Disclaimer: This story is based on characters created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoat Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended. Any original plots, ideas, and characters are mine.
AN:
Sorry for the wait! I thought I would have time to write this chapter during the weekend. But at least it's finally here, and it's a long one. Enjoy! ;)
Part I: Chapter 46
The gleam in the men's eyes was very ominous, of greed, satisfaction, excitement, and malevolence.
Harry was quick to appraise them and know who was the leader. The one pointing the gun at Tom, the one who had called out with a deep, coarse voice.
They all looked half-starved, hair entangled, disgustingly dirty and oily, bodies reeking with accumulated sweat and other unwashed odors, obviously not having used soap in ages, with faces grimy, rough and weathered, along with frizzy, unkempt beards, sunken cheeks and dull eyes that only gleamed when they glanced at him or Tom – as if they were an unexpected booty the men had come upon.
Even the leader, heavy-set, gigantic man that he was, with legs as thick as tree trunks and neck corded with muscles, had a gaunt air about him, of desperation and hunger. He looked all the more brutish given his wide, flat nose, which seemed as if it had been broken several times throughout his life. A scar crossing a thick, bushy eyebrow, and thin lips that curled at the sight of Harry, revealing a mouth with black teeth, missing a couple, lent him even a more menacing appearance.
He was the bully – he had that nasty glint in his eyes, like Dennis Bishop and Mr. Jenkins and all the other people Harry had known, who were violent and mean by nature.
The other three, looking to be in their mid thirties, were his lackeys, because bullies always had gangs, miserable cowards that they truly were, as Harry knew well.
The fifth, though, was much younger. More a boy than a man, who couldn't be much older than eighteen or nineteen, pimple-faced, with scarce, fuzzy hairs on his jawline and no real beard, looking nothing more than a wimp. Eyes too small and close together, front teeth too large, making him look like a scaredy rabbit, impression accentuated by the way he seemed to be constantly glancing at his companions, with both wariness and giddy expectation.
Still with hands in the air, Harry halted before them.
It had been a mistake, to come out from his hiding place –he could have thought of some way of getting Tom back– but it was a moot point now. He would have to simply think of a way of getting the men's trust and aid.
"We're English," said Harry quietly, darting a nervous glance at the men, "we're lost, we need-"
"Stillhet!" roared the Leader, as the gigantic man advanced on him and suddenly wielded the axe in his hands.
Before Harry could even see it coming, he was struck on the chest with the butt of the axe's handle.
For a moment, as he fell on his hands and knees on the snow, he chocked, without being able to breathe, feeling as if his chest had caved in inwards, his lungs shrunken, and he gasped for air, frantically and painfully.
"Get up, you imbecile," he heard Tom's voice whispering sharply somewhere above him. "And do whatever they want."
Harry was wheezing, coughing and hacking, as he spluttered for breath, as his lungs suddenly expanded and filled, and he could finally catch a bout of air, though the pain in his chest was still sharp and throbbing. He felt as if something had cracked.
Someone suddenly grabbed him by the hair, and he found himself scrambling on the tiptoes of his feet as he was pulled up, crying out in pain, "Stop! We mean no harm-"
"Stillhet, sa jeg!" snarled the man that was violently lifting him up by the roots of his hair, and Harry winced in pain as he caught a glimpse of him; it was the Leader again, with a terribly angered expression on his broad face.
"Shut up," hissed out Tom's voice quietly. "Don't speak again, you idiot."
Flinching and with tears of pain in his eyes, Harry glanced at him, just as the Leader released his hair and shoved him towards his brother. He stumbled and nearly fell again, but Tom grabbed him by an arm just in time.
Wheezing, Harry staggered until he found his balance with Tom's aid, and then saw that they were standing amidst the men, who seemed to be loudly arguing and bickering amongst themselves, as they shot him and Tom calculating glances.
Nevertheless, he didn't say another word, tense and wary, and merely gave his brother a look of desperation as he rubbed his aching chest. If they couldn't speak, how were they supposed to explain things to the Norwegians?
Abruptly, the men fell silent, just as the Leader shoved him and Tom forward, with axe in one meaty hand and gun in the other, aiming at their backs, as he snarled, "Flytte!"
Foreign language or not, the command was clear, and utterly exhausted and grim, Harry and Tom staggered forward as they began to walk, with the men at their backs.
The young one, the Scaredy Rabbit, who acted like some kind of servant boy, was left behind, apparently to pick the chunks of wood they had been chopping, because he reached them some minutes afterwards, with a heavy-looking bag dangling from one shoulder, filled with pieces of wood.
The trek felt eternal, as Harry and Tom walked in silence, hearing the men talking amongst themselves at their backs, sounding joyous and excited.
The Leader menacingly prodded them from time to time with the gun, grunting something or other, particularly when Harry, utterly fatigued, stumbled on a patch of snow and nearly fell flat on his face.
Whatever the men were up to, they seemed to be in a hurry as they herded them forwards through the forest.
"They're deserters," whispered Tom from the corner of his mouth, staring ahead without looking at him.
Harry merely nodded a fraction, because he had already realized that. And apparently, the fact filled his brother with misgivings, because Tom's expression seemed grave and bleak.
It was after what felt like ages of dragging their feet, when they reached something in the middle of the forest, and Harry stared.
It was a small cabin, with a strip of farmland at one side, where nothing was growing, and a fenced pen at the other –for cattle, it seemed, though whatever livestock could have been there, was long gone. Apparently the deserters had been feeding on the last animal, because there was a mound of snow at one side, with some bone sticking out and dotted with splashes of blood of the cow or sheep they had butchered and then buried.
One of the lackeys opened the battered, wooden door of the lodge, and the Leader harshly shoved Harry and Tom through the threshold.
The cottage was small and dingy, musty smelling, though it looked as if it had once been a cozy and well-lived in place. It had only one room, with a small fireplace before two sofas, a small table with two chairs, a kitchenette in the back with stove, shelves and pans, and a bed at one side with a messy heap of blankets and thick covers.
The bed had to be the Leader's sleeping place, since there were four improvised cots spread on the floor, for the others.
Nevertheless, as Tom and Harry were pushed to one side of the cottage, apparently to remain there, standing in silence, it was the small details that Harry glimpsed which helped him understand what was going on.
The grimy window had pretty curtains, unwashed and dirty, but with patterns of flowers, the rug before the fireplace was worn but homey and thick, there was a vase on the small table with blossoms now withered and rotten, but which had once adorned the place, along with hunting traps, cages, and equipment stacked near the stove, and everything –sofas, chairs, and the cutlery he could see- came in two.
Evidently, the cottage had once been that of a couple's, and his suspicion was confirmed when he finally caught sight of a framed, black and white picture on the fireplace's mantlepiece: a tall, handsome man standing with one arm thrown over the shoulders of a young woman with a pretty round face, beaming with a beautiful smile on her face, wearing a rather shabby sundress.
Harry gave Tom an anxious look, because it was clear that the deserters had occupied the cottage and there was no sight of the couple that had once inhabited it. Had the man and woman abandoned their home due to the war, then? He dearly hoped so. The alternative wouldn't be good at all.
