A/N: Hey, long time no see/write/exct... Anyway sorry that I haven't updated in such a long, long, long time. Some family stuff came up, mostly my grandma going into a nursing home and one of my aunts taking it worse than the others and being mean and all that over it and putting stress on my other aunts and mom so... Anyway I've finally got some time, so here's the chapter.
My Wonderful Reviewers:
Animegirl13: Thanks for all the words of inspiration! The really made me feel good and brightened my day! Thanks for the review!
Atara Shira: Wow, you think hard. (I do try hard...) Hmm... about Snape and the Unbreakable Vow and the Crustacious Curse... Here's where my loophole comes in (I found it one whole minute ago!) "Will you, Severus, watch over my son, Draco, as he attempts to fulfill the Dark Lord's wishes? ... And will you, to the best of your ability, protect him from harm?" (Rowling 36) My loophole lies in the fact that he didn't promise for how long he would watch over Draco and protect him from harm. As for Snape being a good guy... I'm not sure if I want him to be or not, it would make for an interesting twist... (And I just got an idea of how I could do that too)... I'll think on that. When I started this up it was to be romance-y-ish, then it changed to more of how I thought the story would be continued, now it's kinda merging into the two with my own continuation ideas being added. Thanks a ton for your review!
doom18769: Romance wise I don't know what it will be yet. It originated as DMHG fic and to make things easier read the last few sentences of the above answer, basically everything's stated there. And thanks for the complement in the review about putting Draco at the Dursley's, it made me feel good! Thanks for your review! (And about looking into names where I mixed them up in previous chapters, well I haven't gotten that far yet, I may edit them later if I have the time, if not then I'll just lead others to confusion...
Conclusion: Thanks everybody for your reviews, they made me feel really good and are what is encouraging me to stay up late working on the chapter even if my life feels like confused heck crammed with work. I took the PSAT today so I hope I did well... Anyway onto the story now!
Disclaimer: As said many times before, I, the one who goes under the name Nanie-san, do not own Harry Potter.
Previously: Draco Malfoy ended up staying in the Room of Requirement and was complaining over the sheets being cotton not silk and yadda yadda yadda this whole thing is for my memory so that I can continue the story and is for anyone who may need it.
Chapter 8: Preparation
Hermione watched as her friends walked down the to breakfast, looking like they could use another few hours of sleep and some brushes for their hair. She had been up for the past two hours already, working. She had been having trouble sleeping that night and gave up on it two hours earlier.
"Good morning," Hermione said with fake cheer and awakeness in her voice. "Did you sleep well?"
"No," said Ron sleepily, "stupid Pig kept me up all night, he wouldn't shut up..."
"It's all Ron's fault for forgetting to feed him and not letting him out of his cage, so it doesn't really matter. He deserves what he got," Ginny responded. "As for me I slept wonderfully."
"Bloody little witch," Hermione heard Ron mutter. Hermione sighed, sometimes Ron could be so immature.
"Well it could be worse," said Harry, trying to be positive. "Pig could hav-" Harry cut off his sentence as a loud popping noise was heard. "Hello Mr. Weasley," Harry then said while facing the apparated person.
"Dad, what are you doing here? Shouldn't you be at work?" asked Ginny.
"Yes, I should be at work. I've only stopped by momentarily. The Ministry's in absolute chaos! I won't be by for another week or so, everything's a wreck there! Smoke coming off of the roof, threatening messages over the walls. Moody's group's perusing the culprit now as we speak, hardly anyone's been allowed to leave the Ministry at all! Muggle problems to top it all off..." Mr. Weasly tried to catch his breath as Mrs. Weasley handed him a bottle of butterbeer. After drinking that he ran around like a lunatic waving his wand here and there, sending items flying into his trunk.
"There," he said after a half hour of mad packing. He hurriedly kissed Ron, Ginny, Hermione, and Harry on their foreheads. He rushed over and kissed Mrs. Weasley hurriedly and then disapparated.
Upstairs the Harry, Hermione, Ron, and Ginny were holding council.
"Something bad has to be up at the ministry," Ron said. "Dad mentioned threatening messages, smoke, and Moody all together."
"Trouble's not only there, he mentioned the muggles also," said Ginny.
"What we need to do now is find out what's going on with the muggles. I wonder if anything happened to Petunia and Vernon, maybe that's why they moved Malfoy," said Hermione.
