards to their parents.
"Mum, where's Moody?"
"I just told you I don't know where he is," she answered in a voice that suggested he drop the line of questioning. She turned her attention to Hermione and said, "Dumbledore has spoken with your father, and he's agreed to let you stay here for the time being."
Hermione nodded her head but didn't say anything. Happy as she was that her father was allowing her to remain in Britain, it was quite likely he hadn't come to that decision on his own. Dumbledore probably had to intervene on her behalf so she could be allowed to stay at Grimmauld Place.
"Mum, what aren't you telling us?" Ron pressed. He knew there was something important she was hiding from them both.
He prepared himself for another round of yelling with his mother, and it looked every bit like that was going to happen, until she finally spoke. "They went after Harry."
Ron's eyes nearly bulged out of their sockets. "What? When?"
"Just after dawn," she began. "It would be nightfall by the time they reach – "
"Reach where?" Ron pressed after Mrs. Weasley purposely cut herself off.
"That's not important, Ron. What matters is that they're going to get Harry back."
It was important to him. They had purposely kept him and Hermione out of the loop last night because they had been planning a rescue. "Why the hell didn't they tell us last night?"
"There wasn't any need for you to know."
"Right, because Harry's just some bloke off the street who we really don't care about," Ron said sarcastically.
"It was for your own good," his mother said in a stern voice.
Ron was looking for Hermione to say something and she finally did. Though he nearly fell off her chair after hearing her speak.
"Ron, your mum's right. Telling us wouldn't have made a difference."
He couldn't believe she wasn't backing him up on this, especially after how furious she had been with him when she had found it he was keeping Harry's capture from her. Fuming, he rose from his chair and left the kitchen. He ignored his mother calling after him.
He was in his room with the door shut for several minutes before he heard a knock and Hermione let herself in.
"How can you not be angry?" He shouted. "They purposely avoided telling us anything so we wouldn't try to help. After the way you acted last night–"
"Of course I'm angry," she interrupted, "but I thought it was best not to show it, so your mum won't suspect anything."
"She – what?" Ron was confused.
"If she thinks we're angry and upset, she'll keep a closer eye on us then if we were to take the news calmly and rationally."
"What are you on about?"
"We're going after Harry, of course," she informed him calmly. "I had a look at Moody's notes last night when we were down there and I think they're going to the wrong place."
"How do you know?"
"Because they're not going to hold Harry in some random place. He's too important to Voldemort. They'll be holding him in a safe house heavily protected by magic like Phoenix Headquarters."
"If it's anything like here Moody and the others may never find it. A hidden place would be next to impossible to find."
"Not if you know what you're looking for," she told him. "When I couldn't go back to sleep last night, I went down to the drawing room. I was staring at the Black family tapestry and it occurred to me that if the Black family could have a secret house like this, then probably some of the other pureblood families that supported Voldemort back then would have one too. They would have to if they wanted to meet in secret without anyone finding them. What is one of the few pureblood wizarding families left besides yours?"
"The Malfoy's," Ron spat, the words rolling off his tongue like venom.
Hermione nodded. "Since we know for a fact Lucius Malfoy is a Death Eater, and is probably pretty high up in the ranks, we can safely assume he would play a part in holding Harry. Harry won't be at the Malfoy manor," she said, knowing where his thoughts were going. "It would be too obvious. Do you remember Malfoy bragging last year about what his grandfather used to do to muggles?"
He nodded, just wishing she would hurry up and get to where they were keeping Harry already. "His grandfather had this mansion in Leeds, but there was a fire in it years ago. There's not much left of it."
"What if it's just an illusion? I'm surprised Moody didn't come to the same conclusion because I saw him crossing it off a list he had."
"Blimey…" Ron trailed off shaking his head. "That's only a few hours from here."
"I think it's our best shot," she said to him. "If we leave tonight we have a better chance of escaping Grimmauld Place unnoticed. It should buy us enough time to get there before your mum realizes we're gone. Plus we need something that we won't be able to get before this evening."
"What's that?"
"A port key," she said simply.
