A/N: Hey guys, it's me again. Nothing's going on now, so I'll put another chapter on. Right-o! Enjoy it. Oh and if you had a problem with me not addressing the Hermione issue in the last chapter, sorry but it had to be done. Plus, it gives you something to wonder about. I'm the master of suspense! Ha-ha.
DISCLAIMER: Yeah I really AM Jo Rowling, which is why I'm on FanFiction, instead of in my publisher's office telling him that I'm going to make another million or three with my amazing ideas. (Sarcasm may or may not have been used, please don't attack me. I don't really have delusions of grandeur...often.)
VI
Hermione awoke to the sound of a tray being pushed under her door.
"Hello? Who's there?" she said sleepily. She heard a frightened squeak and feet shuffling away quickly. She sighed, then started eating the stew on her tray.
Hmm, I never thought that anyone else was around. Though, how could they not be? Someone had to have put me here, and they obviously feed me. Hermione puzzled over this for the remainder of her time awake before she inexplicably fell asleep again. As she drifted off she thought, Why am I here? And why am I always so tired? That can't be good…
Her dreams this time consisted of blurred images flying around her, whirling faster and faster until they dissolved into a bright white light, and then suddenly complete darkness. She could hear people talking, but there were so many of them that she couldn't recognize any voices. The voices faded away until she heard but two voices: a deep, almost silky voice, and a high squeaky one.
Deep voice: "She spoke to you?"
Squeaky voice: "I told you, yes she did! You need to give her more sleeping potions!" He sounded positively frantic.
Deep voice: "That will not be necessary, and indeed it would be detrimental for my…guest. Too much and she may fall into a sleep too deep to awake, and if that is to happen it will mean both of our lives. You would do well to remember that, Wormtail."
Squeaky voice: "The Dark Lord would never kill me; I gave him my right hand and my complete devotion!"
What sounded like a snort was heard from the deep voiced man (she assumed they were both men. The squeaky one could be female, however something told her that would be untrue).
Deep voice: "Do you wish to discover if the Dark Lord would dispose of you? I'm not sure why he suffers such fools as you."
The high voiced one let out a squeak just like a rat as she heard something slam against wood, and the deep voiced man hissed something that she couldn't make out. Hermione pictured a large black cat holding down a grey rat, and smiled in her sleep as she drifted into more pleasant dreams.
• • •
After the shower, Harry hurried to Ron's room to find a change of clothes. Ron gave him an odd look when he came in looking extremely pleased with himself.
"Mum was shrieking something about Ginny being home. I don't suppose you got a hold of her through the floo?"
"She came home when I went downstairs and we talked, and your mum came downstairs and saw us together." Yeah, you could call it that, he thought. As long as he doesn't figure out that I haven't been talking to his mum for the past half an hour…
"Oh." He paused. "Why were you so long then?"
Shit. "Well, Ginny and I wanted to talk some more and since Ginny was covered in soot your mum sent her to get cleaned up, so I went and talked to her for a bit." And that is as far as I can stretch that truth! thought Harry worriedly.
Ron seemed to buy that, and simply asked, "When's dinner?" as his stomach growled.
Harry laughed and said, "It should be half an hour, according to your mum." Looking out the window, Harry sighed. "I wish this storm would let up soon."
Ron looked at his hands, and then stood up angrily, "I feel so helpless, just sitting here, waiting for the storm to move on, and waiting for some news about Hermione. It's useless, and can't take it anymore!"
"Come on, mate. Want a game of chess?" Maybe checkmating me several times in a row will get him to cheer up a bit.
"Yeah, sure. I bet I can beat you in 12 moves."
"You're on. I can probably make it to 15."
"You wish!"
The boys laughed and ran down the stairs to the living room where they left the chess board from their last few games. Upon realizing that Ron could be brought out of any bad mood by sitting by a fire and utterly destroying Harry in a few games of chess, Harry used this to try and get Ron's mind off of missing Hermione. Ron focused on the strategy at hand instead of beating himself up about not being able to do anything to help, and was moderately upbeat for a few hours afterwards. I bet Hermione wished he would use that concentration with his schoolwork, he might be able to get through an essay without bugging her for help. That thought was accompanied by a memory of Hermione, Ron and himself sitting by the Gryffindor common room's fire, the boys with a chess board in front of them and Hermione curled up in her favourite armchair with some huge tome from the library she'd call "a bit of light reading" with Crookshanks on her feet. Harry shook his head and tried to focus on the game at hand. I know I'm going to lose anyway, but if I don't give him my best game he'll feel like I'm just giving in. Besides, I want to prove him wrong. 12 moves, ha! I can make it to 15…
A knock at the door interrupted their game. Harry went with Ron to answer it, and as he opened the door, Tonks and a barely conscious Remus Lupin collapsed onto Ron, bleeding from gashes all over his arms and chest.
Harry shouted for Molly to get the over here as Ron half carried Remus to the couch in the living room and Harry helped Tonks to an armchair as she protested weakly that her leg was fine, just sore.
"How did you ever manage to get here? You two look like hell!" said Ron bluntly.
"Ronald!" his mother cried, "Go get your father, tell him to invite Kingsley to dinner. We might need to call a meeting." Ron dashed out of the room, and Harry looked at Tonks with amusement. She laughed and said, "Ron's pretty subtle, isn't he?"
Molly glared at them both and resumed patching Remus up. Muttered remarks to the effect of, "Every time I see you two it seems like I'm healing some battle wounds" came from the corner of the room. Remus was wincing in pain whenever Molly jabbed him extra hard with her wand. ("If you just stopped squirming around I might be able to do this faster, Remus!")
