Hello! I've given up on work for the evening, so I decided to give you all a present for the weekend!
So as usual, thank you to all the reviewers: ollietrombone, Mrs. MaTi, Irindiglo, , creelluka, Cae-Leigh Anne and lizyeh2000! I absolutely love the feedback (so feed me!)
Anyway, enjoy part 2 of the raid!
Bellatrix was put out, but Rodolphus seemed satisfied. Emma's gaze flickered over to her former friend. Alecto held eye contact for the space of a second, then dropped her eyes to Emma's wand arm, still outstretched. Emma followed the red head's gaze. Her arm was shaking, almost imperceptibly, but not quite. A dead giveaway, Regulus would tell her. Quickly, she withdrew it back into a defensive position. It felt odd, like a ghost arm, able to move but disconnected from the nerves.
Her surroundings were a blur. She might have thought it was because of the smoke, if not for the circle of earth before her being sharply clear, the girl's blonde pigtails splayed out in a halo around her unmoving face.
You did the right thing, she told herself, trying to convince herself. She was better off dead than being tortured by Bellatrix.
Still, it seemed like cold had permeated her bones, as though she were the dead corpse and not the very much alive teenager standing in the middle of a burning town. She watched as Mulciber used his robes to wipe off the sweat on his forehead. Had he been worried about her? Or was it the heat? Suddenly, he was blasted back into a tree.
Three heads snapped around to see the glint of silver "M"s for "Ministry of Magic" on the robes of approaching wizards, three bodies leapt into cover, biding their time until the opportunity arose.
Bellatrix, however, was not one known to run and hide at the mention of a battle. Instead, she blasted a crater in the road in front of the Aurors, before leaping into the hole she had created to duel the wizards that had fallen through. Others in the vicinity had been knocked down – although Emma could no longer see them, she could hear them coughing and sputtering up the ash they had been forced to eat.
After a moment's hesitation, Rodolphus cast several Killing curses into the mix, joining his wife in the fight. Emma didn't wait to see what Alecto would do, or even if Mulciber was alright. Taking advantage of the chaos, she crawled across the debris in the opposite direction, deciding that she had played her part in this particular battle. Besides, the analytical part of her brain said. It's not as if you'd be much help in your state, anyway.
Her nerves had been frayed by the encounter with the Muggles. They weren't the kind that mocked wizards until their magic became a disability. If not for their clothing, they could have been mistaken for wizards. Deep down, Emma knew that she had just crossed an invisible line. There would be no going back though, only forwards.
With that thought in mind, she grimly shuffled on, until she came across the mother Muggle. She had obviously been struck in the head by a piece of flying rubble, her face partly submerged in a sticky pool on the ground. Her glassy eyes were staring at Emma, and although she knew that the woman was dead, she still felt an unmistakeable wave of guilt wash over her. This time she couldn't prevent it, making it to the roots of a nearby tree before her evening meal came rushing up.
It was a few minutes before she felt even somewhat functional again, but when her legs began working, they started crawling in the opposite direction - towards the firing range. What are you doing? she asked herself, commanding her legs to stop. But it was as though her body had a mind of its own, darting from cover to cover until she was nearly back where she had started. Luckily, the battle had moved on. In the end, she ground to a halt, lost. The girl was still there, the only sign of the battle a streak of dirt across her otherwise clear face.
A sudden noise behind her had Emma back in hiding, but when she peered around the corner there was nothing to be seen. She waited patiently, scanning the area. Just as she was about to give up, she heard it again, more clearly this time: A choked sob, followed by a muffled reprimand.
Intuition had her turning around and peering into the hallway of the broken building that served as her hiding place. There, she found the rest of the family, the father with his ash-streaked hand covering the little girl's mouth. So they managed to get away, she thought.
'Please don't hurt us,' the little girl burst out, taking advantage of her father's slackened grip.
She screwed up her face for a few seconds, before another sob burst out and this time, she was the one to slap two hands over her face.
The father watched her warily, but said nothing. Emma stared back, at a loss as to what to do. She hadn't even realised that he had managed to get free of the cement bindings. Before she made up her mind, the man spoke.
'Can you help us? That other group of…whatever you are…they killed my wife and my daughter. I need to get Marigold to safety, wherever that is,' he said quickly, his eyes beseeching. 'I have money. I can transfer it to you afterwards, just…please help us if you can.'
Emma realised that with her hood up, they hadn't been able to see her properly before. Merlin, they probably weren't even looking in their haste to get away. Bellatrix tended to garner attention that way. Now, with her hood down and her robes torn with dirt, they probably thought the Death Eaters were hunting her too. He was very calm for having been thrust into the situation without even knowing magic existed.
Ironic, the detached voice observed in her mind. She pushed it away, shaking her head at the broken family with pity.
'I'm sorry,' she said. 'There are too many of them out there. I can't...' she hesitated. 'I can't help you if you can't stay quiet.'
What? she asked herself. That wasn't what she was going to say. She was going to stop at the "I can't help you". What had come over her? But it was too late, the damage was done.
