Diagon Alley
Instead of immediately explaining future plans to the six new arrivals, Ginny went round collecting any spare money people carried with them in order to buy food to feed the malnourished students. She and Lavender then went and bought bread, cheese and chicken and more milk. Whilst they were gone Luna had arrived, her blonde hair more brunette with dirt and her eyes an angry blue. No longer did she rabbit on about wrack spurts, but instead she demanded to know what the battle plan was.
"I'm sorry it's not much," Ginny said as she placed the food supplies on a counter in the kitchen. "It's the best I can do for now," she grimaced.
The others did not seem to care as they greedily dug into badly made sandwiches and Ginny and Hermione only nibbled on a sandwich each whilst they contemplated the change in Luna. It was with worry and slight apprehension that they saw the sheer determination in her eyes.
After the small lunch Ginny once again took to explaining their thought out plan. All four original occupants of the house were pleased with the response, although that did not quash the feeling of why they had had to come up with it in the first place.
The six arrivals slept most of the day away and Colin insisted on doing the cooking for the evening meal as the girls had fed him that morning. Dragging Theo with him, they disappeared into the kitchen and left Hermione, Ginny, Draco and Blaise alone. The four went round the house trying to locate books on Potions (which as you can imagine would be plentiful as Snape was a Potions master), so they would be able to make a Polyjuice potion. Their whole plan was useless if they could not.
Since Draco's revelation about his aunt, Blaise's plan had been adapted so that they would infiltrate Gringotts and attempt to enter Bellatrix's vault. Draco worried whether they would need her wand, but a recent article in the Prophet Susan had brought with her showed that Bellatrix had lost her wand in a surprise attack and was willing to pay thousands of galleons for its safe return.
Flicking through several books, it was Blaise who finally found a complete set of instructions and Hermione immediately set to work. Fortunately Snape had all the ingredients in a small store-room at the back of the kitchen, and if Hermione hadn't known better, she would have said he had dabbled in his own Polyjuice recently.
By the time everyone was awake and dinner was being served Hermione had completed the beginning stages of the potion and was pleased with the progress. It would be one month before it was ready, but that time could be used to further their training, such as they did in the DA.
Seamus and Ernie offered to keep an eye out for any intruders that evening as they had slept the day away. The girls, Colin and the Slytherin boys settled down, once again huddled together under some spare cloaks and other unused items of clothing, shivering despite their closeness and the fact that today that had managed to eat.
Ernie and Seamus did not find it hard to stay awake. It was bitterly cold for a start, as warming charms did not seem to help much and they were trying to limit their use of magic. Not all of them had stolen wands that would not be easily traced back to them. The two sat together in silence. It was perhaps because of this silence that they heard Susan's arrival and both jumped to their feet and crept forward.
It wasn't until the exhausted figure fell at their feet that they realised it was a friendly intruder rather that a foe and they helped her up. Waking Hermione, who was on the outside of the huddle, they helped Susan under a cloak and Hermione moved back into place, hugging the other girl to her in an attempt to warm her up.
The next morning most of the teenagers were surprised to see Susan, who was still asleep and shivering under a couple of cloaks. Luna and Hermione lay down next to her under the cloaks to try and stop the blonde girl from shivering so violently, and it didn't take long for their combined body heat to make a difference. Most of the students sighed in relief, worried for their peer.
They ate up the remaining bread and cheese for breakfast, careful to leave some for Susan who was still sleeping away her exhaustion. It was mid-morning when she finally awoke, and the girls bundled her in a couple of cloaks before allowing her to roam. They watched in slight fascination as she scoffed down the food, pausing only to tell them that the three with her, Anthony Goldstein, Wayne Hopkins and Lisa Turpin, had been killed by Death Eaters, and by lunch time they were once again discussing their plan of action.
"I think we should go to Diagon Alley today," Luna said decisively. "We're fast running out of money, therefore food, and obviously being starving will do us no favours,"
"I agree," Ginny piped up. "I'm sorry, Blaise, but it has to be done,"
"I'll go!" Ernie volunteered. "I've felt so useless since we ran from school," he sighed.