"I hope something's happened to them!" said Ron angrily.
"Maybe Malfoy was moved because they knew someone was after him, like his parents friends," added Harry. "Death Eaters or Voldemort to be specific."
"Maybe, but he was moved before everything started happening," said Hermione. "Though, I do wonder, will Hogwarts be open this year now? Whatever's going on at the ministry could happen at Hogwarts. And after the end of last year, well, the ministry won't want to send student's there will they?"
"Dumbledore would have kept it open as long as possible," Harry said. "Besides, McGonagall said it'd be open!"
"Harry," Hermione said, "that was before the attack on the Ministry. ...Maybe we should do something, something drastic."
"Drastic? Like what, waltz over to the Ministry and say 'Hello, sorry to intrude on you like this, need some help'?" said Ron sarcastically.
"No, drastic like go to Malfoy Manor. The Ministry hasn't done anything to it yet and hasn't discovered anything. You and heard Malfoy, there's stuff there, we could find it!"
"Hermione, you can't be serious!" Ginny exclaimed softly. "If that were coming from Ron, or Fred, George I might believe it, but do you know how many wizarding laws that might break!"
"Yes. Bu-"
"Now'd be the best time," interrupted Harry. "The Ministry's busy enough that it might not notice us."
"Not notice us!" Ron nearly shouted. "They'd probably notice us and we'd just add to their work load!"
"Moody's already busy with other stuff though, and probably so is every other Auror. Dad probably didn't mention everything. Something terribly wrong has gone on there," said Ginny.
"I feel so... so... useless," Harry said weakly. "Everything's going on and we're doing nothing."
"I know how you feel, Harry, I feel the same way too," admitted Ginny.
"So let's do something! No one's going to be at the manor now, right? I mean, Dobby got freed, Draco's somewhere, Lucius is in Azkaban, and Narcissa's been missing ever since the day Moody found Malfoy." Hermione looked almost pleadingly at the group.
"Look, Hermione, I can't wait to expose the Malfoy's for the Dark wizards that they are too, but what if we're caught!" said Ron.
"And what if we're not," argued Hermione stubbornly.
"The Ministry's in the most chaos now. If Fred and George have managed to make anything with invisibility uses aside from their stupid hats then we'll take it and use it. Tonight's the best time, the only time," explained Harry hurriedly.
"Right. But Mum and Dad have that clock, it'll show that we aren't here," Ginny suddenly said nervously.
"We'll put sleeping draught in a cup of tea and take it to her before she goes to bed and say it's for her nerves. Ron'll do it, seeing as he's one of her worst stressers," said Harry.
"Hey!" interrupted Ron angrily, "what do you mean I'm one of her worst stressers! That's Fred and George!"
"Whatever," muttered Harry. "But anyway that'll make sure that she's asleep and so to stay for a while. Can you make a sleeping draught quickly, Hermione?"
Hermione nodded. "I'll work on it right away. Is there a place in the house where I could do it at, that no one but us would see?"
Ron, Ginny, and Harry though hard as Hermione went to gather ingredients.
"The closet, Ron's closet," said Ginny as Hermione returned to the room. "It's the safest place, Mum's not likely to be up here less than looking through the closet today. If Fred and George discover it by any weird means we'll just say that you're practicing for school."
Hermione worked with the potion throughout the day. She briefly paused her work only to go down and eat quickly. Ron said she was busy working on a report for McGonagall's class, it was a good enough excuse for Mrs. Weasley.
Harry had mentioned wanting to go to Diagon Alley to get some school supplies that he needed, alongside some gold to get them with. Mrs. Weasley had given him flu powder and sent Ron and Ginny with him to Diagon Alley.
Harry and Ron ran to Gringots. Ginny ran off in a different direction.
"Harry," asked Ron, "why are we here?"
"To get broomsticks." Ron fell silent. Harry quickly removed a pile of gold from the vault and put it into a bag he had broughten with him.
The two left Gringots and headed towards Quality Quddich Supplies. After looking around for a short while Harry purchased three Nimbus 2000s. He cast a shrinking spell on them and put them in his coat pocket. The two headed over to Gringots, Ginny was waiting for them there. The three went back to The Burrow.
Soon night fell and darkness consumed the house.
