Chapter Ten

After the week he'd had, Ron felt there was no better place to spend his day off then down at the pub he and Harry frequently visited after their shifts ended. He would have asked Harry to join him, but then he remembered Harry hated his guts at the moment.

When he woke up around noon, which would have been unusual for him except he had been sleeping so little lately, he saw Harry was already gone. More accurate would have been that he hadn't come home yet. When he had got in around two, he walked passed Harry's room to see the bed unmade as if he had slept in it and then decided to get up and go out.

He welcomed the cool September air, knowing that a nice long walk would do him a world of good instead of simply apparating to his destination.

He was beginning to consider the fact that he was doomed to live with no one else but himself. He had thought moving out of Lupin's and in to Harry's would have made his life a bit better. Only now Harry seemed to hate him almost as much as Hermione did.

While he had no doubt Harry would get over it, Hermione was another story entirely. While he hadn't meant everything he had said to her, the damage their most recent shouting match had caused made him believe that it was really over. Those weren't the kind of things you simply forgot or pretend never happened. The more he allowed himself to think about, the more he was forced to admit that it really was Harry that had kept the three of them together all these years. It was not that hard to believe that their mutual friend was the only common factor between them. He had always known that he and Hermione were opposites, but he was finally seeing those differences at their most extreme. Whereas he wanted to have fun and avoid doing any sort of real work at all costs – except when it came to his Auror duties – Hermione was always looking for more work, like setting up SPEW campaigns and the like. Then there was his passion for Quidditch that she had never really understood, not too mention how much it bothered him that she was a million times smarter than he would ever be. It didn't take much for him to get lost in a conversation with her once she started going on about spell properties of this and that. Really, why she had even wasted her time with him in the first place was beyond him. All of his bad habits were things that weren't even in her vocabulary – procrastination, foul language, and short tempered just to name a few. He bet she had to dumb herself down sometimes just to talk to him so he would understand.

He should have just let Harry have her when he found out he kissed her, instead of fooling himself that they could be happy together and that she needed him as badly as he needed her. When the truth was she didn't need him at all. She was a strong and capable woman and all he had ever done was take that for granted when it suited him and the other times punished her for it. No wonder she wasn't so willing to forgive him now after everything he had done to hurt her since the first day he had met her.

His feet had carried him across the barrier separating the muggle world and into the ministry shopping area, which was at its busiest at midday. There might have been a war going on but people still needed to shop and eat, though they seemed to go about it much quicker these days and make less frequent trips by buying more at one time.

There was supposed to be a set of Aurors patrolling through there but he didn't see any. It wasn't as if he had covered every inch of the shopping centre. They were most likely making their rounds down the other streets.

The entrance to the pub was down a secluded street to provide a sort of privacy for its daily patrons and the other crowds it tended to attract.

Ron's eyes locked on a figure that seemed to appear out of nowhere, but he was a split second too late in drawing his wand.

"If you don't want to do this the hard way, I suggest you drop your wand."

Ron's lips curled into a snarl. He would recognize the snobbish drawl of that voice in his sleep. "I hardly ever do things the easy way," he said, keeping his wand trained on Malfoy. "It's a Weasley thing."

Malfoy was undeterred by Ron's response. "Remember how I said if you came after me again, you wouldn't walk away from it? Let's just say I got tired of waiting."

The sound of three distinct pops echoed around Ron. Before he could move, a stocky hand grabbed his neck from behind and pinned him against the cobblestone wall. He felt a second hand reaching for his wand and reared his elbow back connecting with something solid. A howl of pain and a string of curses told Ron he had hit his mark. He felt the momentary lapse in his unseen attackers hold on him and used it to break free. He spun on his heel and swung his fist into the burly man's face, causing more damage to his own knuckles than anything else. The man was already regaining his balance and rammed his fist against Ron's face, sending him stumbling back. He could see out of the corner of his eye the two other attackers approaching him from either side, one of them had blood pouring out of his nose where Ron had elbowed him.

"Stop fucking around and use your wands!" Malfoy ordered.

Ron lunged at the man with the bleeding nose, grabbing him by the shoulders and using him as a shield to block the first stunning spell aimed at him. The man fell to the ground out cold. Ron snatched up the man's wand and used it disarm the one who had thrown the stunning spell.

The wand flew out of his hand but as Ron was watching that happen he missed the burly man come up from the side and send a crushing blow to his head.

Ron's head exploded with pain and his vision blurred. Doubled over in pain, he missed avoiding the next blow aimed at his rib cage. The hand holding Ron's wand was snapped back and his wand clattered uselessly to the ground.

Blood over his left eye was starting to cloud his vision worse than the pain. He kicked out using all his strength, connecting with his attacker's exposed kneecaps. Ron wasted no time in jumping over him and seizing a hold of his neck. Just as he had been trained to do in situations just like this, he wretched his attacker's head to the side, snapping his neck and letting him crumble to the ground.