Ron knew better than to ask how she thought they were going to get their hands on a port key, knowing the answer would probably be a long winded explanation originating from a large, dusty book.
Without even having to ask the other they both knew they were going to do this. They were going to get Harry back.
Hermione had gotten quite good at hiding things from her father. That was what helped her and Ron plan their escape from Grimmauld Place and map out a plan for rescuing Harry, all under the watchful eye of Mrs. Weasley.
They had to wait until almost one in the morning to be sure Ron's parents were asleep before springing in to action. They wanted to minimize the amount of the things they were to bring with them, packing only the necessities that would aid them in their rescue. In a single backpack they carried specific potions, along with a few other aids that might come in handy. They each had their wands, but even that might not be enough to defend themselves with depending on what they would find at the supposedly burned down Malfoy home.
Ron had cast a silencing charm on the front door, so that as each of the bolts and locks opened themselves the noises made would not travel upstairs. Once out on the front steps, they made sure the door to Phoenix Headquarters had locked and concealed itself before turning and walking across the lawn of house number thirteen.
Most of the wizarding places that had floo systems installed in them were closed at this late hour, and those that weren't were the kind of places they were looking to avoid. Their age alone would draw too much attention and they couldn't be certain that there were not any of Voldemort's followers at these establishments. That was why she felt a port key would be the safest and fastest route by which to travel. The only difficult part was finding one that wasn't traceable or being watched by the Ministry. That left them with one option – use an illegal one, and Hermione knew there was one person who could get them one without drawing attention to himself.
Mundungus Fletcher was always up to his neck in petty wizard crimes or illegal activities that drove Mrs. Weasley absolutely mad. Hermione had cornered him in the parlor telling him she and Ron needed a port key to take them to Leeds. She tried to give him coordinates as specific as she dared without drawing his suspicions. She had explained her concocted story of how she and Ron were looking to get their minds off Moody and the Order's rescue of Harry. Though Mundungus probably had a dozen or more at his disposal, he hadn't been in a hurry to hand one over. He had known Molly Weasley would find a way to chuck him out of the Order once and for all if he gave Hermione and Ron an illegal transportation device. But Hermione was not a girl without a plan. She had been expecting resistance and eventually managed to blackmail Mundungus into giving her one. She told him she knew he had been breeding illegal creatures but wasn't going to blow the whistle on him if he gave her what she wanted. She had been bluffing the entire time, but having known Mundungus well enough from all her time spent at Grimmauld Place over the last two summers, knew that breeding illegal creatures wasn't beyond him.
He had come by after dinner with very specific instructions on where to find the port key. It would be waiting for them in a park ten minute's away from Grimmauld Place. It was supposed to be a dirty baseball cap buried underneath the sand in front of the swing closest to the park bench.
She and Ron did not talk much as they kept up a brisk pace towards the park. Doubts had already begun to set in her mind about what they were doing. Who were they to think they could break in to some heavily guarded fortress and just get Harry back? Hermione wanted to know when she had become so impulsive that she was acting without fully thinking things through. The truth was, she could no longer sit around and wonder what was happening to Harry, and she knew Ron couldn't either. It was even worse for him because he had known about it longer. True, they could have waited for Moody and the others to return and told them what they had learned, but that could be another day or more and she couldn't stand the thought of forcing Harry to wait a little longer when they could go and get him out themselves.
They arrived at the park and immediately headed for the swing farthest away from their position. Hermione knelt down in front of it and began scooping away sand, eventually uncovering a sodden blue baseball cap.
"Last chance to get out of this," she said, looking back at Ron.
"Like hell I'm leaving Harry with those bastards another second," he said to her.
They grabbed the cap at the same instant and were sent tumbling forward, spinning wildly.
When everything around them finally came back into force, Hermione didn't know how far they had traveled but they were nowhere near the park anymore. If Mundungus had programmed the port key with the directions she had given him they should have been no more than a mile away from the old Malfoy Mansion.
The forest they were in acted as a form of camouflage to keep them hidden from anyone who might be watching. Ron and Hermione used the thick growth of trees and other foliage to hide themselves as they moved in closer. When they reached the edge of the clearing, they took cover behind a fallen tree trunk that looked to have toppled over by lightning.
