or you're lucky you aren't in it at all. Oh well-
those are my problems. On with the show!
Picking Up the Pieces
Chapter Twenty
How Do You Solve a Problem Like the Founders?
--
Ginny woke up, her head lolling to one side. She gasped, closing her eyes, her stomach dropping.
She was suspended on a high pillar in a cavernous room. Her wrists were bound behind her with what felt like rope, but slimier. Her feet scrabbled uselessly against the slippery pillar, the floor so far below her it looked dark in the dimness. The walls were ancient stone, and a tapestry depicting four people hung across from her.
She was freezing cold, and had absolutely no idea how she had gotten here, or even where here was.
She called out "Help!" and her voice echoed pathetically in the chamber. She had never felt so small.
Ginny didn't know what she could possibly do- if she'd
manage to free her hands, she'd plummet to her death.
She couldn't look down again- it made her gag.
So she looked at the tapestry. Four people. A tall,
dark, and sinister man with a twisting smirk...a
handsome man with light brown hair and a smile that
looked like a laugh...a girl with waist-length raven
hair and dark blue eyes smiling somewhat
solemnly...Another woman with blond ringlets with a
merry smile stretching across her plump cheeks...
"The Founders." Ginny said softly.
She realized with a sickening feeling she was in Hogwarts.
But where? And why had no one found her?
--
"Draco...she's secure." Crabbe said, nervously entering his friend's bedroom.
Draco had not left his room for three days straight.
He just sat at the window, motionless.
Narcissa had tried to talk to him, and Pansy after her, and they had remained in the room for three days as well. He'd barely blinked whenever they tried to engage him in conversation, just clenching the curtain in his fist.
"Did you hear us?" Goyle asked, tentatively stepping closer.
Draco gave an imperceptible nod that seemed to say "yes" and "get out" simulataneously.
"Draco, you need to eat." Pansy said quietly.
"You don't know anything about what I need." Draco muttered, staring out the window obstinately.
Pansy looked at Narcissa helplessly. But Narcissa looked even worse than Draco, her eyes red-rimmed and empty of all emotion.
"The Dark Lord has ordered you to return to guard Weasel's cell." Crabbe grunted to Pansy.
She sighed dramatically, casting one last helpless look back at Draco, and left.
Crabbe and Goyle hurried out of the room, the oppressive atmosphere suffocating them.
--
"This is the place." Harry helped Hermione through the thick brambles surrounding an imposing, beautiful estate in northern England.
The air was still and cool, the smell of an approaching storm in the air. The sound of birds was oddly absent. This place seemed as though it had not been touched by anything but the winds of time in ages. Hermione couldn't fathom how anyone could possibly live somewhere this isolated.
They approached the front door at last, and Harry used the giant knocker to send two resounding bangs echoing through the house.
It seemed like a good five minutes before someone answered the door. It was a woman, a thin, frail woman obviously on in years. Her long black hair was tinged with gray, and her grayish eyes looked as though they had once been beautiful but were now dimmed with age.
"What do you want?" She said in a rasping voice that made both Harry and Hermione's throats hurt.
"Are you a descendant of Rowena Ravenclaw?" Hermione asked her, reminding Harry of a news reporter.
"I am. Why do you ask? I'm not selling any of her things." The woman said quickly.
"Oh, no, we're not buyers."
"We just wanted to know if we could ask you a few questions." Harry said, nonchalantly pushing his bangs off his forehead.
She saw the scar.
"You're Harry Potter." She said, aghast.
"Yes. I am. And it is a life-and-death matter that we talk to you." Harry said.
"The One who will save us all." She said, seemingly unable to stop herself from reaching out to feel the scar for herself.
"I'm trying to do just that, ma'am. This is my best friend, Hermione Granger. She's helping me."
"Such a pretty girl. My name is Emily Weston." The woman said, shaking both their hands with her withered, veiny grasp.
"May we please come in?" Hermione said.
"Of course. I'll put a pot of tea on. Wait for me in the drawing room."
She closed the door behind them, pushing them both into a shockingly ornate room with paintings and shelves of books adorning every wall. There was a loveseat and two armchairs around a fireplace.
Hermione and Harry sat down across from each other in the armchairs. A few moments passed as they took in the room.
"Do you think that's her?" Hermione pointed behind his head at a wall-length portrait of a woman with black hair and blue eyes.
She was wearing Ravenclaw colors, and had her hands folded over a book.
"Probably."
"Yes, that's Rowena Ravenclaw," the woman entered suddenly, "That painting has been in my family for hundreds of years."
She sat down across from them with a pot of tea and three cups on a tray.
"So what do you want to know?"
"In your family line, has there ever been anything misplaced? We are trying to find out things that Voldemort-"
The woman shuddered at the name. Harry continued.
"-has used to protect his immortality. We think he used objects from the founders."
Emily Weston closed her eyes as if recalling some unpleasant memory.
"It was such a tragedy."
"What was, ma'am?"
"Her most treasured possession."
Harry and Hermione didn't say anything, waiting breathlessly for her to continue.
"Her own wedding ring."
"Was misplaced?"
"Stolen, more like! Right from my very house! A young man...such a handsome young man...came to visit me one day, many years ago...I invited him in, and the next thing I knew-"
"You woke up and the ring was gone." Harry said softly.
Voldemort had gone straight to the source for this particular treasure.
"Yes! Everyone knew it was in my possession, because Rowena Ravenclaw's marriage is a beloved wizarding tale. She had never been interested in anything but books until him..." The old women's face stretched into a fond smile.
"And you have no idea of where it's gone?"
"None at all. What Rowena would think if she knew it was in the hands of that monster...she wouldn't stand for it...I sometimes wonder if she will stand for it..." The old woman said in a strange, distant voice.
