(A/N) I know many of you, like myself, are reading Harry Potter and teh Deathly Hollows like mad and i may not update for a while, though I am currently working on a chapter in "I'll find you Never Fear." Its becoming increasingly hard to write Dramione fiction. Anyway, read and review:D
The fresh smell of cooking bacon lured Rory from her bed. Jess slept soundly next to her, his brown hair fanning out across his thin pillow. She hopped noislessly from her bed and slipped her pink robe over her matching grey singlet and pants before she tip toed out of the tent past the loud snores that came from Ron's bed.
The morning sun hadn't risen yet but the light lit up the cloudless sky a beautiful shade of blue. Rory looked over to Hermione who was carefully placing long strips of baking into a frying pan that floated midair over the leaping flames of the fire. Her brown hair was put out of her eyes in straight black pins and her light purple tracksuit pants were met by a pink knitted sweater that was one shade too bright and had been embedded with the a large brown 'H'.
"A christams gift from Ron's mom, we all get one," Hermione explained, Rory went pink, she hadn't realised that Hermione had noticed her gawking. "Harry get's the nicest ones, but it the thought that counts."
Rory gave Hermione a small smile before she sat timidly down on a log, looking up at the beutifully green trees where a rainbow of coloured birds sang peacefully. Rory turned to her right and her eyes fell upon a photo album that sat next to her. Rory picked it up and placed it in her lap as she ran her hand over the cream silk cover.
"What's this," she asked Hermione.
Hermione walked over to Rory and sat down on Rory's left, she let a smile of recognition break across her face as she too ran her hands over it.
"Harry's been making this scrap book for years now, it contains pictures of him growing up and all the important things that have happened during his life at Hogwarts." Hermione explained as she opened the front cover.
The first picture was of Sirius Black with baby Harry wrapped in his arms as he smiled into the camera, his arms swaying as he swayed Harry from left to right. Behind them stood a tall thin brick building that seemed to have been crammed in between ordinary apartments.
"That's the day they moved into Grimauld Place, they've been living there ever since," Hermione replied. "We all meet there over the holidays to train Dumbledore's army." Rory looked over at Hermione.
"What's Dumbledore's army?" She asked and suddenly the pages flicked by quikcly until they were almost at the end.
There were two photos, one that had been taken in black and white and had been incredibly creased had a caption that read out; 'The Order'. Rory automatically picked out Sirius's pale face, framed by his shaggy black hair that was the same colour as his shabby black clothes as he grinnd back at her from next to a tall thin man with golden hair cut short and his tweed jacket done up.
"That was the first rebilion group of wizards and witches who had banned up together to fight against Voldemort," Hermione explained, she then pointed to a second more recent photo of a second group of teenagers, about her age, in a blue room. "This is Dumbledore's army, where we followed in The Order's footsteps."
Rory recognised Hermione's face as she stared into the camera, she stood at Harry's left side as they both had their arms crossed, Ron on his right. All around them were kids about the same age, all in black school robes.
"You don't seem to be very cheerful," Rory commented.
"That was taken two years ago, Voldemort had just returned from a breif but cheerful fall of power during the Quidditch World Cup the year before," as Rory gazed at the depressed faces the pictures flipped back to a newspaper cutting. She saw Harry as his body heaved up and down with tears, his hands thrown over a body of a blond haired man who lay dead still on the grassy feilds. The title read out; 'Potter lies about Digory's Death!'. "The ministry refused to acknoledge that it had been Voldemort that had killed poor Cedric Digory," Hermione continued to explain, shaking her head. The pages flipped again and there was another picture of Harry as he lay in a hosptial bed, his limbs wrapped in surgical bandages. A caption flicked on and off, '"Potter's wounds must have been self inflicted," claims Minister Fudge.'
"They all blamed Harry for what had happened?" Rory asked, shakily as the pages flicked slowly, she all caught the photos of her depressed and injured brother, the titles all accusing him of lying of the return of Voldemort.