The man he had disarmed was charging at him while he was still distracted with the body in front of him and bashed Ron's head against the wall. Groaning, Ron wretched himself free from his grasp and using his uninjured hand, dislocated his attacker's shoulder before ramming him head first into the wall much harder then what had been done to him a minute before.

"Not bad, Weasley," said Malfoy, coming around with his wand aimed directly at Ron's heart, "but you still lose."

Malfoy was too far away to tackle, so Ron scooped up the dropped wand belonging to one of Malfoy's goons and took aim at him. Malfoy flew backwards into the maze of stacked crates against the wall. They toppled over, burying the Slytherin beneath them.

Ron dropped the wand he had been holding like it was fire and stumbled back until he was against the wall. His mind was screaming at him to get out of there. There was no chance all that noise could have gone unnoticed by the patrons inside the pub. But he was frozen to the spot.

There was no escape for him once the pub door swung open and the first curious patron stepped outside to investigate what all the racket had been…

"Where is he?" Hermione demanded of Harry the second she walked inside Lupin's. He, Ginny, and Lupin were standing in the kitchen looking extremely tense. She had been at work when the news had come over the wireless.

"He's upstairs," Harry told her.

She was annoyed at how calm he sounded. This was not something that you could keep a cool head over, not with the allegations she had heard. She made for the stairs but Harry grabbed her arm.

"Maybe you should give him some time," he said to her. "He's pretty shaken up about the whole thing."

"Is he hurt?"

"He looks bad, Hermione. But he wouldn't let us take him to St. Mungo's. Tonks went to get his mum. They're going to be here shortly."

She nodded her understanding and climbed the stairs. Ron was in the room that had been his when he lived there. The door was shut and there was nothing but silence to be heard coming from the other side of it.

"Ron?" She called, knocking softly. She received no answer so she knocked again. "Ron, please let me in." She couldn't stand it any longer, so she reached for the handle, saying, "I'm coming in, okay?"

There were no lights on inside but there was more than enough daylight coming in through the windows for her to see him clearly. He was keeping his back to her, facing the window.

"Ron?"

He still said nothing and it was starting to worry her.

When she was finally standing beside him, she knew what Harry had been talking about. There was a large gash just below his hairline and the blood that had been running from it had dried on his face. One eye was nearly swollen shut and the left side of his jaw was turning into one giant purplish bruise.

"Oh my god, Ron," she breathed, reaching out to touch one of the many scrapes on his face, but he pulled away. "I'm sorry," she apologized instantly.

"It's not that," he said finally bringing himself to look at her. "I just didn't want you to see me like this."

She noticed the way he was gingerly holding his right hand. "You really should go to St. Mungo's and get checked out," she said, doing her best not to sound like a nag.

"It's just a sprain. It'll heal," he assured her.

"Will you at least let me clean you up a bit before your mum gets here?" She asked gently.

Reluctantly he nodded. His mum was probably already freaked out, that he didn't want to make things any worse by causing her to faint where she saw the bloody mess that had become his face.

Hermione left and returned a minute later with a damp washcloth in one hand and a small bag in the other. He sat on the bed, letting her clean the caked blood off the side of his face.

When his eyes met hers but he didn't say anything, she said in a low voice, "what?"

"You haven't asked me about what happened," he started. "I know it's all over the news because I heard them talking about it downstairs. That's how you heard about it, right?"

She nodded and wiped the last of the dried blood off his face.

"Why haven't you asked me about what you heard?"

"Because I know most times than not, reporters aren't interested in the truth – they're just looking for an exciting story."

"What are they saying? Hermione tell me," he insisted when she hesitated.

"They're saying you cornered Malfoy in an alley and when three wizards jumped in to try and stop you, you fought them too."

"Hermione, I swear I didn't start anything," he said, his voice desperate. If there was one person he needed to believe him it was her. "I know how bad it must look," he said, looking away from her.

"I believe you," she said unwaveringly.

"You – you do?"

It was her own fault to hear that doubt present in his voice. "I know there's a lot of bad blood between you and Malfoy but you would never purposely set out to do those things to him."

He felt her begin applying the same soothing ointment she had used on his hand months earlier when he had rammed it through the wall in her room. "I was heading for the pub and he came out of nowhere," he began slowly. "He had his wand out so I pulled mine out. Then these three other guys apparated around me and we started fighting. I used one of them as a shield to block a curse and then this other guy came at me. I stopped thinking and just started reacting. I broke his neck," Ron said, the details of the attack spilling out of him. "When the other one came at me I broke his arm and then I rammed his skull into the wall again and again, until I knew he was dead. Malfoy was the only one left, and since I had lost my wand, I used one of the ones on the ground to send him crashing into that pile of crates."

"You were defending yourself," was her instant response.

"I killed two people in cold blood."

"They would have done the same to you."

"Hermione, you don't understand. It was like my Auror training took over and I couldn't help myself. I know how to kill a man three different ways with just my bare hands. You're not supposed to show the enemy mercy – and in my mind Malfoy was the enemy. I couldn't stop until I had eliminated him as a threat. He might have started it, but I wanted to hurt him. I wanted to make him pay."

