DISCLAIMER. None of the characters used are a creation of mine. They belong solely to JK Rowling.
'How do we save him?' Rab wrung his hands through his hair in frustration, looking at Hermione helplessly.
It had taken an immense amount of control for her to keep herself from running through the winding passageways of the Lestrange Manor in search of her brother after Voldemort had ordered Peter to be thrown away into the dungeons until after the sun set and all Death Eaters congregated to witness his subtle transformation into a conniving little bastard to spy on the Order. She had tried every room, frantic and terrified of the events that were sure to follow but had found no trace of Rab.
She had lost sight of him amidst the hubub of Voldemort's departure and was painfully on the alert of his presence.
She had been to all the obvious spots when she had been suddenly reminded of the one place nobody would ever consider to look for if ever he was to disappear.
Hermione had chided herself silently, struck by the numbness of her mind that had prevented her from seeking the obvious answers. She had calmed herself down into an even slower pace as she stepped outside the Manor and covertly into the forest.
Deep into the cover of the trees she had broken into a jog, her feet treading onto a familiar path that had been obscured by the last few years of decaying misery. Her breath had come out in gasps as her eyes had sought out the snow laden treehouse James had so delicately built back when they had been kids.
Hermione had sighed as memories of all the good times she had had inside those four walls, surrounded by the Marauders and their playful banters, reared their way to her mind. She had climbed up the tree carefully, her fingers reaching for the crevices in the ancient wood. Opening the hatchet to the treehouse, she had exahled loudly, seeing Rab pacing back and forth, his hands curled around a bottle of Firewhisky, the smell of the burning firewood in the air.
'I have considered bringing Harry to the Manor but there is not enough time for me to tamper with the wards,' Rab said. 'Even if I could do that there is no way he could go unnoticed. I cannot think of any other way to get Peter out of the Manor safely without compromisig ourselves. I am at a loss of what to do, Mi. Nothing seems to be makig sense.'
Hermione closed her eyes, seeking comfort in a plush armchair.
Rab whispered quietly into the heavy silence. 'How, then, do we save him?'
'We.. we have to do something,' Hermione wrung her hands nervously. 'Peter must be saved no matter what. We must.. hurry. We barely have an hour.'
Rab shook his head sadly. 'Mi.. What do you expect us to do? Go in wands blazing and free him just like that? It would implicate both of us and strip us of our hard earned trust among the Dark Lord's ranks.'
Hermione tugged uselessly at her braid. 'You don't understand. We're talking about the life of an innocent man. I know I was the one who kept harping about how the life of one doesn't count when it comes to saving the world but this is nothing like that. Peter needs to escape and if we somehow cannot help him then I would gladly kill him.' Her eyes flashed as her voice lost all emotion. 'Death would be a mercy. A part of him will always survive somewhere inside. He will wither away at seeing all the unforgivable things he will be made to do. His torture won't end tonight, Rab. It will never end for him.'
Rab sipped his drink. He placed a tender hand on her cheek, his voice weary and tired. 'We would be taking a great risk. I want to save him. Believe me, I do. I saw the boy grow up. I have a soft spot for all your friends, Mi, but what you are talking about is treason. If we do this there will be no going back. We will be unable to return and we still have one more horcrux to find in Malfoy Manor. How do you expect us to get around to acquiring it we leave our place here?'
'That,' she stressed, 'is why it is time for you to blow your cover.'
His brows scrunched up. 'What? What do you mean it's time for me to blow my cover?'
'You must be the one to help him out of here,' Hermione said resolutely, dreading the argument that was bound to follow.
'And leave you in this snakepit?' he asked incredulously, scandalised at the betrayal she spoke of. 'I will never in my life leave you here alone. How could you even think of something so innately absurd?'
Hermione gripped her head in frustration. 'Oh, dear Merlin,' she muttered under her breath. 'Rab! Peter set in motion the chain of events that had the Potters killed. He started everything. He is the reason Harry had no parents. If we let him get brainwashed into a traitorous rat we will most certainly have lost the war.'
Rab's lips set in a thin line, his jaw ticking. He sighed heavily as he looked at her pleadingly. 'Do not make me do this. If something happened to you.. I will never forgive myself. I cannot lose you.. not after everything that we have been through.'
'You won't lose me.' Hermione said, taking his hands in hers. 'I promise this to you. I will be safe. I know that Voldemort will begin to suspect me if you suddenly disappear with a vital prisoner. I doubt I will have long to get my hands on the horcrux but this is a risk that I must take.'
'How will I even get him out? The Dark Lord has called upon almost every one of his followers. We will be surrounded on all sides. There is no way we can possibly escape.'