"They were scared, Voldemort was pure evil and him returning to try and seize power again was to much to comprehend." Hermione explained. "One night we broke into the department of ministries where we battled Death eaters, Voldemort's supporters, and that's when Voldemort appeared to try and kill Harry and Dumbledore." Rory stared down at the article that grinend up at her, the pages had finally rested and the headline's blared out; 'He-who-must-not-be-named returns! Potter redemed, Fudge disgraced!'. "That's when the minitry walked in and saw Voldemort."
"Wow, I never realised so many poeple were putting there lives on the line," Rory muttered as she looked down at the picture of Harry stainding in a crowd of reporters, their microphone's shoved in his face as a tall elderly man with a long white beird had his arm wrapped protectivly around him. "While I worried whether I wanted to go to Yale or Harvard."
"It's a lot to taken in, believe me, I know," Hermione replied with a smile, "I didn't know about magic until I was eleven and accepted at Hogwarts, and that first year was amazing!"
The pages flipped back to the begining where there was a picture of a very young Ron, Hermione and Harry smiled, their arms slung aorund eachother as they laughed in a stone corridor as the crowd around them cheered. The page turned and there was a news clipping that had the same photo but the title read out, 'Three first years tackle lost Mount Troll'.
"That was the first year Voldmeort tried to kill Harry and regain power. But we beat him, as we had done until year four, when he fnally succeeded, but still we refuse to be beaten.' Hermione smiled proudly as she looked down at her eleven year old self.
"I'm starving, that smells brilliant," came Ron's sleepy drawl as he emerged form the red tent. Rory had to hide her giggle at his bright maroon sweater with its orange R. His long limbs sat uncomfortablly on the log next to Rory and Hermione's as he easily rested his sleepy head on his knees.
Hermione and Rory looked over at each other and smiled, Hermione stood up and let Rory continue to look at Harry's album. He looked up at Hermione with his big brown eyes and at first Rory saw nothing that made him appear very handsome with his flame red hair and freckled face on top of his tall frame but then he flashed his wide smile and suddenly Rory saw what had made Hermione love him.
"Morning Ron," the two girls said in unison. Hermione was scooping the sizzling bacon off the frying pan and onto a plate.
"Did you sleep well," Rory asked Ron.
He shrugged sleepily. "I've slept better, personally I didn't want my bed right next to Malfoy's. I would have slept much better if I wasn't afraid I was going to wake up with boils all over my face or an extra ear in the middle of my face." he mumbled bitterly.
"Why didn't you sleep next to Harry then?" Rory asked absently, still flicking through the ablum, right now her eyes were on a news article that explained how Harry and Ron had, at twelve years of age, broke into a hidden chamber, battled a deadly monster, saved a small girl and their own defence against the dark arts teacher. She looked over and watched as Ron sat lazily on his log, lazily biting his thumb nail. She found it hard to beleive that he would have done such great things...
"Harry slept near the entrance to keep watch," Ron replied. "Speaking of, where is he?" he looked over at Rory who shrugged again, she was still reading the long article.
"He woke up early to go and check out the forest, making sure no one followed us here," Hermione replied as she broke eggs onto the frying pan.
"What are you reading?" Ron asked Rory, she finally looked up from the article about Harry during The Triwizard Tournament to look at Ron, who had stood up and walked over to sit down next to her to look at the album.
"Oh yeah, I forgot Harry had brought that for you to look at," Ron said with a half laugh. A picture in the middle of the article repeated itself, where Hermione had thrown herself at Harry and brought him in for a big hug, the caption described it as young love.
"Did Hermione really like my brother?" Rory whispered to Ron who laughed loudly.
"Of course not! They were close friends, she was wishing him luck before he battled dragons," Ron said loudly through his laughs, he had caught Hermione's attention who had furrowed her brow in annoyance.