"Me too," Colin added. "And y'know, I'm almost as good as Gin with that bat bogey," he winked, causing most of the room to laugh quietly.
"And me," Lavender stepped forward, not flinching as all eyes turned on her in surprise. "I'm fed up of being seen as someone who can't do anything. I'm not THAT bad at spell work!"
"All right," Hermione took control. "And Gin and I'll go too. We did fight at the Department of Mysteries two years ago, I think we can handle this," she said with a small smile.
"And I'm being made to go," Blaise muttered sullenly.
"Speaking of which, Nott, you're kinda not involved therefore not particularly wanted by Vold- He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named," Hermione looked at the moody Slytherin. "How much do you have in your account?"
"Not much," he replied shortly.
"Liar," Malfoy scoffed.
"Yeah, well, I don't see Malfoy emptying his vault for the cause either!" Nott argued.
"Yeah, because of the small matter of me being murdered by anyone even associated with the 'Dark Lord'" Malfoy rolled his eyes.
"Fine," Nott huffed, crossing his arms and turning away from the group.
"Padma, will you make sure nothing happens to the Polyjuice whilst we're gone?" Hermione asked the only Ravenclaw bar Luna present.
The Indian girl nodded and Hermione proceeded to show her the method for the potion as shown in the book Snape had.
"Will you six be alright?" Ginny asked them. "Practise the jinxes, hexes and curses you're good at. When we get back we'll work out what everyone needs to work on. Hopefully it'll work out well,"
The rest of the group nodded, and the seven going to Diagon Alley gathered a large robe each and pulled it on, trying as hard as they could to hide any tell-tale traits. They then waved farewell, told Susan not to do anything too strenuous and left with a loud pop.
They appeared just outside the Leaky Cauldron and each pulled the hood of their robes high over their head, hiding their face and hair from view. They wandered into the pub and found Tom the barman at the end of the bar. Revealing a lock of hair, Ginny looked at him from under her robe, and asked if he had a private room for them to use for a few minutes.
Recognising the red hair immediately, as they knew he would, Tom hurried the seven cloaked strangers into a side room and asked them if there was anything they needed.
"I'm sorry, Tom, but we haven't the money," Ginny said tiredly.
"Oh, no matter," Tom waved this away. "How does ham sandwiches and hot chocolate sound? Free of charge of course,"
"Thank you, Tom," Ginny sighed, grateful for his act of kindness. "We have a group of seven still in hiding, if you would be so kind as to do a pack for them too,"
"Of course," Tom replied kindly. "You're too young to be going through this. I'll do anything to help,"
All seven in the room thanked him, even Nott, although Tom didn't know that, and Tom disappeared to make up their lunch.
"Right, glamour charms," Hermione said, once again in control. "I suggest we start on some colour changing charms, see what we end up with,"
Blaise and Nott did not need to change their appearance, so Blaise simply cast a colour changing charm on Ginny's hair.
"Mm, you look less like a Weasley now," he mused. "But I hope you keep the red look,"
Ginny pushed her boyfriend lightly. "Thanks. I was planning on keeping to my natural colour, don't you worry,"
"You still look like Ginny though. Let's make your eyes blue and your hair like Luna's…"
Blaise easily cast the charms and stepped back to admire his handiwork. "Much better," he said. "As a disguise of course; I much prefer my Ginny,"
They laughed together and turned to watch as Colin struggled to turn Lavender's hair from a light brown to black. With a flick of her wand, Hermione helped him out and he thanked her, before turning back to Lavender so she could change his eyes from a deep blue to an almost black. The change it made surprised them all; and the sudden chocolate coloured hair that fell into his eyes made him look much different. Pleased with the result, attention turned to Ernie and Hermione.
Ernie's blonde hair was now a platinum blond like Malfoy's and his eyes had been made a steel grey, also reminiscent of the Malfoy's.