Ron took the pack off his back and pulled out a pair of Omnioculars that he used to scan the area in front of the mansion.
"Not a Death Eater in sight," he said, keeping his voice low. What remained of the mansion looked extremely unsteady. The area around it was charred and burned. A couple of pillars remained untouched, but the fire had blazed through most of the house before it had been put it. It looked as though all a person had to do was glance at it the wrong way and it would come crashing down. "Can you tell if there's a spell being cast around it?"
"No," she answered. "We need to be a lot closer."
Ron put the Omnioculars away and pulled something else out from their back. It was a long, almost transparent cloak. From the summer, they knew Moody kept his spare invisibility cloak hidden away at Phoenix Headquarters. They had seen him putting it away in the drawing room once. After much searching, they had finally discovered a hidden compartment at the back of the desk where it was kept. The cloak was really only meant for one grown person, but if they took their time and walked slow, and Ron stooped a little because of his height, it would get the job done. It was the only way to be sure they would get across the great stretch of land without being noticed by some unseen watcher.
The grass was wet from an earlier rainfall, so that by the time they reached the burnt wreckage, their shoes were soaked and caked with mud. They would have to risk removing the cloak now in order to find if a spell was being cast around it. Hermione pulled out a glass jar from the pack, unscrewed the top and threw the liquid contents onto the wreckage.
"Aperio," she whispered. It wouldn't break the spell, but it would reveal if what they were looking at wasn't real. The air in front of them rippled visibly and then disappeared.
"Some sort of barrier has been cast on it," she said, her heartbeat increasing.
"Can you bring it down?" Ron asked her.
"No," she admitted. "But I can cast a spell to find us a doorway in."
She pulled out a couple of ingredient jars and test tubes, and began mixing. When she was done, she pulled out her wand and pointed it at the powdered substance in front of her. She said the incantation, "Foris," and the powder rose out of the jar and started mixing with the air. It thinned out to the point where it looked like strips of energy whirling around the wreckage in front of them. It swirled frantically in a lone spot and then combusted into tiny particles that vanished before they hit the ground. In it's wake it left a large shabby wooden door, the wood stained and splintered. It was their doorway.
Hermione looked over at Ron. He had his wand out now too. They shared a quick look before he reached for the handle.
"Be careful," she warned. "There could be a recognition spell on it. If the wrong person touches it – "
Ron gripped the handle and turned it. When he didn't feel anything happening he slowly pushed the door open. Pitch-blackness awaited them beyond it.
"Lumos," Ron muttered, and the tip of his wand lit up, casting a yellow glow into the darkness. Someone might notice the light, but he was not walking in there completely blind. He stepped inside, knowing Hermione would be right behind him.
The door clicked closed behind them, and Ron suddenly had a very bad feeling about this.
Without warning, overhead torches came to life, illuminating the room completely. They were in a narrow hallway, where the ceiling and walls were cracked and the air that filled their nostrils was quite stale.
Footsteps could be heard – and they were fast approaching. There was only one way they could be coming from because the other way was a dead end.
Hermione tried the door handle, knowing that if they could get outside and find cover they would stand a better chance of defeating whoever was coming. Only the door would not open. She said the unlocking spell to no avail. They were going to have to fight their way through this inside.
They stood together, their positions in the fighting stance they had been taught at Hogwarts.
The first of many black cloaked figures with masks, had his wand outstretched at the two of them. He was the only one that spoke.
"Drop your wands," the man ordered. "There is no escape."
"When you say it so nicely like that it really makes me want to," said Ron, his wand still aimed at the Death Eater's chest.
"I won't warn you again."
That was when Ron sprang into action. "Expelliarmus!" He shouted, sending the Death Eater who had been speaking to them stumbling back, and cast a second disarming spell on the one nearest him.
"Stupefy!" Hermione's voice joined Ron's. She managed to stun two more before a curse hit her from behind and she fell to the ground. She cursed herself for not considering the dead end was just another illusion. Ron tried to fight the attack from behind, but he too was hit and went down.