He was startled when his satchel was abruptly yanked from him.
The Leader was looming before him, gun aimed straight at him and Tom, as he barked something completely unintelligible.
Harry gave him a look of utter incomprehension, and Tom must have done the same because the gigantic man scowled fiercely before he took Tom by the lapels of his coat, shook him violently, and then harshly pulled the coat down from one of Tom's shoulders.
Swallowing thickly as the gun was aimed at him again, Harry got the gist of it and began to undress slowly, casting his brother a nervous look.
Tom complied in silence too, until they were wearing nothing more than their trousers, their shirts, and only one pair of socks, making them shiver with cold.
Apparently, though, that was enough for the Leader, since the man's lackeys were now hoarding all the other clothes Harry and Tom had been wearing, going through them and sorting them, picking whichever they liked the most, from all the jerseys, scarves, mittens, gloves, socks, the two Norwegian Army coats and the two pairs of overlarge shoes.
Nevertheless, Harry nearly yelled when the Scaredy Rabbit grabbed Ulysses.
The Scorcrup had been revealed when Harry had taken off his pullovers and Slytherin scarf, and had been dangling from his shirt, clawing to stay in place. But now, as the youngest of them had Ulysses in his hands, staring at him, chuckling and poking, the other men took an interest.
The Scaredy Rabbit might have been patting Ulysses with some measure of fondness for cute little animals, but the other men didn't look at all charmed or entertained by the Scorcrup's soft meows.
One of the lackeys took hold of Ulysses by the fur of the neck, briskly saying something to silence the Scaredy Rabbit when the boy apparently complained, and was soon harshly shoving Ulysses into one of the cages near the stove. A cage for rabbits, it seemed, and Harry watched, crestfallen, with foreboding twisting his entrails.
Tom abruptly grabbed him by the arm, saying nothing, but the grip was tense and painful, when Harry nearly opened his mouth and took a step forward to prevent Ulysses' capture. But his brother was right.
He shouldn't say anything. It didn't seem as if the men liked when he or Tom spoke, and he should be feeling relief that Ulysses had done nothing so far except meowing.
Indeed, apparently his Scorcrup thankfully remembered Harry's instructions. It wouldn't go well if Ulysses transformed before the muggles, not when they were armed and Harry and Tom weren't. The shock of seeing a 'kitten' with a scorpion's tail could be too much for trigger-happy muggles.
After Ulysses had been caged, the Leader loomed before them again, grunting something. They both froze, when the gigantic man instantly clarified his command by gesturing with his hands for them to turn out the pockets of their trousers.
Harry went completely pale, and glanced at his brother, just as Tom looked at him at the same time.
His brother looked extremely tense, and Harry wasn't feeling much better either, utterly anguished and fearful. He could see by Tom's expression that his brother was doing some hard and fast thinking, and he hoped his brother reached the same conclusion as him.
No matter what, they couldn't do magic. They had come too far to lose everything now.
He saw Tom hesitate for a brief second, but when the Leader made a move to forcibly inspect their pockets for himself, Tom was quick to show the only things they had left, and Harry followed his brother's lead, possibilities warring inside his head, not knowing if he should feel relieved or not by his brother's decision of going along and doing what was safest for the time being, even if Harry himself had also thought it was the wisest thing to do.
The Leader stared at their hands, as they presented their wands, and Harry didn't think he had ever felt so stressed and wary, on tenterhooks, awaiting the muggle's reaction.
"They are wood pieces," Harry then mumbled quietly, hopefully, as he stared up at the man, "twigs."
"Stillhet!" snarled the hefty man, as he violently grabbed the wands from their hands.
Harry's heart was thundering frenziedly in his chest as the Leader turned their wands this way and that, inspecting them, frowning, while he felt Tom stiffening and tensing further with each passing second, because their wands didn't look like mere common twigs, they were smooth and polished, and the muggle could-
Their wands were tossed. That was what the muggle did abruptly, with a sudden expression of complete dissatisfaction and disinterest. The man merely tossed their wands towards the fireplace, apparently with perfect aim, since they landed on the stack of wood blocks that the Scaredy Rabbit was forming at one side of the hearth, as he unloaded his bag.
Yet it didn't make Harry feel any less uneasy, because if the Scaredy Rabbit made one move to use their wands as fire-building material, he knew Tom would react. Bloody hell, Harry would too.
After that, thankfully, the Leader apparently lost all interest in Harry and Tom, leaving them standing at one corner, shivering and with teeth clattering, as the men went through all their things, like conquerors dividing the spoils.
It was very painful and nerve-wrecking to watch, though. Not when the men allotted the clothes between themselves, but when they spilled the contents of Harry's satchel on the table, because the Invisibility Cloak was there.
His heart pumped frantically in his chest, as he saw the mantle of silvery magic fluidly and slowly falling to the floor, and his heart lodged in his throat because most of it had fallen under the table, but there was a bit sticking out, unshielded by any furniture.
The muggles couldn't see it of course, but they were walking around the table as they sorted through the contents of Harry's satchel, and if one of them stepped on the Invisibility Cloak, perhaps they would feel there was something under their boots, perhaps they would crouch on the floor and search with their hands, and they would touch the Cloak and feel it and realize that it could not be seen, but that it was a piece of cloth that made their hands invisible when covered by it.
Indeed, Harry's pulse was beating off the roof, as he watched, petrified, as the Leader was quick to claim for himself the cigarette lighter and the clip-on compass, grunting and barking something when one of the lackeys apparently attempted to contest the man's acquisitions.
If he dreaded the possibility of the muggles seeing Ulysses transform or of trying to use their wands to feed a fire, he outright feared what their reaction would be to the discovery of something like the Invisibility Cloak.
Not often had he pondered how muggles would react to the Wizarding World and its gadgets, but it was then when he finally understood that it would be devastating, and extremely dangerous, for wizards. Especially for wizards captured by muggles.
"Hva er dette?"
Harry glanced up, seeing one of the lackeys towering before him, shaking the flask of Blood Replenishing Potion in front of his face, looking puzzled.
"Er... it's soup," said Harry quietly, hoping he had gotten the gist of the man's question.
The Norwegian stared at him, clearly not having understood a word, before he scowled and unstopped the flask. Harry wasn't too worried about it, even if no one with half a brain would believe that soup would be held in a glass phial, of all things.
Predictably, the muggle took a tentative sip from the flask, only to spit right out what he had swallowed.
Harry nearly shot him a nasty, vindictive smirk –the Blood Replenishing Potion tasted like rotten eggs, after all- but was quick to swipe off his expression when the muggle glowered at him and hurled the flask to one corner of the room.
None of the muggles seemed to take notice that no crashing sound followed and that the flask didn't break, the men had all gone back to chatter with satisfaction amongst themselves for the things they had stolen.
The Leader seemed to be the one most content, inspecting the clip-on compass with a greedy glint in his eyes. It was framed in gold, after all, and looked expensive, one of the things from the Broom Serving Kit that Alphard Black had given Harry for his thirteenth birthday. And thankfully, though rich-looking, the compass didn't have any weird symbols or depictions of stars, constellations, and phases of moons like other compasses of the Wizarding World.