'We can be quiet,' the father said quickly, looking at his daughter intently. 'Can't we, Marigold?'
The child nodded, her curls bouncing on her shoulders.
'Right,' Emma said, steeling herself. She nodded, though to whom, she didn't know.
If I'm going to do this, I have to have a plan, she told herself. I've been in crazy situations before; this can't be too bad, can it? I've already escaped a werewolf pack that refused to ally itself with the Dark Lord.
In truth, that werewolf pack didn't have wands and they weren't trained precisely in the art of deadly magic. Plus, she wouldn't just be up against her fellow Death Eaters. There were the Aurors, too. The Muggle didn't know that though, and she felt like she would be safer in not telling him this particular piece of information. No knowing how clever the Muggles really are.
'Right,' she repeated, assessing the situation.
First of all, she would call to the little piece of self preservation that she had left. Then, she would help this man and his daughter get free of this hellhole. Merlin knew that she owed it to them. Nodding to herself again, she knelt down and rubbed ash onto her face.
'You should do this too,' she gestured to the family. 'It's harder to notice dark faces in the night.'
After a second's thought, Emma duplicated her hood and passed it to the father to tie around Marigold's blond curls. That should do it, she thought. There was no way she would become less recognisable, or less conspicuous.
'This way,' she gestured to the Muggles, shimmying through a crack in the building.
They followed as best as they could, keeping low and waiting for Emma to distract any fighters with a spell she had just learnt from Bellatrix - shaving an ordinary spell in three so as not to give away one's position. There was a one in three chance that they would be found each time though, so she used it sparingly.
She was halfway through subtly levitating a boulder so that it would block anyone's line of sight when a body came flying over the collapsed stairwell that they had been using for cover. With a thump that knocked the breath out of the person, they collided with a doorway and fell to the floor like a ragdoll.
'Hurry,' Emma urged the Muggles across into the next building, keeping an eye on the wizard.
The person groaned as the dust dissipated, making Emma freeze in her tracks.
'Bast?' she asked tentatively, before a sudden impulse overpowered her natural reservation. She raced to the fallen wizard's side to check that it was her friend, and not his brother, sighing with relief when she pulled off the Death Eater mask.
That relief was short lived however, when she heard his wheezing breath. Evidentally, the collision really had knocked all of the breath out of him.
'Rab? Bast? Bast, can you hear me? Try to control your breathing,' she told him urgently, hauling him off of his back and onto his side.
She was met with shuddering gasps as Rabastan tried to answer. 'Can't.…breathe...' he wheezed, before disolving into a fit of coughs.
Emma realised that he must have inhaled dust and smoke when he tried to suck in more air.
'Rennervate,' she whispered, hoping that the Stunning spell counter-curse would be effective in this situation too.
She closed her eyes in relief when his coughing stopped and breathing normalised, sitting back with a smile. He peered up at her, rubbing a hand over his eyes.
'Emma?' he asked questioningly, frowning. He coughed again and struggled to sit upright. 'Is that you? You look like Morgana risen from the dead.'
Emma glanced away self-consciously, rubbing at the dirt on her face. 'I can explain,' she said.
She thought about how to extract herself from the situation whilst she brushed the dust off of him as much as she could, checking for any wounds. You should have left him here when you knew he'd be fine, the logical voice chided her. She was preparing a counter-argument in her mind when a small voice jolted her back to her senses.
'Miss lady?' Marigold called, her high voice carrying easily through the sounds of battle.
'Shit,' Emma swore, looking across to the building.
There she was, looking frightened and concerned, chewing one of her thumbs. Even as she watched, the father shushed the girl and brought her back into the building, but it was too late. Emma felt a tug on her arm and turned to see Rabastan staring at her in disbelief.
'Ems, am I seeing what I think I see?' he asked, incredulity making his voice break. 'Tell me I'm not.'
She didn't answer, dropping her gaze to stare at the floor. Rabastan propped himself up with his arms, wincing has he did so. Evidently, he had put the pieces together.
'Emma,' he started, his voice low with concern. 'You can't. They're Muggles! You'll be caught!'
'I have to, Bast,' Emma said, raising her voice, but never going above a whisper. 'Help me get them out. Please. We didn't sign up for the killing of children.'
'I wish I hadn't signed up for anything,' Rabastan grumbled, before falling silent.
Just as Emma's heartbeat started to accelerate with worry, the wizard gave a short nod of his head.
'Help me up, then,' he said, his eyes scanning the battlefield. 'I have a feeling Scrimgeour is out for blood.'
'The Deputy head Auror?' Emma asked, horrified.
Rabastan just gave her a tight smile, dragging himself to his feet. He took a moment to recover as he stood, before pushing past her towards the building. 'For the record, I'm only doing this because I want to get out of here.'
'Wouldn't have it any other way,' Emma replied, knowing just what he was risking, she was risking, just by being in the presence of the two Muggles.
As soon as they arrived at the edge of the Apparition field, Emma turned to the Muggles, the stress of the battle field giving way to worry about what was to come.
'Listen, you can't tell anyone about us, okay?' she asked forcefully, staring the man in the eyes.