Hermione felt a body binding charm being cast on her, as she was helpless to resist or fight back when a pair of arms grabbed hers and roughly dragged her forward.
Something was happening, Harry was sure of it. No one had been down to check on him in hours. He had no way to know if they were planning some sort of attack or even get out a warning if they were. He was utterly useless, sitting there, hands chained behind his back.
He heard the door to upstairs open, and with it the sounds of orders being barked back and forth before footsteps began to descend down the stairs.
It didn't take long for Harry to figure out what all the commotion was all about. His eyes widened in horror and his heart stopped in his chest at what he saw.
Ron and Hermione, with their hands bound behind their backs were shoved to their knees in front of his cell.
Malfoy unlocked Harry's cell and unbound his wrists from the shackles with one flick of his wand. Two Death Eaters came inside and grabbed him. They shoved him out of the cell's confinements and onto the hard cold floor in front of his friends.
They continued to hold him from behind, their grip remained tight so that it was practically cutting off the circulation in his arms, but nothing was as tight as his chest at seeing his two friends in front of him. They looked relatively unharmed, but a feeling in his gut told him that wouldn't last long.
"Aren't you going to say hello to your friends, Potter?" Malfoy sneered.
Harry looked at Ron and Hermione, but neither dared to say a word. Their expressions were brave but the fear in their eyes mirrored his own.
"I'm sure this was not the happy reunion you were hoping for, so let's see what we can do to fix that," said Malfoy. He pointed his wand at Hermione. "Crucio!"
Both he and Ron were screaming at him stop, but Malfoy did not let up. Hermione's screams filled the room but not once did she beg for him to stop. Ron shouted an explicit string of curses at Malfoy that earned him a slug across the face from the Death Eater behind him.
When Malfoy finally stopped the Cruciatus curse, Hermione crumbled to the floor shaking.
Malfoy looked up at Harry, a smug grin on his face at seeing the look of horror and loathing on Harry's.
"Tell me what you know about the prophecy you heard last year in the Department of Mysteries."
Ron was staring at him confused, and Harry knew he would be next if he didn't say something. Both his friends were going to be tortured for something they didn't even know existed.
"Or maybe the Mudblood would like to tell me so I'll spare her the next time."
"She doesn't know anything!" Harry shouted.
"Then tell me what I want to know."
"Harry, don't you tell them anything!" Hermione managed to cry out.
Harry was torn. He knew they would never get out of there alive even if he told Malfoy everything he wanted, but he didn't know how much longer he could stand watching his friends suffer under one of the Unforgivable curses. Lucius Malfoy had spent days trying to break him and not once had Harry had ever given any indication that he was close to being broken. Malfoy had finally figured out there was only one way to break Harry Potter – through his friends.
Malfoy didn't even give out a warning this time before using the Cruciatus on Ron.
"What is the Order of the Phoenix?"
Harry clenched his jaw tight, forcing himself to watch Ron writher in agony. Ron was paying the price for being his friend and all he could do was watch.
He lost track of the time as Malfoy continued to alternate between torturing Hermione and Ron. He didn't ask Harry any more questions because Harry knew what two answers would make it all stop.
"I've heard that prolonged exposure to the Cruciatus causes brain damage," Malfoy said after awhile. His wand was held out in front of him, deciding who to torture next.
Ron and Hermione were barely able to sit up, but they had forced looks of determination on their faces.
"Of course there are other more noticeable methods that may get you to talk," Malfoy continued. "My father had a rather disgusting fascination with muggles," he said, gesturing to the chamber they were in. "He would bring them back here and I'm sure that by looking around you have a fair idea of what he did to them." He tucked his wand back inside his black robes and walked over to a beat up looking wooden table in the far corner. There were at least a dozen sharp metal objects sitting on it. Malfoy picked up a slender knife that looked to have rusted over the years. "His fascination may have been misguided but he had the right idea on how to go about it. So I'm giving you one last chance, Potter. You tell me what I've been patiently waiting for and I will release your friends. If not, I guarantee you their deaths will be anything but quick."
