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A/N: Ah! I AM SO SORRY! I know I haven't updated in over 2 months! But today's the story's year anniversary! Isn't that amazing? Anyways, I hope you all still remember me and you review. I'll try to get up another ASAP since it's summer.

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Chapter Forty-Six

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"Malfoy you bloody git, where are you?" Pepper huffed, pacing the dark classroom where she was scheduled to meet Malfoy. He was already six minutes late and her heart was fluttering against her chest in nervousness.

"Calm down Pepper," said Harry from under the safety of the Invisibility Cloak, where he was huddled with Hermione. Pepper hadn't wanted to go through this alone.

"That's easy for you to say, Harry; you're not the one about to die," said Pepper.

"Oh stop being so dramatic, Pepper, you know you're not going to die," Hermione said.

"Quiet, he's coming," Harry hissed. Sure enough, a few seconds later, the heavy classroom door opened and in strode Malfoy.

"Make sure you're on time Halliwell, I have to make it to the meeting," Pepper mocked, crossing her arms and leaning back on a desk as Malfoy faced her.

"Sod off," growled Malfoy. "I ran into some problems."

"Well guess what?" said Pepper.

"What?" Malfoy replied in a bored voice.

"Hermione and I found a cure! Well, we partly found it and the other part my aunts and I sorta made up so—"

"Give it to me," said Malfoy, excited now.

"Hermione, the potion please!" Pepper said dramatically, flinging out her hand. Hermione stepped out from the Invisibility Cloak, (trying not to show that Harry was there too, because he was there for protection, in case something went wrong), and that threw Malfoy off guard a little. Hermione handed Pepper a small purple vial.

Malfoy made a move to take it, but Pepper pulled her hand back from him. "A a ah, Malfoy, let's not get greedy. First you've got to promise me that you'll do everything in your power to protect me and my clone from getting mauled by evil, perverted Death Eaters while we're at Death Eater meetings and otherwise."

"Fine, I promise, just give me the damn potion," Malfoy said, glaring at Pepper.

"What are you going to swear by?" Pepper asked.

Malfoy glared at her. "You are kidding me. Do you really think I want to fucking die?"

"No, but I think you'd like me dead. So swear by….Hermione, what should he swear by?" Pepper asked her friend.

"Nothing. Pepper, I think he'll keep his word," Hermione said. She took a stunned Pepper's arm and pushed it in Malfoy's direction so that he could take the potion from her hand. Pepper didn't do anything as he retrieved it. He uncorked the vial and almost drank it, but Hermione put a hand on his arm.

He stopped, shooting her daggers through his eyes. "Don't drink it, Malfoy, we don't know what the side effects are, and you have a Death Eater meeting to go to. Take it after the meeting," Hermione told him.

He eyed her suspiciously for a moment before re-corking the bottle and sticking it in the pocket of his robe. His eyes focused back on Pepper. "I've got to go soon, Halliwell, so make this fast."

"Alright, alright, hold on," said Pepper. She shut her eyes tight and tried to remember everything that had made her mad this year. It didn't take very long for a clone to appear at her side. She opened her eyes and faced it. "Okay clone, go with Malfoy. Struggle and curse him and stuff so everyone thinks that you're me. Put up a damn good fight when then try to take your baby and kill you. Okay? You can try to Mirror out but I'm sure they'll have put something around the place so you can't. Don't fight them so much that they kill you right away, though. But you've got to do something if they try to….er…hurt you. Okay?"

"Okay," said the clone in Pepper's voice.

"Good," said Pepper. "Now go."

Malfoy took the clone roughly by the arm and hauled her out the door.

Harry removed the Invisibility Cloak and came to stand by Pepper and Hermione. "What do you think will happen to it?" he asked.

"Dunno," said Pepper, and Harry could tell that she was very frightened. "I just hope it doesn't get killed and they don't find out that it's a clone."

"This is all happening so fast," Harry said. "Hopefully we have more time than I think we do."

"I wonder if I die when it dies," said Pepper, trying to be nonchalant. Her façade didn't work. Both Hermione put her hand comfortingly on Pepper's arm and Harry went around to Pepper's other side and wrapped his own arm around her shoulders. She rested her head on his shoulder, staring at the open door Malfoy had just left through.

"You're not going to die, Pepper," said Harry. He couldn't answer the question she had asked, but he hoped that wasn't true. He hadn't thought that the clone was that attached to her…

"We won't let you die," Hermione reassured her. "We will get out of all of this somehow. It'll all be over soon."

"It will only be over when both Voldemort and the Source are dead," Pepper said. Her voice sounded very hollow. Harry wanted to know what she was thinking. He hated when his friends felt like this. He rested his cheek on the top of her head.

"They'll die soon," said Harry. "I'll make sure of it. I can't stand another person dying." He paused for a few minutes before saying, "In fact, I have an idea. Pepper, get your aunts. And Hermione, get Dumbledore. I'll get Ron. Let's meet in the Great Hall."

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"Young Draco and Snape are missing," Voldemort stated as he looked around at the faces of the Death Eaters gathered in the small, dark chamber.

"We are here, my Lord," Snape bowed as he and Draco entered the room. "And we come with a gift."

Draco pulled the struggling Pepper clone into the room as well and the circle of Death eaters parted so he could throw her at Voldemort's feet. They reformed the circle so she couldn't escape.

"Ah…" said the Source pensively. "Good work, boy, but next time work faster."

Clone Pepper's hands were tied in front of her and she had a blindfold on, so she had difficulty getting off the ground. "Let me go!" she said once she was standing, though her voice shook. She was more frightened than she had thought she would be.

The Death Eaters laughed coldly at her. "She's pretty, my Lords," one of them said.

