CW: Opens with an attempted sexual assault on an unnamed muggle woman. Feel free to skip the first section if you need to.
Spoiler TL; DR: Hermione sees masked terrorists attack a muggle couple. One threatens to rape a woman, and Hermione (from hiding) turns him into a worm. After this, she does it to the other two terrorising the couple.
A shriek pierced the night, and Hermione's fears were confirmed. Men in black robes with full-face masks rampaged across the long grass and dragged a muggle couple in their twenties from their improvised tent.
"I'll fecking kill ya! Let us go, you dodgy bastards!" a black-haired Irish man shouted, trying to fight off the three masked assailants.
A woman shrieked and pleaded while the men taunted the first man. Wands came out and the muggle man shot into the air feet first. Screams and cries mixed with the cruel laughter.
"Wash that muggle filth's mouth out," the tallest masked man instructed.
Pink suds escaped the black-haired man's mouth and he choked, as it travelled down into his nostrils. Blood soon mixed with the foam, and tears stung his eyes.
Do something! Do something! Fucking do something! Hermione urged herself, still frozen in cat form behind the foliage.
One held the woman by her red hair ignoring her shriek. "Stop it! Stop it! You'll kill him!"
The masked assailant holding her growled, and Hermione could hear the grin. "This one's pretty, innit? I would love a a bit more." He forced the woman to the ground. "Let's just say you look ravishing, darling. Perhaps your man would like to watch?"
"Try it and I'll bite your prick off!" she spat at him.
The man tried to form words but all that came out were gurgles, and the tallest of the masked men shouted at the pervert. "If you're going to insist on sullying yourself by fucking a muggle tart, at least let me leave. I just had supper."
That voice...where do I know it from?
She had to abandon that train of thought as the man's gurgling stopped and his eyes drifted shut. Beneath the floating man, the woman wasn't faring much better, as the would-be-rapist shoved her face into the dirt.
Hermione willed her body to stop shaking and took human form. She held her wand in a death grip and summoned whatever strength she had and whispered a transfiguring spell under her breath. The woman shrieked and flung what was now a worm off of her.
"What the fuck?!" the second masked figure (who hadn't spoken till then) cried and spun around.
"One of the attendees fancies playing hero," the one with the familiar voice said. "Let's find them."
He approached the hedge and Hermione bit her lip and held back the tears threatening to brim over as she summoned the blue-bell flames she had perfected back in first year. Whispering, her voice was no match for the confused screams around her. The man's flesh wouldn't burn, but he would feel the heat.
The man screamed in panic, abandoning his focus on the muggle man to douse the Hermione stopped from hitting the ground, by gently lowering him. Soap bubbles stopped forming from his mouth, but Hermione did see his chest rising and falling.
"Come out, muggle saviour!" the man taunted after the flames died. "Or we'll kill them."
Hermione debated on revealing herself, but couldn't force her legs to move as the man's footsteps grew closer. It was her or them—wasn't it the right thing to do to give herself up?
Who'd warn the others? Hermione wondered, wishing that was the only reason she wanted to stay hidden. I'm a fucking coward! Stupid piece of shit!
Hermione eyed her wand and realised she was stupid. The solution was somewhere crawling in the soil. She swallowed and counted to three mentally before the man with the familiar voice vanished to more confused screams.
Who's the fucking filth now, worm?! Hermione thought ready to aim at the last masked figure.
"This isn't worth it!" he screamed, running off into the distance.
Hermione felt exhaustion from expending so much energy. Sore muscles, a dull mind and fuzzy vision, she had to force herself back into cat form and run back to their camp.
Keeping to the ground, she moved as fast as her wobbly cat legs would allow her. The campground teemed with masked men in black robes, each cackling as they destroyed tents and burned trees.
"Who wants to play with some mudbloods?" a man shouted to whoops and hollers.
Saiyaka! Dean!
