For those of you in our facebook group - Bubbleybear & Pienuniek's Story Nook - this news will come as no surprise. But I recently lost a very dear friend to cancer who was also an unofficial Pre-Reader for the Under Her Spell Series. Leonie Price, I miss you, so very much but I hope that you are free from pain, wherever you are.

In her honour, I am dedicating this entire book to her. Her enthusiasm helped me continue to write on many days where I felt ... lost. In fact, one of the last emails she sent me was that she wished that these books had been on the big screen; that they were better than the originals. I know it will never happen, but the thought was enough to encourage me. Please keep her in your thoughts as we continue with this story. Cheers.

I'm so glad that I can finally give you the next in the series. Just know I've already read Book Six and have taken my notes. Now ... I can say that I've started to write!

Thanks must go out to my team. My pre-reader Pienuniek and my Beta Alice's White Rabbit. I would be lost without the pair of you, truly.

I don't own Twilight, or Harry Potter, I'd be a richer person if I did. But I do so love to create my own places for them out in the world. No copyright infringement is intended.

See you at the bottom ...

Chapter Thirty-One ~ Fight in the Ministry

It took us several minutes to get back to where the others were waiting. Harry was arguing about the others coming to the ministry. All of them wanted to. Including Draco.

"Draco, you can't," I said as we stepped through the tree line.

"Why not?"

"You've already outed yourself to the Inquisitorial Squad. If Voldemort and his cronies are at the ministry, holding Esme no less, who do you think is going to be there?"

Draco groaned. "Dad. Of course. What should I do?"

I shrugged. "If you want to continue to out yourself, to come across to our side, then get your mother out of the house and to Potter Manse. We can look after you. But if that's not what you want …"

"Then I need to make sure that the others don't tell their families or Dad. Either by threatening them or by modifying their memories."

"And if that's the case," Bella joined in the conversation, "you might want to talk to Professor McGonagall."

Draco started pacing around the area. "How do I get her to help?"

Fleur answered Draco's question. "Explain everything. The more she knows the more she can help."

Draco nodded. "Got it. It's not time to come clean yet. Go … save Esme." With that, he turned and took off back toward the castle. He was aiming for Professor McGonagall's classroom. He wasn't quite ready to reveal himself to his father yet.

"Now there's the question of the day," Fred stated. "How are we getting to the ministry?"

Once that question was posed, suggestions were thrown out from everyone. Not one of them a viable answer. Everything from the floo network, to the Hogwarts Express, to apparition, which only Fred, George, and myself could do.

"What about the thestrals?" Luna joined in the conversation. She hadn't said much while the others were debating modes of transportation.

Everyone stopped short at her suggestion. We all looked at her in surprise because nobody else had thought about it.

"It's a good idea," Bella mused. "They're quiet and fast."

"But some of us can't see them. And I don't like flying!" Hermione argued. "How am I supposed to fly on something I can't see."

I pulled Bella's hand and started to guide the others in the direction of the thestrals. "You're just going to have to hang on tight. We'll guide them."

Hermione groaned as we ran across the grass between the forest and Hagrid's hut. She wasn't excited about flying at all, but flying on something she couldn't see terrified her beyond belief. I wasn't sure where the thestrals were when they weren't in the paddock, but I thought that might be the best place to check.

Once we arrived there, I realized they weren't there. I couldn't sense them anywhere. "Not here. Now where should we look?" I murmured to myself.

There were a couple throats clearing from behind me. I spun around to see two very beautiful women staring at me, each with an eyebrow raised. "Need some help?" they both asked me.

I shrugged sheepishly. Sometimes, I forgot that Bella and Fleur could use their siren powers to bring animals to us. Instead of saying anything, I indicated to the paddock and the field farther on behind me.

Bella kissed my cheek as she and Fleur walked past me, climbed through the fence, and stood in the middle of the paddock. The pair of them looked back at me before they began to hum quietly, much like Bella had when she was trying to calm the centaur. Slowly, as the girls hummed, animals began to come into the paddock. First, the smaller animals such as rabbits, mice, birds, and rats came to them. Then slowly bigger ones. Cats, dogs, horses, and the like.

"I'll never get used to seeing things like this," Ginny murmured from next to me.

"I know. Me either."

After a short period of time, we had everything in the forest nearby including some hippogriffs and the thestrals. Bella looked back at me. "Are you all ready?" When we nodded and started walking toward the paddock, Bella said, "Then let's go save Mum."

Before I climbed up onto my Thestral, I bowed to a hippogriff and waited for him for bow in return. "Hermione, come here." Slowly, Hermione made her way over to me and bowed as well. The hippogriff in front of me bowed once more. "Will this be better for you?"

"Yes, thank you." Hermione sighed as she stood back up. I helped her climb up onto the back of the stunning black and white hippogriff and settle into the correct spot.

I walked over to one of the last remaining thestrals and swung up onto it's back. "All right, is everyone settled and ready?" With nods and verbal agreements, I looked down to my thestral, giving it a pat on the neck. "Let's go."

The eight thestrals and two hippogriffs took several steps backward before bolting forward and launching themselves into the air. Their wings spread out and began to flap hard, catching the current and propelling us into the sky.

I looked back over my shoulder to make sure that those on the hippogriffs were keeping up, and that Hermione and Harry were doing okay. It seemed that Harry was enjoying riding his hippogriff almost as much as riding his broom.