The gigantic man's attention was then focused on the gun they had stolen from Tom. Apparently, the deserters had had no weapons, but only cases of ammunition, which the Leader was now using to reload the gun with bullets, looking very smug as he shot his companions harsh, nasty glances.
Nevertheless, Harry didn't quite know what to expect or do, and merely stood there beside Tom in one corner of the cottage, wrapping his arms around himself, trying to stave off the cold, as his gaze anxiously darted from the Invisibility Cloak on the floor, to their wands in the stack of wood, to Ulysses who was sitting in his cage, observing the muggles, looking alert. So many things could go wrong.
He felt as if he was standing on a thin sheet of ice, with no idea of when it would give way or if it would break at all.
The muggles were paying no attention to them, and Harry took the chance to cast a glance at Tom, as he whispered very quietly, "We should-"
"Do nothing," whispered Tom, shooting him a hard look. "We wait."
"For what?" said Harry from the corner of his mouth, frowning, feeling very jittery and nervous.
"Wait," hissed out Tom sharply, before he went back to stare at the muggles, with a plotting and calculating gleam in his eyes.
Or at least, Harry hoped his brother was thinking of some way of escaping or of winning the muggles to their side, so they could have their help.
They both tensed when the youngest of the men, the Scaredy Rabbit, began to make a fire. Their eyes followed the boy's every move, as he took pieces of wood, as he used the cigarette lighter and old pages of newspapers, as a fire kindled, and thankfully the boy hadn't yet touched their wands.
Soon, there was a pot hanging above the fire, as the boy tossed into it large pieces of meat from a metal container. It seemed as if the deserters had been reduced to using the fireplace, the stove having ran out of propane gas at some point, because the Scaredy Rabbit was quick to cook some kind of mutton broil in the pot, the smell wafting from it spreading throughout the cottage.
It smelled mouth-watering and delicious to Harry, feeling so hungry and starved that he had half a mind to plead to the muggles for a bit.
He didn't have much of a chance, however, because the Scaredy Rabbit was soon handing out bowls of the broil to the others, and the men instantly sat down for their lunch: the boy seating on the floor, two lackeys on the sofas, and the Leader and another lackey at the small table, on the only two chairs in the lodge.
The five muggle men, looking like half-starved, desperate, mindless beast, attacked their food ravenously, while Harry stared morosely, his stomach twisting and complaining painfully.
Suddenly, it all seemed to happen at the same time.
The heap of blankets and covers on the only proper bed in the room shifted, a muffled moan of agony seemed to come from it, a thin, bruised leg revealed itself as the heap moved slightly, and Tom stared, his gaze flying from the heap, to the pot in the fireplace, and to the men, as he muttered under his breath, "It was no sheep."
And with those words and the abrupt flash of realization they provoked, Harry lost all color from his face, his mouth hanging agape, horrified, as his own gaze went from the heap of blankets, a female half-face suddenly revealed from under it as another excruciated moan echoed in the room, to the framed picture on the mantelpiece of the happy man and woman, as he remembered the mound of snow he had seen outside the cottage, the bone, the blood, and the men's axes.
And the muggle men were devouring the chunks of cooked meat like a pack of voracious, savage wolves, and Ulysses was stuck in a cage –for rabbits– and Harry and Tom had been left there, divested from everything and barely clothed, at one corner of the room –like trapped livestock.
"It was no sheep," breathed out Harry, his green eyes impossibly wide, horror-struck, "it was the husband." He shot a frantic glance at his brother, feeling faint with terrified agitation, anxiousness, impotence, and fear. "We have to get out of here now!"
"Be quiet!" snarled Tom under his breath, tensing when one of the lackeys shot them a frown as he kept stuffing bits of broiled meat into his mouth.
Tom briefly glowered at Harry, as he whispered sharply, "We play dumb, we play along, we win us some time and wait, until I can think of something-"
"Danse!" abruptly roared the Leader, spitting out some of his food as he pounded a meaty fist on the table, laughing loudly. "Danse!"
"Ja, danse! Danse!" echoed the lackey seated by the Leader's side, as he halted in his feeding to grasp a small, battered radio from a shelf, turning the knob, noise and voices crackling until the muggle was satisfied and a melodious song sprung from the contraption.
"…heaven, I'm in heaven, and my heart beats so that I can hardly speak, and I seem to find the happiness I seek, when we're out together dancing, cheek to cheek…"
"Danse, danse!" was soon chorused by the other men who were clapping and pounding fists as they expectantly stared at Harry and Tom.
"What?" croaked Harry disbelievingly, staring back at them because at least that single Norwegian word was easily comprehended.
"We play along," reiterated Tom, his voice a mere low, harsh whisper, as he grabbed Harry's hand and pulled him to the middle of the room. "Let's entertain the muggle scum, little brother."
"… heaven, I'm in Heaven, and the cares that hang around me through the week, seem to vanish like a gambler's lucky streak, when we're out together dancing, cheek to cheek..."
Harry gaped at him, utterly incredulous.
"Fred Astaire, ja?" yelled one of the lackeys, chuckling as he clapped his hands, following the tune.
"Yes," said Tom smoothly as he turned to face the muggles, a warm, solicitous smile on his face. "Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Swing and Tap Dance. You like that, do you?"
"Swing, ja!" roared one of the lackeys, cackling and applauding. "Danse!"
"Then you're in luck, because we know how to dance the Swing very well," intoned Tom, beaming gorgeously at them, apparently to show the muggles how very well disposed he was, before he shot Harry a hard look. "Don't we, little brother? Alice taught us and you loved it, remember?"
"You've gone bonkers," croaked Harry faintly, as Tom briskly shoved him forwards.
"Dance, you fool!" hissed Tom, as he perfectly and fluidly executed the steps that Alice had so long ago taught them, an eternity ago, when she had been happy, when she had used the radio in the orphanage to listen to the latest hits, to teach the children how to have fun and dance, before she began to always tune the radio to news stations, to hear about the German threat like someone possessed, to cry wretchedly and in despair, before Hutchins had left to join the British Army, before sirens rang in London and people fled in the havoc and chaos, before the rise to power of the Nazis, before the German had began their program of conquering vital space for their Arian race, before Hitler had been helped along by Grindelwald to reach political power, before Grindelwald had publicly announced himself as the new Dark Lord of the age, before War had struck them all, and now they were dancing Swing, before the rabid eyes of five Norwegian muggle men, deserters of their army, who were finishing their plates of cooked human flesh as they watched Tom and Harry dancing, men who had gone mad in the war.
They had all gone mad.
"… Oh, I love to climb a mountain, and to reach the highest peak, but it doesn't thrill me half as much, as dancing cheek to cheek…"
"Cheek to cheek!" roared the lackey seated by the Leader's side, apparently the bully's right-hand man. "Som dette!"
As he danced mechanically, feeling as if he was floating in some frozen moment of utter horrid, grotesque and ludicrous lunacy, Harry didn't realize what the Norwegian had said or meant until the lackey rose to his feet and reached the bed.
