✓ | PLAY WITH FIRE ⎯⎯ harry potter

forty-one

"Bloody hell, Hermione, that's Harry!"

Marina could relax her tense muscles when Ron and Hermione came to sight. Hermione had turned pink and was quietly muttering an apology, and Ron was reaching a hand out for Harry to take.

When the quartet sat down around the wide table in the kitchen just five minutes later, Hermione explained that they had come to Grimmauld Place alone the same morning. Harry asked about what had happened at Hogwarts the night before. Marina tried to focus hard on her cup of tea in hopes that she could somehow block out Ron's words, but she was failing miserably. Harry must have noticed that she was shaking, for he silently put his hand in her lap and used his thumb to rub circles on the inside of her thigh under the table in hopes to calm her down.

"Dunno where they came from," Ron said, mouth full of the chocolate Remus had left behind. "They came into the Common Room and began firing spells at us. There were lots of them, and we tried to fight back, but most of us ended up in the Hospital Wing. They even got Bill. I tell you, he's got nasty scars on his face now. The others were afraid of what Fleur was going to say, but she didn't mind them. She thought it made him braver or something."

"Most of the students were fine when we left," Hermione explained. "But... I don't know if you know, Harry... But Dumbledore..."

"I know he was murdered," Harry answered sharply.

Hermione gulped before continuing, "and some students were also killed."

"Well, that's one way to put it," Ron scoffed. "The Death Eaters went crazy - blasting everything and everyone they saw. You should have seen Bellatrix. She got into the Great Hall and-"

"What?" Marina gasped. Harry let go of his grip on her thigh, and the warm feeling he had created was replaced with cold air. Merlin, how she hated the cold.

"Yeah! She set fire to the whole place and shattered the windows, and then someone tried to stop her but she just-"

"Bellatrix?" Marina said, needing him to confirm that he had spoken her name. "That's not possible."

"I'm telling you, she was there! Surrounded by some other foul Death Eaters."

"That's not possible."

"Why wouldn't it be possible? I mean-"

"BECAUSE I KILLED HER!" Marina shot out of her seat. Ron jumped back; Hermione smacked her hand over her open mouth; Harry's eyes widened. "I didn't mean to, but she was cursing me, and I was so stressed. I remembered a spell I had read in an old Potions book and tried it on her. Suddenly, she was covered in blood, and she fell to the floor."

Silence danced around the room for a long minute. Then, Ron gulped, "what kinda Potions book teaches you to slash someone?"

Somehow, all the pieces fell together with the thought of his name. The reason why she had recognized the Half-Blood Prince's handwriting... The reason why Snape had asked her where she had learned the curse... The reason why he had run to help Bellatrix while she was bleeding to death...

"Snape's," Marina declared, flaring her nostrils. He was the Half-Blood Prince. "Snape taught me the spell. Snape undid the spell after I killed Bellatrix so that she could live. Snape killed Dumbledore and Snape didn't let me fight the Death Eaters who were going to Hogwarts and Snape did the Unbreakable Vow and Snape didn't let Voldemort wipe out my memory last summer-"