Now while this was a serious mission we were on, saving Esme, I couldn't deny the fact that this was fun. The wind in our faces. The speed we were travelling. And for some of us, the fact that they couldn't even see the thing they were riding on. It gave an extra thrill to the whole situation.

By the time we made it to London, the sun had set, and it was easier to hide what we were doing. The other plus was that it was—as usual—a cloudy night, and that made our approach even less likely to be seen. The thestrals guided the way into an alley that was hidden and not far from the visitors' entrance of the Ministry of Magic. I slid off the side of my thestral, rubbing its neck in thanks, before turning to look at our group of misfits.

I sighed. I didn't like taking children into battle with me. Vulnerable ones at that. But I had a feeling this wouldn't be the only battle they were going to face as Hogwarts students either. "This is probably going to be dangerous," I said, calling their attention to me. "And I wouldn't blame you if you wanted to sit it out. Especially for those whom Esme doesn't mean as much to you as she does to us."

Fred scoffed. "Esme is a godsend. She's helped with Mum, and that makes her just as important to us as she is to you."

George and Ginny were nodding, but Ginny continued with, "We're a team, and we work together to save the people we love and care about. So just … lead the way."

I nodded and walked to the end of the alley, only to look up as the thestrals and hippogriffs flew off above our heads, and peeked around the corner. When I'd determined that nobody was watching or waiting for us, I led us out onto the thoroughfare toward the phone booth Arthur told us about. It felt so long ago that we were here for Harry's hearing over the summer, like a lifetime, but it had been less than a year.

"Wands out," I called as we stepped up to the booth. "We aren't all going to be able to fit at the same time. The first group to go down will be the most invulnerable of us. Fleur and Bella, hop in, and I'll join you. For those who come after, you need to pick up the handset and dial six, two, four, four, two, and you'll be taken into the ministry. We'll make sure it's safe for you at the bottom. Got it?"

"Got it," everyone replied, nodding to me before I turned and stepped into the booth, closing the door behind me.

I picked up the handset before looking at the girls with me. "Ready?" Fleur and Bella nodded, holding their wands up. I released mine, and then dialed the number. Once I'd hung the handset up, I turned to look out one side of the booth while Bella and Fleur did the same.

The girls and I became more alert as we descended into the ministry atrium. I ranged my hearing out while Bella stretched out her shield to make sure we had the best advantage without compromising our safety.

It's empty, was Fleur's first thought as we came through the ground and entered the atrium itself. Where is everyone? The night staff. The security.

"Good questions," I whispered, just in case anyone was within earshot. "There should be a skeleton crew cleaning the place once everyone's gone home."

Bella snorted. "Just goes to show that something is going down tonight, and we may be the only ones who stand in the way."

"Not comforting," I growled softly as we landed on the floor, and I opened the door, allowing us to step out. "Keep that shield up, baby girl."

Mmhmm. Bella wandered out to the right while Fleur stepped to the front, and me to the left.

I tried all the different frequencies in my mind—as the phone booth ascended again—that Cortesia had shown me so long ago but couldn't find one single person inside the ministry … at all. "Yeah, this is not good. I can't hear anyone."

"Does that mean Voldemort has infiltrated the ministry?" Bella asked as we stood on guard as the next load of our friends arrived in the atrium.

"One more load," Harry called out as they spread around and strengthened the circle.

"I wouldn't be surprised, Bella. He's had this planned for a very long time. I have no doubt he's made very fast headway into infiltrating all sorts of places. Muggle government included."

"Even though he thinks of muggles as inferior."

I snorted. "Especially because of that. He wouldn't consider it a challenge. And what better way to keep them underfoot"—At this, I indicated the ugly, gaudy statue in the ministry itself—"than to infiltrate and control them from inside the muggle governments themselves."

It took another five minutes for the last of our group to make it into the atrium and prepare for whatever was coming.

"Where do we go?" George asked as I led them past the security desk Eric had manned the last few times I'd been here.

I shook my head and walked through to the elevators. "We're going down as far as we can go to the damn black door Harry's been dreaming about since his hearing here over the summer. We're going where only the Unspeakables have been before."

"How do you know that's where they'll be?" Fred queried.

"Because that's where the Hall of Prophecies is located," Harry explained. "And that's what Voldemort is after. A prophecy that was recorded not long before his first demise about how he would be defeated once and for all. His 'spy' only heard the first half, and he didn't get all the information."

Neville grunted. "It's why Voldemort came after both Harry and me when we were babies. Because we were both born at the end of July. Asshole."

There were chuckles at Neville's descriptive word. But it was Hermione's "too right" that broke up the seriousness of the moment.

We all managed to squeeze into the one elevator—it was squishy—and I pushed the button for the very last floor that led through to courtroom ten where Harry had to face the Wizengamot. We were quiet as the elevator made its way down.

"What do we do when we get there?" Fleur asked as the elevator began to slow.

I grunted and stepped out of the elevator as the doors open. "We search until we find what we're looking for. And we rescue Esme."

The others nodded as they followed along behind me toward the door at the end of the hall. Harry had been dreaming about this door for nearly a year, and as such, I had gotten to know the door as well as he had. This door had been such a beacon that I had to freeze as I reached out for it. My hand hovered over that damn silver door handle in the middle of the door.

"Edward? You okay?" Bella whispered from beside me.