"Don't say anything!" Ron shouted, seeing how close Harry was getting to breaking. They could never give away what the Order of the Phoenix was and the location of their headquarters. It went well beyond saving lives. The Order might be their last chance to stop Voldemort.
"One last chance, Potter," Malfoy warned, stepping between his friends, the knife clutched in his right hand.
"Don't you fucking say a word!" Ron yelled at him. "You know he'll never let us leave here alive!"
Harry swallowed hard. He was very likely condemning them to their death by staying silent. Malfoy was done with the games. He meant to kill them now. His silence gave the Death Eater his answer.
He took the knife and plunged it into Ron's midsection, twisting and plunging it deeper and deeper before at last pulling it out. Ron quickly became a crumpled heap on the floor, his hands feeling around on the gaping open wound there. A pool of blood was already beginning to seep onto the floor around him.
Hermione was screaming, and Malfoy was staring at Harry, his look telling him he could have prevented this.
"I've cut through some vital arteries. I suspect he has little more than ten minutes to live," Malfoy informed Harry.
Harry suddenly felt something visibly snap inside himself. At that same moment, the two guards holding him went crashing into opposite walls, landing in unmoving heaps on the floor. The first Death Eaters who jumped forward to grab him ended up in similar fates, except Harry could actually hear their necks snapping before they slumped to the ground. The next group was slightly more cautious but that only spared them a few extra seconds. He was still unarmed and it would only take one curse from Malfoy's wand to bring him down. He envisioned himself smashing Malfoy's head against the concrete wall and it happened just like that, except he was dead before he hit the ground.
It took Harry about three seconds to bring himself out of his shocked state. There would be time later to think about what he had done. There were much more important things to worry about now. He rushed to Ron's side where Hermione already was. Ron's face was covered in sweat and he had turned as white as a ghost. His eyes kept rolling back into his head.
"Hang on. We're going to get you out of here," Harry told him, trying to control the panic in his voice. He didn't even know if Ron could hear him.
"We have to do the spell," Hermione said frantically to Harry. The front of her shirt and hands were soaked in Ron's blood.
"Not here," he said immediately. "We have to get out of here."
"Harry he's lost too much blood. He's going to die," she sobbed frantically.
He grabbed her arms and shook her, desperate to make her understand the severity of the situation. "And we'll all die if we don't get out of here now," he argued. "I don't know how many other Death Eaters are still here."
Even though it was clear she disagreed with him, he didn't waste any more time arguing with her. He hauled Ron to his feet and flung one of his arms around his shoulder. With Hermione's help, the two of them half carried, half dragged him up the staircase, both trying desperately not to think of Ron's laboured breathing or all the blood he had lost.
They ducked around a corner just as several bursts of red energy hit the spot where they had just been. The remaining Death Eaters were closing in on them, and Harry did the only thing he could think of. Using the wand had picked up from a fallen Death Eater, he aimed it at the roof to send a section of it crashing down behind them to help cover their escape.
"Where's the door?" Harry asked her, coughing from all the debris he had created.
She moved away from him and Ron to begin searching the walls. "It sealed itself when we came in," she explained. "There has to be some kind of a switch …" She frantically felt around the smooth brick wall, eventually coming across a loose one and pulled it free. A doorway appeared out of thin air and she wasted no time in yanking it open.
She went back to help Harry with Ron, and together managed to get him across the open acre of grass and into the sheltered forest area.
"We need to stop," Hermione panted.
He disagreed. They needed to get as far away from here as possible. There was no telling how quickly the Death Eaters would break through the pile of rubble he had created.. "Hermione, we have to – "
"No, we have to do this now before it's too late," she said, her tone leaving no room for argument. Without waiting for his response, she removed Ron's arm from over her shoulder and with Harry's help laid him as gently on the ground as they could.
Harry knew he should have argued further, insisting they needed to be a safe distance from here, but he wanted to save Ron as badly as she did.
"He's not breathing," she said, leaning over his body.
That was all the convincing Harry needed that they had to try and heal him now.
"Sit on the other side of him," she instructed him. "Grab both my hands and close your eyes."
He did as he was told, marveling at how calm her voice was, but when he touched her hands they were shaking as badly as his own.
