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Chapter 34
It hadn't taken long for the students Harry had sent to the school and to Hogsmeade to come back with professors and aurors, and all the students were taken back to the castle. Dumbledore was going there as well, the Aurors apparently wanted everyone in one place so that they could take statements, and the school had records on how to contact parents so they could sit in with the minors.
Of course, those parents would be the lucky ones. Ginny and the handful of dead Death Eaters were not the only ones now covered in white sheets. Harry recognised one before the Aurors covered him, one of the lycanthropy students from Hufflepuff, second or third year if Harry remembered correctly. The boy had been so full of life only this morning as he chatted to his friends about getting to see his parents again and inviting them to stay for a few days over the summer. But now that spark of life was just gone. Harry knew he should be happy that the death eaters weren't going all out. There would have been a lot more casualties if they weren't afraid of hitting any baby Death Eaters, their own kids, who were among the students. But that's not how he felt.
Harry and Hermione were led to a carriage by one of the Aurors and, along with as many other random students who would fit, they were sent back up to the castle. The trip passed in silence, no one wanting to say anything. Harry and Hermione were both holding the other close and wishing they had Fleur there offering them words of encouragement, but also glad that she wasn't because if she was she would also be dealing with everything that had just happened.
Professor Flitwick was waiting for the students when they climbed out of the carriages, and the professor wasted no time in sending all the students to the Great Hall. In the enduring tradition of the British on how to deal with problems big or small, the house elves had quickly set up large teapots filled with tea and placed them every few feet (along with mugs, milk and sugar) along each of the House tables. Harry didn't know if it was just because it was something to do, but the familiar ritual of fixing a cup of tea each for himself and for Hermione helped calm him a little. He handed Hermione her cup, only for her to pull a little box of sweeteners from her handbag and add two to the cup before she tapped it with her wand, causing the tea to swirl and mix for a second.
Hermione pulled Harry to the corner of the room and called Sassy, asking for a cushion to sit on. The elf, seeing how out of it her family was, quickly conjured one for her and popped away without saying anything or waiting for the customary thanks from one of the future Ladies of her House. Hermione took Harry's tea and had him sit down, which Harry did without protest, and once he was seated she handed him the cups and sat half leaning on him and half in his lap. She then put up a light Notice-Me-Not charm. Harry knew that it wasn't strong enough to stop anyone who was specifically looking for them, but it would stop anyone who was just looking around from noticing them. As soon as the Notice-Me-Not was up, Hermione buried her face in Harry's chest and started to sob. He was left wondering what to do with the two cups of tea he was still holding, but he was able to awkwardly set them down on the floor and wrap his arms around Hermione, offering what little comfort he could as tears leaked from his own eyes.
Neither of them could have told anyone how long they sat like that, just comforting each other after their ordeal, but the next thing they knew an Auror was standing over them with Sirius. "Are the two of you fit to give statements now, or do you need a few more minutes?" asked the Auror, one neither Harry or Hermione recognised.
Harry looked at Hermione and she nodded, wiping her eyes. Sirius offered them each a hand and pulled the two teens to their feet. They were quickly led to a classroom, which had been quickly converted into an interview room. There was one table in the middle of the room with two pairs of chairs across the table from each other. In one of the chairs sat another Auror, one who had been the 'good cop' Auror when arresting Harry at Easter, Auror Roberts or something similar to that. The rest of the room's furniture was stacked along the back wall.
The Auror who had come in with them flicked his wand and a third chair joined one opposite the already seated Auror, who was setting up a D.M.L.E dicter-quill. After taking the seats offered to them by the Auror who invited them in, they finally learned the names of the Aurors, as they all tuned their voices to the quill so that it could track who said what. The Auror they had met before was Robards, so Harry's guess was close, and the other was Auror Gladstone. They all went through the process of introducing themselves to the quill then the interview started.
They dealt with Harry's point of view first, and as Hermione sat there going through her story in her head she realised she had a decision to make. Did she tell the Aurors the truth? She thought back over what she had done after Harry had climbed out of the carriage.
(Flashback)
"Please help get as many away from here as you can. I will hold him off for as long as possible. I love you." And before Hermione could try to stop him, Harry jumped out of the carriage as she shouted, "Harry, no!" The door swung shut behind him. "God damn him. If he thinks he is going into this alone then he is fucking mental. Dobby!" She shouted the last word, and almost immediately the elf popped into the carriage, standing in the seat Harry had just vacated.