They were safe. Hermione got to their camp and dove into the girls' tent before assuming human form again. Upon realising someone had entered the tent, the lot of them sprang to their feet, and raised their wands, only to lower them on the realisation it was Hermione.
"We're under attack!" Hermione gasped.
"Baka!" Saiyaka cried, throwing her arms around her.
"I know," Hermione freed herself and threw Saiyaka her jacket. "We need to get the boys and go."
The girls exited the tent to see Mr Weasley and the boys waiting for them outside the tent, unharmed in sleepy confusion in pyjamas. Hiro, his black hair messier than usual and wearing a coat and her school scarf. She wondered if the chill and time difference added to his confusion, as she approached him and took his hands.
"Mi-chan, are you okay?" he asked, brushing his thumb over a cut on her cheek, she didn't realise she had.
She nodded. "There are men attacking in the camp. Masked, and I don't know how many."
Hiro drew his wand and looked over her head, trying to find the assailants.
Hermione turned to Mr Weasley, who already had his wand out, along with Charlie, Bill and Percy. Harry, Ron nearly did the same when Fred and George, of all people, stopped them. The sounds of shouting and screaming now filled every corner of the night sky, echoing off what looked like burning tents in the distance.
"Masked men in black robes are attacking people," Hermione explained. "They're targeting muggles and muggle-borns."
"Right," Mr Weasley nodded. "There won't be any muggles to target, the ministry booked the whole camp. Should just be the camp owners."
"And anyone who comes and sets up a tent on the outskirts regardless," Hermione swallowed the bile burning her throat as she thought of the muggle couple from earlier. "What of the muggleborns."
"Let us worry about that," Bill surveyed them. "You lot should get somewhere safe."
Percy ran up to them, fully dressed and brandishing his wand as he clutched a stitch in his chest. "Dad, everyone," he gasped. "Spoke to Mr Crouch, we're sending the underage witches and wizards into the forest. A bunch of adult volunteers will guard until the aurors come."
"Does everyone know that?" Harry asked, straightening his glasses. "What about the muggles?"
"How long are they expected to sit tight for the bloody aurors?" Anya asked.
"As long as you need to," Percy said, straightening his posture.
Anya shook her head and began to speak, before Kaori clung to her arm with a shaking hand. "Don't leave. Please."
Anya resigned. Percy showed no such inclination when his father and brothers pleaded he join them. Mr Weasley shook his head and squeezed Percy's shoulder. "We don't have time to argue. You're an adult now..I can't…" he gulped, unable to finish before turning to the twins. "Fred, George, you're in charge. Keep them safe."
The twins nodded with rare solemnity before Fred grabbed Ginny's hand to head into the forest.
They were a large group, impossible to all fit under Harry's invisibility cloak, and Hermione didn't know who to suggest should take it. Harry was an obvious target by blood purists as a symbol, and it was his cloak. Saiyaka was a muggle born, and Miyuki had pretended to be one for a stupid bet. Then all of the Weasleys were detested by blood purists...though Ginny was the youngest. And some part of her wanted to suggest Hiro, knowing he'd never listen.
In the chaos, they moved without notice regardless, but they did notice the masked men once they reached the campground owners' cottage. Sickening slurs and cackling sent chills down Hermione's spine and the lot of them ducked behind foliage.
This group of masked men was larger than the ones who terrorised the muggles before. Twelve full-grown wizards all ready for violence. The camp owner's wife hung precariously from her ankle, nearly crying, as she tried in vain to hide her body by righting her nightdress against gravity.
"Get a butcher's of that cow's flab!" the one levitating her said..
"And that nasty scar!" another joined in with a cruel snigger. "Reckon they still dissect their women to bring muggle whelps into the world?! Savages!"
"What the hell are you—!" the camp owner cried before he joined his wife in the air, his scrawny arms flailing as if he could find an anchor in thin air. "How the fuck is this happening?!"
"Too advanced for their filthy muggle brains!" one called.
A small boy of nine or so soon joined his parents, he clutched a stuffed dinosaur to his chest and wailed for his parents, who were now (unconvincingly) assuring him things were fine.