I nodded but reached out and grasped the handle, turning it, and letting the door open wide. What I expected and what we saw were two very different things. I had expected a square room, or a hallway, something to hide what was actually happening behind the first door. What we got was a round room with many, many doors. I couldn't imagine all the stuff that was behind those doors. What did they do with it all?

We were all quiet as we stepped through the door and into the center of the room only for the door to shut behind us. Once it did, that was when things got interesting to some, weird to others. The whole room spun around in a circle. It was an effective countermeasure because if you didn't know which door you wanted, or where it led, you were shit outta luck.

I could hear a groan from George. "Now what do we do?"

"All I saw when I was dreaming was glittering. A door opened, and there was a lot of glittering or shiny objects inside," Harry answered. "I never saw what was inside, or I never remembered. Edward?"

I shook my head. "You never did. I would remember otherwise." I walked over to a random door and opened it up to see nothing. Just an empty room. When I shut the door, there was a slight pause, and then it spun around again. "Great." What to do.

When the room stopped, Fred stepped forward and pulled open another door only to find a storeroom of sorts. There were a lot of boxes and moving things but no glittering objects. Once he shut the door, there was another short pause before the room spun around again.

"Why don't we place an X on the doors that we open until we find the right one?" Fleur suggested. "Plus, if we all open one together that will cut down on the number of doors we have to open."

"Good idea, Fleur. Does everyone know the Flagrate charm?" I looked around as the others all nodded their heads. "Okay, pick a door everyone!"

All ten of us walked toward a door with our wands out. I looked around once more only to note that there were still another three doors we would have to check.

"On three," Bella called out. "One … two … three!"

All at once, we pulled open the doors in front of us.

"Nothing here!" Harry called.

"Me either," replied Neville

My room wasn't empty though. In this room was the amphitheater that Bella had seen in her precognitive dream from the beginning of the year. The one with the mysterious archway with what I thought was a veil in the center of it. While I hadn't been able to get a good look at the worn writing on it in the dream, I could now. It was written in one of the romance languages from years past. One that I had studied in my many lonely years before Bella. Ancient Greek. It read πύλη του Άδη roughly translated to Hades' Gate.

Is this how Orpheus made his way into the Underworld to save his love Eurydice?

I was brought out of my thoughts when I heard several of the others call out with negative replies. I shut my door and pointed my wand at it. And with a chant of "Flagrate", I drew an X before the room started to spin. As soon as it stopped Bella, Harry, and I stepped up to the only doors that were left, and all at once, we reached for the door handles and pulled them open.

"Here! It's this one!" Harry yelled. "Don't close your doors in case it resets the room." Leaving the doors open, Bella and I followed everyone as they rushed over to Harry to peer through the door. "They're clocks," he murmured. "I wonder what they're for?"

"Doesn't matter. We need to go." I stepped into the room, looking at all the different clocks. But what I noticed was that it wasn't just clocks. There were also other circular devices that had what looked like hourglasses in the middle of them. I could see that there were two circular parts that were able to spin independently of each other, as well as a dial on the side of it.

On the right was an open archway that led to another section of the department. But it was the other items in the room that were the most fascinating.

On the left side of the room, before the door, stood a matching set of glass cases. Inside were a couple of really beautiful glass bells. They were quite large, probably about the size of a basketball, and it was these bells that were the cause of the glittering we had seen in Harry's dream. For a split second, I wondered what they were for, but then I decided it didn't matter when Esme was in trouble. I looked around the room to see if there were any other doors, and when I saw that the one on the far end of the room was the only one, I made my way toward it.

What I hadn't noticed was that surrounding each of the glass cases holding the bells was like a bubble or cloud. I was too busy making my way across the room to the door that I walked through one of them.

"Edward! Careful!" Bella shouted running up to me but around the path that I had just taken. "You need to watch where you walk!"

I frowned. "Why?"

Bella's hands cupped my face. "Because while the scruff is extremely sexy, did you want to age?"

"What?" I asked surprised my hand coming up to rub my cheek only to find that Bella was right. There was scruff on my face. I spun around to look behind me at the space I had walked through. "What happened?"

Hermione, who had been looking around at all the things in the room, turned back to us. "I think they're studying time here. These"—she pointed at the circular objects I had been looking at before—"look like time turners. I'd say that those bells either reverse time or speed it up. And considering you just grew a five o'clock shadow, I'd say that at least one of them speeds it up."

Bella and I turned back to look at the bells. I could now see the aura they were putting off. "I wonder which one does which?"

"Only one way to find out. Hermione, you go to that one." Bella pointed at the bell farthest from us. "And I'll go to this one."

"Are you sure that's wise?" Fleur asked.

"The knowledge may come in handy," Bella answered. "Ready, Hermione? On three. One … two … three!"

Both girls stepped forward at the same time. At first, it seemed as though nothing had happened, but slowly, I saw changes happening to both of them. Bella's hair grew a little longer, and her face lost a little of what people would call "baby fat" and thinned out some. While Hermione's hair shortened and curled a little more than it had been. Similar to what it looked like the year before.

"All right, girls, out you come," I commanded, thanking God that they listened and stepped backward. "You both okay?"

"Yes, Edward," the answered together before bursting into giggles.

I smiled at them. Their happiness would always be my happiness. "It seems that the one Hermione was in brought her aging back a little. You look more like you did last year. And Bella's aged her a little. Not too much, just made you more beautiful."

"Oh gag!" Fred and George exclaimed together with Harry while Bella swooned a little.