The other men had also finished with their gruesome meal, and seemed to be watching their companion with avid anticipation.
Grabbing the heap of blankets, the lackey pulled them off, and Harry tripped and stumbled as he stared, aghast.
He didn't know what he had expected to be revealed: the woman in the picture, certainly, having already caught a glimpse of a thin leg and part of a face, having heard the moans of agony, but not her state. Half eaten alive, he had expected with mind-numbed horror, perhaps, but that she was not.
In fact, she seemed whole, though there was little that looked like the woman in the framed photo on the mantelpiece.
The real living woman was painfully thin, her face sunken, her cheek and shoulder bones protruding ghastly, making her look cadaveric, her hair a dirty mass of unwashed, frayed curls, her stick-like legs and arms filled with blue and yellow bruises and red gashes, a trail of dried blood running down her legs, revealed by the torn dress hanging loosely from her small frame, buttonless, displaying one of her breasts –not looking round and full like in the picture, but withered with scarce flesh, drooping, with bite and blunt fingernails marks.
And it was then, when Harry stared at her, speechless, when he realized that her, the former soldiers hadn't used to feed on. Oh no, as little as he knew about such matters, it was evident what the five men had been keeping her alive for.
He had heard about such things before, from Santi. Is that how poor Sherisse Slytherin had looked like when Morgon Gaunt had been done with her?
But this muggle woman, so completely brutalized, barely looking coherent or conscious, having gone through who-knew-what kind of unimaginable tortures, perhaps knowing what her husband had been used for by the men who had invaded her home, wasn't going to be given any rest.
The lackey had taken hold of her, harshly pulling the woman off the bed, taking her hands in his, as she let out a weak, frail moan, as the man tossed her around in some parody of joyful swing-dancing, her limbs flailing about limply with every move, like some sort of gruesome, lifeless doll, her head snapping from one side to the other, as the song continued cheerfully.
"Oh! I love to go out fishing, in a river or a creek, but I don't enjoy it half as much, as dancing cheek to cheek…"
"Cheek to cheek!" cried out the lackey again, as he demonstratively swept the half-dead woman around. "Som dette!"
The others sprung to their feet, laughing uproariously as if they were having the time of their lives, as the woman was tossed and passed from one to the other, as they forced her into the Swing dance moves.
It was the most perturbing and macabre spectacle Harry had ever seen, making his insides churn and twist sickly.
The only one who didn't participate was the youngest, the Scaredy Rabbit, who had remained seated on the floor before the fireplace, with empty bowl on his lap, with hunched shoulders and head hung low, as if the boy didn't want to observe, as if he was trying to escape from it all, too.
"Oh no, you don't," snapped Tom sharply, taking a hold of Harry's arm before Harry had even realized he had taken a step towards the men tossing the woman around. "You can't save her, you twit!"
Harry stared at him, just as one of the men yelled again with chuckles and laughter, singing along with Fred Astaire's melodious, upbeat tones.
"Listen to that," said Tom, smirking with what appeared to be dark amusement. "The filth do know their lyrics. Quite a demonstration they're giving us. Let's please them further, shall we?"
Before he could even gather back his wits, Harry's hands were grabbed, as Tom pressed their faces against each other's, precisely cheek-to-cheek.
"What the bloody hell do you think you're doing?" hissed out Harry sharply in his brother's ear, as Tom kept leading him around.
"Oh! I love to go out fishing, in a river or a creek, but I don't enjoy it half as much, as dancing cheek to cheek…"
"Giving them a jolly good show," drawled Tom calmly, as he spun Harry around, so unexpectedly that Harry nearly fell flat on his face.
"Stop it!" roared Harry as regained his balance just for his brother to swing him around again, to then press them close together. "Have you lost your marbles! You must know what they want us for - that was no mutton they ate! We have to-"
"…dance with me, I want my arm about you, the charm about you, will carry me through to Heaven…"
"Of course it wasn't," whispered Tom harshly into his ear. "And lower your voice, you idiot, or you'll draw their attention back to us." His voice turned vicious and nastily mocking, as he mimicked in a high-pitch, "Oh, let's ask the nice Norwegians soldiers for help, because they're on the 'good side'." Tom's faked expression of stupid joy vanished from his face, as he glowered, his eyes becoming furious, narrowed slits, as he spat in a virulent whisper, "You fool! I'm never going to pay heed to any of your 'brilliant' ideas again."
"…I'm in Heaven, and my heart beats so that I can hardly speak, and I seem to find the happiness I seek, when we're out together dancing cheek to cheek…"
"Cheek to cheek!"
"Yes, cheek to cheek!" Tom yelled back, his tone chirpy and cheerful, a gorgeous smile on his face as he abruptly swung Harry around once more. "My brother and I are dancing cheek to cheek, just like you are with the pretty lady!"
"Pretty? Ja! Pretty!" parroted one of the men, Harry didn't know who because he was busy trying to catch his brother's gaze, to stare at him, to impress upon him the dire gravity of their situation because Tom seemed to have taken leave of his senses.
"Stop fumbling around so stiffly," snarled Tom quietly, as he pressed the sides of their faces together. "Relax, and dance properly, or they'll know something's up."
Harry slightly pulled his face back to give him a desperate look, as he whispered frantically, "So something is up? Do you have a plan?"
"Of course I do, you imbecile," sneered Tom acidly, intently piercing him with his dark blue eyes. "Now, listen carefully. You have to-"
They seemed to have the worst of luck, because just then Fred Astaire's song ended, giving way to another one, someone foreign song Harry had never heard before, by the sound of it, some other romantic crap, slow paced and very sedate this time.
"En perfekt sang, dette!"
And suddenly the Leader was there, looming before them, violently tearing them apart. And everything seemed to spiral down and out of control so quickly, senselessly and horribly, that Harry for a moment didn't comprehend.
Two of the lackeys had stopped dancing, pushing the woman to the bed, hungrily and frenziedly roving their hands up her dress, all over her skeletal body, as she whimpered weakly, while the brawny Leader shot her a look of immense disgust, as if he had become utterly bored and disinterested in what was left of her, to then stare back at them, first at Harry, then Tom, and back, a dark gleam of appraisal in his eyes.
Abruptly, in the bat of an eyelash, the remaining lackey, the bully's right-hand man, nodded at the Leader as if he had been given a silent command, and took hold of Tom, pulling him away, shoving him to one corner of the room, as the brawny Leader began to advance on Harry.
Automatically, Harry stepped backwards as the gigantic man kept moving forward, as a nasty smile displaying rotten or missing teeth spread on the muggle's broad face, until Harry felt the back of his knees hitting something.
With wide, round eyes glancing around, Harry realized the bed was behind him, with the woman lying spread on it at one side, the two men looming on top of her, bickering in angered Norwegian, seemingly fighting each other for their first go at her, and she had stopped attempting to struggle feebly, now lying lifelessly and compliantly, staring up at the ceiling with dull, unseeing eyes.
As the Leader horribly grinned at him again, Harry's numbed, mind-boggled, shocked and stunned incomprehension finally gave way to realization, as the man began to unbuckle his belt. He had become the substitute of something too overused and battered to still interest the Leader.