"What do you mean by that?" Hermione said, raising her eyebrows.
"After their deaths, the bodies of the Founders were placed deep within Hogwarts. I sometimes wonder if they've ever really left the place. In spirit, I mean."
Harry shot Hermione a quick, skeptical look.
"Within Hogwarts?"
"Yes. The only living person that was rumored to know of the location was Albus Dumbledore. Well...I suppose, he's not living anymore." The woman said, in that same strange voice.
Harry and Hermione suddenly felt the eerie stillness of the house wash over them.
"Thank you so much for your help." Hermione said,
standing up.
"Yes, thank you." Harry followed suit.
"Aren't you two going to finish your tea?"
Every painting in the room turned to look at Harry and Hermione.
"We really have to get back to work." Hermione said,
her hand on Harry's arm.
This place was seriously giving her the creeps. The woman was clutching the handle of the tea cup so tight her blue veins were bulging from her hand.
"But I so rarely have visitors..."
"We really should go."
They turned towards the door, and it magically slammed shut in their faces.
"Have a seat. I really do insist." She said in a chillingly polite voice.
--
Pansy walked back to the cell, wondering what could possibly be done about Draco.
He was being so impossible.
She pushed open the door and stopped dead in her tracks.
The glass cell was empty.
Ron Weasley's footprints in the dust led to the middle of the room she was now standing in and then disappeared.
--
Lupin had lost all sense of time or place. He had fully become the beast, and roared with rage as he rose to his hindlegs.
The moon made the blood beat wildly through his veins,
and his hatred towards Greyback had not dissipated
with the transformation.
They were now two animals hellbent on killing the other, and knew nothing else.
Greyback pounced on Lupin, his thick, old claws
tearing into Lupin's fur. Lupin howled with pain,
swiping at Greyback's face.
Their fight continued for what seemed like forever,
bones cracking, blood spurting, their cries of fury
and pain echoing through the forest.
Lupin faintly heard with his preternatural sense someone yelling something- a human voice. But none he recognized, and he couldn't turn away from the fight for a moment.
After one particularly painful blow, Lupin pushed off from the tree, panting wildly and feeling weakness coursing through him.
He used every last ounce of strength he had to leap under Greyback, who was jumping towards him. Lupin slashed his claws into Greyback's underbelly, and felt them go deep. Greyback let out a cry of agony, falling to the ground.
Lupin withdrew his claws with a sickening slickness,
shaking, feeling as if the adrenaline and pain were
going to kill him.
Greyback made a feeble attempt to get back to his
feet, but he was done. He was dying. Lupin watched in
disgust as Greyback took his last shuddering breaths.
He was slowly turning back into a man, a deformed,
bloody mass of flesh and bones. He looked so weak in
his final moments, one last breath passing through his
once-powerful body.
He lay there lifeless as Lupin felt his body reverting
to its weakened human state. It was as if it wasn't
strong enough to remain a beast. He wondered faintly,
as his human mind feebly took control, if he was
dying. He wondered if anyone would find his body.
"LUPIN!" He finally identified the voice. Sirius.
Lupin fell back against the tree, quickly losing consciousness. His breaths became more and more labored.
"No, no, Remus, you can't die. You're stronger than this...please, you have to fight..." Sirius was kneeling beside him
"W-Why didn't you help me?" Remus said, his words choked and barely intelligible.
"I couldn't. I couldn't help you." He faintly heard Sirius' reply.
Remus didn't say anything else, feeling Sirius trying to apply pressure to his most gaping wound across his chest. He felt as if every rib on his left side was broken. Breathing was so painful he could hardly bear to even try anymore.
"I'm so sorry...I'm so sorry..." Siriuskept saying it over and over, his wand on Remus' wounds, trying to heal them. But they were too deep and severe for someone who wasn't a Healer to handle.
"Why?" Remus managed to choke out.
"You can't die. I can't let you die." Sirius was crying like a child.
"Help...Harry."
"Don't do this! Don't say goodbye! I'm not letting you go!" Sirius put his hands on Lupin's face.
"Sirius...you're my best friend..." Remus said, his eyelids growing heavy and his breathing coming in slower and slower intervals.
"Remus, it's me. Can't you see it's me?" Sirius said desperately, his face streaked with tears.
"Of course...it's you..."
Remus eyes closed. He could feel Sirius' breath on his face.
"I won't let you die. I love you too much."
Suddenly, Remus felt a mouth press insistenly against his. His eyes cracked open, his heart faintly registering surprise.
But it wasn't Sirius that had kissed him.
It was Tonks.
--
Harry and Hermione turned to face each other, pale with surprise.
"What are you doing?" Hermione turned to face the old woman, who was drinking calmly from her tea cup.
"I can't allow you to leave."
"Why not?" Harry said, remaining remarkably calm.
"Because of my ancestry. Perhaps you have never heard the true story of Rowena Ravenclaw?"
"What are you talking about?"
"She would want Harry Potter dead. So, in her memory,
so do I."
Before she could continue speaking, Hermione suddenly whipped out her wand, stunning her. The old woman fell to the floor with a cry. Harry and Hermione tore out the nearest door that wasn't magically sealed, and raced down a hallway. They heard alarmingly fast steps behind them.
They came to a split in the hallway.
"GO!" Harry grabbed her arm, and they tore off down the left.
They skidded around a corner, running into someone hard.
Harry and Hermione scrambled to their feet to see their attacker.
"Where's the fire?" Ron Weasley said, looking at them with a bemused grin.
--
A/N- WHAT? Ron got out? Sirius is Tonks? Lupin's dying? Draco's pouting? (Okay, so the last one wasn't that big of a surprise.) Just felt like writing a particularly shocking chapter, haha. Next chapter- the pieces start falling into place. Five more chapters to go kiddies...