"All done, Remus, relax for now. Oh, Tonks dear, your ankle…"
"Not to worry Molly, merely a flesh wound!" Tonks winked at Harry, who laughed at the reference. It was lost on Molly however.
"What are you talking about? Your ankle might be broken!" Tonks sighed as Molly cast a charm to check the damage on her body.
"As I thought, broken ankle, bruised all up your leg, you didn't tell me about a bump on the head…" she trailed off and gasped. "Tonks, you aren't…"
"What's wrong now?" Tonks asked anxiously. Harry felt like an intruder and sighed with relief when Ron walked in with Ginny, his father and Kingsley in tow.
"Congratulations, dear! Oh I didn't know… How far along are you? I suppose I could cast another charm…" Molly hugged her and everyone else continued to look extremely confused.
"Did we miss something?" asked Arthur.
"Now, now, Tonks, no reason to hide the good news!" Molly said, beaming.
"Hold on just a moment." Remus said from the couch. He sat up painfully, and looked Molly straight in the eye. "Are you saying what I think you're saying?"
It seemed like everyone clicked in at once. Tonks looked like she was going to faint and mumbled something suspiciously like "so that's what's been going on". Ginny went over and hugged her, and the men went over to congratulate Remus.
"You sly dog, Moony!" Arthur shook his hand, and grinned, "I'll fetch some Firewhiskey. This news deserves a little something stronger than the Butterbeer set out for dinner." Kingsley clapped him on the shoulder, and Harry sat beside him on the couch. Ron didn't look like he knew what to do with himself so he plunked himself down in another chair after congratulating Remus.
"About your letter, Moony –" Harry began but was cut off by Arthur returning with a bottle of Firewhiskey and a few shot glasses.
"I'll talk to you and Ron about that later, alright?" Harry nodded, and turned down the shot glass from Arthur.
"I'm not really sure about this, Mr. Weasley –" Harry protested
"Go on, Harry," said Ron, "It's a celebration right dad?"
"Indeed," said Arthur. Everyone (except Ginny and Tonks, who weren't drinking) raised their glasses to the couple and then downed them.
Molly went over to Remus and hugged him, saying, "Children are a handful especially the first time around. We're always here for you two. Oh I've got to start knitting!"
Ginny groaned when she heard that, and Ron laughed. I wish Hermione was here too, Harry thought.
• • •
Later that night when everyone was going to bed, Ron snuck back downstairs with Harry to talk to Remus. Mum specifically told them not to bother him, which was why they had to be quiet or risk the wrath of a woman with knitting needles.
They found him in the living room staring into the fire. He looked up and smiled tiredly at them, and gestured for them to be quiet. Tonks was snoring gently on the couch he had occupied earlier. She apparently refused to turn Ginny out of her bed since she just arrived back home and instead crashed on the couch. Ron sat in an armchair while Harry just sat on the floor holding a pillow. They had a quiet few moments, which Tonks shattered when she let out a particularly loud snore. Harry and Ron barely suppressed their laughter, and Remus chuckled quietly.
"Wow, mate, how'd you get any sleep?" asked Ron, half jokingly.
Remus looked at him with a serious look on his face and said solemnly, "We didn't sleep much," They all chuckled at that.
It was Ron's turn to be serious as he leaned forward and asked, "Have you gotten any further on where she might be?" There was no need to clarify who "she" was.
Remus sighed and rubbed his hand over his face. Harry took this as his cue. "I'm pretty sure your news isn't the greatest, Moony, because if it was you wouldn't have waited around to say it. But we really, really need to know what you know, even if we can't actually do anything to help." Though I'll try anything to get to her, thought Ron.
"I've been looking for clues with Mundungus and his more "unsavoury" acquaintances as to who might be keeping her. We haven't entirely ruled out the Malfoys, but since Lucius is in Azkaban, it's highly unlikely that Draco would be able to hold Hermione by herself. We've heard some interesting things about the break-in, but nothing definitive about any captives."
That piqued Ron's interest. "Interesting things? Like what?"
Remus grinned, "Something about a few Aurors and some in training who came for a raid and the group of Death Eaters apparently killed 5 of them, captured 2 and the other 2 ran away like scared rabbits."
Ron snorted. That's about as likely as Snape wearing bright pink robes and fluffy bunny slippers, he thought, and outright laughed at the mental picture that thought presented.
"Shh, it seems Harry has had a long day." Remus said, pointing to Harry. He was stretched out in front of the fire with the pillow under his head.
"More like too much Firewhiskey."
"Perhaps that too." They both smirked, and Ron stood up to leave. "I better get to bed, d'you reckon we ought to wake up Sleeping Beauty there?"
"No, I'll watch over the two of them. It would be best to speak with him in the morning at any rate. Good night Ron."
"Good night Moony." As he was walking out the door, he turned and said, "Oh, good luck with Tonks. Be careful she doesn't drop the baby on its head, yeah?"
Remus rolled his eyes and said, "I'll watch out for that, thanks Ron."
Love it? Hate it? Review it! Thanks to you for sticking it out and waiting for these chapters. It's been tough trying to narrow down which of the billions of ideas I've had into a conceivably believable plot. I think most of the kinks have been worked out, but let me know if you spot something weird or out of place. I try to make it as HBP compatible as possible, though I'm a bit rusty on some fine details. I've only read it 10 or 20 times rather than the hundreds with the others grin.