"Bring me Harry's invisibility cloak now," Hermione ordered him. The situation was too dire for her to worry about little things like manners. Dobby popped away looking worried, and a small part of Hermione made a mental note to herself that she needed to reassure the little elf later.
"Hermione, what are you planning?" demanded Daphne.
"I'm going to go watch Harry's back," Hermione said as if it was obvious.
"But Harry said he wanted you to help get everyone away from here," Daphne insisted.
"And Harry is a noble self sacrificing idiot. I'm more concerned with doing everything I can to make sure he lives through this."
Hermione said, her passion obvious in her voice. Just then Dobby popped back, the silvery cloak in his hands. Hermione gave the elf a quick thank you as she grabbed the cloak and swung it around her shoulders, disappearing from view.
Hermione was too anxious to wait any longer, opening the door of the carriage she jumped down to the ground. She drew her wand as she left and started to look around for Harry and any Death Eaters who may be threatening him. She saw many of the latter, but she couldn't see Harry anywhere. She had intended to just sneak past the Death Eaters, but her plans changed when she saw one of them grab hold of a struggling girl who looked to be at the end of her third year. It was obvious from the way his hands roamed over the young girl's body just what the masked man was intending.
There was no way Hermione was going to let this happen, and she knew what Harry would do. Yet, she thought as she strode over still invisible to all, Harry's method is too quick and clean for someone like this. However, her need to press on and find Harry won out. The Death Eater had no idea that Hermione was standing behind him as he groped the struggling girl. She let herself feel the revulsion of this piece of humanity's refuse being allowed to contaminate the air that she breathed.
Hermione was more precise than Harry. She didn't need to cut off a whole head, instead she pointed her wand at the main artery in his neck and muttered a piercing curse. It was too late for the Death Eater to do anything by the time he had realised what had happened. The girl broke away and ran, and Hermione squashed the part of her brain that had just started screaming like a little girl who had just seen a monster. She didn't have the time for an emotional breakdown right now, she had to find Harry. She listened, her larger ears helping her find Harry's voice to guide her.
(End Flashback)
Hermione shook herself from her memories. It may have been her first kill, but unfortunately it wasn't her last. She had killed three Death Eaters by the time she had found Harry, and when she had seen the situation he was in she killed two more who were just standing around guarding the perimeter, hoping that if Harry needed to run he would have a better chance with less Death Eaters around. Then she had to watch as Ginny, one of her friends, was murdered by Voldemort. That had come far closer to breaking Hermione than any of the Death Eaters she had killed. She had watched as the horrible smoke had left Ginny and joined with Voldemort. She felt proud of Harry when he used Voldemort's surprise to kill him.
However, Hermione had no idea if she should admit what she had done. Sure, on one hand she had killed Death Eaters, the terrorists that magical Britain was basically at war with. She knew if it was Minister Bones who was judging her actions then it wouldn't be a problem. But if she ended up in front of the Wizengamot, well…there were plenty of people there, some of whom she was sure were Death Eaters or had close family who were. To them, she was just an arrogant upstart muggleborn sub-human animal who had most likely just killed purebloods who could trace their magical family back to some point centuries in the past. They would probably throw the book at her, and the only shield she would have against them was that she was betrothed to Harry, someone who had just given Voldemort his second near-death out-of-body experience of his existence.
It would become a battle between those who wanted to give Harry everything he wanted and those who would think that they were doing the magical world a favour by removing such a muggle influence from such a prominent wizarding figure. That Harry was himself raised in the mundane world and knew it almost as well as she did probably wouldn't even cross their minds. Harry was a half-blood, after all. No, it was probably better if she lied. Thanks to Harry's cloak, no one had seen her actions. She just had to keep the lie simple.
Harry finished up telling his version of events, and the Aurors asked him a bunch of questions. From the questions and the grim look on their faces, it was obvious they didn't like the fact that, despite having Voldemort's body with his head separated from the rest of his body, they had to report that Voldemort was still alive. Hermione wondered what that would do for Voldemort's recruitment efforts. It appears that the self-styled Dark Lord was actually unkillable, yet unkillable and undefeatable were very different things. Harry had just proved again that Voldemort could be defeated.
"You need to go to wherever Voldemort's father is buried and destroy his bones," Harry said firmly after Auror Robards asked if there was anything else Harry thought was important.