"Don't you think that, if Malfoy senior saw him, he'd get he was an impostor?" Blaise asked.
"And he also could get mistaken for Draco and killed on the spot," Ginny added and Hermione giggled.
"Yes, but I just wanted to see what he'd look like," With another couple of swishes of her wand, Hermione had made Ernie's hair a light brown with flecks of grey, almost like Remus Lupin's, and kept his eyes the same grey.
"Nice," she commented before allowing Ernie to change her hair to a light blonde, copying Blaise's charm on Ginny. As her eyes were already brown, the others commented on the fact that the two could now almost get away with being sisters.
"You think this is okay?" Hermione asked Blaise and Theo.
"We'll see when Tom comes back," Blaise replied, and not seconds later Tom returned carrying a large array of sandwiches on a tray.
"Where's Ginny gone?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Here," one of the blondes raised her hand and Tom looked over her in surprise.
"I wouldn't have recognised you, Miss Weasley,"
"That's the idea," she grinned, before stepping forward and relieving Tom of his burden. "Thank you so much for this Tom. We will pay you back at some point,"
"There are bottles of water, juice and a few fizzy drinks for a sugar rush in there, too," he smiled and backed out of the room.
Ginny quickly handed out a sandwich to everyone before shrinking the rest and carefully putting the pack in her robes. They didn't bother so much about hiding their magic here as it wouldn't lead the Death Eaters straight to their hideout.
The seven set off, everyone bar Ginny and Hermione again hiding themselves under their robes. The two girls instead transfigured their outfits into stylish colourful robes to give the impression they were wealthy. They gave Tom a discreet wave as they left through the door that led to the Diagon Alley entrance. Blaise tapped the brick and they watched nervously as the arch formed.
They separated, Lavender going off to look at Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions, Hermione and Ginny, eager to have some fun, took to eyeing the expensive robes on display at Twilfitt and Tatting's whilst pretending they both had the money to shop there but preferred not to, Ernie to look at the window display Flourish and Blotts had on, Colin to stare at the display in the Quality Quidditch Supplies window and Blaise and Nott separately making their way to the bank.
They all kept one eye on the thin crowd, looking out for either of the Slytherin boys. Fear kept Diagon Alley pretty empty even on the best of days now, so the teenagers tried not to stand out too much, but also to seem pretty immersed in whatever activity they were involved in.
Ten minutes later Blaise had reappeared and had gone into Flourish and Blotts where he could keep an eye out for Theo when he also exited the bank and they could leave.
Nott was still in the bank when several loud pops broke the relative silence of the alley. Spinning round, the five students outside immediately knew they had been discovered, and with most of them dressed in black robes, the Death Eaters probably assumed they were working with the Order and Harry therefore they were in a lot of danger.
Quickly and quietly Hermione and Ginny stunned three or four of the evil bastards before curses started firing back of them. The two girls separated, trying to form a circle around the Death Eaters, and it would have worked had a stray curse not hit Colin and he went flying back into the Quidditch store's window. Ginny gasped and firing well placed stunners she reached Colin in record time. Looking at the pale boy, she knew there was nothing she could do, and instead hid the body before resuming fighting, this time with more fierce determination.
About half the Death Eaters were down at this point, and Hermione was doing her best whilst trying to work out if Nott had come out of the bank yet. Finally seeing that he had, and that he was drawing his wand, she sighed in small relief. She smirked as his stunner hit the Death Eater she had been fighting and sent a smile in his direction before turning to the next one.
Blaise, in the meantime, had somehow managed to get from Flourish and Blott's to Madam Malkin's without being seen, and hurried her to get him twenty or so warm robes for both men and women of multiple sizes.
"We're not fussy!" he told her hurriedly, when she asked him, confused, about lengths and the like. "Just hurry, please,"
Seeing the desperation on the young boy's face, she ran around getting the best quality robes she could, handing them to Blaise who packed them into bags. She even managed to put in a few extras, such as travelling cloaks, scarves and hats, and when Blaise asked her what he owed her, she merely charged for the twenty or so robes he had originally asked for. Somehow she knew that this boy and his friends, wherever they were, were fighting against Voldemort and she would help them as much as she could.
