Harry was being closely followed by Draco, Hermione, and Ron as they furiously made their way out of the forbidden forest and into Hogsmeade, where they would be able to apparate.

"I thought I should just warn you Harry," said Ron. "I haven't really mastered the whole apparating thing."

"You can hold on to me," said Hermione.

"You can hold on to me all night long," said Draco, grinning evilly.

Ron turned red and pulled out his wand. Hermione stopped him quickly, preventing him from doing anything stupid.

"Can you all shut up," said Harry. They were almost to the gates, and he could see the Shrieking Shack in the distant, looming under the full moon.

"Poor Lupin," said Ron, glancing up at it.

"Now," said Harry. He wasn't exactly sure where he was going, so he grabbed onto Ron and Hermione's hands, and Draco, quickly grabbing onto the back of Ron's shirt, disapparated with them.

"QUIT TOUCHING ME!" said Ron as they were pulled out of Hogsmeade, and disappeared.

His words, however, came to a sharp halt as they landed in the cemetery, which was dead silent and filled with nostril-choking black fog.

"Harry," Hermione breathed. "Where are we?"

"The cemetery," said Harry. He remembered that spot with full force—Harry, it's a portkey. Cedric's voice was echoing in his ear like it was yesterday.

"SHUT UP!" a voice called from somewhere far off in the darkness. "If you don't stop crying right now—"

"Ginny!" Harry gasped.

"—I will Crucio your ass, Lucius," said Rebekah.

Draco giggled.

"I am so sick of you two," Lucius sneered.

"Oh, shut up," they said in unison.

"Someone get the girl," said Alex.

"Bloody Whorecruxes," said Lucius, walking farther and farther away. Still, out in the cemetery, Ron, Hermione, Harry, and Draco could not see them.

"The Dark Lord wouldn't appreciate you talking to us that way, Lucius," said Rebekah.

Harry, suddenly, saw the windows of what was unmistakably the Riddle house.

"Whoa," said Draco.

"Look at that," said Hermione. Ron's face was blank, dumbfounded. There was a light coming from a window on the third floor, and Harry automatically sprang forward.

"Harry, no!" Hermione hissed. Draco grabbed the back of his shirt. Harry slapped his hand away.

"Don't touch me!"

"She's right, you know," said Draco. "If you go in there—those girls aren't exactly beginners at unforgivable curses."

"How would you know?" asked Ron.

"Alex likes to Crucio people," he said. "Thought it was kinky."

"Ew," said Hermione.

"Right," tried Ron. Hermione slapped him.

"We have to get in somehow," said Harry, growing more and more annoyed with each passing second. "We have to get to her somehow—"

"Well I think we should go in the servant's door—" Tried Draco.

"Servant's door—" Hermione scoffed.

"Yes, servant's door—"

"What about in through the—" Ron started.

"There's no such thing as a serv—"

"Hello," said Draco, pointing to himself. "I'm the Pure-Blood here."

"HEY!" said Ron. "I'm a—"

"Shush!" said Harry. "Quit arguing!"

"LUCIUS!" Rebekah screamed. "WHAT. IS. THE HOLD UP?"

"Sodding Malfoys," Alex grumbled.

"Harry!" said Hermione. "Not now—"

"Alex." said Rebekah, with a tone in her voice undeniably like urgency. "Shush."

Harry, Hermione, Draco, and Ron all got insanely quiet, trying not to breathe, or move, or make any sound at all.

"Get the girl," said Rebekah. "GO!"

Harry sprang out from behind the tombstone and ran forward at full speed.

"HARRY!" The three behind him screamed.

"LUCIUS!" Alex screamed. "LUCIUS, GET THE GIRL! IT'S POTTER! POTTER AND THE BRATS GO!"

"ALEX!" Rebekah screamed. "GET TO THE TOMBSTONE AND TAKE HER TO THE—"

"MANSFIELD!" Harry screamed. "MANSFIELD!"

Rebekah fell silent.

"YOU CAN'T HIDE HER FROM ME!"

"DON'T BE SO PATHETIC, POTTER!" she shouted back.

"WHEN I FIND YOU, YOU BITCH—"

"DRACO!" Alex shouted. "YOU FRUITCAKE WHEN I CATCH YOU!"

"YOU'LL DO WHAT? TELL MY FATHER?"

"YOU'RE NO SON OF MINE!" Lucius shouted.

Harry and the three behind him ran until they saw a brief glimpse of Alex, with her wand raised, waiting before them—she saw them, and disappeared into the haze.

"This is fun," Draco gasped. "We should do this more often. I love chasing after dangerous witches in the middle of the night."

"Oh, sod off Draco," said Harry.

Suddenly, he heard a voice that made his heart freeze.

"Harry!"

His mind came to a halt.

"Ginny? Ginny, where are you?"

"Harry!" Ginny cried. "Harry! Go back! Harry you have to go back!"

"I'm not going anywhere, Ginny!"

Suddenly, Ginny screamed an ear-splitting, horrible scream.

Harry pushed farther and farther on, but it was too dark to see anything. Behind him, Hermione collapsed. Ron went back for her, but Draco and Harry kept running.

"IT'S TOO LATE, POTTER!" Alex taunted. "IT'S OVER! SHE BELONGS TO THE DARK LORD NOW!"

"YOU DIRTY BIT—" Draco started.

"DRACO, YOU SISSY—" Lucius screamed.

"YOU WOULD KNOW!"

"OUCH!"

"YOUR MOM!"

"I'M GOING TO MAKE HER SUFFER, POTTER," Rebekah screamed. "I'M GOING TO TORTURE HER, AND THEN WE'RE BOTH GOING TO KILL HER!"