"Mummy!" he cried.
"It's okay, love," she lied through her tears. "J-just hang on to Rexxy, i-it'll all b-be o-over soon."
"Oh," another one of the men sneered, summoning the stuffed t-rex to him, "Is this Rexxy? Not very fierce, is he?" the man ripped its head off, laughing maniacally before slamming it to the ground and stomping on it.
The little boy wailed even harder at this, screaming as if the world had ended. His dark eyes streaming with tears, and little hand reaching for the flattened pile of fabric and stuffing.
"This is sick," Ron hissed.
George gripped both Harry and Ron's wand arms, stopping them from giving away their position. Hermione and Hiro similarly grabbed their wands to act, but Saiyaka and Miyuki made a similar motion, meanwhile Kaori, watched with gritted teeth, clutching her wand, only lowering it when Anya gestured to Hiro. Disgust and remorse warred within her as she likely debated what they all were. Save the child and give up their position, outnumbered or continue to the forest,ignoring the clear need.
Unlike the first time, Hermione couldn't simply scarper away as a bloody cat after attacking. She still felt drained from the two transfigurations and running through the camp. She knew she couldn't take all twelve. Perhaps she could cast one spell transfiguring them, or attacking them, but she knew she didn't have the energy for all twelve. Summoning the muggles to her, or banishing them to a safe place both required more energy than she had, and such spells were dangerous to use on humans. The others were all capable wizards, but was it really worth gambling their safety?
The child screamed louder, shaking Hermione from her thoughts as they began to spin him at breakneck speeds. Dark hair whipped around him and a dinosaur slipper flew off his little foot, as the parents begged them to stop. The twelve cowards howled with laughter,
"This is really fucking sick," Ron stared at the poor child.
Trying to find their way to the forest, two girls about Kaori's age clung to each other, terrified, as so many passed them by, ignoring them as they ran for the forest. Wide eyed and shaking, they craned their necks looking for anyone to give them the time of day.
"Ou est Madame Maxine?" one with curly black hair asked.
"Aide les adultes?" said the blonde, clinging to her arm.
Hermione turned back, she was closer to them than Anya and Kaori, who's vigilance returned to the back of their pack. She clasped her hands together, still burdened with the silly worry of being laughed at. When she and her friends hid in the forest while the adults fought for their lives.
Stupid piece of shit, she admonished herself. They're terrified, offer help.
"S-salut," she waved to them. "Are you alone?"
The curly haired one nodded. "We came with Madame Maxine, our head master. We got separated."
"Thank God, we haven't found a single other French speaker," the blonde said. "I'm is Sophie."
Hermione extended her hand. "I'm Hermione, and Anya over there speaks French too."
"Anya Jenkins?" Sophie asked, standing on her tiptoes, to find the petite girl in their knot of teens.
Hermione nodded. Then translated for Hiro, asking if they should join.
"Better than them being alone, Mi-chan," Hiro agreed, Saiyaka nodding behind him, the twins with Ginny between them on her heels. Anya and Kaori close behind, their wands drawn.
"Hey," Hermione addressed the group in English.
"Not exactly the place for chit-chat, Hermione," Harry reminded her as the throng moved around and through them.
"Right!" Hermione nodded, turning to the French girls. "Suivez-nous!"
"He means now," Ron said, hoisting her over his shoulder.
"Mi-chan!" Hiro gasped before narrowing his eyes at Ron. "Put her down."
"Arsehole!" Saiyaka hissed.
"Oh, now you can speak English!" Ron groaned. "Let's move before we're keer-ooed, yeah?"
"Eloise! Sophie!" Anya called, running up to them, speaking to them in French. "We're going to the forest!"
"Ron," Hermione said. "We'll both run faster if you put me down."