"His father's bones?" Auror Gladstone asked, sounding confused.
"Bone of the father unknowingly given, flesh of the servant willingly sacrificed, and blood of the enemy forcibly taken. Those were the three ingredients he needed to complete his restoration ritual last year. If you can vanish the bones, then it will be harder for him to get a body again."
"Do you know the name of the place or his father's name?" Ribards asked.
"I don't know the place, but his father's name was Tom Riddle, the same as his, and his father was a muggle." Harry chose to use muggle this time because he didn't want to go through the explanation that it was a rather insulting name. The two officers were surprised to learn that the leader of the blood supremacist terrorist group was a half-blood, but to their credit they only asked Harry if he was sure of his information. "Yes, he told me his name and his blood status himself. The git likes to gloat when he has a prisoner. The difference is that I have this tendency to escape after he spends a good five minutes talking." Harry didn't sound like he was bragging, just angry.
"We will see what we can do, though I suspect that he has already moved the bones or at least enough of them that he won't need to return to that location for more bones. After all, he knows that the location of them is compromised. Now Miss Granger, can you please tell me your point of view of what happened." Robards said, looking right at Hermione when he finished.
"After Harry left, I called one of his house elves and asked them to bring me something."
"Wait, you can call a Potter elf?" Gladstone asked, surprised.
"I am Harry's betrothed. The elves know this and already treat me and Fleur, Harry's other betrothed, like we are family already." Hermione wasn't happy with being interrupted, but Sirius hadn't said anything and he didn't trust the D.M.L.E. If there was something worth objecting to, he wouldn't hesitate.
"Anyway, I asked them to bring me an item of Harry's that would help me go unnoticed-"
Gladstone interrupted again. "What item?"
"That's a Potter family heirloom and secret," Sirius interjected. "Miss Granger won't be telling any more about it beyond that it aided her in remaining unnoticed."
"The elf helped her steal an heirloom?" Gladstone was obviously fishing now.
Harry didn't like this and snapped at the auror. "Miss Granger is my girlfriend and betrothed. She is one of the few people in this world who is trusted with Potter secrets and has permission to borrow certain artefacts as the need arises. If she didn't have permission, she would hardly be telling an Auror and me about it like this, would she? Pull your head out of your ass and stop going out of your way to make trouble. Don't we have enough to deal with?" There was silence for a few moments when everyone decided how they were going to react to Harry snapping at the auror. Apparently they decided that after the events of today, trying to pull any 'you will respect our authority' crap on Harry was just going to invite more trouble than it was worth.
Hermione quickly went back to telling her side of things. "So, as I was saying, I was difficult to notice. I went to find Harry, sending a few stunners at the Death Eaters as I searched, and I found Harry just in time to watch Voldemort kill Ginny." Hermione didn't need to fake her display of anguish as broke down and started to cry again. The images of her friend lying on the ground, her chest crimson as wraith-like Voldemort emerged from her, filled Hermione's head, her brilliant memory making the experience that little more torturous. She knew she was going to suffer with nightmares for the rest of her life after seeing that.
Hermione described watching what happened after Harry cut off Voldemort's head, and the Aurors took notes. She was sure that for the most part they just wanted to get that story from as many points of view as possible. Considering how unbelievable what had happened to Voldemort was, she couldn't hold it against the aurors for being sceptical.
It wasn't long after that the Aurors told them they could go, and that they were free to leave the castle now. Sirius thanked the Aurors and led the two teens away from the converted classroom. He called Dobby and Sassy and had them collect all their trunks and deliver them to Grimmauld Place "Now, Professor McGonagall has opened up her office for Flooing out of here. I want the two of you to go to Grimmauld Place, and I will join you later."
"Where will you be?" Harry asked, obviously not wanting his godfather to leave him but also not wanting to say that.
"I need to stay here and act as guardian for Daphne and Tracey. Daphne's father is here already for his other daughter, but due to the conflict Daphne is having with her grandfather he can't stand as her parent. So I need to sit with them as they are interviewed." Harry nodded in understanding and forced himself to leave his godfather. Hermione was worse off than Harry; the only difference was the adults she wanted to have wrap their arms around her and tell her it was all a bad dream were currently at Grimmauld Place waiting for her to get home.
