CHAPTER X
They landed, not in a broken telephone box, but Hermione's small bedroom at the top of the house. It was a tight squeeze; Draco banged his head on the sloping ceiling and let out a hiss beneath his breath.
"Your bloody bedroom," he muttered, giving the offending beam a malevolent look—although it softened slightly when she slipped her fingers through his.
"What—" Arthur glanced confusedly about. "What are we doing here?"
"Change of plan," Remus murmured. His eyes had settled on her hand laced with Draco's, but although his eyebrow quirked a little, he didn't comment. "Someone's about to tell the Death Eaters where we are, and we need to stop them."
"How—How did…How…" Arthur's mouth opened and closed a few times, his eyes darting bewilderedly between the three of them. "But who?"
It was a good question, and one Hermione only wished she could answer.
"That's what we need to find out," she said.
Arthur's eyes went round but he appeared stunned into silence. And it was a good job too, because otherwise they wouldn't have heard the muffled creak from the bottom of the staircase.
All eyes—and wands—landed on the door.
Another creak, this time a little louder, and Hermione realised someone was making their way up the narrow, crooked stairway to the very bedroom they were in.
"Oh good lord!" Molly almost dropped the basket of clean laundry in shock. "You're supposed to be in London! What in the name of Merlin are doing here?"
On seeing his wife, Arthur had lowered his wand. But Hermione didn't, and neither did Remus or Draco.
"Granger?" Draco asked, a clear question in his voice.
A beat, as Hermione considered and Molly stared, alarmed, between them. The Weasley matriarch had been killed on the stairs, Hermione remembered, as if the older woman had simply been bustling about the house when the Death Eaters attacked. The thought of Molly—warm, kindly, motherly Molly—struck down so callously sent a sharp pang through her chest.
She dropped her wand.
"It's not Molly who betrayed us," she said. "She was on the stairs. They took her by surprise."
"Betrayed us?" Molly echoed faintly and with horror. "Who betrayed us?"
It was, of course, a shame to scare poor Mrs Weasley, especially since they'd already made her jump out of her skin twice this morning, but there was no time for explanations.
"Where is everyone else?" Hermione asked her urgently. "What are they doing?"
Molly blinked, evidently flustered and more than a little baffled by the whole situation, but answered the question nonetheless.
"Kingsley and George are in the front room, playing chess," she said. "Hestia is with them, I think. Although she might be making a cup of tea."
"And Dora?" Remus asked tensely. "Where is she?"
"Outside with Teddy and Angelina," Molly replied. "Teddy wanted to build sandcastles."
Hermione's mind was racing. Everyone was together. How could any of them summon the Death Eaters?
"Podmore," Draco said suddenly. "Where's Sturgis?"
"In his room," Molly said. "I popped in on my way up to let him know what was going on. He looked dreadful—so peaky. I told him I'd have Hestia bring him up a potion."
An image of the man's easy-going smile and thatch of sunny hair flashed before Hermione's eyes. It couldn't be him. He hadn't even been there to hear Ndidi's address.
Unless…
"Did you happen to tell him where we were going?" she asked.
"Oh yes. He was quite interested in knowing exactly where that witch lived. Said he used to live near Leicester Square himself…"
Hermione met Draco's eyes in a moment of shared realisation.
"Merlin, it's Sturgis," she said, and then they were racing, no time to waste, down the staircase.
Hermione got there first, Remus and Draco just a fraction of a second behind. She flung open the door to find the wizard sat in his wheelchair, a leather-bound notebook in his hand.
He snapped it shut.
"What's going on?" he asked with a smile, all innocence and charm although his eyes were tinged with red and his jaw strained. He tried to tuck the book innocuously down the side of his chair, but Remus was upon him straight away. Keeping his wand pointed at the man's chest, he snatched up the pad and flipped it open.
"Addresses," he said sharply. "No prizes for guessing where."
Hermione's heart sank as she joined him and realised it wasn't just addresses Sturgis had handed over to the Death Eaters. Scrawled below were a set of instructions for disabling the complicated wards protecting the house—silently and without warning any of the occupants what was going on outside.
As they stared, struck dumb with betrayal, two words appeared in thick black ink beneath.
Ten minutes.
A moment, as the group absorbed the full horror of so few letters, and then Remus lifted his head. Below his moustache, his mouth set into a grim line.
"They're coming."
...
Six hundred seconds. That was all they had. And Merlin help them, they would make the bloody most of it.
Tonks was the first to leave, little Teddy clinging to her neck. Kingsley, Hestia and Angelina left next, the latter already tending to a catatonic Sturgis Podmore.