And someone was yelling. Tom was yelling furiously at the top of his lungs, from his corner of the room, and it rang loudly in Harry's ears though he couldn't understand the words, which sounded meshed together in his mind, like noisy, senseless gibberish, but the enraged yells abruptly halted with the sound of flesh hitting flesh, because the remaining lackey seemed to want to satisfy his pent-up sadistic madness by beating Tom into silence and submission, into a pulp.
And the sound of punches and kicks continued, just as Tom cried out and roared once more, and this time, as if coming from a distant, foggy dream, Harry understood his brother's enraged shout.
"Don't you dare put a finger on him, you filthy muggle scum!"
Harry felt it too, his scar sizzling, throbbing, splitting apart in unbearable pain, the worst he had ever felt, heightened and meshed with his brother's crazed, murderous rage, so profound and hateful and seething as he had never experienced before, yet there was something horribly familiar.
This was a hundred-fold in intensity, but he had felt all those things long ago, when Dennis Bishop had been bullying him in orphanage's backward, and Tom had stood up and the boy had fallen to the ground, screaming in agony and writhing, because Tom had wanted to 'make him hurt', as his brother had put it when later explaining it to an astounded Harry.
However, this time, he was seeing it too, and for a split second Harry could only stare, as he saw something pulsing around his brother like a throbbing mantle of dotted specks and swirls and fog, of sheer magic wrapped around Tom's body, flowing out of him, expanding, making the skin of Harry's arm prickle, his small hairs standing up as if struck by static electricity.
Never had he seen his brother's core magic before, not even when they practiced dark curses from Grindelwald's Durmstrang textbooks. He hadn't even known that his Magic-Sight ability, as Alphard called it, could allow him to see the magic of others.
Yet, the overwhelming sense of sheer awe instantly transformed into panic, because Tom didn't seem to realize what was happening, because his brother was attempting to physically lash back at the muggle attacking him with fists and kicks, to pick himself off the floor, but the intense hatred and rage darkening Tom's eyes meant that his brother's magic would soon be obeying his wishes, unwittingly or not.
And there was such mindless, murderous insanity in Tom's eyes that it could only end in utter devastating catastrophe for them.
"Our Traces!" bellowed Harry frenziedly, as he began to leap forwards, attempting to dash around the towering Leader. "Tom, stop! OUR TRACES-"
"Stillhet!"
A meaty fist struck him so hard on the face that Harry was catapulted backwards, making him crash on the bed, as black dots momentarily obscured his sight, as his jaw throbbed and flared with such intense pain that for a moment he thought it had been crushed and broken to splinters, as blood flooded into his mouth.
The Leader was suddenly before him once more, fumbling with his belt, and Harry felt nothing but utter desperation, because in any second Tom could be doing something that couldn't be taken back, that would take everything away from them - Hogwarts, his friends, the Magical World, and perhaps even their freedom.
Abruptly, he saw a flash of steel, and without a thought, Harry went for it, leaping at the Leader, yanking out the gun tucked in the waistband of muggle's trousers, and he took aim.
The Leader stared at him in what seemed to a be a frozen second, looking stunned before he roared with laughter, as if he was seeing nothing but a scrawny little boy trying to play the big, bad, threatening man, and he had never seen something so amusingly ridiculous.
As the hefty muggle raised a hand as if to indolently bat the gun away from Harry's hands, Harry didn't hesitate.
The kick and backlash when he pulled the trigger, when it ran up his arms and propelled him backwards, was so unexpected that Harry nearly staggered and collapsed on the bed again.
And just then, everything seemed to burst and explode into chaos around him, everything happening so fast, screams and yells and people moving and racing and attacking, all occurring in mere seconds that Harry could only react instinctively, as he yelled frantically at the top of his lungs, "Ulysses, KILL!"
Yet he didn't pause, as he kept aiming and pulling the trigger frenziedly, at the Leader who had only been wounded on the shoulder because it seemed that having excellent aim in throwing Quaffles through Quidditch hoops wasn't the same as good aim in gun firing, but he was successful the second time as a bullet struck and went through the Leader's left eye, making the man stumble like a tottering Troll before he fell back on the floor, the thud loud and reverberating.
And Harry succeeded again as he kept mindlessly clicking and clicking, when the two lackeys who had been on top of the woman gaped at him before they launched themselves at Harry, as he heard another clicking sound, one he didn't make, because Ulysses had easily opened his cage with a paw and jumped and became a hissing and spitting black blur leaping through the air, a series of clanking sounds following the transformation of his fluffy tail into the carapace of a scorpion's, as the Scorcrup latched himself on the neck of one of the lackeys attacking Harry, as Ulysses' lethal stinger struck once, twice, thrice, and the muggle's face became latticed with protruding, black veins, froth erupting from the man's mouth, before he fell dead on the floor a second later, while Harry kept firing at the other lackey, blasting the man's head open.
While Tom had somehow, at some point, gotten hold of one of the axes, and was striking like a crazed madman at the lackey who had been using him like a punching bag, looking livid, seething and enraged beyond sense, snarling and bellowing who knew what, but his magic had disappeared.
And the Scaredy Rabbit, who had been seating on the floor all the while, with head hung low, covered by his arms, as if he didn't want to see or hear what his companions would be doing with the woman or what the Leader had wanted to use Harry for, was now looking up, apparently having finally realized that matters had changed drastically.
The boy's expression of shocked and stunned disbelief instantly turned into absolute terror, as his eyes flew from Harry and his gun, from the 'little kitten' now wielding a stinger, to Tom hacking into the remaining muggle's skull like a psycho with axe in hand.
But it was when the Scaredy Rabbit took hold of the fireplace's poker, jumping to his feet, rushing at Tom with a crazed look of fear and frantic distress, that Harry's eyes went wide with horror, because his brother had his back turned towards the boy and hadn't seen the danger, and he wildly took aim and pulled the trigger, again and again, just as Ulysses jumped at the boy's leg and struck with his scorpion's stinger.
The boy went down almost instantly, but Harry didn't seem able to stop clicking and clicking, until he suddenly realized nothing was being fired, that he had expended all of the gun's bullets, and he abruptly halted, staring at the gun and his hands stained with blood, his shirt splattered with it, as he felt his arms and legs shaking, as he felt utterly numbed when he glanced around at the carnage, because everything had suddenly stopped, there was only silence.
Except for the radio, which was now sounding with an upbeat, cheerful song that made it all the more surreal, and the chop, chop noises coming from Tom, who still seemed to be in a world of his own.
Blinking, as his breathing became haggard, hitched pants for air, Harry shakily stuck the gun in his trousers, as he reached his brother.
"Stop. He's already dead, Tom," he rasped out, his throat suddenly feeling very dry as he stared at the corpse's head his brother kept hacking into, nothing left but a mass of brain matter, pulp, and fluids.
Harry frowned when the axe kept falling, again and again, and glanced up at Tom, swallowing thickly as he caught sight of his brother's face.
He had often heard that his brother was astoundingly handsome, and he often saw it for himself too, but not then.
