Author's Note: The Lake District is a real place, as is the specific lake our heroes visit. I've tried very hard to be factually accurate -- my thanks to the netizens of Wikipedia for their info.

That evening after dinner, I met with the three heroes and Ginny to talk about the lorgnette. I pushed my confrontation with Neville out of my mind and did my best to appear carefree.

". . . So Susan suggested we figure out a way to destroy the Horcrux while it's still embedded in the lake," Harry concluded. "What do you lot think?"

Hermione, of course, piped up first. "Well, this is another instance in which using the object would lead to its destruction, correct?"

They all looked to me. "Yes, quite," I said distractedly.

"Then we must use the lorgnette," she said. "Obviously, its use would be reading something."

"But could we just read anything?" Ron interjected. "Could I bring a copy of, say, Hogwarts: A History down to the bottom of this lake? And could we leave it there when we were finished?"

Hermione smacked him; Ginny giggled. "Susan?" Harry prompted me.

I blinked and reconsidered the question. "Er. Well, that might do it -- but then again, it might not. You'd do much better to bring something purely good."

"Purely good reading material?" asked Ron incredulously. "What on earth would that be?"

"I'm trusting that Hermione already knows," I said, half-joking.

"I think I do," she said slowly. Everyone chuckled, but she rejoined, "No, really, I do. There's a set of runes, it's called the Lightbearer's Creed, and it was used by ancient wizards and witches to invoke the forces of good. It starts and ends with the rune that means both goodness and light."

My heart gave a little jump: that was the rune on Neville's necklace. Was he even wearing it now? Or had he taken it off?

"So you figure, we bring this creed down with us to the bottom of the lake, use the lorgnette to read it, and . . . it'll implode or something?" Harry summarized.

"If anything can do it, it's this," Hermione confirmed. "Susan, what do you think?"

"I agree," I said. "If you can destroy it, it'll be with these runes."

Harry nodded. "Well, the sooner the better, I say. We can go tomorrow evening after dinner."

"Wait a moment," I said. "You never know what will happen there. You'll want to save this for the weekend again."

Instantly Ginny looked worried, but Harry just nodded. "Friday night, then."

We broke a few minutes later, but Harry cornered me in the common room later. "Susan, I want you to come with us on this mission."

My heart raced. That was right; it was my turn to accompany them. "And Ginny?" I asked, knowing the answer already.

He shook his head. "I can't. If I put her in danger -- I've already killed her brother."

I frowned deeply. "I suppose it's no good telling you it wasn't your fault?"

"No good at all. So will you come?"

"Yeah, what did you have in mind?"

"Well, Ron and Hermione and I were discussing it, and we realized that Hermione is the only one who could actually read these runes, so she'll have to go down. But we don't want her to have to go down by herself. But if one of us goes down with her, there'll only be one person at the lake surface, and that doesn't seem like enough."

I nodded. "You're perfectly correct. You and Ron both will need to stay above to pull us up to safety."

Harry started at this. "Wait a second! YOU want to be the one who goes down with her?"

"It's the most logical thing to do," I countered. "I'm the one who's Seen the lorgnette. I'm a good swimmer. And you two are stronger than we are, so you'll be physically best equipped to haul us up if all else fails."

Harry narrowed his eyes. "I'll think about. I'll talk it over with the other two. In any case, don't make any plans for Friday."

Plans? With Neville probably not speaking to me? Not bloody likely. "Righto."

I didn't hear anything else about it until breakfast on Friday, when Hermione sat next to me at breakfast and did her best to seem covert (which meant, of course, that everyone around knew she was up to something). "Tonight," she murmured.

"Yes?"

"Meet in the common room after supper."

". . . Okay. Am I --"

"We'll talk about it then," she said, and threw her bag over her shoulder and walked away.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Neville watching us surreptitiously as he ate a bowl of hot cereal. When he saw me looking at him, he looked away quickly. Tears welled up in my eyes, but I didn't let them spill over.

I went through my classes that day in a daze. I purposely went late to dinner so I wouldn't have to see Neville; unfortunately, my plan backfired.

He approached me as I sat slurping down a bowl of soup. "Susan? Can we talk?"

I looked up at him and almost choked. I was meeting the heroes in twenty minutes; now was not a good time. "Sure, sit down," I said, wanting to kick myself for my stupidity.

He glanced around. "This is awfully public."

"Sorry," I said stupidly.

"Can we get out of here and go somewhere else?"

"I can't, Neville, not tonight." His expression grew stormy, and I felt tears pricking my eyes again. "I'm sorry."

"Don't you think you owe me at least this much?" he hissed.

I drew back, stung. "I want to talk with you. But tonight won't work."

