𝐢. 𝐌𝐈𝐂𝐑𝐎𝐂𝐎𝐒𝐌𝐈𝐂 ; harry j. potter ( UNEDITED )

130. "and maybe then you'll hear the words I've been singin'"

"I virtually lived in the Room of Hidden Things all last year," said Malfoy, his voice brittle. "I know how to get in."

"We was hiding in the corridor outside," grunted Goyle. "We can do Diss-lusion Charms now! And then," his face split into a gormless grin, "you turned up right in front of us and said you was looking for a die-dum! What's a die-dum?"

She was only a few meters away from. Come on... come on...

"Harry?" Ron's voice echoed suddenly from the other side of the wall to Harry's right. "Are you talking to someone?"

With a whiplike movement, Crabbe pointed his wand at the fifty-foot mountain of old furniture, of broken trunks, of old books and robes and unidentifiable junk, and shouted, "Descendo!"

The wall began to totter, then the top third crumbled into the aisle next door where Ron stood.

"Ron!" Harry bellowed, causing Lucia to halt as somewhere out of sight Hermione screamed, and they heard innumerable objects crashing to the floor on the other side of the destabilized wall: Harry pointed his wand at the rampart, cried, "Finite!" and it steadied.

"No!" shouted Malfoy, staying Crabbe's arm as the latter made to repeat his spell. "If you wreck the room you might bury this diadem thing!"

"What's that matter?" said Crabbe, tugging himself free. "It's Potter the Dark Lord wants, who cares about a die-dum?"

"Potter came in here to get it," said Malfoy with ill-disguised impatience at the slow-wittedness of his colleagues, "so that must mean —"

"'Must mean'?" Crabbe turned on Malfoy with undisguised ferocity. "Who cares what you think? I don't take your orders no more, Draco. You an' your dad are finished."

"Harry?" shouted Ron again, from the other side of the junk wall. "What's going on?"

"Harry?" mimicked Crabbe. "What's going — no, DiFiore! Crucio!"

Lucia lunged for the tiara with a quick jump; Crabbe's curse missed her but hit the stone bust, which flew into the air; the diadem soared upward and then dropped out of sight in the mass of objects on which the bust had rested.

"DAMN IT!" she exclaimed, heaving impatiently. Again, so close...

"STOP!" Malfoy shouted at Crabbe, his voice echoing through the enormous room. "The Dark Lord wants Potter alive —"

"So? I'm not killing him, am I?" yelled Crabbe, throwing off Malfoy's restraining arm. "But if I can, I will, the Dark Lord wants him dead anyway, what's the diff — ?"

She let out a faint scream as a jet of scarlet light shot past her head by inches after Harry had pushed away just in time: Hermione had run around the corner behind him and sent a Stunning Spell straight at Crabbe's head. It only missed because Malfoy pulled him out of the way.

"It's that Mudblood! Avada Kedavra!"

Lucia saw Hermione dive aside, and everything flashed like a streak of light as before she knew it harry began to shoot a Stunning Spell at Crabbe, who lurched out of the way, knocking Malfoy's wand out of his hand; it rolled out of sight beneath a mountain of broken furniture and boxes. Lucia took this as a chance and slipped away from the scene to find the diadem once more.

"Segaiolo..." she cursed under her breath as she began climbing carefully on the mountain of objects. She saw the glint of sapphire at the top. Distantly she could hear the fight from below happening.

"Don't kill him! DON'T KILL HIM!" Malfoy yelled at Crabbe and Goyle, who were both aiming at Harry.

Right as the diadem was near her grasp, she had lost her balance and began falling from the height she was in. However Ron, who appeared out of nowhere, caught her right on time.