"GINNY!" Harry screamed.

"HARRY NO!"

Suddenly, Harry heard a voice that made his voice crawl.

"Hello Harry," said the icy, bone-chilling voice of Bellatrix Lestrange. "Know that she will suffer greatly at the hands of the Dark Lord, Potter! It's going to take more than a couple of teenagers to save her from the Dark Lord's wra—!"

"BELLATRIX!" Harry shouted into the darkness. "WHEN I FIND YOU, I AM GOING TO—"

"To kill me, Harry? Little baby Potter is going to kill me?"

Harry sprang forward through the fog, and, finally catching a glimpse of her—

"ARGH!" they both screamed at once.

She waved her wand in the air, and nearly screamed Avada Kedavra, when Harry knocked her onto the ground.

"GET OFF ME!" She hissed, digging her nails into his scalp. He pointed his wand at her face, but her free arm sprang up and hit him—her wand was in her right hand, he took it and slammed her wrist as hard as he could into the tombstone next to them. With a frightening crack, her wand broke in half.

"YOU LITTLE—!"

"STUPEFY!" Harry screamed.

Bella fell silent, her eyes rolled back in her head, and she collapsed onto the ground.

Draco appeared behind him, pulled Harry up by the collar of his shirt, and the two boys continued to run.

Suddenly, everything seemed to go silent. Harry's scar seared with pain, but he could not feel himself scream.

Draco pulled him through the rest of the fog, and suddenly, they were standing in a round courtyard, in front of a tombstone that haunted Harry's memories.

Ginny was lying at the base, arms chained to the Riddle tombstone with some kind of magical chain that curled and moved as if it was a snake. Rebekah and Alex were nowhere to be found.

Behind you.

The voice whispering in his mind was strangely familiar.

Harry whirled, threw up his wand, and—

"EXPELLIARMUS!"

"SERPENSORTIA!"

"OPPUGNO!"

Their wands, like Voldemort and Harry's wands had done in his fourth year, connected. Draco fell back on the ground, dumbfounded.

"Phoenix?" Harry asked breathlessly.

Alex and Rebekah's eyes were wide with horror, but they answered, just as breathlessly.

"Unicorn," said Rebekah.

"Dragon," said Alex.

"What—" Rebekah started. She looked desperate. "What's happening—?"

There was a string of magic flowing from all of their wands, each a different color; Rebekah's was pale silver, Alex's was green, and Harry's was bright as a red flame.

Harry heard himself, as if from some distant memory, screaming "SIRIUS! SIRIUS NO!"

There was a shadow of a man hovering over them, eyes gaunt and hollow. Suddenly, the light changed, and he was white and blinding.

The man faded, and a snake curled it's ugly head in the air.

I will kill her, Harry.

Parsletongue.

I will kill her.

The snake curled as if to strike—Harry heard Rebekah sob, and it vanished.

Harry, said another voice, as clear as a summer day. Harry, there is only one way you can save her.

"How," Harry asked aloud. The memory of the voice was hovering over them like a pleasant dream.

"NO!" Alex was crying, staring up at the man.

Dumbledore.

Save her with your love, Harry. Save her.

With one horrible, potentially fatal jerk, Harry pulled his wand away—the magic, floating in the air, with no other place to go, split forward—Harry ducked, but Alex and Rebekah didn't have the time to think. They both flew backwards, hit with the different effects of their different spells. Ginny, at this exact moment, screamed in horror and pain.

"GINNY, NO!"

Her scream tore through the Earth like a plague.

"GINNY!"

His scar suddenly seared like it had never hurt him before. He felt as if his body was being torn in two as he fell forwards, screaming with Ginny as one.

"ALEX!" Rebekah screamed. She was holding herself up across the courtyard, magic still swirling around her, holding her hand over her left eye, where her skin seemed to have turned into scales. "GO NOW!"

Harry heard the crack as they disapparated, and hate scorched his veins.

"Harry," a voice called softly—the sound splitting in his mind was so deafening, he was surprised he could hear her. Ginny—she was alive. His body coursed with warmth at the sound of her voice.

And just like that, the pain left him.

His body lost it's rigidity, the swirling magic that filled the air in the graveyard lifted, and Harry and Ginny both collapsed on the ground.

Harry slowly opened his eyes and glanced across from him where Ginny lay—her body was changed. Her stomach was smooth and flat once more, like it had been, and she wasn't moving. She was lying on the ground as still as the cemetery itself, curled into a ball. The magical chains were gone.

"Ginny—!"

She gasped for air.

Relief filled him.

"Ugh," said Draco, sitting up. "What on Earth happened—?"

"Shut up—"

Somewhere farther out in the cemetery, Harry heard Hermione scream.

"Oh God," said Harry. "Bellatrix."

There was another crack, and they all flinched. Was that—?

"A gunshot," said Harry, sitting up quickly. Ginny stood up shakily, and Draco stood up as well in the back, confused.

"A what—?"

Harry took off running into the darkness, afraid of what he would find. But he had only heard one gunshot—surely, if it had been Bella...

"Harry, stop," said Hermione. She was sitting on the ground in the shade of a tombstone, with Ron at her side.

There was a body on the ground, and a man standing shakily in the dark, still holding the gun. Ron's wand flew up, and—

"Stupefy!"

The man fell to the ground. His hat rolled off his head and over to Harry's feet; on it was stitched "Security". Harry turned to the body.

"Harry, don't," said Hermione, smothering a sob. "It's Bellatrix, she—"

Hermione didn't need to explain.

"Let's get out of here," said Harry, grabbing Ginny's hand.

They didn't need to be told twice.