Chapter 9

Naturally, Neville got caught. It was for something stupid, of course (writing "Potter for President" on the wall next to the entrance of the Gryffindor common room. If he was going to get himself caught, couldn't he at least have done so next to the Slytherin common room, where it would have pissed off someone?). Ginny didn't find out till the next morning, when Seamus, white with worry caught her as she came down the stairs of her dorm, asking her if she knew where his friend was. That question told her everything she needed to know. She ran back upstairs to the seventh year girls' dorm, hoping beyond belief that it just meant Neville and Lavender had graduated from heavy snogging to something more serious.

That wasn't the case, unfortunately, and they all soon resigned themselves to the idea that their day would be spent investigating Neville's fate. Seamus was already musing insane plans to free Neville from Voldemort himself, and Lavender was moaning the fact that the way things were going, she'd die a virgin.

(Ginny gave herself three seconds to sigh with relief hearing that bit – it meant her idiotic brother hadn't been quite stupid enough to do the deed with her last year.)

The Seventh Years had Transfiguration first thing in the morning, and Parvati was tasked with the mission to get as much as possible out of their Head of House. When Parvati saw Ginny later on, she informed her that McGonagall hadn't even known Neville was missing, and that she was "more furious that I've ever seem her, and that includes a few times in fifth year when she went up against Umbridge. If he wasn't such a git, I'd feel sorry for Snape right now – she went to his office to demand to know where Nev is."

Whether McGonagall got answers out of Snape or not, they were not to find out. When asked by her students, her lips thinned, she shook her head and changed the conversation. They did find out, however, how he got caught out of Rose Winters who had been with him just before the incident ("If those bastards don't kill him, I will – hadn't we agreed not to take anyone under Fifth Year on these suicidal expeditions?"). She had managed to get away. Filch, the little scumbag, found him, and immediately alerted both Carrows. Alecto had showed up, and had seemed, as Rose put it, "disgustingly happy to have someone linked to a crime to punish properly". The young Hufflepuff obviously felt really guilty for leaving Neville on his own, and no matter how much Ginny pointed out there wasn't much to be done by an inexperienced witch once Death Eaters got involved, the girl seemed to think the whole disaster was entirely her fault. Ginny eventually gave up and left her in the care of Susan Bones (with strict instructions to keep her out of trouble).

The day went on, without any signs off Neville. The Carrows looked much too happy for comfort, and even Snape deigned grace the Great Hall with his presence and had the faintest hint of a smile on his lips. By the time dinner was over, Ginny was trying to figure which one of Seamus's insane rescue plans they should go with. Both Terry and Hannah had managed to find her and proudly announce that their houses would help the Gryffindors in rescue missions – though Ginny did notice that more than a few people overhearing this looked uncomfortable; she made a note to remember that no matter how committed, the members of the D.A. did not, in fact, speak for everyone. There were still more than a few people happy to sit back and stay safe while the Wizarding World collapsed.

All this was for nothing, though, because when she stepped in the empty common room with Seamus after dinner, they found Neville laying on the couch – grey-faced, bleeding, bruised, swollen, passed-out – but alive.

She didn't think she'd ever seen anyone looking quite that bad. Even after Bill had been attacked by Greyback, half his face had looked somewhat normal. Neville looked as if not a single part of his body had been spared from torture – which was probably the case, she realised.

Without a word, Seamus stepped towards the sofa, lifted his friend as if he weighed nothing more than a feather, and carried him up the stairs. Ginny followed close behind, trying to hide them both from the view of the other students suddenly pouring from the portrait hole. The loud whispers behind her indicated that she didn't nearly succeed.

As she moved to open the door for Seamus, another shock met her – the dorm had been searched, and whoever had done it didn't bother to hide their tracks.

"Damn. The last time this happened was in Second Year when someone searched Harry's stuff. We never did find out who had done it. I think in this case, we can make a pretty good guess."

Ginny chose to ignore the bit about who might have searched Harry's stuff in Second Year, and gestured to put Neville in Dean's bed, since Neville's was now out of order.

"Take his shirt off," she said quietly. It was a testimony to how scared they both were for Neville that Seamus didn't make a lewd comment. She turned to the bathroom to get supplies to clean him up.

His chest looked worse, if that was even possible. It had been reduced to one giant bruise. The only reassuring part was the movement of his lungs, showing that he was still breathing. Gently, Ginny started running her hands over him, feeling his ribs. She counted at least three that were broken, and two more she wasn't sure about.

"We need to take his trousers off as well, to see the extent of the damage." Seamus nodded and did as she asked. She breathed a sigh of relief when she noticed nothing was broken. His knees were heavily bruised, and there were several cuts all along his legs. Looking at the boy before her – no, the man before her, because if Neville hadn't been a man before, he surely was now – she could only reach one conclusion.

"I can't do this by myself. There's too much damage that I can see, and it's likely that there's more damage that I don't see. I could hurt him more by trying to fix this. We need Madam Pomfrey."

"I'll go get her," Seamus answered gravely.