"Yes," she agreed sourly. "And that awful reporter, Rita Skeeter, made it seem like I was some trallop!" this made Ron laugh even louder.
"Oh shut up," they both said in union.
"It seems my brother has been through a lot of hard times and little good times," Rory tried to say casually but she just made herself seem afraid. Both Ron and Hermione looked at each other with worried eyes then over at Rory.
"I know that it may seem that Harry just moves from one battle to the next, but its not like that at all!" Hermione said earnestly. "We all have some great times together, and we will have many more once Voldemort is defeated."
"But how do you know that you'll win?" Rory muttered to herself.
Before anyone could answer, Draco emerged from the tent dressed in black pants and a tight black dress shirt rolled up at the sleeves. Rory couldn't help but find him slightly attractive with his peircing grey eyes and platinum blond hair that sat on his head gorgeously, a few strands floating across his forhead and his thin pink lips set in his handsome scowl.
"Morning all," he said pleasantly.
"Morning Draco," Rory said, smiling wide.
"Hey Draco," Hemrione replied casually as she began to divivde the ready cooked bacon and eggs onto plates.
"Malfoy," Ron said curtly.
"Weasley," Draco replied, Rory could tell they were trying their best to be on their best behaviour for the groups sake.
Rory was now looking at pictures form the Yule Ball, finding that each new page was a new thrilling discovery. She saw Harry looking quite furstrated as he tried to dance with an indian girl in a beautiful flowing sari. She then saw a picture of a chinese girl dancing with a handsome tall golden haired boy, but in the background were two dancers that were a head and shoudlers above the rest of the crowd, the man was slightly shorter then the woman, in thick brown clothes that matched is thick brown hair and beard. He spun the woman around and her short black hair flew widly around like her long purple dress. In the next photo she saw Ginny in a light green dress with a yellow tutu bottom as she turned sheepishly away from the camera, in her small pale hand was a crystal glass filled with punch.
At that moment, Ginny emerged from the tent dressed in a blue long sleeved top and tight black jeans, her red hair flowing easily in the hot morning air. "Hey," she greeted lazily as she flopped down on the log behind Hermione.
Rory turned back to the photo album to observe the rest of the photos. Ron sat hunched in one of the chairs alone, making no attempt to hide his scowl, Roryr sniggered at his brown lacy dress robes. In the next photo Hermione wore a beautiful flowing pink satin dress as she walked down a corridor on the arm of a tall russian man in red army clothes and a crew cut.
"Wow, Hermione! He's really cute!" Rory exclaiemd holding up the album and showing the picture to Hermione who went pink as soon as she glanced at the allbum. Ron leaned forward from where he sat and looked at the photo too.
"Oh yeah, Vicky!" Ron muttered darkly, glancing over at Hermione who was now overly interested in dishing out food. Ginny snorted with laughter and Draco, despite himself, laughed a little too.
"His name is Vicky?" Rory scoffed, looking back at the photo.
"No, he's Viktor Krum, the best quidditch player Bulgaria has ever seen!" Draco said, trying to hide his excitement.
"Quidditch, what's that?" Rory asked, looking up at Draco.
"Its like soccer," Hermione tried to explain, "But on brooms high up in the air. Viktor plays quidditch for the Bulgarians."
"And Hermione went to the Yule ball with him," Ginny added, smiling secretly at the automatic discomfort this sentence made Hermione feel and how red it made Ron's face.
"He was your boyfriend? " Rory said, amazed. "Hermione, he's so gorgeous!"
"Not 'boyfriend' so to speak," Hemione muttered. "More like... pen pal." Ron let out a cough that hinted towards his doubts that he was just a 'pen pal'. Hermione cleared her throat and added affectionatly "Anyway, who wants Viktor Krum when they could have Ron Weasley!" They all looked over at Ron who sat with a hunched back.
"I can think of many reasons," Ginny replied and they all sniggered except for Ron who gave his little sister a stern look and Hermione who still was trying not to blush.
