8.
You come to still hanging from the chains in the wall. The agony hits you like an eighteen wheeler, driving into your stomach at ninety kilometers an hour. You gasp feebly, tasting the remnants of blood in your mouth. You vaguely remember biting your tongue in the midst of it all.
"…-ter? Potter? Harry? Can you hear me? Potter!..." The voice is slipping in and out of hearing, and the gaps are suspiciously timed with the grey fog that occasionally swamps you.
"Urgkh." You moan out. It was supposed to be 'what', but something seems to have gotten lost on the way. "Uhmm."
"…Come on, you've got… stand, come on…they're going to release…fall…Harry!" The last, said so urgently, begins to snap you out of your stupor; it is still too late. The chains around your wrists disappear, and you come crashing to the ground. The impact sends another wave of fire lancing through your body and you scream, or try too. All that emerges is a strangled whimper. Something is grabbing you, turning you over. You try to fight, they're hurting you! A cloud of brown obscures your vision and it clicks inside: that something is actually a someone, Hermione. You relax.
"Oh, Harry." She murmurs. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I am so, so sorry." She repeats, and something cool is dripping over your face as she cradles your head in her lap. You try to smile at her, tell her it isn't her fault, but everything hurts and unconsciousness is beckoning sweetly. You let it all slide away.
You come to again, increasingly familiar with the slow rise though the blackness that signals a return to consciousness. Your head is still cradled in Hermione's lap, and above your head, voices are twining in a soft dance of words. One is Hermione, but it takes you a second to identify the other voice as that of Professor Snape. It is quiet, and entirely without malice. In fact, the deep baritone has a remarkably soothing quality to it that threatens to send you under again. You blink once, twice, and wait for things to come into focus. Then you remember your glasses are gone, likely shattered somewhere between here and the Graveyard.
"Mmm". You mumble, still dizzy, but more lucid than you were last time. "Hrmm?" You mumble again, and the brown shape above you that is Hermione bends closer.
"Hey Harry. You're awake. How do you feel?"
"Hrmm?" You repeat.
She laughs slightly, and you can make out the ghost of a smile on her face. "Yes, Harry, I'm fine. Thank you for asking. You are such a Gryffindor." Out of your sightline, a figure snorts. Snape.
"He is indeed, Ms. Granger. Potter, try not to move too much. Your arms are still tender, and though we've done the best we can, it is best not to aggravate such injuries."
You mumble something in response, but you aren't really paying attention to them anymore. Your arms… Hell. You don't want to think about that right now. Gingerly, you shift the rest of your limbs. To your relief, everything else seems to work properly, though your head is pounding. You don't try to move your arms.
Coughing slightly to clear your throat, you try in vain to bring everything into focus. It still doesn't work, not that it has any of the other hundred times you've tried since you wound up in this cell. "So," you croak out finally, "What now?" You cannot see the glances your best friend and potions professor exchange, but there is no need for sight, as you can all but feel them.
"We wait." Says the Potions Master eventually. "We wait, and you heal."
You have no response to that.