He sounded so guilt ridden it tore at her. "Ron, you're a good person – you're not a monster. You didn't ask for this to happen."

"So Malfoy just got what he deserved then? And those two I killed got what was coming to them?" His words were harsh but they weren't being directed at her.

Before she could respond to that, Mrs. Weasley's frantic voice could be heard from out in the hall.

She came into the room and went to embrace her son, but Ron held out a hand to stop her. He didn't deserve to be coddled by his mother right now.

"Ron, your hurt! You really should go to St. Mungo's and get checked out. Remus thinks you might have a concussion." She touched his face with her hand to inspect him closely.

"Mum, stop fussing I'm fine," Ron snapped.

"I'll be downstairs," Hermione said, gathering her things off the bed.

She slipped out of the room and downstairs, the fretful sound of Mrs. Weasley's worried voice following her as she went.

When Hermione came back downstairs, she found Harry, Ginny and Remus in the kitchen, with the only difference being Tonks was there with them now. She was currently the one speaking.

"It doesn't look good for Ron. It's no secret that there's a history between them."

"This isn't his fault," Harry said, growing angry. "Malfoy and those thugs ambushed Ron and he defended himself."

"Harry, we're all on Ron's side here," said Lupin calmly. "But we have to be realistic. Malfoy's in a coma, one of the other attackers is still unconscious, and the other two are dead. There are no witnesses to come forward and say what happened." As Lupin said those words to Harry, he didn't miss how the young man was doing everything in his power to avoid looking at him, just as he had for much of the afternoon.

"What's going to happen to Ron?" Hermione said, making her presence known.

"Even with the two deaths they don't have enough evidence yet to charge him with anything," Tonks said, her voice devoid of its normal humour. "They still have to launch an official investigation. They'll look into Ron's school records, talk to his old professors, and that's where they'll find out the boyhood grudge between them goes all the way back to their school days at Hogwarts. Ron does have his Auror record, which is spotless and has a lot of good mentions in it by Mackenzie, but it would have helped his case a lot if he hadn't been the only one conscious on the scene. It shows he wasn't hurt as bad as the others."

"Not as bad?" Ginny exclaimed. "Tonks, his face was covered in blood. He's a mess."

"Ginny, I know," she responded sympathetically. "But you have to understand the law enforcement officials won't see it that way. He was the only one who walked away from this."

"They were going to kill him," Harry said furious. "The only thing that saved him was his Auror training."

"That's another problem. They're going to investigate if Ron's actions were warranted. He didn't have his wand but still used his hands to kill two people. That could be seen as going beyond self-defense. And until this is resolved Mackenzie is going to have no choice but to suspend him."

Harry looked away from the Auror. The whole situation seemed to look worse and worse the more they talked about it.

"What about dad?" Ginny said. "He could – "

"No, Ginny, your father needs to stay as far away from this as possible," Lupin said sternly. "The last minister was replaced because the wizarding world finally realized how corrupt he was. Arthur can't be shown displaying any favourtism towards his own son. If he gets involved in this not only would it be political suicide but he would land himself in a lot of trouble with the Magical Law Enforcement officials if he were caught interfering in an investigation. He could lose his job over it, not to mention be facing charges for obstructing justice."

"What are the chances of Ron being cleared of the charges?" Hermione asked the adults.

"Well, if this thing does go to trial, Ron would be entitled to a fair hearing just like anyone else. He would get a lawyer and fight this thing. His chances for getting off would greatly improve if Malfoy were to wake up and admit it had been a set up and that Ron was just acting in self defense."

"There's still that other one he brought with them that's still alive, right?"

Tonks nodded. "The Healers haven't been able to revive him yet but he should make a full recovery. That doesn't mean he's going to tell us what we want to hear. He's liable to do more harm to Ron awake than unconscious."

"What about Veritaserum?"

"They only grant the use of that in extreme situations, and I doubt the ministry would consider using it under these circumstances," Tonks explained to her.

"What about linking Malfoy to his father's Death Eater activities?" Hermione asked, reaching for anything that might help Ron.

"That might be difficult," said Lupin. "Malfoy has a clean record."

"Can we do anything to help?" Ginny said.

"Yes and no," Tonks told them. "Ron's going to need all his friends to get through this, but this isn't a battle you can fight for him. You've never come up against the law like this before. We can do some investigating of our own, as long as it doesn't interfere with what the Ministry officials are doing. I hate to sound negative, but there's not a lot we can do."

A grim silence settled in the kitchen after Tonks spoke those words.

WalkingTheFallen: Thanks for your really great comments. I don't read nearly as much as I write, so just send me an email when you post your story and I'd be more than happy to give it a read.

adrianne2: I just hope my story isn't taking over your life ;)

tabitoo: Thank you for all your amazing reviews so far. I'm glad you're loving the story.

reading-rider: I try to have a lot going on because as you said it's a lot more fun to read that way.