The forest teamed with kids ranging from four to seventeen, the younger ones crying for their parents, older siblings shushing them. Under the thick canopy and silhouettes merged in the darkness. Hermione sorely missed the cat's vision, but couldn't risk morphing in front of so many, even under the cover of darkness. Perhaps Hermione wasn't smart enough to bring Owl's Sight Potion, but someone else here might have been.
"Itai!" Hermione jumped as a heavy boot rolled over her bare toes.
The tall figure backed off and Ron's voice whispered. "Sorry–Erm–Hermione?"
"That was my foot," she hissed, backing up into a familiar torso. "Ah, sorry, Hiro-kun."
"I think that was one of the twins, Mi-chan," Hiro whispered, a hand from her side pulling her into him.
"Can confirm," one of their voices said.
"Itai!" Saiyaka squeaked from somewhere behind her. "Megune! Watashi no megune!"
"What is it, Saiyaka?" Ginny asked.
"Don't move! Lost my—eto—gurasu!" she explained.
"What?" The other twin—Fred—asked.
This was followed by a crack and a whimper.
"This is ridiculous!" Hermione hissed. "Lumos!"
The scene illuminated before her, Saiyaka had tripped over a root and was reaching around for her round framed glasses, which were under Fred's foot. Hermione stepped through the throng to try to check on her, but Fred had repaired the glasses and placed them on Saiyaka's face.
"You okay?" Hermione asked.
Saiyaka nodded, flashing two victory signs and a grin. "Mmm, still have girl power! Right Miyuk-chan?"
Miyuki stifled a laugh. "And Kaori said I was a bad influence!"
Anya stood on her tip-toes to whisper something to Kaori, who simply nodded. Anya translated for Eloise and Sophie. Who then giggled.
"I think you can let go of my hand now, Fred," Ginny said, eyeing their clasped hands. "We're safe and I'm not five."
"At least he didn't throw you over his shoulder like a ragdoll," Hermione grumbled, glaring at Ron.
"You were just standing around, asking to be trampled," Ron hissed back.
"I was helping people!" she hissed. "Honestly!"
"Are you two at each other's throats now?" Harry said.
Another voice chimed in, drawling with a thick smugness even the Japanese and French members of their group could pick up. "Looky, looky, the heroes of Gryffindor cowering in the woods and at each other's throats. Rather hide than save muggle filth? Where's your father, Weasley? Did they already get the fool? They're after muggles, but I bet they'd make an exception for blood traitors."
Harry let out a scornful laugh. "Mr Weasley's fighting to save people. I reckon your dad's one of the nutters wearing masks."
The voice of the tall masked man…Hermione clasped her hands before her and finally knew where she recognised his voice. Lucius Malfoy had been one of the tormentors. And was now writhing in the soil…
Or crushed under foot...She swallowed. Had she indirectly led to the deaths of three men? She hadn't thought that through.
Hiro slipped his arm around her shoulder and lifted her face. "Are you okay?"
She gave him a smile and nodded. I really don't deserve you.
Malfoy scowled at Harry and approached him. "My father is one of the highest ranking members of the ministry. Even famous Harry Potter can't just accuse him of that."
Hermione bit her lip before shaking her head. "Honestly," she sighed. "Look around you, Malfoy. No one gives a shit who your father is (or was, murderer!). We're all just trying not to get killed."
"You might be," Malfoy sneered–very much like his father. "But you see, I think they do care who my father is. Too bad yours couldn't be bothered, think he'll realise he should've kept you locked in the dungeon before or after your funeral? If he shows. Might be grateful to be rid of you; finally realise Mummy Dearest had the right idea tossing you in a rubbish bin."
Rubbish bin behind a Chinese restaurant. Korean Box Baby. Traded for a head of lettuce. Coin Locker Baby...Wait, where did I hear that one? She turned her face down as she realised her own imagination now came up with likely origins, each involving being abandoned, unwanted and now a burden to her father. Why does this still hurt so much after all this time?
"Sorry, my English is not so good," Hiro bowed to Malfoy. "But I think I have it right when I say 'fuck off, you stupid twat!'"