Right then, for the first time, Tom looked monstrously hideous, his eyes dark with a crazed gleam of vicious enjoyment, his lips curled and twisted, his features contorted with savage, mindless hatred and rage.
For the first time, as he stared at him, Harry felt true fear, utterly scared of his twin.
"Enough!" roared Harry anxiously, as he laid a hand on one of Tom's shoulders, and shook him hard. "BROTHER!"
The axe halted, as Tom abruptly turned his head around to stare at him. For an instance, Harry nearly took a step backwards, but the demented look in his brother's eyes faded in the next second, as Tom blinked and stared at him again.
"It's over," whispered Harry quietly.
Tom frowned, slowly lowering the axe as he glanced around.
His eyebrows slowly rose upwards, before he turned to Harry again, his lips hitching into a wide smirk, as he intoned coolly, "So it is."
Harry swallowed thickly as he took another glimpse of the carnage, the five bodies, the gore and blood, and back to his hands that didn't seem able to stop shaking.
And he frowned down at them, fisting and unclenching them, trying to make them stop, as his mind swirled and he muttered under his breath, "My own Odyssey."
"What?"
Harry snapped his head up to glance at Tom, who was frowning at him, and mumbled softly, "I've killed. We've killed, Tom. We're murderers-"
"Killers, yes," snapped Tom sharply, scowling at him. "Murderers, no." He shot him a hard look, as he sneered acidly, "It's not murder to kill to protect and defend yourself, to prevent any kind of harm to come to you." His eyes narrowed to slits, as he added angrily, "Do not tell me you're feeling guilt and regret, again!"
At that, Harry frowned at him, before his eyes darted towards the Scaredy Rabbit's body. A boy that couldn't have been more than eighteen or nineteen, who had seemed to have been living through his own hellish nightmare for some time, given the company he had been keeping, perhaps out of necessity, a boy who hadn't participated in any wrongdoing.
Granted, a coward too, who hadn't tried to put a stop to any of it, but Harry could understand that: trying to save one's own skin instead of helping others. In Hogwarts, he lived amongst Slytherins, after all, and most were just like that. Yet, the boy had gone for Tom, and that cinched it.
Harry glanced up at his brother, as he replied honestly, "No. None."
Tom stared back at him, his eyes narrowed and piercing, as if wanting to see into Harry's very soul to detect any lies. A moment later, he relaxed, looking thoroughly satisfied with a positive assessment.
"It seems you're finally learning, then, little brother," drawled Tom, looking supremely smug and pleased with himself.
"Right," griped Harry acerbically. "Learning how to be a killer with no conscience, you mean?" He shook his head, sighing somberly, not giving his brother a chance to say another word, as he added curtly, "Let's get our things, and leave."
Unsurprisingly, Tom went straight to look for their wands, while Harry gathered back the Invisibility Cloak, stuffing it in his satchel. He recovered the Blood Replenishing Potion and finally crouched before the corpse of the Leader.
He didn't even feel fazed as he stared at the large, dead body, didn't even have to steel himself to search the man's pockets to retrieve the cigarette lighter and the clip-on compass, along with the box of ammunition the muggle had used before for the gun.
It seemed to him that, lately, he had only been seeing corpses everywhere, in Leisure Alley, in the ruins of Namsos, and almost Robert Hutchins' too, looking dead, floating in accumulated feces and urine.
That three of the dead bodies in the room were of his own doing, didn't seem to make any impact on him either. He just felt extremely weary, exhausted, so fatigued and fed up, that he went through the paces mechanically, wanting to be done with it all, as he reloaded the gun and kept the box with the remaining bullets.
He felt a faint frisson of joy, though, when he discovered that the Leader had been keeping a pocket watch. Right useful that, given their need to tell time in order to reach the Norwegian Ministry of Magic before Tuesday noon.
Harry inspected it for moment, having the inkling that it had probably been stolen from the woman's husband before the deserters had killed the poor sod.
Then he blinked. The woman. He had completely forgotten about her.
"Tom, help me-" He trailed off as he rose to his feet, staring at his brother who was looming before the fireplace, apparently peering down into the pot dangling above the merrily crackling fire. "What on earth are you doing?"
"There's nothing left," groused Tom irritably as he glanced at him. "The scums ate it all."
It took a moment for Harry's mind to wrap around what his brother was saying to him, and he gaped disbelievingly. "So what? Surely you weren't thinking about eating the bits left of the woman's husband!"
Tom scowled at him. "Moot point, isn't it? Because, as I told you, there's nothing left." An eyebrow arched, and a smirk suddenly appeared, as he pointedly gestured around. "Not of him, that is. But there's plenty to be had of the others, now."
"What?" croaked out Harry faintly.
Tom reached him in seconds, looking magnanimous as he thrust a hand forwards, offering his blood-dripping axe to Harry as if bestowing the noblest, most selfless of favors. "You can use it, if you want."
"What?"
Tom frowned at him. "You're the one who's been studying about Healing. Hence, you should know about human anatomy. At least, which parts are the most fleshy and tender."
"What?"
Tom glared at him irritably, as he sneered contemptuously, "Fine. If an axe is too heavy for your puny, pathetically scrawny arms, I'll get you something else. Must I always do everything?"
Shooting him one last glower, Tom stalked off to the kitchenette, opening drawers and perusing their contents, until he came back to a Harry that still stood rooted in place.
"Here," said Tom shortly, slapping a large knife into Harry's hands. "A chopping knife. That should do the trick."
"What?" Harry finally shook his head, staring at his brother with horrified disbelief, as he cried out, "We're not eating human flesh!"
"Why not?" Tom frowned at him, looking puzzled.
"Why... not?" echoed Harry slowly, blinking at him, feeling utterly stupefied by his brother's nonchalance.
Now looking extremely annoyed, Tom bit out impatiently, "Flesh is flesh. Human or animal, it's all the same. I don't see what's the matter with it." He gestured impatiently at the bodies littering the cottage. "In desperate times, desperate measures. The filth, at least, understood that."
"They were howling, raving mad!" spluttered Harry, gesturing wildly with his hands. "Loons, and desperate, as you said. Starved and desperate, Tom! That's why-"
"And so are we!" snarled Tom furiously, glaring at him. "If we don't eat something, we'll die, you imbecile! We haven't eaten in ages. We're weak. We're exhausted. There's nothing in this damned, forsaken land but snow and trees. We need food. Any food!"
"We don't have time," mumbled Harry, shooting him a pleading look. "The gunshots could have been heard-"
"We're in a cottage," interjected Tom sharply, clearing not wanting to allow any feeble excuses, "in the middle of a forest, that is in the middle of nowhere. We saw no houses nearby. There's no one around in miles. Nothing was heard."
"Fine!" spat Harry, bristling and angered, as his fingers jerkily tightened around the knife. "Fine!" He gestured briskly at the pile of clothes that had been stolen from them, lying in the separate piles the Norwegians had made for themselves. "Then get those while I work! And a frying pan from the kitchen, and some plates and cutlery - we'll need those. Some of the hunting traps too, just in case. And twigs and some chunks of wood from the fireplace!"