"Yes, and she's mine, once I put her baby in another," Voldemort sneered.

The Pepper clone shuddered. She longed for the blindfold to be removed so she could see where she was and who she was dealing with. If she could just get her hands free then she could freeze the room and run. She was afraid to try and Mirror, in case it didn't work or in case it did work and she got Malfoy in a lot of trouble.

"Where is that damn Seer?" the Source roared. "The sooner this is over, the sooner we can make our attack. Seer!"

"I'm here," the Seer said calmly, entering the room. "I was preparing the potion." She stepped into the middle of the circle and walked around still-blindfolded Clone Pepper, who could feel eyes on her. "So this is the girl…" said the Seer.

The Death Eaters watched the Seer attentively. The Seer stopped walking and held up a vial with black liquid in it. "Remove the blindfold," she ordered.

"Draco—do it!" commanded Voldemort.

The Pepper clone felt Malfoy's footsteps bend the wooden floorboards as he came closer to her. He tried to keep his hands steady as he fumbled with the blindfold. When the cloth was finally removed from her eyes, the clone could see the Source and Voldemort standing importantly in front of her, the Seer close to them, and at least twenty cloaked Death Eaters. She couldn't even see half of the Death Eater circle. There were more of them behind her.

She tried not to look or act terrified as she was as Voldemort stepped into the circle and came closer to her. His face was the ugliest thing she or the real Pepper had ever seen. His skin was a pale grey, stretched over thin, jutting bones. His eyes were red slits and his teeth were pointy and yellow as he sneered.

She tried not to look away. She wanted to be brave, however hard that may be at this point. He walked around her, much like the Seer had, and her back went rigid. She thought that, if she were pregnant, it would be only logical for her to want to protect her baby. Her hand flew to her abdomen.

Voldemort chuckled, like she had wanted him to do. "You won't have to do that for long," he sneered.

"Seer, give the potion to Draco. He will feed it to her to prove his loyalty," said Voldemort, stepping back to his place at the head of the circle, alongside the Source.

As the Seer handed a reluctant Draco the small vial, there was a knock at the door. "Come in," said the Source. His voice told Clone Pepper that he already knew who it was. That dashed her hopes that it was someone to save her.

The door creaked open and eleven people entered. Ten of them were wearing Death Eater cloaks. One of them was Ivi Spada, who was smirking cruelly, though she looked worn.

"Azkaban is emptied, my Lords," said one of the Death Eaters. A cheer went up through the room, which made Clone Pepper sick to her stomach. That meant that Voldemort and the Source now had control of the Death Eaters, the demon factions, and all of the Dementors.

Shit.

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Harry hurried through the halls to Gryffindor Tower, carrying the Invisibility Cloak. On the way he ran into the one person he had been trying to avoid.

"Where are you going so quickly, love?" Eowyn Cuomo purred seductively as Harry met up with her in the hallway. She knew what was happening tonight and she knew she had to double her charms with Potter so that he wouldn't be able to interfere in case he realized Halliwell was gone.

He stopped in his tracks when Eowyn put a delicate hand on his arm. He smiled at her, not being able to help himself. "I've got to talk to Ron," he responded.

She smiled at him. It was all he could do not to kiss her.

"But you can't leave me waiting here all alone, can you?" she pouted.

"Ah…I suppose not," he said. She smiled at him again. He smiled back and before he knew it he had her pressed up against the wall, kissing the life out of her, the Invisibility Cloak on the floor at their feet.

As he started to nibble on her neck she whispered, "Why don't we go back to my room?" (A/N: Bad Elise!)

He looked up at her. "Yeah," he said breathlessly.

She led him by the hand down staircases and corridors. He was elated for a good while but after a few minutes his mind started to work again. His face lost the dreamy look and he remembered what he needed to do. He yanked his hand away from hers. She turned around and glared at him, her seductive air forgotten. Before she could say anything, he turned and ran.

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Draco walked defiantly out of the now-larger circle of Death Eaters to Clone Pepper's side. He looked like he wanted to say something to her but she knew he couldn't without getting in all sorts of trouble. Her eyes grew wide as he uncorked the potion. She wasn't sure if she or the real Pepper had ever been this scared in her life. "Get the hell away from me!" she screamed, backing up.

She'd stepped too far, though, because she was shoved from behind by the hands of a few Death Eaters. They pushed her too hard and she fell forward. She landed on her knees. Luckily, the floor was wood and not stone. Again, the Death Eaters laughed at her. Draco was coming ever closer, teeth clenched, potion in hand.

He held her head and forced it down her throat, the liquid burning her throat all the way down. The room was deathly silent.

She took a few deep breaths after swallowing, trying to recover from the burning sensation. The Seer began reciting a spell. A few moments later, while the Seer was still speaking, the writing pain started. She tried to stay still, but it overtook her pretty soon.

The stabbing pain ripped at her stomach and her heart pounded against her ribcage. Her skin felt like it was boiling. The Seer stopped talking in surprise.

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Most of the staff, Harry, Ron, Hermione, the Charmed Ones, Leo, many of the Order members, and a few Aurors were gathered around a table in the Great Hall. Harry was discussing his plan: to ambush the Death Eater meeting.

"They won't have any of the Dementors or demons around," he explained. "It's pretty much the ideal time to attack. Pepper can track her clone. We can just burst in and—"

He stopped suddenly when Pepper doubled over, crying out in pain. Instantly, her aunts and Hermione were at her side. "She's hurt," she bit out through the pain. "They've given her a-a potion. They're…they're trying to switch her baby to the Seer's body."

"We should hurry," said Dumbledore. "Round up as many of the Aurors and Order members as you can."