He paid her quickly before shrinking the bags and putting them in his cloak, before he drew his wand and ran out the door without so much as a thank you. Madam Malkin didn't mind, as long as he helped with the defeat of Voldemort.
Blaise jumped into a fight Hermione had been having with two particularly large Death Eaters and the two of them took them down in no time. Before they could move on however, they were all distracted as, with a loud cry, Ernie took down a Death Eater but received an unknown purple curse to the chest and also fell to the ground. The Death Eaters merely shrugged and started cursing everyone in sight, which at this point, Ginny thought with annoyance, was only the five students.
They were doing fairly well, evenly matched against the remaining Death Eaters when two more pops sounded, and Lavender was attacked from behind by Fenrir Greyback, who bit her in the neck before letting her limp body slide down his with an evil smirk.
Suddenly the Death Eaters stopped and, with a last deranged smile at the four still standing, disappeared, including the stunned (and worse) ones, with the exception of Greyback. He stalked back over to where Lavender lay and gripped her body against his, seemingly unconcerned with the four wands trained on him. He also smiled, showing dirty, blood stained fangs, brushed Lavender's hair from her face and disappeared with her still pressed against him with a loud pop.
Ginny sighed, trembling, and fell into her boyfriend's embrace. Hermione walked over to where Ernie lay, unconscious, and leant down next to him, brushing a tendril of hair from his face. He looked like he was merely sleeping but Hermione still couldn't stop the tears from coming.
Ginny walked over to Colin, and with Blaise's help, lifted the small boy in her arms. She carried him back up to the Leaky Cauldron whilst Hermione levitated Ernie. The walk was silent. No one had anything to say. Outside the pub, which was deserted, they summoned the Knight Bus, too tired to think about anything else.
"St Mungo's, please," Hermione said, letting Nott dump a handle of money in Stan Shunpike's hand. "Then Spinner's End." The four walked up off the bus before Stan could count the money, and he shrugged before the bus set off again.
Apparently there were no other occupants on the bus as they reached St Mungo's in record time, and Hermione continued to levitate Ernie down the bus. There, she entered the visitor's entrance and simply told the voice that there was someone who needed help before leaving Ernie's unresponsive body there and re-boarding the bus. She nodded at the driver as she passed him and within seconds they were off again.
"It wasn't a total disaster," Blaise said finally. "Both Theo and I got some money out. I managed to buy a lot of robes and we won't starve,"
"I wondered where you were," Ginny mumbled. She and Blaise were curled up together, and Ginny's still blonde hair was covering the side of her face that wasn't buried in Blaise's chest.
"Three people is far too many!" Hermione cried angrily.
Nott nodded in agreement. "I'll miss that Creevey dude," he admitted quietly, not letting himself look over to where Colin's body had been carefully laid on a bed beside them.
Silence fell again. The mood was definitely sombre and Hermione couldn't help but feel relieved with the Bus dropped them off at Spinner's End. The four of them walked into Snape's house in silence. Blaise had taken over being the one to carry Colin and when they entered the living room the girls and Nott left Blaise to explain to the others what had happened, choosing instead to sit in silence and stare into space.
Ginny couldn't handle seeing Colin's body laid out on the floor, and silently she linked her fingers with Hermione and the two of them went out the back where they began to dig a grave. Soon, Nott came out to help them and they dug in complete silence. It seemed that even the birds didn't sing in this rundown estate.
They had a fairly large hole already when Luna and Seamus came out to help. Quietly they said that Blaise and Draco had gone to get some food, and that Susan and Padma were busy comforting Hannah and Parvati over the loss of their close friends.
It was dark when they finally carried Colin's body outside, and with one last tearful glance, Ginny was the first to start filling the grave. The others soon followed and the sun had set before they finished. The weary teenagers made their way inside to discover Blaise and Draco had set out a buffet for dinner, made up of the leftover meats from that morning and salad.