Tom left him to follow the instructions without complaint, apparently well satisfied that Harry had finally decided to comply with his deranged wishes.
Yet, for this, Harry did have to steel himself, as he crouched before the hefty body of the Leader, as he used the knife to tear the trousers open, to sink the blade into the man's large calves, as he began slicing, carving, and butchering with clenched jaw and gritted teeth.
He employed the metal container the Scaredy Rabbit had once used, to store the bits and pieces of flesh, as he kept chopping and gathering.
When he was done, he felt utterly sick, having to swallow down bile, to finally reach his brother, to stuff everything into his satchel, before they finally changed into the clothes that had been stolen from them.
"Let's go."
"Not yet," retorted Harry briskly, as he held the Blood Replenishing Potion in his hands as he made his way towards the bed and the woman. "Help me with this-"
"With what?" hissed out Tom, instantly appearing by his side, towering and glaring. "You're not using our last potion on a filthy muggle woman who's already half dead!"
"I'm the one who thought of bringing potions," snapped Harry waspishly, "and the one who stole them, so I'm the one who decides what will be done with the last of them, not you! And I'm not leaving her like this."
He gestured at the piteous, skeletal woman lying on the bed, clearly having fallen into unconsciousness at some point. Hopefully she hadn't seen the carnage that had ensued, because she must already be traumatized and scarred beyond what was bearable.
"We haven't bled," he added sharply, as he peeled his gaze away from the woman, "so we have no use for the potion. But she does."
"We haven't bled, thus far," spat Tom poisonously, looking livid. "But you're always getting us in trouble, thereby we might need-"
Harry turned a deaf ear to his brother's gripes. He was determined. He couldn't possibly leave the poor girl like that, knowing she would certainly die without the aid of the potion.
Tom didn't lift a finger to help him, and kept hissing out a constant virulent harangue, but Harry did his task, unflappable.
Working her thin, frail throat with his fingers, massaging the muscles, he managed to make her reflexively swallow the whole potion he dipped into her open mouth, seeing some color suffusing her gaunt cheeks.
"You're a fool!" bit out Tom contemptuously when Harry was done and tossed the empty flask into the fireplace.
"Yeah, yeah," said Harry loftily, as he turned around to swing the strap of his bulging satchel over a shoulder. "Spare me. I've heard it all before." He searchingly glanced around, before he caught sight of his familiar and grinned, opening his arms. "Ulysses, to me."
The Scorcrup instantly jumped into them, meowing contently as Harry hugged him, beaming a smile as he said softly, "You did very well. You saved us. Thank you."
Little Ulysses purred loudly, licking Harry's cheek with his tiny, rough tongue, as he nuzzled his small round face with Harry's, tickling him and making him chuckle happily.
"How very disgustingly sappy of you," sneered Tom acidly, looking revolted at the lovey-dovey scene they were making.
"You're just jealous because he's mine," said Harry, shooting him a wide, smug smirk, "and you've finally realized just how useful and clever he is."
Tom scoffed nastily at that, yet they were quick to throw the Invisibility Cloak over themselves as they left the hellish cottage at long last.
Harry only paused on the threshold for a second, glancing back, wishing he had the time and strength to drag the bodies out of the cottage, to bury them, so that the woman, when and if she woke up, wouldn't see any of it.
Alas, he did not. He felt completely drained and worn out, and the journey before them would be daunting and taxing enough.
They had no sense of where they were, at all. Not knowing where the cottage had been, not knowing what forest they were trudging through, not even knowing if they were closer or further away from Oslo since leaving Namsos.
Their encounter with the Norwegians had left them completely disoriented and clueless regarding their whereabouts.
By glancing at the pocket watch, Harry only knew that they had been walking for over four hours, that it was Monday afternoon, and that it was impossible to reach Oslo with so very few hours left.
He had never felt so utterly distraught, wretched, hopeless, and dejected, as he kept sluggishly dragging his feet, one after the other, because he could think of no other thing to do.
And they weren't doing well.
Harry had been the first to stumble and nearly collapse from exhaustion, and Tom, in an uncanny display of brotherly solidarity, had helped him, supporting his weight as they kept walking - only scowling, glaring, and saying something scathing, because Tom was Tom, after all.
Then it had happened to Tom, and Harry had repaid the kindness, without the insults. And thus, they had begun to take turns at being the other's walking stick.
However, at present, Harry felt as though he would faint if he tried to take one more step.
"Rest," he coughed out, wheezing. "I need – to stop – for a bit."
"Then, we'll eat," said Tom commandingly, piercing him with narrowed eyes.
"Yes, alright," whispered Harry haggardly, as he dropped on the ground like limp, dead weight.
Working together, and with the twigs and pieces of wood they had taken from the cottage, and the cigarette lighter they had recovered, it was fairly easy to make a small fire, to throw the chunks of raw flesh on the frying pan, and let it cook slowly.
The wafting smell was intoxicating, so mouth-watering that when he took his plate with his portion of meat, Harry felt such rabid hunger that he didn't think about it and stuffed his gullet with bit of meat after bit, swallowing ravenously, until it was all gone and he was frantically licking his fingers.
"That was so good," he finally breathed out, before he realized just what he had said and cringed, aghast.
Tom looked unbearably smug, as he intoned smoothly, "I told you, didn't I? Meat is meat, no matter where it comes from."
"Right," retorted Harry, sullenly staring at the crackling fire. "So besides being killers, now we're cannibals to boot."
"Cannibals are those who eat their own kind," drawled Tom superiorly, "and filthy muggles aren't our kind, are they?" He widely smirked at him. "Thus, if you have no intention of taking a bite off me, we'll have no problems."
Harry sighed, finding no amusement in it. His brother had always had a very twisted sense of humor. Yet he couldn't find the will to argue and bicker with his brother about the issue. It would be pointless, anyway, and hypocritical too, because he hadn't been able to resist the hunger, the need, and Tom would be quick to nastily point that out.
They went silent, as they pressed close together to keep warm, with the Invisibility Cloak draped over their shoulders, Ulysses on Harry's lap, savoring his own plate of cooked human flesh, and for a moment Harry envied his Scorcrup's nature and way of being, utterly unburdened from any moral considerations.
To be only driven by instincts and basic needs and desires, what a gloriously carefree, easy existence that would be.
Harry scowled at himself for those thoughts, and then frowned, and finally sighed before he broke the comfortable, companionable silence between them, as he kept staring at the dancing flames of the fire.
"You killed her, didn't you?" he said quietly, not looking at his brother.
"What?"
From the corner of his eyes, he saw Tom frowning at him, disconcerted.
"Mrs. Sharpe," clarified Harry tersely. "All those years ago."
Tom tensed instantly, before he scoffed and drawled snidely, "What are you babbling on about?"
Harry glanced at him at that, as he said calmly, "I always suspected that you lied to me. That it wasn't that she tripped and fell down the stairs before you could reach her– or that you watched without helping, as you said later." He sighed heavily, rubbing his forehead as he added, "I think you pushed her, that you killed her, on purpose. And I think I've always known, but didn't want to face it. Well, not back then, at least."