Suddenly a white glowing whisp of a large animal trotted quikcly from the shady forest. It was a galliant Stag that had made Hermione scream and drop the plate of delicious bacon onto the dusty ground. Rory stood up instictvly and looked around at everyone else. The stag flicked his head back towards the forest then in Harry's voice the stag spoke.
"Five Death eaters, two dementors approaching, prepare yourself. I will be there soon." and then in a gust of wind the stag turned in on itself and had vanished in a blink of and eye.
Rory tunred to look at Hermione who was fretting with her wand, Ron beside calmly took chrage as he let the tent crumble into a ball and sent it flying in the air back to where it had come from, he turned on the fire and sent water form his wand and extinguished the flames. Ginny was almost as quick as her big brother, whipping out her long light yellow wand. Draco was quicker then them all and had sent Jess over to Rory in one hard push.
As soon as Rory had Jess so close to her, and not mention death advancing quickly, she let her arms wrap around him, and hugging him deeply, breathing in his smell of coffee and cigarettes. As she felt his nose in the crook of her neck, she could tell he was trying to do the same, have one last strong vivid memory of her.
Suddenly Harry's tall figure emerged from the woods at break neck speed, skidding to a stop he looked around at their worried expressions. He looked oddly relieved as he saw their wands clutched in their hands.
"Good, you got my message," Harry said looking behind him wildly.
"How'd they find us?" Hermione asked, her voice trembling as she stood next to Ron.
"Must have followed us here or something, Snape's with them the ruddy bastard," Harry muttered.
They all heard uproars of the uproaching death eaters, all begging for a fight. Harry ran over and gave Ginny a breif deep hug that seemed to have stopped her shaking, as they hugged Harry had motioned for Draco to come over to him. In long quick strides Draco had appeared at Harry's side. Harry drew away from Ginny and backed her against Draco so that her long red hair blew across his skin.
"Harry, are you mental?" Ron cried but Harrry shook his head.
"I'm trusting you with her life, anything happens to Ginny I'm coming after you!" Harry said, though his voice was almost a whisper it was plain and direct, Draco's whole body quivered slightly but he firmly nodded once.
"Harry, what the," Ron began but Harry cut him off as he walked backwards toward Rory.
"You have to protect Hermione, I have to protect Rory," he said in the same hard to argue with tone and then he turned, nose to nose with Rory.
He took hold of her wand hand and made it flick violently forward. "When I scream go, concentrate on your happiest memory, and continue to keep it in your mind as you shout the words 'Expecto Patronum!' at the top of your lungs, and do not give up until I tell you so," he said smiply, the yells were louder then ever from the forest and suddenly Rory panicked, she nodded vigorously as her mind reeled, trying to find a happy memory.
Harry walked in front of them all and held out his own wand infront of him awaiting to be faced with seven deadly intruders, Hermione was holding her wand, trembling slightly beside Ron who glanced to Hermione, to the forest and over to Draco. Draco Malfoy had one arm seized tight around Ginny's upper arm who tried to get away from him and to Harry's side. Jess stood defenceless beside Rory, unsure what he should do, so he just stood silently beside Rory.
But she wasn't paying attention to any of this, her mind was flicking fast through her happy memories, much like the pages of Harry's photo album that now blew in kicked up wind on the abandonned log. Was her happiest memory her first kiss with Dean? Her hands wrapped nervously around stolen corn starch? Or was it returning from a long trip to her mother's warm embrace? Was it the first the time she and Jess spent the night together in his new apartment, where they lay entwined on a double blow up matress?
Harry shouting "Go!" furiously made Rory even more panicked as she rose her wand into the air.
Suddenly her mind rested on one memory, a memory infinetly more joyous then anything her mind could think of atthat moment, but a memory of what started this, what had brought her to Harry. She focused on the way her heart beat had quickened as she turned on her bar stool to face a pair of enchanting green eyes beneath black circular glasses and a lightning bolt scar dashing boldly against his pale skin from under a mop of black hair.