"M-mum, I've b-brought you a c-cup of t-tea," said Ron nervously while walking into Mrs. Weasley's room. "I-it's not m-much, but Hermione thought that it... that it would help calm your nerves..." Ron desperately hoped that he didn't sound like he was coming to give his mother sleeping draught. He tried to stop the shaking of his hands as he handed the cup to his mother.
"I-I'm sorry for all the t-trouble that I've c-caused in the past," he managed to stutter.
Mrs. Weasley looked up at her son, trying to smile despite the tears that ran down her face.
Ron turned after a minute and walked out the door up to his room. He was shaking by the time he made it there.
"It's gonna be cold tonight," said Harry, "wear a sweater. The Manor, abandoned, isn't going to be warm."
Ron nodded dumbly and began to take off his pajamas and pull on a pair of pants and a shirt and a sweater. He tossed another pair of pants and shirt to Harry, who still had only Dudley's old clothes, aside from the sweaters that Mrs. Weasley had given him for Christmas over the years.
After dressing the two quickly and silently darted over to Ginny's room, where Hermione and Ginny were waiting for them. All four of them were wearing black pants, black shirts and dark sweaters. Hermione had pulled a black scarf over her mouth and nose and had managed to tie her hair back and put it under the hood of her hoodie. Ginny had dressed similarly to Hermione. Hermione mentioned something about getting the idea from ninja. Hermione handed Ron a black hat, which he put over his bright orange hair.
"Ready?" asked Harry.
"As I'll ever be," said Hermione.
"No," responded Ron.
"Yes," Ginny said, somewhat confidently.
Harry suddenly turned and ran back to his trunk in Ron's room. He returned with his broomstick.
"Harry," asked Ginny suddenly, "do you have any clue where Malfoy Manor is?"
Harry took out the three shrunken broomsticks and let Hermione unshrink them. "No," he said, "but Hermione's taken care of that for us."
Hermione held out a torn, wrinkled piece of paper and showed it to Ron. "I found a book in your mum and dad's room that said where it was. I was there the other day, dusting. I decided that we'd need it eventually so I ran to Ginny's room and ripped a bit of parchment off of the scroll that I was using for my Potions essay. I went back down and quickly, magically made a copy of it. I think your dad wanted to raid the Manor sometime soon, because it was near to the top of a pile of other books with Ministry related stuff."
Ron grinned. "Well then, shall we mount our brooms?" he asked. A look of horror flashed across Hermione's face.
"You... want me... to fly, to fly a broom!" Hermione looked scared, deathly scared. Harry nodded his head.
Ginny smiled. "It's not that hard," she said. "And only one person per broomstick is best."
"Time to learn to fly, Hermione," said Ron.
Hermione squeezed her eyes shut. She had only been on a broom once before, for class, in her first eyar, because Madam Hooch made her. And even then she was only hovering two inches above the ground.
She mounted the broom carefully. Fear flowed through her veins. She heard Harry, Ron, and Ginny giving her advice. Telling her to quite shaking, to stay steady, to concentrate on what she was doing, and to think that she'd be fine. Finally she kicked off the ground, a bit harder than she expected to. She rose five feet off the ground and screamed, or at least, tried to. No sound came from her mouth. She looked down, Harry was holding his wand out. He had cast the silence spell on her. She glared at him as he reversed the spell.
"Good job, Hermione," said Ron, "you've managed to stay in the air!"
The other three mounted their brooms and kicked off the ground.
"We've have to fly high up so that we aren't seen. Is that all right, Hermione?" Harry asked.
Hermione felt herself nod. Her body felt numb. Somehow, though she didn't know how, she managed to rise up in the air following her friends.
She felt herself nearly fall once or twice but somehow managed to stay on the broomstick. Her arms, back, and legs felt sore after the first ten minutes of flying and her whole body was numb. Frost coated her hair. She shivered.
The group flew downwards and landed on the lawn in front of the main gate. Ron tried to open it.
"It's locked," he said.
"Of course it's locked you idiot," said Hermione, Ron looked offended. "Okay I'm sorry!" she fumed while pulling out her wand. "Alohamora," she said. The gate, surprisingly, opened.
A/N: Correction on how to spell Alohomora would be appreciated. I hope you liked it, please forgive me for taking forever! Please review! And thanks for reading! If I have some spare time I'll try to correct mistakes in other chapters like I've been meaning to...
Nanie