But it was Hermine who made us laugh with her comment. "Oh, poo. Guess I need to step into Bella's for a little bit. I was beginning to like the way I looked." Without preamble, she did sidestep into the aura around Bella's bell just long enough to age again.

"Don't want to age a little more?" Ginny asked teasingly.

Hermione laughed. "No. I'll grow at my own pace, thank you very much."

Luna smiled. "As informative as this has been. Should we continue?"

A serious feeling settled over all of us, and with a nod, I strode off toward the door I had been heading toward, ready to save the center of our family, the others following closely behind me. I'd expected there to be more rooms that we would have to discover before we made it to our destination. But to my complete surprise, the door opened to the Hall of Prophecies that Harry had been dreaming about. I looked back at all those who were willing to put their lives on the line to save Esme. "Let's go get her."

We stalked through the rows and rows and rows of prophecies that had been placed on the shelves and, essentially, forgotten about.

How many lives could have been saved? Bella thought, horrified. Although, she wasn't the only one thinking it.

"I'm trying very hard not to think about it," I murmured as I continued to lead the way farther into the shelves. This place seemed so much bigger now that we were in it than I ever imagined.

I had ranged out my mind reading, but I couldn't hear anyone around us. I didn't think there was until a man stepped out into the crossway in front of us. The problem was the man who stood in front of us wasn't completely a man—he was a vampire.

Oh my god, Bella squealed, that's … that's …

That's Gabrielle's mate. Fleur was stunned. Now what do we do?

Before any of us could say anything, Gabrielle's mate Dean, pointed back toward the door we had walked through. His thoughts were completely locked down, which meant he knew Occlumency, and if he was working in the ministry—in the Unspeakables section, no less—then he had to be a wizard, too.

I turned and encouraged the others to head back. Bella and Fleur trusting me without question because they knew who he was, who he would be to Gabrielle.

As soon as we all walked through the door to the room with the clocks, Dean closed it behind us. He pulled out a wand and waved it around. "Muffliato. I know who you are," he began without preamble. "And you shouldn't be here. It's a trap."

"Voldemort's not here, torturing our mother Esme?" Bella asked, stepping up next to me and holding my hand.

Dean shook his head. "They knew you would come. They knew Harry Potter would be overwhelmed from his studies for the fifth-year exam, and that vision was planted at that precise moment to get this reaction. You can't go in there."

"Dean," I began only to pause when he looked up at me in surprise. "Yes, I know who you are, too. As do the two Veela who are with me. There's a reason for that, and we'll explain it. But regardless of whether this is a trap or not, we need to stop those death eaters in that room."

"And if we destroy that bloody room, all the better," Bella grumbled under her breath. But it caught in her throat when she spied Dean's red eyes. "You're a human blood drinker?"

"I am, but only because I didn't know there was another choice. You"—he pointed to me—"are a vampire, but you have green eyes?"

I smirked. "Again, we can explain it all. What's happening out there?"

Dean stood at attention like he was a military man. It's possible that he had been part of the auror division when he was still just a wizard. "There were twelve death eaters, one of them was a member of the Unspeakables, so now there are only eleven."

I couldn't help but let out a chuckle. "Sounds like a traitor to me. Was he under the Imperious Curse?"

"No." Dean's answer was fast and emphatic. "I thoroughly tested and retested him once I knew he'd turned on the ministry and all we stand for. And then I made him pay for his treachery. That was when I saw the death eaters he had shown into the Hall of Prophecies."

"Okay. So, there are eleven we need to be rid of. Wanna help?" I laughed at the smirk Dean let loose. "But can you think about where each of them is hiding?"

Dean frowned. "Why?"

"Because that will help me prepare a strategy for defeating them." I tapped my temple. I knew Dean was going to be a member of our ever-growing family, and that made him trustworthy.

You're a mind reader. Dean's thoughts were full of realization before he smiled at me. "Handy that."

I shrugged. "Sometimes."

For the next few moments, Dean showed me what he had seen and experienced when the death eaters arrived, skipping over drinking from one of them. He showed me where they had set up around the row where Harry's prophecy ball was located and how we could set up an ambush.

We talked the others through what we thought was best to do before making our way back to the Hall of Prophecies after removing the silencing spell. With a few silent hand signals, we all separated, with Harry, Neville, Hermione, and Ginny making their way through the aisles and rows while the rest of us spread out to try to surround the death eaters who were hiding among the shelves in their ambush positions.

I listened for the minds of the death eaters so I could relay who was here in case any of them got away … not that I was counting on it happening. I could hear the mind of Lucius; that was no surprise. But I could also hear several others such as Crabbe, Mulciber the second, Dolohov, Jugson, and McNair. As well as Avery the second, Rookwood, Nott, and Travers.

We've made it to the cross section, Edward. I can feel the eyes on us, Harry thought as the four of them slowly walked into position.

I gave Bella and Dean a few signals to spread out a little farther, and they passed them onto the others, giving us a better circle to capture them in.

"It was right here," Harry said, calling the attention of all the death eaters in front of us. "Esme should be right here."

"Are you sure, Harry? Could it be somewhere else?" Hermione asked as she spun around in a circle as if looking around for a different spot. "It all looks the same here."

Neville and Ginny were scoping out the different shelves and looking down each individual row.

"Esme should be here, Hermione! Where could she be? Edward is going to kill me if we can't find her!" Harry almost shouted.