'Come now, Rab,' she chuckled. 'Don't tell me you've forgotten the old hidden passageways of the Manor.'
'You will never find your way through them,' Rab said. 'They are impossible to make sense of.'
'Good thing that I was an honourary Marauder then not to mention all the sneaking I did in my own time,' she said before motioning him to follow her.
Rab cursed as he fell in step behind her, the silence too much for the pair as each considered how it could very well be the last time they would be seeing each other for a long time.
'What if I came back?' Rab murmured. 'I could leave him at Harry's and return immediately.'
'We can't be sure how long it will take you to actually find Harry if he's not home or if you could make it back in time before your absence was noticed,' Hermione retorted. 'If you're late even by a minute Voldemort will suspect you and put you through immense pain and that is not something we can gamble with.'
Rab remained silent for he longest time as the two drudged through the snow. Hermione could feel him following close.
'He will come after you,' he said softly, his fingers gripping the hem of her sleeve, never once halting
It was true that her mind was slowly drawing up strict walls around itself inf ear of the retribution Voldemort was sure to serve her for Rab's treachery. There was no way he hadn't already witnessed the love that the two shared.
Hermione shurgged her shoulders nonchalantly. 'I wish I could tell you otherwise but if there is one thing that I have learned in all my years is that our lives are full of impossible choices. We can never truly be happy. Not amidst all this violence and evil. We all pay a price for the freedom we're fighting for, Rab.'
Rab grabbed hold of her hand, bringing her to a stop as the treeline began thinning. 'You can take him away. Let me find the horcrux.'
She shook her head at him, her face a look of pure agony. 'It is a non descript diary, Rab. You wouldn't know it was there even if it was staring right back at you. I have lived through a lot worse. I will make it.'
Rab let go of her reluctantly, his hands shaking at the effort.
Ignoring the tiny sob threatening to break free inside her, Hermione spoke clearly. 'Okay, here is what we're going to do. We will use the elves' entrance. We can't enter through the main entryway. We will go behind the West Wing and make our way to the dungeons through the kitchens. After that I will conjure up a trail for you that will take you through a mile long tunnel underground which eventually catches up to the old storehouse which is north of the Manor. From there you have to walk a couple hundred yards but the tree cover shall be enough to keep you out of sight if alarm has already been raised. You will then find the end of the family wards.'
Rab nodded tightly. 'Understood,' he murmured.
Hermione bit her lip, entwining her fingers with hers. She brought their joined hands to her lips, dropping a sloppy kiss against his knuckles. 'I am so sorry. Have faith in me, Rab. I will break free.' She chuckled dryly. 'For all that it's worth perhaps it will be a great enough incentive for me to hurry up and look for the horcrux? How about that, yes? We would be done with the war for once and all,' she offered.
'Hermione,' he croaked out. 'Please don't do this. We have been in this together since the start. To leave you alone would rip me to pieces.. I, I can't. You're my sister. My only duty is to protect you and you are asking me let you go.'
'I will come back.' Hermione pointed at the vaguely visible sun, dipping down below the clouds. 'But we are out of time now, Rab. Come on, we have to go now.'
Rab withdrew his hand from hers, the small action almost painful, and led the way towards the West Wing. The lead in his feet reminded him of the gnawing worry in the pit of his belly.
He walked as the oppressive walls almost seemed to be caving in on him, the deserted corridors devoid of human touch since long years past. As he wound through the twisting pathways, his fingers tracing the cold stone walls, Rab couldn't help but feel that this was the tipping point of his life. More than the fear he felt for his sister's life, he felt an insurgent rage. She was far too young to have been dealt such a hand and the night would only bring her more horror all because of him.
He cursed the fates as he turned round the final corner, hearing Hermione crouch low and breathe into the misty silence. Their eyes remained trained onto the pair of guards patrolling outside the dungeons, pacing in front of a tiny doorway leading into the darkness, the round chamber lit up only by a sole burning candle off into the corner. The taller man had grey hair and a ramrod straight back, the rusted key to the lockup hanging round his neck. The shorter man was burlier and build with a thickset of muscle, his mouth firmly held shut.
Hermione's wand let out flares of vibrant red light making the men grunt, startled and suddenly apprehensive, and fall on their knees. The shorter man attempted to fight back only to be shot down yet again, his hand going round his throat, his breath giving out as an invisible force knocked out the air from inside him.
Rab kicked at the old man's face, sending him hurtling into the wall, his fingers snapping into half as his wrist was crushed under the weight of his own body. He cried out in pain, a current running through his entire body as Hermione struck him down.