The two Floo'ed to Grimmauld place, and Dan and Emma, who had been sitting at the kitchen table drinking tea, immediately jumped up and wrapped the two teens in hugs. Dan pulled his daughter into his chest while Emma showed Harry that Hermione's bone-crushing style of hugs may actually have a genetic component. Hermione immediately broke down and started crying. Harry was sure he knew why, he hadn't said anything before now because (if he was right) Hermione answering around anyone they couldn't completely trust was risky. He finished his hug with Emma, and with a quick nod of his head the two joined Dan in enveloping Hermione in a group hug. The only thing that could have made it more comforting for Hermione was if Fleur were there as well, though it would have made the group hug awkward to accomplish.
It took time for Hermione to cry herself out, and when she was finished Harry picked her up bridal style and carried her to the main living room and put her on the sofa next to him. Dan and Emma followed and each took one of the armchairs closest to them. "So what happened?" Dan asked cautiously. "We got a Floo call from a very agitated magical police officer who said you had been involved in an attack by 'You-Know-Who', and they needed a guardian to sit with you while you gave statements.
Harry glanced at Hermione, who was now cuddled up to his side purposely not looking at any of them. It appeared that everything was just too much for her at the moment and she needed some time. Realising it was up to him to explain, he told them about the explosion, the ultimatum, how Voldemort had Ginny, Dumbledore turning up, and how Voldemort had killed Ginny. It was just as difficult for Harry to say it a second time. He didn't want to remember the expression on Ginny's face as she died, he didn't want to remember the black smoke pouring from her, he didn't want to remember seeing her body just lying there on the floor. But he couldn't escape it. He told Dan and Emma about the smoke that had come from Ginny, and had tried to, for a lack of a better term, merge with Voldemort. How he had taken the opportunity and had relocated the bastard's head from atop his neck to lying on the same floor that had held Ginny's body.
The older Grangers were stunned by what Harry had done, but said that he had done everything he possibly could to save his friend. They thought he had made the right choice at every moment, and they were proud of him for doing everything he could to save not only Ginny but every other student. Then Emma asked Hermione what happened to her. Hermione gripped Harry tightly, almost as if she expected him to run away and said, "I killed five people." As soon as she said that, Hermione burst into tears again.
Harry understood. He wished he didn't, but he did. When he had first purposefully taken a life, it was life changing. A fundamental part of you now felt wrong, tainted. It felt like you were a monster and you didn't deserve to be around people who love and respect you. You feel that everyone around you can tell that you aren't fit to be around them any more, and that they are going to reject you. He figured that was why Hermione was desperately clinging to him right now; she was afraid he was going to leave her, that he was going to ditch her and run to save himself from the monster she had become. It was all wrong, of course. It would take a lot more than Hermione killing a few human monsters for him to consider leaving her. But then again, who ever accused emotions of following any kind of sense?
Harry did the only thing he could think of, although he needed to stand up first. He winced as he saw a look of pain and resignation pass over Hermione's face, that was quickly replaced by surprise when he once more picked her up bridal style and then sat them both back down on the sofa, with Hermione now seated in Harry's lap. Harry then leaned in and pressed his lips against hers, trying to push the message that he was never going to leave her into every movement and caress of their lips. It took Hermione's over-stressed mind a few moments to catch up to what was happening, but she started to return the kiss. First tentatively, then when Harry didn't recoil, she grew a little bolder. Harry could literally feel the fear and anxiety leaving Hermione as her muscles relaxed, and he realised just how stressed his girlfriend was. Sure, her ears had telegraphed her unhappiness and stress, but not the magnitude.
After a minute, the couple were interrupted by a loud fake-coughing sound, and when they broke apart and looked at the Grangers they saw Dan was staring very intently at a landscape photo print of modern mundane London. Hermione, realising that she had been snogging her boyfriend in front of her parents, let out a cute "eep" sound and turned bright red. Harry actually counted that as a good thing. Being embarrassed by your parents, at least in this way, was better than some type of self-loathing-infused dread thinking that your whole life was about to implode.
Hermione was indeed calmer now. Still not exactly in a good place, everyone there knew it took more than a kiss to fix everything. She was going to have a bad time of it for a while. What Harry had done was prove to Hermione that her family (and Harry was family even if it wasn't official yet) was a stable point from which she could rebuild. Hermione knew the first part of that was opening up about what had happened. She told them about how she had used Harry's invisibility cloak to move around the fighting, but how she had come across a few situations where she couldn't let it go knowing she had the ability to stop it. She told them of the Death Eater who was in the process of groping a young witch, obviously intending to do more and worse, and how she had killed the man where he stood. She told them about seeing a Death Eater cast the killing curse on one of the lycanthropy students, and that she copied Harry and cut his head off from behind.