"To keep everyone's strength up," Blaise told Ginny softly, wrapping his arms around her. Her red hair had returned, as had Hermione's natural brunette and Blaise wrapped a piece round his little finger.
"It's going to take a little more than meat and salad," Ginny replied, pushing him away from her and sitting herself on the floor without getting anything to eat.
Hermione, having seen the exchange, made up two ham and tomato sandwiches and handed one to her friend silently, keeping the other for herself.
"I'm sorry about Colin," Hermione said after a few minutes of more silence.
"I'm sorry about Ernie. And Lavender," Ginny replied, staring at a blank spot on the wall opposite her. "They were all too young, and too good, to die,"
"I hate to say it, but it's for the cause," Hannah came over to the two girls. "If they hadn't been there and died, it could have been you. And none of us would be here without you,"
"Yeah," Parvati followed Hannah, her eyes still red and sniffling slightly. "Lav wouldn't want you blaming yourselves when our only chance is you and she chose to fight,"
"Don't blame yourselves," Nott added quietly from his spot a few metres away. He turned red as all eyes turned on him, but continued. "Creevey was a great kid and we will all miss him. His energy and enthusiasm was unique, but this operation can, and will, go on without him,"
Blaise manoeuvred his way to sit next to Ginny and wrapped his arms round her again. This time she didn't push him away. Hermione gave them a small smile before gesturing for the others to give them a moment.
Finding herself in the kitchen, Hermione began to clear away the leftovers, sorting out what she could put out for breakfast in the morn. Malfoy found her there, already having directed the other students to the bedroom where they would find books of useful spells for battle.
"You did good today," he said quietly from the doorway.
She stopped still for a second but didn't turn round and instead chose to continue with what she had been doing.
"I know you think that three deaths in this small group is a gigantic loss, and I won't disagree, but you can't blame yourself, Granger. You're still here to do the Polyjuice potion and we have money to take care of the survivors. We still have the spirit and the determination to beat this thing. So, yes, you should let yourself feel the deaths of your friends, but don't beat yourself up about it, because we're still here and we still need you,"
Hermione turned round. She gave him a slightly confused look before sighing and crossing her arms. "Thank you," she whispered.
He nodded once and turned to return to the bedroom. He was long gone when Hermione looked up and called after him "Malfoy!" She sighed again, somewhat glad he was out of earshot for she didn't know what she had intended to say anyway. Malfoy still confused her and she didn't know what to make of his confession of love nor of his apparently very accurate observation of her. What she did know was that she didn't hate him and that he had most definitely changed since school. She just found it sad that they both had to have a death sentence on their heads to realise that they really weren't that different after all.
She was pulled out of her thoughts by Blaise's quiet call that there was movement outside. She joined the rest of the group in the living room and they prepared to fight, Blaise, Ginny and Hermione at the forefront as they were the best fighters.
For the third time they sighed in relief when they discovered that the figures who entered the house were just a very dirty Michael Corner and Terry Boot, made to look even worse by the lack of light in the house, especially as it was now night.
Ginny ran to Michael so she could tend to a bleeding cut that ran from his cheek to his chin, whilst Terry collapsed on the floor, clearly exhausted. Hermione immediately ran back to the kitchen and pulled out the remains of the food, making sloppy sandwiches. She pulled two bottles of water out of the pack Tom had given them at the Leaky Cauldron and went back through to the living room.
She knelt by Terry and helped him into a sitting position before putting one of the open bottles of water to his mouth. He drank greedily and Hermione mopped him up before letting him sit on his own and handing him a sandwich.
"I think we've got this covered, guys," she looked up at the rest. "You can go back and look up more spells if you want?"
They nodded and left, leaving Hermione and Ginny with the boys.
"Brocklehurst's not with you?" Ginny asked Michael softly, ignoring his wince as she dabbed a wet cloth on his face.
"She got killed," Michael croaked out and Ginny's facial expression turned into one of great sympathy.