Hermione stared up at Hiro, her mouth hanging as Hiro gave his trademarked crooked smile, and his hazel eyes gave their cheeky twinkle. She admired him for it, but wondered how much he knew, how much he understood.
"I think I like the word," Saiyaka mused, pushing up her glasses. "Arsehole."
Harry laughed. "I reckon those are the best words for Malfoy."
Malfoy clenched his jaw. "Stupid, Japanese tourists! Your brain's as shit as your taste in girls!"
"Stop your squawking before we turn you into something that does!" George shouted.
Hermione surveyed the area, several people were staring at them, their own lumoses dimmed to evade detection, and here they were jeopardising them with their petty arguments. With light around her from the others, the least she could do was obscure their sounds.
"Honestly," she sighed to her friends. "This isn't worth it, he'll never learn. I'm going to ward the perimeter."
"I remember the spells from Tsukiyasha's forest," Hiro said in Japanese. "I'll come with you."
Hermione smiled, taking his hand. She hated the idea of endangering him, but still longed to be near him. And Hiro had proved himself just as capable as she was, and after in truth, Hermione still felt drained. If anyone was with her, she wanted it to be him.
"Separating's a really bad idea," Anya and Fred mentioned at the same time.
Harry and Ron exchanged a look and shrugged taking out their smirked surveying his new friends.
"It's settled then," Harry nodded with a smile. "We'll all go."
"All for one and one for all!" Miyuki leapt up between Hiro and Hermione, wrapping an arm around both of them. "Like the muskitties!"
"Musketeers, Miyuki-chan," Hermione stifled a laugh.
"You'll have to teach us the warding spells though," Ron mentioned. "Probably best if you leave the actual casting to us, you look exhausted."
Hermione nodded before tearing the hem off her night dress. "I think I have enough energy for this." She placed a tracking spell on the long strip of fabric. "Everyone, tie a piece to your wrists. It'll keep us from getting separated."
"Mufflatio," Harry pointed his wand at the tree line.
Ron mimicked Hermione's coached movements "Terreom Sirenus. Won't it go off even if an auror passes through?"
Hermione nodded solemnly before approaching Kaori, who had already successfully cast a spell Harry never heard of on the perimeter. She said something to Hermione in Japanese before placing her hand on Hermione's head, and walking away. Hiro shrugged and Miyuki laughed.
"She said it's cute Hermione didn't think her upperclassmen knew simple wards," Miyuki clarified when she saw Harry's expression.
Harry thought he was starting to like Hermione's friends, and often spoke freely in English as they planned out perimeter points they wanted to ward, deferring to Hermione, Anya or Miyuki for specific words when needed.
"We warded our camp's perimeter when we were stuck in—" Hiro began to explain.
"The fictional world we got Isekai'd to," Hermione finished, unhooking her pinky from Hiro's to monitor the shimmering threads of silver magic floating between the eleven of them to ensure the ones ahead and behind were still in view.
Harry crooked his head to the side. "We're still all in plain view, why are you doing that?"
"I'd know the magic's still working now instead of after we got separated by a breach," she explained.
Harry watched her rehook her pinky into Hiro's and wondered if anything could separate those two.
"I reckon that's not a concern with those two glued together, eh?" Ron whispered into his ear.
Harry chuckled before placing an alarm between two trees and grinned back at Hermione. "You're almost as paranoid as Snape!"
"Oh, piss off with that nonsense!" Hermione rolled her eyes. "Honestly!"
Hiro whispered something in Hermione's ear, sending a furious blush to her cheeks. Hermione leaned in to whisper something and sighed.
Saiyaka made a teasing remark where Harry only understood "lovebirds" and told the rest in English "I'll check to see if anyone else needs help."
"Chikaku ni ite!" Hermione called, before saying something in French to the Beaux Batons girls.
Thumbs ups from each subsection of them indicated they were ready to move on. Ensuring the lot of them were safe, Hermione kept a keen eye on Saiyaka as they moved forward, directing other kids further into the core.
