TOGETHER (A HARRY POTTER LOVE STORY) 4

16

MILLIES POV:

"Hello?" I called, earning myself a round of 'shut up!''s from the other three.

I didn't get a response, anyway. Ron got to his feet and peered around the tree Harry had just straightened up from.

"Don't think there's anyone there," he whispered, squinting through the trees. "It's too dark to tell-"

And then, without warning, the silence was rent by a voice unlike any I had heard in the wood; and it uttered, not a panicked shout, but what sounded like a spell-

"MORSMORDRE!"

And something vast, green and glittering erupted from the patch of darkness Ron's eyes had been struggling to penetrate; it flew up over the treetops and into the sky. Mione grabbed my hand so tightly I began to lose feeling in my fingers.

"What the-?" gasped Ron, stumbling backwards into Harry.

For a split second, I thought it was another leprechaun formation. Then I realised that it was a colossal skull, composed of what looked like emerald stars, with a serpent protruding from its mouth like a tongue. As I watched, it rose higher and higher, blazing in a haze of greenish smoke, etched against the black sky like a new constellation-

Both my stomach and heart dropped so quickly I thought I might throw up.

The wood all around us erupted with screams, but they sounded distant as I stared up at the skull, which had now risen high enough to illuminate the entire wood, like some grisly neon sign.

And as though someone had flipped a switch in my brain, my shocked state turned into instant panic; stumbling forward, I seized the back of Harry's t-shirt and began tugging him backwards.

"What're you doing?" Harry asked, turning around and grabbing my wrists.

"It's the Dark Mark, Harry!" Mione screamed before I could answer, pulling his left hand off my wrist and attempting to pull him with her. "It's his sign!"

"Who's sign-?"

"Voldemort's," I answered breathily, ignoring Ron and Mione's winces and staring determinedly at the Boy-Who-Lived, silently pleading with him to understand.

His wide eye's quickly scanned my face, looking to see if there was any part of me that wasn't serious - but he found none.

"Voldemort's?" he muttered, his grip on my wrist loosening.

"Come on!" Mione insisted, still tugging uselessly on the boy's arm, her face full of fear. "Harry, please-!"

But before we could even take one step, a series of popping noises announced the arrival of twenty wizards, appearing from thin air, surrounding us.

I whirled around, pulling my wrist from Harry's hand; in a split second, I registered one fact: each of these wizards had his wand out, and every one of them was pointing right at us. Without pausing to think, I yelled, "DUCK!", seizing whoever I could find and pulling them onto the ground.

"STUPEFY!" roared twenty voices - there was a blinding series of flashes and I felt my hair ripple as though a powerful wind had swept the clearing. Raising my head a fraction of an inch I saw jets of fiery red light flying over us from the wizards' wands, crossing each other, bouncing off tree-trunks, rebounding into the darkness-

"Stop!" yelled a voice I recognised. "STOP! THAT's MY SON!"

My hair stopped blowing about. I raised my head a little higher. The wizard in front of me had lowered his wand. Harry was propped up on his elbows, staring at me in disbelief; Mione had rolled over, tears in her eyes; Ron was rubbing his head, a grimace apparent on his face. Squinting up, I saw Mr Weasley striding towards us, looking terrified.