"It won't be on you!" Hermione shouted back. "We should have told them before we left."

"Uh … guys," Neville attempted to interrupt.

"Why should we ask for help? This is my problem. I didn't even want to involve all of you!" Harry argued.

"Guys …"

Hermione turned around to face Harry and argued right back. "Well, too damn bad. We're all in this together!"

"Guys!" Neville shouted to get their attention.

"What?" Harry and Hermione shouted, spinning to face Neville.

Neville was pointing to a shelf off to the left and up above his head. "This one has Harry's name on it."

All four of them froze as if they hadn't expected to find the prophecy for Harry. But it was Harry's "Me?" and him reaching for the little glass ball that caused a shift in the death eaters around us.

Harry pulled it off the shelf and held it in his hands. We all expected something to happen, for him to hear something, but even after a few minutes, nothing happened. It was as he was looking down at the glass ball that the death eaters shifted and began creeping toward our four friends, and as they moved, so did we.

"Harry," Hermione called quietly, catching his attention.

Harry looked up to see one of the death eaters approaching the crosswalk. He couldn't tell which death eater it was because he had on one of their masks. Hermione, Ginny, and Neville all tuned to look down different branches of the crosswalk only to see more death eaters converging on their small area.

"Where's Esme?" Harry all but growled toward the death eater approaching him as he held his wand aloft. All of them had their wands out.

That was when we heard the slimy voice of Lucius Malfoy. "You know, you should really learn the difference between a dream …" Here he paused and swiped his wand over his face, causing his mask to melt away into thin air, revealing himself as he walked toward Harry. "And reality. You saw only what the Dark Lord wanted you to see. I mean …" Here Lucius paused. "… he's known about your connection for some time. Now, hand me the prophecy."

Harry, Hermione, Ginny, and Neville all grouped together tighter. "No, I don't think so."

That was our cue to step forward and place wands at the throats of the death eaters standing at the back of the group.

"You see, what you failed to account for was the fact that we thought this might be a setup, so we came prepared." Harry smirked as the death eaters in the front turned around to see the rest of us holding our wands to their throats.

The death eaters stood still, most as stiff as a board, but others slumped ever so slightly. Their thoughts were confusing, however. They still thought they could walk out of here with the prophecy that Harry held in his hand; though, they didn't actively think on how that was going to happen. Just that Lucius always managed to get what he wanted.

"Voldemort's not here to help you this time," I whispered menacingly into the ear of a death eater who I had come up behind. Loud enough for the others to hear. "Nor is the Minister for Magic, McNair. Be grateful that I can hold my temper because if Bella was the one behind you, you'd be ashes for threatening the life of Buckbeak."

Bella hissed from next to me. She had wanted this guy's head since the trial. You did that on purpose. No fair.

I couldn't help the evil snicker I let loose. The funny part was that McNair shivered in fear. It seemed that while Voldemort scared him, I absolutely terrified him.

"You know I'm not the only vampire here. Just the only one who doesn't drink human blood." This time, I heard Dean snicker from the other side of the circle. "I wonder who's going to feed him first."

"Enough!" Lucius yelled. "You will hand me that prophecy, Potter."

Harry held the prophecy closer to his face. "This?" He shook his head. "If you try anything with us, I'll break it."

There was a hiss of something moving, and a swish of black smoke appeared, seemingly to land behind Lucius, before a laugh cackled, even managing to raise the hair on my arms. This person, this woman, was not quite sane. "He knows how to play!" She laughed slowly, coming closer to Lucius and into the light. "Itty, bitty, baby, Potter," she sang.

Neville stepped forward and up next to Harry. "Bellatrix Lestrange."

Oh no, Bella thought, looking at me from the corner of her eye. One of the ones who tortured Alice and Frank.

"Be prepared, Bella. This could all go sideways really fast," I whispered at vampire pitch as I got myself ready to fight or to run; I wasn't sure which.

"Neville Longbottom, is it? How's Mum and Dad?" Bellatrix asked with a sarcastic snicker and a twisted sneer on her face.

I thought Neville would lose it. I thought he would attack without thought. But it showed how much he'd learned, how much he matured, when he simply lifted his wand and said, "Better knowing that by the end of the night, they'll be avenged. How about you?"

In response to Neville's words, Ginny and Hermione raised their wands while Harry kept his pointed at Lucius. The four of them were handling this better than even I had hoped they could.

"Why don't we all calm down?" Lucius asked, not just to the group in front of us but looking around in the direction of the death eaters and those of us holding them hostage. "All we want is that prophecy."

Harry frowned. "Why did Voldemort need me to come get it?"

"How dare you say his name? You filthy half-blood!" Bellatrix shouted in anger.

Lucius was about to say something to try to defuse the situation, but Harry tilted his head to stare at Bellatrix. "You do know that Voldemort …" Harry said, stressing Voldemort's name "… was a half-blood, right?"

Bellatrix hissed in anger. "You lie!"

"Ah … he hasn't told you." Harry snickered. "Voldemort may be the heir of Slytherin. He may be related to him by way of the Gaunts, but Voldemort is as half-blood as I am. His mother, Merope, loved a muggle by the name of Tom Riddle. She never did anything about it, of course, being as beaten down as she was, thanks to her father and brother because she was too afraid of their reactions."

Bella looked over at me. We had told everyone everything we knew about Voldemort's history. His past. His conception. Everything. And it looked like Harry was going to use that to his advantage.