Rab looked at her with a strange emotion burning in his eyes. She looked away, ashamed. It was funny how easy it became to kill once you'd been doing it for as long as you could remember.
She saw Rab bend at his waist to get to the key round the man's neck. They were lucky the Order or the Resistance hadn't before tried to carry out a rescue operation or they would have found the safety mechanism of prisoners a very difficult taskforce to compete with indeed.
Hermione nodded at Rab for him to go on, her own feet carrying her across the small chamber and back towards the kitchens. She felt along the walls, constantly rapping against them after she had crossed around a hundred feet. She kept her ear trained against the stone, keeping a look out for the hollowest echo of a false wall.
After several trials she finally found the crack in the slippery mass of stone and moss. She carefully pulled out the tiny, jarred stone out of its resting place. She could hear Rab struggle as he levitated Peter's body toward where she stood. She worked faster, her wand already moving and casting complex spells, laying down the briefest and the quickest way out of the Manor and into the outside world.
As the sound of Rab's footsteps grew louder, Hermione uttered one last spell and sent out a silent prayer before taloing her wand against the entryway, enlarging the small opening.
Once sure of her handcraft, she turned around, her eyes already seeking out the limp form of the bleeding man she had come to cafe for. Her fingers brushed against his damp hair, his eyes shut close to the pain that surrounded him.
Hermioned muttered several spells under her breath, healing every tiny scrape that she could, taking pride in the redish hue returning to Peter's ashen cheeks. She placed a tender kiss against his forehead before pressing her fingers to Rab's chest, who had been watching her intently all this time, his face a perfect mask.
'There will be a white light guiding you along a trail of salt which will vanish the moment you have passed a particular point,' she explained. 'Nobody should be able to follow you. You will find yourself reaching towards the end of the tunnels by the time a quarter of an hour is up.'
Rab said nothing.
'You can do this,' she urged him, a faint urgency in her words. Her heart beat wildly beneath her chest as she took in the sight of her haggard looking brother. Oh, how she must be torturing his poor soul. 'And even if you can't, you have to. All war depends on it.'
'This isn't goodbye,' he whispered to her, his voice a fierce storm of will.
'Never goodbye,' she mumbled before turning around, sparing one last look at him as he carried Peter's body inside the hidden stoneway, his own eyes betraying him as they flashed of his pain.
Hermione sighed, reaching out helplessly to the cold stone underneath her hand as the passageway melted away into the mould of the wall. She disillusioned herself before making her way back to the grounds, her mind a whirlwind of could be's and would be's.
Hermione knew of memories that would never leave her bones. She was full of them. And so she was quite certain that the memory of Rab's haunted eyes would never let her rest.
She removed the charms on herself as she took her place beside Rodolphus in the hall, awaiting the return of the Dark Lord, awaiting her final predicament. She glanced at the man on her side, awestruck at the similarities he bore to Rab and baffled by the austerity in his eyes.
She sucked in a sharp breath as Voldemort entered, his predatory gaze hunting over the hundreds of heads of the room full of his miscreant Death Eaters. He rose to his full height as the crowd bent low into a collective sigh of reverence.
Hermione tuned out all the smudging details of the evening for she knew her fate was forfeit. No power could save her for the pain that lay ahead. And yet she knew her ignorance, however blissful, would only last a bare second of a fissure into the landscape of eternity.
She cringed and scrambled away as Voldemort howled in fury. 'That treacherous little leech! How dare he! How dare he defy the Dark Lord! I shall end him! I shall bring him such pains that he shall be reduced to begging me for his life! RODOLPHUS,' he thundered.
'My.. My Lord?,' Rodolphus trembled.
'You brought to me a traitorous man. How must I punish you? How must I deal with the grief of losing an inctedibly vital reosurce tonight at the hand of your blood?'
Hermione saw as Bellatrix fell on her knees. 'My Lord, I confess to you my lingering doubts. Spare my husband for he has not betrayed you. I never once brought my concerns to your notice in fear of being subjected to your scorn. I knew the boy would bring us nothing but trouble. He will try and hide, Master. There is only one way to lure him out, My Lord,' she said succinctly, her terrifying gaze settling onto Hermione, 'and that is not through my husband.'
Hermione felt a chill creep up her back as Voldemort clutched at her hair. She cried out as the tip of his wand pressed against the nape of her neck, a pressure building against her eyes as pain lashed through her body from a cold Cruciatus. She felt herself succumbing to the darkness as Voldemort spun on his feet, dragging with him Hermione's tiny body into the vortex of Apparition, her final destination obscured into the numbing cool of the nothingness that surrounded her.