"Fine," he said, and got up and walked away, leaving a half-finished dinner on his plate.

It was all I could do not to run after him. Instead I finished my supper, ignoring the stares of the other Gryffindors sitting around me, and went up to our common room, where Hermione, Harry, and Ron were waiting for me.

Hermione motioned for me to join them, and I did, entering their little circle. We were clustered around a map of Wast Water and the surrounding area, where I knew the Horcrux to be hidden.

"I've done quite a bit of research," Hermione said quickly and nervously, "and it looks to me as though we're going to learn a new Charm. Wast Water is the deepest lake in the country; it's twice as deep as recreational scuba divers are advised to go."

"Scuba?" broke in Ron.

"It's like, oh, you've got all sorts of equipment and training and such. And we don't have any of that," she said unnecessarily. "It'll be terribly cold, and there's no oxygen down there."

"No oxygen means no gillyweed," Harry mused.

"Right," Hermione said, almost triumphantly. "You all know the Bubble-Head Charm, right?" We nodded. "Well, there's a slight variation that will make the bubble around your whole body. Instead of Inflato Caput, say Inflato Corpus instead. Here, watch. Inflato Corpus!" In an instant, she looked as though her body were enclosed in a giant ellipse, though we could only see it indirectly by the firelight glinting off the barrier.

We saw her mouth something but couldn't hear what it was. I, assuming she'd told us to try it, did so. I knew the Bubble-Head Charm well, so it was no problem expanding it to cover the rest of me.

"Weird," I said to no one, attempting a turn about the common room. I found quickly that walking was not as good a solution as hopping, so before long I was hopping about like mad. At one point, I accidentally stumbled towards Hermione, and when our bubbles touched, they glommed on to each other, making a double-ellipse shape.

"Hello," I said, grinning. "That's rather handy, no?"

She smiled back. "The real test is going to be whether you can separate again."

I could, though it took some pulling. By this time, the boys were bouncing around in their own bubbles. For a moment, we all forgot our deadly serious mission and let ourselves act like astronauts on the Moon. But after a little while, Harry pulled his bubble down and gestured at us to do the same.

"Let's go," he said softly. We couldn't all fit under Harry's Invisibility Cloak, but it hardly mattered; with Snape gone, there were far fewer corridor hazards for us to contend with. We made it out to Hogsmeade through a secret passage on the map my grandfather had helped make.

In Hogsmeade, Harry took charge. "Ron, Hermione, you Apparate to this spot," he said, pointing to a place on the map. "Susan, I'll take you with me." Upon seeing my expression, he assured me, "I've used Side-Along Apparition before; don't worry."

Ron and Hermione nodded and blinked out a moment later. Then Harry took my arm and the world funneled to one point --

-- and we dropped into a darkened valley hundreds of miles away from Hogwarts.

I caught my breath and looked around. It was one of the most beautiful places I'd ever seen; the land rose and fell in a way characteristic of places shaped by glaciers. In the valley below us there was a massive lake, and the very sight of it chilled me. Wast Water: it was our destination tonight.

"Ready?" asked Harry steadily, and I looked up at him and his two best friends. I realized they were waiting on me.

"Sure," I said, trying to sound nonchalant, and failing. "Let's do it."

It wasn't a long trek down to the lakeside, but it felt long. By the time we got there, my feet were damp, and I was already regretting not wearing heavier robes. Scotland was, on the whole, much colder than England, but apparently the Lake District was chillier than average. Or maybe it was just a cold night.

At the lake's edge, Hermione pulled her hair back, and I did the same. Then she lit a little bluebell flame and closed it up in a jar so we'd have light in the pitch-black lake. Ron and Harry Conjured long, flexible, metallic cords; Ron attached his to Hermione, and Harry did the same for me. Hermione and I nodded once at each other and performed the Bubble-Body Charm, then waded into the shallows. We looked back at the boys, who waved forlornly, and then we dove into the lake.

The quiet in the deep was fantastic. When we'd performed the Bubble-Body Charm in the Gryffindor Common Room, there had still been a background hum, though we'd been unable to make out speech. Down here, though, there was not a sound.

I tried swimming conventionally for a bit and found it next to impossible. Hermione shook her head at me and made me watch as she poked her wand outside her bubble and shot a jet of water backwards from its tip. Instantly she shot forward, and I followed her example. Before long, we were scooting around like miniature girl-submarines in blue-lit waters.

Mum and Aunt Mi-Mi had told me to find the deepest part of the lake and I would find the lorgnette. But the lake was huge. A few times Hermione looked at me quizzically, but I shook my head. We skimmed the lakebottom, peering around in the blue firelight for anything sparkling or shining, but I could see that we were still descending, and thus weren't there yet.