What is he doing?

I smirked. I couldn't help it. It was a brilliant plan, and I was hoping it would work. I leaned away from the ear of the death eater so that he couldn't overhear me. "It seems he's hoping to place doubt in some of Voldemort's crew. By spilling Voldemort's secret about his non-magical history instead of his pureblood rhetoric."

That's … surprisingly clever. Huh. I could tell Bella was impressed. Not that Harry had decided to do it, or that he had remembered, but that he thought to do it right then.

"And Merope had a right to be. Worried, that is. Because her brother, Morfin, spilled to her father, Marvolo, and for that, she was choked and very nearly killed. If it wasn't for a ministry official visiting that day, Voldemort may have never been born." Harry smiled. He could see that what he was saying was getting to Bellatrix.

But it was one of the other death eaters, one of the ones we hadn't met before, who stepped forward. "If that's so, what happened? How did she become with child?"

"Because after that incident, Morfin and Marvolo were arrested and sent to Azkaban prison, leaving poor Merope all alone. Where they had thought she was more of a squib than a witch, Merope had actually hidden her magical talent. She brewed a love potion and somehow managed to get it to Tom Riddle so that he fell hopelessly in love with her. He ran away with Merope where they fell into a passionate love affair." Harry was really laying it on thick, but it was working. Bellatrix was getting angrier by the minute. "And for many months, she continued to feed him love potions. Until, that is, she became pregnant with none other Tom Marvolo Riddle. After that, she stopped giving the potions to him, hoping that he had fallen in love with her, too, only for Tom Riddle Senior to leave her the minute the potion wore off. So, as you can see, Voldemort's pure blood nonsense is just that … nonsense."

Bellatrix stormed past Lucius before he could grab a hold of her and held the tip of her wand under Harry's chin, forcing him to look up at her. "You have no idea what you're talking about," she hissed in a whisper. "Voldemort is the epitome of pure blood. He is descended from the noble Salazar Slytherin, and he would never be related to a muggle." She was hoping to instill fear in Harry and the rest of us, but I could see that it had the opposite effect.

Harry glared up at her. He wasn't afraid of her. He wasn't afraid of any of the death eaters. "You're wrong. We've done nothing but research Tom Riddle since we started at Hogwarts. We've got fifty years of memories, notes, teachers' reports, and the professors themselves to back up our claims. What have you got? Just your belief in your false prophet."

The scream Bellatrix let loose was just this short of completely insane. She stormed away from Harry, twirled around, and cast an obscure spell, wanting to obliterate him for his lies. Harry simply protected himself and the others with him with Protego, causing the spell to bounce off his shield, miss Bellatrix by mere centimeters, and break a few of the prophecies opposite him.

This was going to go as south as we thought it might. "Now!" I shouted, causing several death eaters to look at me. But with those words, all of us who had come tonight started to run in all different directions, including Dean. "Reducto!" I shouted, firing off a spell as did the others. Only we didn't fire them at the death eaters trying to catch us; no, we fired them at the shelves containing all the prophecies. It was a goal we all had—not that we told Dean that—to be rid of this room and all it stood for.

The result of ten reductor curses being flung at the shelves was instantaneous. Those that were hit exploded spectacularly, obscuring the vision of those who had been looking. After that though, none of us could have predicted what happened. Slowly—like an avalanche—the shelves all started to fall. First, one-by-one, then gaining speed. So much so that although the death eaters had been firing spells at us, they had to stop and focus on where they were going and not being hit in the head by falling glass orbs.

"I think that was a little too much!" Bella shouted as she ran alongside me, dodging glass orbs.

I snickered. "Maybe just a little." I pointed to a door ahead. "Aim for that door. Hopefully, the others will follow suit!"

What I realized as we reached the door was that there were several doors. I could only hope that our friends followed us through. I flung the door open when I reached it, causing Bella, Luna, and myself to almost fall through the door, which promptly slammed shut and plunged us into absolute darkness. It was so black in the room that I almost couldn't see around me.

"Edward?" Luna asked.

"Over here. Just hold my hand," I replied as I reached out for not only Luna, but Bella as well.

"Lumos," Bella held her wand aloft so that it illuminated the room enough to see it. "Where are we? Where are the others?"

I looked around at the room we were in. I'd thought it was empty, but as I took stock of what I could see, I realized that it wasn't as empty as I thought. "I have no idea where the others are. I thought they were following us. But that looks like Pluto over there." I pointed over to the left. "And that's possibly Mars."

Luna frowned. "What were they studying?" she asked as she looked up at the roof. "Are those stars?"

I was about to answer her when there was a loud bang from behind us, causing us all to spin and look back toward the door. There was another loud thump, which caused the door to bow and release a puff of black smoke. "I'm not sure we have time to find out. Light your wands. See if we can find a way out of this room."

Luna lit the end of her wand at the same time as I did, and we all separated, trying to find our way out. Even I was having a hard time, considering how dark it was and how the walls were decorated. Our searching turned frantic as the banging on the door continued to get louder and more persistent. And just as we found the other door for us to escape through, a massive boom sounded from behind us as the door flew open to reveal a couple death eaters. "Found you," they growled, raising their wands and stepping through the door.

Before I could even register a spell to use, Luna fired a spell, the reductor curse, at what I thought was the planet Pluto, causing it to barrel into and knock over the two death eaters who were coming at us. We didn't pause but bolted out the door we had found behind us only to run straight back into the room with the bells and the time turners. It was then that I heard more death eaters coming up behind us.