The worst for Hermione were the three perimeter guards who were creating a ring around Voldemort and Harry. The first two were easier for her to justify to herself, they were either in the middle of a terrible act or had just committed one. The last three hadn't done anything yet, they were just in the way of Harry being able to escape if things went bad. Harry just held onto her as she spoke, constantly letting her know that he had no intention of being separated from her any time soon. Hermione was clinging to him just as much, needing the reassurance he offered. Even her tail was wrapped around Harry, holding him as tight as it could.
Hermione's parents were a constant stream of reassurance as well. They seemed to accept that Harry had taken the role of providing cuddles, so they told their daughter all the things she needed them to. They said they understood why she had done what she had, that given the circumstances they may have made the same choices, and most importantly that they still loved and supported her. By the end of it, Hermione was in tears again, only this time they were tears of relief rather than despair and dread.
Not long after that, Sirius had Floo'ed in with a tired looking Daphne and Tracey. They joined Harry and the Grangers in the living room, and the two girls had collapsed into another sofa while Sirius did the same into a chair. They decided on an early dinner after that, as most of them were tired and just wanted to go to bed. Dan had run to a nearby chip shop and gotten everyone a bag of fish and chips each, and pretty soon everyone was full enough and the four teenagers made their way up to bed. After they had both gotten ready for bed, Harry had climbed into bed next to Hermione and held her close. He knew that they were both going to have some difficult nightmares tonight, and they were going to need each other now more than ever.
-ϟϟϟ-
Voldemort was in agony. Not only had the Potter brat disembodied him again, somehow he was being forced to reintegrate one of his Horcruxes into himself. How one of them had ended up in the body of that blood traitor girl he had no idea. At least not yet, he would take time to reintegrate the memories. For now, all he had was some vague impressions: slaughtering a number of rosters, unleashing the basilisk on the mudbloods, and fighting Potter in the chamber.
As Voldemort struggled to keep his sanity from the pain of his soul fragments rejoining, he was also being dragged across the country south to an unknown location. It wasn't a fast flight, and it was well past midnight when Voldemort found himself flying through the wall of what was a rather upscale muggle house he knew. It was his hideaway, an anonymous muggle house with enough muggle-repelling wards on it that it had been left completely alone since he had taken it from the annoying muggle who had told him he was worthless and would amount to nothing the summer before his last year at Hogwarts. The muggle had tried to force him into abandoning his schooling and to go and work himself to death in a workhouse. Tom had taken great delight in torturing his wife and son to death in front of him for having the audacity to try and dictate his life. Now, the house was just a last ditch backup plan, somewhere to go if he ever needed to lick his wounds and recover. It wasn't exactly secure, though, that was why he hadn't fled here in eighty-one. The best security on this place was that nobody knew about it.
Voldemort found himself drawn through the wall, his incorporeal self finding the bricks and mortar no barrier whatsoever. He was drawn into the dining room where three individuals all sat around a large table. There was a girl wearing a diadem, a goblin drinking from a cup, and a house elf wearing a locket. The goblin sneered at him, then spoke to him with his own voice. "Well, it looks like you got your ass handed to you by the welp again. Bravo Tom, what's the next step in your master plan: give all your followers gold away to the mudbloods? Or maybe surrendering your wand?" The goblin mocked.
"Oh come now Blackfang, you know as well as us all that if there was any opportunity for our wayward self here to do better then he would have. After all, he was facing the most deadly force in all of Britain: school children." The young witch who still looked like she was in Hogwarts herself snickered at Voldemort's expense.
"Who are you!?" Voldemort demanded.
"Why, can't you tell?" The house elf asked in a disrespectful and rude tone that was at odds with how its species was supposed to behave. "We are you. The parts of yourself that you cut off. Did you expect us to sit idly forever with nothing to do while you got to gallavant around the country? Would you have just sat there and waited for eternity? Now shut up and listen, we need to work out how we are going to fix your screw up."
AN: Remember that my writing is powered by a mix of reviews and energy drinks. One of those is free...
ps I posted two short stories here today as well if you want to check them out..