He opened the door of the dorm, only to find a crowd made of practically all the Gryffindor boys, and a good half of the girls waiting in complete silence. Lavender was the first to speak, sounding uncharacteristically shy.

"How is he? Is it bad?"

"We need to get Pomfrey," Seamus said, and that really answered everything.

"We'll go," answered Jimmy Peakes, pointing at himself and Ritchie Coote. Seamus nodded silently, and walked back in the dorm. He sat on the chair next to Ginny, and looked at his friend. Ginny was wiping a wet cloth on his forehead. Lavender timidly walked in the room, and Ginny handed her the cloth.

"Please clean him up. I'll look through my book to figure out what we can do. Seamus, can you close the door? As nice as it is to see how concerned everyone is, Neville has a right to some privacy."

At some point in the past few months, she had taken on the habit of bossing people around whenever she felt nervous. Was this how Hermione felt whenever her two best friends ran out of stupid ideas and looked to her for the next steps? Probably. Hermione deserved a lot more credit than she got for her nerves. Being the one people relied on for bright ideas was a terrible responsibility. Especially when the responsibility came with broken friends who got medical attention in secret.

What to do, what to do?

At what point did someone become responsible for saying stop? Once Neville got better, should she demand that no one participate in this mini-revolution? That everyone stop everything? That they all become obedient students?

And would she ever dare look at Harry in the eyes again if she did such a thing?

No.

There was her answer. If Harry could shoulder his responsibility for so long, if Hermione could help him for so long, if Ron could stand by their sides no matter what, then Ginny could do this, or she would not call herself a girlfriend, a sister and a friend anymore.

Stupid Gryffindor nobility.

Madam Pomfrey arrived with Jimmy and Ritchie. Swallowing visibly, she got to work on Neville, mending bones, checking for internal damage, giving out sleeping potion and painkillers. She operated in almost complete silence, broken only from time to time by raspy breathing from Neville himself.

Ginny watched every step, wondering if she'd have to do this herself soon on Neville or on someone else.

As the nurse finished, she turned to the few students standing in the room.

"He's asleep for now. The bones have mended, but his body has been put under a lot of stress. He should not leave his bed for two or three days. I will let his teachers know that he is excused, though it might be best for him to try and attend Professors Carrow's classes. He will need help to walk to the classroom for these. Mr Finnnigan, I hope you can be counted on for this." She took a deep breath. "I was not here tonight, I did not help Mr. Longbottom. Any recovery he made was due only to his own physical force. Is that clear?"

They all nodded. Without a doubt, she'd been instructed not to help and had taken an amazing risk disobeying her orders. Like most adults in the Castle, though, Pomfrey had always considered her duty first to Hogwarts, then to the students, and only last to the Headmaster. Under Dumbledore, the three had always been the same. With the new Headmaster, they differed more often than not.

With a solemn nod, she left the room.

They remained silent for a few minutes, before Lavender spoke up.

"One of us should stay here tonight to help Seamus in case Neville wakes up. I really would like to stay, but Ginny... you have a lot more experience than me on this. I don't want to be a bad girlfriend, but I think it'd be best."

After such a difficult day, Ginny was relieved to have an excuse to stay in Harry's bed. Even if it didn't smell like him anymore, something of his essence remained – or maybe she needed comfort so badly that she'd convinced herself something was there even when there wasn't. Did it even matter?

"I'll stay here. Do you have the either of the Carrows tomorrow?"

"No, we're free."

"Great, he can sleep through the day then – but we should make sure he's never alone. Can you talk with the rest of the Gryffindors and figure out a schedule so there's always someone with him? Preferably boys, so we don't take unnecessary risks."

"I'll do that right now," Lavender answered, looking very happy to have something – anything – to do.

"Seamus, I guess we should clean up this dorm, and figure out if anything's missing. Did you have anything illegal stored in this room?"

"We don't have anything illegal stored anywhere, Gin. That's your job," Seamus answered with a sad smile, picking up some of Neville's clothes and shoving them in the closet. Ginny rolled her eyes, took the clothes back out and started folding them properly.

"Boys... Can't any of you ever fold clothes?"

Seamus let out a laugh – almost genuine this time.

"I didn't think you'd be the type of girl who cares about that. You'll have a bit of a problem if you ever marry Harry, he's the worst of our lot when it comes to folding and cleaning up after himself."

"I can handle Harry."

"Aye, you can. You and Hermione, you're probably the only two girls who ever will know how to handle Harry. I don't reckon anyone else will ever need to."

He tried to imitate her way of folding a shirt and failed miserably.

"Isn't there a spell for these things anyway?"

"There is, but I like to fold clothes by hand. It clears up my mind." She started putting togetehr a pile of robes.

"Do you think he'll be alright?" Seamus asked after a short silence.

"Yes. Otherwise Pomfrey would have taken him to the hospital wing, Carrows be damned."

Another short silence, then...

"Ginny?"

"Yes?"

"What do we do now?"

...

"I have no idea."