"You have to clear your mind and concentrate," she said, making it sound like an order.
It was exactly like the practice sessions where they had gone through each of the steps in order to perform the spell. Except this time Ron's life depended on them performing this correctly. He was trying to force everything from his mind, but the events from his capture and the last several hours refused to abate.
"Harry!"
"I'm trying!"
He called on some of the Occlumency skills he had picked up for clearing the mind. He searched for that one spot of peace somewhere in his mind and used it to focus.
He wasn't sure what happened next, but knew his mind was no longer his own. He caught glimpses of Hermione and knew the meld was working. With their souls joined together she could see everything as they worked to get Ron a part of it. Long, agonizing moments passed before they were able to see Ron's injury in their minds. Their hands hovered over the wound as they tried to use the protection magic to heal it.
Harry could actually see strands of blood vessels and arteries repairing themselves. That was when he felt something go wrong. Both his and Hermione's eyes snapped open at the same instant. His hands were shaking so badly now he could barely continue to grip Hermione's, and there was this scorching heat coming from them. A white light began peaking through Ron's injury and his body started shaking. Then he and Hermione were hurled backwards as the blinding light filled the area and then died almost as quickly as it had started.
Hermione scrambled back to Ron's side. The wound was still there, but he no longer seemed to be losing blood. She couldn't understand what had gone wrong. He should have been healed completely. The spell should have worked.
Then she saw him stir and his eyes blink open. He tried to move and let out a groan.
"Don't try to move," she said, hovering over him. "I don't know how badly you're still hurt."
Harry moved to go to Ron's side when he heard a twig snap.
He shared a quick look with Hermione and they both knew there would be no escape this time. If they moved Ron now it would probably kill him. Harry poised himself to attack. He was the only one with a wand. Maybe he could hold them off long enough for Hermione to risk moving Ron –
"Harry?"
He recognized that voice, but didn't lower his wand. A second later someone stepped out from the coverage of the forest. It was Bill, followed by Charlie, Moody, Tonks, Lupin and a dozen other men wearing the designated Auror robes. While The Order members faces were filled with relief, The Aurors looked furious.
Bill rushed to his brother's side where Hermione still was, while Moody came up to him. "You all right, Potter?"
He gave a faint nod. He really didn't care much about himself right now. The only thing on his mind was getting Ron to a Healer.
Tonks conjured up an invisible stretcher for Ron, who rose from the ground a moment later.
"What in Merlin's beard happened here a few moments ago?" Moody asked him. "There was a bright light coming from this clearing that could be seen straight across the forest."
"I don't really know," Harry told him. It wasn't a lie either. He couldn't even begin to explain what had transpired, and he certainly wasn't up to giving Moody an explanation of the spell he and Hermione had used to help save Ron's life.
Moody's revolving glass eye studied him carefully for a moment, before turning away to watch the stretcher with Ron on it move forward of its own accord.
"He'll pull through if we get him to St. Mungo's in time," Moody said to him.
It was the Auror's own way of being comforting, but Harry didn't find much comfort in that statement. He didn't want to be told that his friend might make it, but until the Healers had a look at Ron there wasn't anyone who could tell him anything different. He watched as Hermione walked beside the stretcher, holding Ron's hand, while Lupin and Charlie walked on either end of it.
The other Aurors that had come with them were staying behind and moving into tactical positions around the illusioned house. One of them shot Moody a sharp look before walking away.
Harry had never seen an Auror look at Moody with that kind of disrespect. "What's going on?"
"Nothing you need to worry about right now, Potter," said Moody, pulling him away from the other Aurors. "We need to get you to St. Mungo's – make sure the curses those bastard Death Eaters threw at you haven't rattled your brain too much."
Harry wasn't really paying attention to him. He was watching Tonks and two Aurors have a silent argument. He had never seen Tonks so furious. "I'm going to have to ask you some questions, Potter," Moody said, drawing his attention away from the other Aurors. "Starting with how the hell you broke out of that house full of armed Death Eaters."
Harry nodded his consent and Moody began firing questions at him as they trekked back through the forest, careful to remain close behind the others.