After a while -- how long, I couldn't say -- I began to feel uncomfortably warm. I frowned at Hermione and got close to her so our bubbles merged. "Are you hot?" I asked.

"Yes," she said, frowning. Then comprehension dawned. "Oh, no, that means we're running out of oxygen!"

"We still have to find the lorgnette and destroy it," I said despairingly. "We'll have to go all the way back to the surface."

There was nothing for it; we had to ascend, and carefully, since we both knew that a quick ascent could damage us irreparably, regardless of the fact that as witches, we were much harder to injure than Muggles. At the surface, we looked back and realized we couldn't come close to seeing the boys on the shore.

"Gosh, we must be far away from them," Hermione said, and her voice was small.

"How are we going to do this?" I asked. "If we break our bubble now, we'll get soaked."

Hermione thought for a moment. "Ah, got it." Then she separated herself from me, leaving me in my own bubble. I didn't hear her incantation, but all of sudden I was unceremoniously hoisted into the air.

"Hey!" I cried, though no one could hear me. She'd levitated me, of course. While I hovered in mid-air, I pulled down the bubble, let myself breathe in the cold night air for a moment, then made another bubble. Hermione let me down gently, and then I did the same for her. In another minute, we dove straight back down.

It was another half-hour at least of searching before we came upon it. Something glinted on the lakebottom, and we turned to each other in excitement. It was the lorgnette; we'd found it!

It stood perfectly straight, handle down, shining unnaturally in the firelight. The sapphires in the handle sparkled dangerously. It looked not unlike a miniature, ridiculously adorned Quidditch goalpost.

Hermione gestured for me to stay back, and she took a length of parchment from her trouser pocket that, I knew, had the Lightbearer's Creed on it. She peered at the lorgnette for a long moment then decided, apparently, just to let it be incorporated into her bubble so she could use it to read the Creed. She positioned herself on top of it and used her wand to propel herself downwards.

I remembered a moment too late what would happen. I cried out to stop her, but of course she couldn't hear me. As soon as the lorgnette came into contact with her bubble, it burst, leaving Hermione suspended in the deep, defenseless.

She passed out almost immediately, though from shock or lack of oxygen, I couldn't tell. I almost panicked, but reminded myself that I had to save us both. If I touched the lorgnette, we'd both be dead. So I manuevered around it and pulled Hermione to me, enclosing her in my bubble.

She was limp and sodden, and I couldn't tell if she was breathing. I settled us down on the lakebottom a few yards from the lorgnette and cried "Rennervate!" to no effect. Then I remembered the Muggle method of saving drowning people -- taught to me by, of course, Hermione -- and blew into her mouth gently.

She wasn't responding. "Come on, Hermione!" This was insane. I knew her in the future! She couldn't die now! And yet I was growing more and more terrified by the moment.

I blew into her mouth again, and again. All of a sudden she sat up, smacking her forehead into my chest, coughing up a storm. Lakewater spurted from her mouth. "I -- I --"

"Shh, it's all right," I said, and took her in my arms.

She began sobbing immediately. "I saw -- I saw my whole life --"

"Shhh," I said senselessly.

After a minute, she wrenched herself from my grasp. "We have to finish this," she cried. "We haven't got enough air to stay down here much longer, and I don't know if we could find it again. But how can we do it? That -- that THING will destroy any protective spells we put up."

"What if I hold the parchment on one side, and you read it from the other side?" I offered.

She shuddered. "I don't want to get anywhere near that thing ever again. But what choice do we have?"

"None," I said softly.

She nodded and handed me the parchment. "D'you think I can separate and make my own bubble from this?"

"Try it," I said, and she did. When she was a few feet away from me, my bubble warped and separated, but I noticed it was much closer to my body. We were both operating on just my share of oxygen.

Hermione swam over to the far side of the lorgnette, and I swam to the closer one. Of course we'd chosen the wrong orientation; the letters were made tinier, not bigger. We switched around, and this time Hermione gave me the thumbs-up.

I saw her lips moving, but I couldn't hear her speaking. I did notice the sapphires sparkling more, though, and the glass glinting in a hundred directions. Something was taking notice of this little exercise.

She read each rune carefully but quickly; the whole thing was over in a minute. When she'd said the last one, she looked up at me expectantly.

And the lorgnette exploded, sending fragments into the lakewater for yards around, including into our bubbles, which both promptly burst.

I had almost been ready for this, and I took a lungful of air and grasped Hermione's wrist. With my last fully conscious thought, I gave an almighty tug on both our cords and began kicking towards the surface. Then everything went black.