The moment they had begun preparations to escape, Sturgis had tried to turn his wand on himself. Fortunately, Draco had had swifter reactions than she; he had pinned the older man's arm behind his head, immobilising him completely as he broke into shuddering sobs.
"I'm sorry," he had choked. "Please just kill me. Please. I'm so sorry."
Hermione had almost been in tears herself at the sight of him, distraught and begging in his wheelchair, but then Remus put them all out of their misery by stunning him where he sat. Kingsley had said, however, that the suicide attempt was a sure sign the man had been under the Imperius curse—or at least, some variation of it—and Hermione quite agreed. Bellatrix was just the sort to command someone to kill themselves should they be discovered.
Regrouping in the hallway, a few minutes later, it was decided almost unanimously that the rest would stay and fight. Hermione herself was the only dissenter, but then again, she was the only one who'd seen how badly this could end.
She knew it was different. She knew this time they had the upper hand. She just couldn't shake the feeling, deep in her gut, that something terrible was about to happen.
And, this time, like all others, she wouldn't be able to stop it.
She evidently looked as overwrought as she felt, because when the others spread about the ground floor, armed and ready for the Death Eaters' assault, Draco caught her hand and tugged her into the library.
The library. The room where this entire misadventure began. Ndidi's books and Hermione's own notes were still spread out on the rug, exactly as she'd left them so long ago.
Except it wasn't so long ago, was it? To Draco, it was just last night. Last night when he'd scowled at her from the sofa. Last night when she'd dropped that book right on his head. Last night when they'd stayed up so late, heads bent together and excitement rising as they'd discovered something that could change the entire course of the war.
Hermione sagged back against the wall. Just last night, and so much had changed since.
"Are you okay?" Draco murmured, searching her expression.
"Yeah, I just…" His body was tense, just inches from hers, his eyes so concerned—and her heart twisted.
She couldn't lose him. Not again.
"This is our last chance," she whispered, and he exhaled a long breath. He was so close she felt it, fluttering the ends of her hair.
"I know."
"You have to promise me you'll stay alive." She gave him a pleading look. "No heroics. Not this time."
He rubbed a hand across his forehead.
"Granger…"
"No. I mean it. Not after…" She paused, feeling her throat contract like the sudden clench of a fist.
Could she say it? Could she tell him what he'd said, way back in that hallway, their dead friends all around?
"After what?" he prompted gently. "After I kissed you?"
She swallowed.
"It wasn't just a kiss, though, was it?"
His forehead creased, uncertainty in his eyes, and Hermione ached for him to remember. Ached for him to know.
"You told me you loved me," she whispered. His whole face jerked, visibly startled.
"I told you…?" he echoed, staring down at her.
"You told me you loved me," she repeated, voice a little stronger. Then, because it hurt her pride that he looked quite so stumped, and also because she was starting to wonder whether twenty-fourth loop Draco had simply been caught up in the moment, she narrowed her eyes at him. "Isn't it true?" she asked sharply.
His mouth opened. Then closed. Then he swallowed, hard.
And although it was neither the time nor the place, although the steady tick-tock of the grandfather clock beside them revealed the Death Eaters to be mere minutes away, Hermione felt her heart shatter into a million tiny pieces.
"I see," she said flatly. "Now if you'll excuse me, I have a Dark witch to defeat." She went to tug away, but he pressed his hand to the wall and trapped her.
"Well of course it's true," he said, looking faintly exasperated. "I just… I'm a bit incredulous that I told you."
When she blinked at him, he gave a sheepish shrug. "I've wanted to for ages, you see."
There was a rushing in Hermione's ears, and this time, it was nothing to do with that damn clock dragging her back in time.
"Ages?" she echoed dazedly.
"Ages," he confirmed. His mouth quirked into that half-smile she knew so well. "Why else would I launch myself so very readily between you and a Killing Curse?"
Hermione's heart was soaring. She hadn't realised how hard she'd been hoping, how much she'd put on those words, whispered as they were in the aftermath of a kiss.
"Don't do it this time," she whispered. "I can't watch you die again."
His lashes fluttered as he looked down.
"Hermione…"
"I mean it," she said again. "You have to promise me. No heroics."
Muffled footsteps across the porch—so faint she'd think she were imagining it had she not known what was coming—sent adrenaline coursing through her blood.
Malfoy straightened sharply, wand in hand, and the adrenaline turned to sudden and wild desperation.
"Draco," she whispered, and he delivered a quick, hard kiss to her mouth. His lips lingered, just for a moment, but time was running out.
"No heroics," he promised, and then the front door burst open.