"Exp-pect-to Patr-tr-onum!" she fumbeled and from her wand came a whisp of silver light but it suddenly died away, through the failed spell's smoke she could see the cloacked figures close in on the group.
Harry yelled out "Expelliarmus!" and a deatheater lost his wand but the others deflected the curse. Form the otherside of the clearing she heard Ron yell out a sell that made the unarmed masked man fall to the ground with a thud.
Suddenly from the sky two cloacked figures slolwy descended onto the group, their presence suddenly made Rory feel very sad, small hot tears rolled down her cheeks as she saw the battle quickly fall apart. Both cloakced figures locked all their attention on Draco who was still trying to disarm the masked men. When the hovering figure knocked him to the ground it took both Draco and Ginny quite by surpise as a cold dead hand wrapped around Draco's neck and suddenly began to do what looked like sucking all the colour from his already pale face through his mouth.
As she watched Ginny slowly try and drag Draco away from the dementors who were completely ignoring her, Rory's mind began to echo with many horrid memories of her past.
We're sorry to inform you... Ginny fell backward, blood splirting from a cut on her cheek. But you're mother, Lorelei Gilmore, has died... Draco's body shook violently, cathing Hermione's attention.
Dean is living with his parents and my Lindsey is heart broken... Hermione attemtpeted the same spell Rory had tried but her small otter gave out after a few moments and one demetor continued to suck Draco dry.
You and you're dughter can go to hell...Rory tried as hard as she could to grab hold of her happy memory but the memories of sadness drenched her soul to the point she found herself hoelessly monaing in tears as she watched everyone fall around her.
Rory spun round and saw that the second dementor had come up behind her, but where was Jess? You promised, Dad! You promised this time it would be different... She suddenly saw Jess's feet as they twictched from under the dementor's flowing coat, the rest of him unable to move as he too, like Draco, was sucked dry.
I'm dropping out of Yale... Rory felt her body move in slow motion as she ran to Jess's side, he looked close to death. Well, you're certainly not coming back home if that's what you think... She grabbed his flailing hand and as it squeezed back she felt a pang of heart break.
Everything's falling apart, Grandpa... She turned and saw that it was Ron and Hermione against the two remaining death eaters.
I'm sorry for your loss, you're mother was wonderful... Harry was now hunched over Ginny's limp body tears streaking down both their faces.
You've been arested for stealing a boat... Harry turned around and looked over at her, his eyes pleading her to do the spell. My little Rory has been fingerprined and has a couart hearing... What had Harry expected to happen? She could barely light a fire let along an advanced protection spell.
You just don't have it kid... Rory stood from Jess's side in time to see Hermione fall hard on the ground in a flash of purple light. But I thought I was doing ok... Ron dove after her. Everything is falling apart... her sobs echoed through her head.
Suddenly her mind sent her back to her grandfather's embrace, his hands running though her hair as she sobbed, his voice boomed through her head, Everything will be ok, Rory... She wished more then ever to be back in his comforting arms and suddely she lifted her wand once more and quickly ran to the otherside of Jess. Everything will be ok... these words seemed to drown out everything else and with memory of his strong arms wrapped around her she tried again.
"Expecto Patronum," she shouted loudly and suddenly a blazing light came from her wand, she looked up and saw it had taken shape of a magnificent snow leapord that growled feircley, it stormed at that horrid dementor and it flew away from her apparation like sheet of paper in a hurricane, the second one doing the same. Suddenly her snow leapord tunred on the remaining two deathe eaters. Its stood on all fours, crouching and ready to strike at them as they both tripped over each other in effort to get away from its snarling form.
Rory looked over at Harry and the last thing she saw before everything went black was his beaming smile and the words repeating over in her head, Everything will be ok, Rory...
(A/N) In the next chapter Rory comes face to face with a face she never expected to face...