"Oi, Hermione!" Ron called, unfolding a map of the campground.
Hermione ran back to him, clutching a stitch in her chest. "Yeah?"
Ron surveyed the map and pointed to the hiking trails that wound through the forest. "We've covered the treeline here, close to the camp sites and well. Here's the pitch. Where did you first see them?"
Hermione traced a line with her index finger from where they were camped off the pitch to the northernmost tip of the forest, near the river, just out of the forest proper. "Here, they were hollering and I went to investigate."
"A little ways from our camp, innit?" Ron asked.
Hermione shook her head and sighed. "What did you want to say, Ron?"
"This," Ron pointed at the northern trail. "Is our weakest point, I think. We should ward it next."
Harry looked at the two exchanging glances and wished he knew what the two were thinking. Hermione looked over her shoulder to see Saiyaka helping Ginny with a spell. She turned back to the map, running maths in her head.
"We're less than a minute out," Hermione said. "Should a smaller number of us go while the rest go to the core with the others?"
"Fuck no!" Harry said, surprising himself. "Fred and George said it was a bad idea to separate, and I agree."
"They're after muggle borns, Harry," Hermione looked at her friends. "If anyone overheard me tell Mr Weasley that...or if anyone overheard Miyuki pretend to be one with Bagman...and then you and the Weasleys, well, Malfoy said it best, didn't here. They'd be happy to make exceptions for you lot."
"Mi-chan," Hiro said. "We all stay together. It's safer."
On their way to the trailhead, Harry spied familiar faces. Dean Thomas and Seamus Finnegan sat with Cho Chang of all people, among other confused kids waiting to be told it was safe. Though Harry supposed Mrs Malfoy said her dad was a sports columnist, it would make sense for her to be here.
Hermione, Anya, and the Beaux Batons girls directed anyone that didn't speak English to move where most of the kids were gathered at the core. The rest of them redirected those who spoke English.
"Why aren't you going to the core?" Seamus asked.
"We're—erm–-placing wards on the perimeter," Harry explained. "Hermione taught us how."
"Cool!" Dean said. "We should help."
"Erm," Seamus pulled on the taller boy's sleeve. "Dean, I think you should probably go with the others."
Hermione nodded. "If anyone overheard you say you don't know who your father is, and that your mother's a muggle—erm—they'll assume. They're after muggles and muggle borns."
"Neechan," Saiyaka pushed up her glasses. "Fuck you (Hermione's jaw dropped). Just because I'm a muggle-born doesn't mean I need protect! Or he (she pointed at Dean)! We want to help!"
Seamus stared at Dean, and Hermione at Saiyaka who, despite her poor English, had made her message crystal clear. Harry could easily see why Saiyaka and Hermione were so close, with their want to help people while not being underestimated.
Dean wore a similar glare. "Tell me how I can help."
Miyuki pitched in. "Also, Mione-chan forgets she also pretended to be a muggle born. You're in just as much danger as the rest of us."
"Stupid bet," Hermione looked down, ashamed.
"Not that it matters!" Cho Chang said. "I'd want to help too, but did Little Miss Perfect forget about the trace? If we use magic, we're expelled. Probably why she was instructing you instead of casting."
"The trace doesn't work in a place with magical adults," Hermione said. "We're as good as invisible. And I—erm—can't cast something as powerful as the wards we need. I'm maintaining this." she lifted her wrist. "Everyone connected can see the invisible strings, so we don't get separated—it's a lot of energy."
Cho's pretty brown eyes scanned Hermione sceptically before tying her shoulder length black hair into a ponytail, exposing her heart-shaped pale face, and making Harry's heart flutter as she smiled and took out her wand. "Then I'm in."
Hermione ripped more fabric off her nightdress, and expanded the linking spell with on to it. She then wrapped a bit around each of their wrists, silver threads, connecting the torn navy fabric to the new members as the others.