"Run, girls! We need to move faster."

We moved as fast as Luna could run, but that didn't stop the death eaters from firing spells at our heads. A few of them managed to make contact with our clothes, but none of them were painful. It seemed they were just trying to slow us down. But if I'd taken a close enough look at the three of us, I would have noticed a few things.

"This way!" Bella called, leading the way through the open door I had seen when we came through this way before. Luna followed with me bringing up the rear.

"This is crazy," Luna puffed as we continued to run. "They really have no scruples."

I chuckled, throwing a spell over my shoulder. "Sounds like every bad guy ever, everywhere." I smiled when I heard my spell connect, so I looked back to see that the spell had hit the death eater in the front, who then fell into the second one, and they both landed into one of the bells. By the time they had scrambled apart, their time as death eaters had come to an end. The pair of them had been turned back into toddlers. Maybe they could make a better go of their second lives. "We can slow down now. We have time," I said as I stepped through the doorway behind Bella and Luna.

I turned to look around the room to see it was set up as a theatre. Large stone benches and steps, which were leading down to the amphitheater. There in the center, as I had seen before, was the stone archway with πύλη του Άδη, or Hades' Gate, written around the top.

As I looked to my left and right, I could see different doorways that others were entering from. Harry, Fleur, and Neville from my left. Fred, George, Hermione, and Dean came in from my right. It seemed we had all been running, and we had all been in our own battles. Hermione was limping and clutching at her chest while Neville had blood coming from one of his ears, and I could see his shirt had been torn in different places.

It was then that I remembered where I'd seen this scene before. Bella had dreamt this at the beginning of the school year. It was with that thought that I turned around to Bella and raced over to give her the once over. When I stood in front of her, she had her head tilted to the floor but let me lift it with my finger under her chin. I could see she was furious—I could tell that through her body language—but her eyes were aglow with the power she exuded. "Are you all right?" I asked as I fingered some of the blood that was streaked throughout her hair. I knew some of the other girls had it as well. I could smell it from here.

"I'm fine." She tried to push my hands away. When I wouldn't relent, she sighed and glanced up at me quickly before looking away. "I'm fine, Edward. One of their spells skimmed the top of my head. I didn't even feel it until now. I can feel it already starting to heal."

I kissed her quickly but hard. "Good. You have to be okay," I mumbled against her lips.

She smiled as I kept pressing kisses to her lips. "I am okay. Is everyone else?"

We spun to look at our group of friends. They were all windblown, disheveled, and holding their wands. Even Dean. Harry, who had been looking down at the prophecy in his hand, looked up to see that Hermione had been injured. He stormed past us and pulled her into his arms. "You okay," he asked quietly.

"I'm good," she answered back just as quietly. She laughed lightly when he looked down at her in disbelief. Hermione grimaced when Harry reached for the hand clutching at her chest. "It's nothing. Just a small burn. The water where the brains were kept was a little hot, that's all."

"Brains?" Harry asked with confusion. In fact, we were all looking at her with confusion.

Hermione giggled. "I'll fill you in later. Let's get away from the doors."

There were murmured agreements as we all started moving toward the bottom of the amphitheater, the stage, and the stone archway in the middle of it. I recalled Bella's dream as I looked over the archway, once again wondering if the fact that it was called Hades' Gate had anything to do with how Orpheus made his way into the Underworld to save his love Eurydice.

The archway was beautiful, even if some of the writing had worn off. And I could see the veil, the shimmering air, that moved and flowed inside it. The way it did move was engaging, almost hypnotic, like it wanted you to reach out and touch it. But like in Bella's dream, it was what I heard coming from it that was the most disturbing. The voices were hypnotizing, inviting, almost siren like.

As we walked closer, Harry, Luna, Bella, and I could see the veil shift and move more, and what I could see inside made a shiver run up my back. Occasionally, I could see hands reaching or a face screaming. I couldn't decide if it was still hypnotic or more disturbing.

"Can you understand what the voices are saying?" Harry asked, creeping farther forward to get closer to the archway.

"There are no voices, Harry!" Hermione whispered, scared. "The archway is empty!"

"I can hear them, too." Luna spoke in that lilting way of hers. She, too, was fascinated by the arch. And she was taking steps toward it.

"Me, too," Bella whispered. "Edward, I'm not sure we should be going anywhere near this thing."

Instead of acknowledging what Bella had said, I heard a whisper of a voice long past that caused me to react. "Pull them all back, Bella! Don't let the others near the arch!" I yelled out. I released Bella's hand and pushed her toward Luna while I took off toward Harry. I used my speed to reach him so I could pull him back toward the edge of the stage. "We can't go near that archway. Do you all understand?"

"Why, Edward?" Bella asked, looking up at me as she held on to Luna's arm.

I opened my mouth to answer her only to be interrupted by the flying smoke I had become acquainted with during our fourth year at the Quidditch World Cup. "Spread out! Keep moving! Don't let them capture you!"

We all separated, running in different directions and firing spells at the death eaters who were flying around the amphitheater. Some of the spells hit while others harmlessly flew through them. For a while, it seemed we were holding our own. That was until Luna, Ginny, then Hermione were captured by death eaters. Neville was captured next by none other than Bellatrix Lestrange, and shortly thereafter, Fred and George as well.