He searchingly stared at his brother. "And I think that's why you lied to me, because you weren't sure how I would react to the truth. Because you feared that I wouldn't understand or forgive-"
"Fear?" spat Tom, his expression seething, his jaw clenching so hard that muscles strained. "I fear nothing, and much less any reaction or opinion of yours regarding anything I do."
Harry chuckled wryly under his breath. "Yes you do. You always do." He shook his head, as he sobered, adding gravely, "But you see, I understand now, because I've done the same. I killed three people in that cottage, so I can't judge, can I? And you were just a little boy back then, probably didn't even realize what-"
"I knew exactly what I was doing when I shoved her – hard," snarled Tom sharply, narrowing his eyes at him. "I knew she would break several bones, if not her neck, as came to happen. If you say you understand, then don't delude yourself about my motives and reasoning."
Harry stared at him mutely, as Tom continued in a harsh voice, "I killed her for the same reasons you killed those muggles in the cottage, to protect us, because with her as the Matron of the orphanage, allowing Mr. Jenkins to do as he pleased, violence would have only escalated with the years, unchecked." His dark blue eyes narrowed to mere slits, as he bit out furiously, "And no one was doing a thing to protect us from that. It was I who did what was necessary, who saved us from what would have happened."
Harry nodded at him, as he muttered, "Yes. I know that now. I do understand."
"But you wouldn't have, back then."
It was posed as a harsh statement, though there was a hint of a questioning in it, of a need to know, and Harry glanced at his brother, tilting his head to a side, considering it. "Maybe not." He sighed heavily, carding a hand through his hair. "You did right by lying to me. By allowing me to believe whatever I wanted to."
"Whatever you were comfortable with, you mean," quipped Tom acerbically, a hint of accusation in his tone.
Glowering with annoyance, not feeling at all proud of the fact, Harry snapped, "Fine. Yes."
Tom smirked indolently. "Just as I thought."
Narrowing his green eyes, Harry said warningly, "It doesn't mean, though, that you can lie to me now that we're older - now, when I can understand."
Tom merely arched a cool eyebrow at that, saying nothing, as he shifted awkwardly.
Harry noticed the brief twinge and wince, and frowned. "You're injured?" His eyes went wide. "From the beating you took from that lackey-"
"I wasn't beaten," snarled Tom, venomously glowering at him.
"Lemme see," snapped Harry sternly, making a move to lift up his brother's layers of jerseys.
"Get off, you dimwit," bit out Tom churlishly, harshly slapping Harry's reaching hands away from him. "I have some bruised ribs, that's all." He shot him a scornful look, as he sneered acidly, "And you have a rather hideous bruise on your face, yourself. Shouldn't have given that potion to the muggle woman, should you?"
"The Blood Replenishing Potion wouldn't have healed us," said Harry absentmindedly as he gently prodded his jaw. He pulled his hand away the next second, wincing since the touch had made his jaw throb painfully.
"Is it broken?" demanded Tom sharply, narrowing his eyes.
"No," said Harry, sighing deeply before he shot his brother a curt glance. "Let's get going."
"We need more rest," gritted out Tom, a hard expression on his face.
"We need to get moving," insisted Harry tiredly. "We'll never reach Oslo if-"
"Reach Oslo – still?" echoed Tom, letting out a harsh bout of laughter, as he sneered contemptuously at him. "Ever the optimistic, pathetically hopeful idiot-"
"Optimistic?" interjected Harry, his lips twisting wryly. "Why do you think I made you get those hunting traps? It takes hours, if not days, of waiting for prey to get captured in those kinds of things." He shot him a sour look. "Those traps are in case we don't get to the Norwegian Ministry of Magic in time before it's controlled by Grindelwald and his minions. They're in case we're stuck in Norway for days, weeks, or months, before we find some other way to get back to Hogwarts, brother."
Tom stared at him, before he nodded grimly.
"Regardless," added Harry sternly, "we have to keep on trying to find the Ministry in time, and we cannot waste another second."
They soon set out again, after they extinguished the fire with snow, as Harry kept the pocket watch in one hand and the clip-on compass in the other, continually glancing at them, checking how the minutes ticked by and how the needle spun and marked the south-bound direction they had to follow.
It was when the sun had already set and begun to vanish, a mere orange sliver on the horizon, when they suddenly found themselves leaving the forest behind, stepping into a road. A very wide one. A paved one.
Harry stared at the asphalt under his shoes, and then stared up at his brother, as he stuttered with breathless hope, "It's a – a – it looks like a – a main road! It looks like one, right? Right?"
Tom frowned, inspecting it. "Maybe… it does." He shot Harry an impossibly wide smirk. "It does."
"So it could lead to Oslo, yes?" said Harry, swept by such profound and intense relief and joy that he felt he was about to burst.
"It could," intoned Tom placidly, a gleam of contentment sparking his dark blue eyes. "If it really is one of Norway's central roads."
"It must be!" said Harry excitedly. "Come on, let's take it!"
It was then when he suddenly heard it, a distant rumbling sound, and he snapped his head around, staring at a black dot – traveling on the road, towards them, getting larger and larger with each passing second.
"Is that…" he began to mumble before he trailed off, squinting hard, before his eyes went wide. "It's a truck!"
"Yes," muttered Tom, frowning as he also stared at it intently, until it became more discernible, until Harry himself caught sight of the insignia displayed on the vehicle.
"It has the Nazis' swastika!" breathed out Harry.
Tom glowered at him, as he spat furiously, "If you tell me now that you want us to hide from these Germans, after you so stupidly trusted that Norwegians would help us-"
"Help?" scoffed out Harry. "Oh no, we're not asking for help again – not to any soldiers of any side."
Tom narrowed his eyes at him, but Harry didn't give him a chance to beep a word, as he shot him a grim grin and declared firmly, "I know exactly what to do, this time around. So go lie on the middle of the road!"
"I beg your pardon?" Tom hissed out slowly.
Harry urgently waved his hands around. "I've got a plan! You lie there, writhing and screaming, in agony and stuff. Oh, and clutch some part of your body too, you know – like your ribs or a knee!"
"What?" sneered Tom acidly. "Explain yourself."
"We've got no time for explanations!" said Harry frenziedly. "They're coming. Just trust me – I won't make mistakes this time, I promise!"
"If this is another reckless, harebrained plan of yours," raged Tom thunderously, "that will end badly again-"
"You'll smite me to dust with your wand when we're back in Hogwarts," said Harry quickly. "Yeah, I know."
"If we ever get back to Hogwarts," spat Tom, seething, though he briskly spun around all the same, making his way to the middle of the road.
Harry watched, on tenterhooks, with his heart pumping fast, as his brother splayed himself on the pavement, looking irritated beyond measure.
"Now scream, for Merlin's sake!" urged Harry hurriedly. "Writhe and moan and do stuff - be convincing!"
Tom shot him a dark, withering look, before he began his play-acting.
With his brother's perfectly executed screams of agony scintillating his ears, Harry dashed forward, standing several feet in front of Tom, as the truck came closer and closer, and he began his own role in the plot.