"Alright," Hermione said. "Now that we're connected—-"
A shrill siren cut through the air, the high ringing and flashing red lights filled the forests. Screams joined in, threatening to burst Harry's eardrums as the others they'd previously directed to the core turned to a stampede.
"They tripped the first barrier!" Ron shouted. "Do we go or prote—shit!"
Two masked men in black robes ran into the forest, shooting attacks into the masses. Some dodged, others fell.
"We fall back," Fred yelled, grabbing Ginny's and Ron's arms. "Now!"
"Protego!" Kaori called blocking a hit on a random fleer. "I agree with George!"
"It's F—nevermind! Let's go!"
Harry could barely make sense of the scene, he disarmed one of the masked men before falling back with the group, but more masked men appeared, and the fleeing party scattered, while the lot of them fell into a knot of trees blocking attacks from hiding where they could, and moving on.
None of them knew how to handle the clustered masses running every way. The best Harry, or any of them could do is help the fallen. Hermione became more drained with every counter curse she used. If he could say one thing for Snape, it was that he made Hermione's knowledge of counter-curses and hexes so thorough that she outclasses even the oldest among them.
"I think that's everyone there," Cho returned with Fred and George from the east.
Silver strings grew shorter as the girls from Beaux Batons came from the south and Hermione, Hiro and Kaori from the west.
"They say the south is clear," Hermione said. "West is too."
"Looks like there aren't any more stragglers," said Seamus, surveying the area.
"Too bad everyone will be sitting ducks," Dean mentioned. "All clustered like that."
"W-we–erm—" Hermione clasped her hands together. "We fortified what we—we could. But—erm—" she slapped her forehead. "Stupid piece of shit! I-I-I th–"
Hiro wrapped his arm around Hermione's shoulder and sighed. "We thought big group would be safe if found. Older kids were—eto—"
Miyuki placed a hand on Hiro's arm and sighed. "We thought if they were hidden, fortified and together, it might scare the attackers. The older kids should take defensive positions."
"I know I would," Kaori agreed.
"Us too," Fred said. "I reckon they'll be fine. But we should—-"
Screams in a language Harry didn't recognise came from close by. His legs carried him instinctively to follow the sound, the others gaining ground, each with their wands drawn. Leaping over roots and foliage, barely illuminated, he soon came upon the scene.
A masked man in black robes stood alone among a group of kids wearing orange muggle clothes. Harry couldn't tell how many of them were fleeing, but they ran in one direction, despite a confused girl of sixteen or so, before chasing after a small child that ran off in a separate direction. The man raised his wand, firing into the crowd.
"We'll control the crowd!" Anya said, disappearing into the orange mass with Kaori and Hiro. "Stop him."
"Expelliarmus!" Harry shouted.
"Petrificus Totalis!" a squeaky voice cried at the same time.
Harry turned to see Hermione pointing her wand at the masked man, who now laid unarmed on the ground, as rigid as a plank. Hermione's face drained and her legs wavered, though she continued eyeing the prone man with before, running to turn her efforts to the crowd as well, joined by Saiyaka, and disappearing into the crowd.
Harry turned his attention back to the prone man. Ron knelt by the man and ripped off his mask to expose an unremarkable face of a middle-aged,clean shaven man with milky skin and dirty-blond eyebrows.
"Well that was anticlimactic," Fred said.
"Did you expect it to be someone we knew?" Seamus asked.
Dean shook his head. "We're one great dane short for an 'Old Man Jenkins' reveal."
The two of them laughed and Harry recalled vaguely an old cartoon Dudley pretended to no longer like and joined in on it.
"Is this a muggle thing?" Ron asked.
Ginny shrugged with a sigh. "Don't suppose it matters if we know who it is, so long as the aurors see his face when they catch him."
The crowd now fully dispersed, and Harry found Hermione and Anya with the Japanese lot down in the grass. Hiro hovered over Hermione, who moved her wand, whispering things, while Saiyaka stared ahead. When Harry drew closer, he found a little boy, maybe eleven flanked by Anya and Kaori, while Hermione stitched an open gash on the boy's leg.