He seemed taken aback by her statement.
'As if anyone would believe me,' he retorted, sensing that their alliance was at an end. 'The whole thing was out of a nightmare. And my wife...'
'Ems,' Rabastan said quietly, drawing her to the side. He shot a filthy look at the man when he tried to join them. 'You have to Obliviate them. It's the only way. Already...' he hesitated. 'If it were anyone else, I would have reported you already. Instead... I just hope you have good reason for risking our lives like that. If even one of the family saw us, then we'll be dead, or worse.'
Emma opened her mouth to argue, to say that it was none of their business removing the last memories of the man's dead wife and child from his conscious. But no sound came out. She didn't have a good reason for saving the Muggles, other than some kind of twisted debt that she knew could never be repaid. Plus, who knew if he would keep to his word?
She had lost the moral high ground, had lost any kind of ground that could have given her support to her argument, so instead she closed her mouth and nodded. She just hoped that she could muster the concentration necessary for the spell. Taking a deep breath, she turned back to the man, gripping her wand tightly. In one fluid motion, she brought it to his temple.
'Obliviate.'
Marigold screamed as her father fell to the ground, caught by Rabastan at the last minute. Emma knew even before he opened his eyes that something had gone wrong. It had felt as though her wand was sucking something out of him, instead of wiping his mind clean.
'What just happened?' the father asked, getting to his feet. 'Marigold?'
Maybe I was wrong, Emma breathed a sigh of relief, sharing a grin with Rabastan.
However, she had counted her chickens before they hatched, for the moment he tried to walk towards his daughter he fell back to the floor. The two wizards watched in growing horror as they realised what exactly they had wiped from his mind.
'He can't remember how to walk,' Emma said aloud, the words feeling like a punch to the gut. 'I shouldn't have done that. Oh, Merlin, what are we going to do now?'
'Relax,' Rabastan said, before Emma could work herself into a stressed frenzy.
He walked over to a nearby tree and pulled the rotten bark off into a crudely shaped chair. Then, he raised his wand, waving it over the wood the way they had been taught to in Transfiguration. After he spoke the incantation, a rough wooden chair on wheels appeared before them. After testing it out to see if the wheels worked, Rabastan looked back sheepishly.
'Not my finest work,' he admitted. 'But it'll do the job.'
Together, they hauled the man into the chair, where his head lolled to the side. It seemed like most of his muscle memory had gone, his arms hanging limply over the edges.
'Listen, kid,' Rabastan said. 'Can you get your dad to the nearest village?'
'Rabastan!' Emma admonished.
The child took that as her cue to burst into the long held tears, sitting on the ground and wailing with all of her might. Rabastan cringed, looking back towards the village.
'Silencio,' Emma cast quickly, running a hand through her hair. 'Merlin,' she moaned. 'What did I get us into?'
'Let's just leave them here,' Rabastan suggested in a voice that was higher than usual. 'Someone will find them in the end. We've done more than enough.'
'More than enough?' Emma laughed, but the sound was hysteric. 'You mean burning down their homes and removing their only chance of getting out of here? Oh, I'd say that we definitely did more than enough.'
She paced in front of the now drooling man and his silently bawling child, thinking. They wouldn't be able to stay in the clearing for long, not without the village smoke to hide them. In fact, she didn't know how their luck had held so far.
'Look, this is what we'll do,' she said quickly. 'We'll Apparate to London, dump them there, Apparate away and wash in a stream, mend our clothes, then meet in front of my apartment building in Diagon Alley. It's better if the middle step is done apart, we'll be less conspicuous.'
'What?' Rabastan asked, stopping in his tracks. 'Have you gone insane?'
'Rabastan, look at them!' Emma said, exasperated. 'Just look at them, not as though they're Muggles. Do you really think they'll get anywhere?'
Her voice carried on the wind as they both stared back at the Muggles. They really were a sorry duo - one unable to keep himself upright, but still trying to sooth the other, whose silence only made her even more scared.
Emma took a deep, slow breath. When she looked back at Rabastan, he had softened his stance, his face filled with…pity? regret? He uncrossed his arms and sighed, shaking his head slightly.
'I know what you're trying to do, Ems,' he said. 'And Merlin knows if it's working. But there's something that - as your friend - I have to remind you. We're the ones who picked a side. We're the ones who joined the fight. There's no going back. There's only making sure our side wins, and living to see the end of it. If you're starting to have doubts, I'd suggest you remind yourself of what you have to lose.'
He gave her a considering look, evidently weighing the consequences of any future actions.
'I'll help you. Friends are the only thing we have left to hold on to through this damned war, and I'm sure as Merlin's pants not going to lose one because I refused to bathe in a river. But you can't pull something like this on me again, Ems. I mean it. We might not survive it next time.'
With that, he turned his attention to the Muggles, hoisting the girl onto his hip and conjuring ropes to tie themselves around the man's midriff. Emma watched him prepare, wondering what she had done to deserve a friendship like theirs, and what harm it might do to them if she wasn't careful.
Rabastan was right. She did have something to lose. But that only made it even more important to make sure the right side won.