"How's Terry coping? Weren't they an item?"
"Yeah," Michael replied. "Not so good. I've never seen so much hate in one person's eyes before,"
"We lost Colin Creevey, Ernie Macmillan and Lavender Brown today," Ginny sat back, as happy as she could be that the wound was clean. She took the food and water Hermione handed to her and gave them to Michael. "We left Ernie at St Mungo's and buried Colin out the back," A single tear slipped down her cheek.
"I'm sorry," Michael laid a hand on her arm. "What about Brown?"
"Greyback took her body with him when he apparated," Ginny said furiously. "As if it wasn't enough to attack her from behind and bite her neck when she couldn't defend herself. He had to take her with him and let us know exactly what he was going to do with her, too. There was nothing we could do, and I hate myself for that,"
"Don't," Hermione said softly, she and Terry having been unashamedly listening. "Don't hate yourself, Gin,"
"Hate the monsters that did this!" Terry said to her angrily. "We will take them down, one by one, until there is nothing of their disgusting, vile, evil arses left if it's the last thing I do!"
"In time," Hermione looked at the Ravenclaw sadly. "First you need to build up your strength,"
He reluctantly agreed and allowed Hermione to place a cloak over him. She left him and went to the bedroom, where she found Luna and Malfoy looking at a book on fatal curses together. Shaking her head, she told the occupants of the room that it was probably time for bed and that it was a good idea not to have to candles burning for too long for fear of being seen by somebody who would be suspicious.
Agreeing, everyone but Luna and Malfoy left the room, and Hermione looked at them sternly. "It's not going to make a difference whether you perfect that spell tonight or in the morning. So get to bed, please,"
"No," Luna shook her head determinedly. "I need to do this,"
"It's nice that you two are bonding and all," Hermione said. "But it really is time to sleep,"
"Just because you went out and fought today doesn't mean that the rest of us are as tired," Luna spat at the bushy haired Gryffindor.
"Right, that is it. I am the oldest here and I am telling you to go to bed, NOW," Hermione said firmly. "I don't care what you do at any other time, but you will sleep when I tell you,"
Growling, Luna slammed the book shut and stalked past her friend. Malfoy looked up at her.
"Can't you just pretend to know what she's going through?"
"I don't have to pretend, Malfoy. I know exactly what she's going through. My parents are dead because of him. My second family, bar Ginny, are dead because of him. My best friend is out there somewhere and I have no idea where he is or even if he's alive, because of him. My best friend has this massive burden on his shoulders and I can't help him, because of him. And I miss my best friend so much. I miss them all. I don't know if I can do this, but I know I have to, because of him. So, really, do me a favour and just do as I ask when I ask,"
Malfoy tentatively pulled her to him and into a hug. She gratefully sank into him embrace, tears threatening to fall.
"I want to say it's going to be okay. But I don't know that. I wish I could say we'll find Potter and live happily ever after, but the chances are slim. What I do know is that you're strong and that the only reason I'm willing to do this and get through it is because of you," He rested his chin on her head.
"No, don't say that," Hermione pleaded, stepping back seconds later. "Do it for the greater good, do it to rebel against your family, but don't do it because of me,"
"Why not?" Malfoy asked, confused by her reaction.
"Because I'll never be able to repay you,"
"I don't want you to repay me," Malfoy said slowly. "If anything, this is me repaying you for being such a bastard to you all these years,"
Hermione looked startled. "Oh, okay. Well, yeah," she said awkwardly. "So, er, bed?"
Malfoy nodded. "Come on then." He followed her out of the room and they settled on opposite sides of the room.
The new robes Blaise had bought came in useful, especially for the new additions to their resistance. He had been pleased to discover the travelling cloaks and hats and scarves and freely handed them out for extra warmth. They were soon all asleep, even Luna, despite her argument that she wasn't tired. Curled up together, peaceful and contented looks on their faces, even the more tormented ones, it was hard to believe what these teenagers were going through.
This was the pure definition of social injustice.