Bella, Dean, Fleur, and I managed to use our speed to hide among the rocks, benches, and divots the spells had made around the archway and the stage. Unfortunately, we had left Harry exposed by the archway, and that was where Lucius and Rodolphus were slowly walking toward him.

You guys had better be preparing to save me, Harry thought in my direction. Although, he knew that we wouldn't let anything happen to him. As best we could anyway.

"Did you actually … or where you naïve enough … to think that children stood a chance against us?" Lucius asked as he tapped his cane along the ground as he walked.

Harry snorted. "Children. Are you naïve enough to think that we're all children?"

Rodolphus's eyes roamed the ones they had captured, thinking that they were all children. But he didn't take note of who wasn't there. He hadn't been sure how many of us were there to begin with.

"Yes, children," Lucius spat as he spun in front of Harry with his hand out, palm up. "Now, I will make this simple for you, Potter. Give me the prophecy or your friends die."

Edward? What are we going to do? Dean asked from his place not far from me.

"We're going to have to surround them. Maybe try and take some of them out silently?"

Bella and Fleur nodded. "We'll go around that way. Try to get to Hermione, Ginny, and Luna," Bella said almost silently. "You two go that way. Edward, aim for Harry while, Dean, you try to get Fred and George. Lucius can't get that prophecy."

I kissed Bella on the head, then slowly started to follow Dean around the base of the central stone where the archway was located. I wanted to get opposite Lucius and behind Rodolphus. Through Bella, I was able to keep up with her and Fleur's progress as they stopped behind the death eaters holding Hermione, Ginny, and Luna while Dean stopped just before Fred. It seemed they were waiting on my signal.

"Don't give it to him, Harry," Neville called out in response to the death threat made by Lucius, causing Bellatrix to pull back on Neville's hair and hold her wand at his throat with a "tsk, tsk."

Harry paused ever so slightly, wondering if he should hand it over or if he should trust that we would save him and the prophecy. Slowly, ever so slowly, Harry extended his hand—the one with the prophecy—and began to hand it over to Lucius. We all watched as Harry released the prophecy above Lucius's hand, and it fell in slow motion. At the very last moment, just as the stupid little glass ball was about to drop into good old Lucius's hand, a bolt of white light come out of nowhere, hitting Lucius in the chest, forcing him backward and causing the prophecy to smash on the rocky floor below it.

I thought I'd finally hear the entirety of the prophecy from the damn thing itself. Only to hear absolutely nothing when it burst into a million shards, releasing a cloud of smoke.

What the? Bella's thoughts hit me like a ton of bricks, causing me to look through her eyes. I found her looking up and saw flashes of white smoke flying around the amphitheater. But it was the one directly in front of me that really captured my attention and that of Rodolphus because as the smoke hit the ground, Sirius stepped out of it.

It seemed that the intention of the witch or wizard played a part in how you travelled as well. If your intention was dark, so was your smokey appearance. Good and your smokey appearance was white. Light and dark in any situation.

I couldn't help the snicker of laughter when Sirius stepped up to a stunned Lucius Malfoy and uttered the words "Get away from my godson" before knocking Lucius the fuck out.

But it was with those words that the true fighting began. The Order swooped in and forced the death eaters away from their hostages. Spells were being fired in every direction and black and white smoke mixed, and twisted, and fought to beat each other.

Bella and Fleur pulled Hermione, Ginny, and Luna down to where they were coming around the base of the stage while Dean helped Neville, Fred, and George. They all started converging on my position, but I leaped up from where I was hiding and bolted toward Harry. Lucius was just waking up when he saw me running at them; his eyes widened in surprise enough that it caught Rodolphus's attention. But it was too late. By the time he made the turn to face me, I had collided with him and pushed him toward the archway and the invisible veil.

I watched as Rodolphus collided with the shimmering air, only to freeze ever so slightly with a surprised look on his face before ever so slowly leaning backward, his eyes rolling up into his head and simply floating away, only to disappear.

"Nooo!" Bellatrix screamed in anger—not because she cared for her husband but because he was a good, loyal soldier to Voldemort—before she turned into smoke and came at me as fast as she could.

Instead of flinging a series of spells at me, the stupid bloody woman grabbed at me, hoping to bring me along with her. Unfortunately for her, I was a hell of a lot stronger, so I was able to grip her arms, use her momentum, swing her around, and slam her onto the ground next to me, knocking the wind out of her. "Did you really think that would work on a vampire?"

"I don't care. How dare you?" She panted from the floor, slowly working her way to standing.

I frowned, dodging as she threw a spell at me. "How dare I? You came here with the express intention of hurting and killing children, all to get a stupid prophecy, and you ask how dare I?" I flung an expelliarmus spell back at her before using Protego to block another from her before saying, "It's not like you loved him or even cared about him. Why are you fighting so hard for him?"

We traded spells back and forth for a few minutes while she tried to come up with something to say. During this time, the Order got the upper hand on Voldemort's death eaters, and the fighting slowly came to a stop. The only one still giving all that she could was Bellatrix.

"Because the cause needs him!" Bellatrix screamed at me. I thought she was going to fling another spell at me, but this time, a smirk crossed her face before she shot one over my shoulder.

I was too late to block it, and by the time I'd spun around to see who it had hit, Sirius was falling backward and into the veil.

~*~UHS~*~

Oh no! Sirius is into the veil. But will he die? That is the question. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts.

See you in a fortnight!