"Galyna!" he cried. "Iskam sestra si!"
Anya responded to the boy, gently in whatever language he spoke. Eventually the boy calmed down and talked to her.
"This is Nickolay," Anya explained. "He got separated from his sister."
"From that crowd?" Ron asked. "There's a clearing with high ground over that way (he pointed after consulting the map). Let's go there."
Hermione nodded weakly before ripping yet another strip from her nightdress, and summoned more spectral threads to connect to it. She signed to the boy to give her his wrist and tied it to him while Anya (likely) explained what it did.
Hermione rose to shaky feet and Hiro stabilised her with an arm around her shoulders.
"Daijoubu," she forced a smile.
"Will that petrification spell keep if you pass out?" Cho asked, eyeing the wizard on the ground.
"The spell has to be actively lifted," Hermione explained, stifling a yawn.
"Accio rope," Seamus said.
"Let's not take chances," Dean agreed, helping bind the prone man.
Ginny ran up to them and placed the mask on his abdomen. "Just so there's no doubt he's one of the attackers."
"And I thought I was supposed to be the clever one," Hermione smiled weakly and Ginny blushed with pride.
They made it to the higher ground Ron specified, but no one else was there. The little boy cried once more while Anya tried to comfort him, but she wasn't doing well to hide her concern.
Harry looked over to the lot of them, the Beaux Batons girls huddled together in fear, the Japanese lot exchanging concerned whispers, Hermione barely stood, but still tugged on each of the spectral threads, looking to ensure everyone was still connected.
"I forgot Hermione pretended to be a muggle born for Fred and George's stupid bet," Ron said, eyeing her. "You don't think she'll be—"
"I know Hermione was worried," Harry shrugged. "But I don't reckon they'll have heard or remembered stray comments that suggest someone might be muggle born. Besides, she just has to say her father's a Hogwarts professor."
Though the way Hermione kept staring at Dean,Saiyaka and Miyuki, Harry wasn't sure he believed that.
"Sophie, Eloise," Hermione asked. "Etes-Vous okay?"
Both girls nodded, and Hermione turned her attention to everyone else.
It wasn't just Hermione. Fred and George fussed over Harry, Ron and Ginny, despite the fact that they suffered no injuries.
"Wait!" Anya called. "Does everyone have their wands? Nicolay's lost his."
Each of them still clutched their wands in their hands, Harry's hand almost felt glued around it, and his right hand ached, but none of them could bring themselves to let go of them while they tried to defend the forest.
Harry wondered if all those kids they sent to the centre of the forest were as safe and hidden as they'd hoped. Dean's suggestion and Hermione's reaction to it seemed to suggest that their 'heroics' were gravely misplaced.
Fuck, it's not just Hermione, now I'm starting to sound like Snape.
Harry didn't have time to go down that rabbit hole as a deafening bang sounded from nearby. Each of them jumped to attention, brandishing their wands, Hermione, Anya and the Japanese students forming a protective circle around the small child. Ron and the twins made a similar attempt with Ginny, while Harry joined Dean, Seamus and Cho near the treeline.
It wasn't long before Saiyaka and Hermione turned their attention to the sky.
"Look!"
Everyone stared at the sky, transfixed as billowing smoke of a sickening shade of green coalesced across the moonless and starless night, trailing into one point. A giant skull with prominent cracks took from while tendrils of toxic green made a serpentine loop from an eye socket to the skull's gaping mouth, wrapping around it once more until a snake's menacing visage rose above it, fixing a chilling glare one them, as its unnatural eyes shone like emeralds anticipating prey, and bared fangs dripped with ready venom.
"What the bloody hell is that!" Ron gasped.
They looked to Hermione for answers, but she just stared, frozen at the symbol, her face blanched in terror and the symbol reflected in her now bulging, dark eyes.
"That," Fred breathed. "Is the—"
George finished when Fred swallowed a dry lump. "The Dark Mark."