•••
I fight for the ones
who can't fight;.
and if I lose at least
I tried.
•••
"Row ninety-six", Harry whispered more to himself than to his friends, enlighting the small silver sign saying 'thirty-four' with the tip of his wand. The high shelves surrounded them, row for row like threatening giants, longing into the depths of the hall. They turned left. "Keep your wands ready", Harry breathed, raising his own a little higher.
Passing row for row, eighty-four, eighty-five, Harry was listening strained into the silence for a sign, a whisper, even a breath. But Lynnea might be gagged by now, or else unconscious. Or, said an unbidden voice inside Harry's head, or she might be dead ...
I'd have felt it, he told the voice, his heart hammering against his throat. I'd know ...
"Harry", Hermione muttered, her glowing wand shining into the depths of the darkness; the light fell on the floor, enlightening something that didn't fit into the blackness surrounding them, that didn't match the threatening shadows raising high up the shelves. Like a fire in the night her auburn curls were shining through the darkness.
"Lynn", Harry whispered, and his heart skipped a beat. She was laying on the floor, not moving the tiniest bit. Don't be dead, he thought, ignoring Hermione's mumbled warnungs as he fastened his steps, until he ran. Don't be dead. Please don't be dead!
His footsteps echoed into the silence, crashing like thunder onto the floor. Harry fell to his knees right next to his sisters lifeless body, shaking hands were searching for a pulse, and Harry let out a muffled sigh as he finally found it, while his friends reached him and Lynnea.
"Seems like she's stunned", he muttered. "Lynnea?" Softly Harry grabbed her soulder, giving her a weak shake. "Lynnea, please wake up."
Her eyelids twitced, and slowly they fluttered open, immediately locking with Hary's, and she was highly alarmed, while Harry wondered how he ever could not have noticed that they were like a mirror to his. There was not the tiniest bit of doubt left that this girl was his sister.
"Are you okay?", he asked, examining her face. "I -"
"Harry, you goddamn fool, it's a trap!", she whispered in a fierce voice. "I'm so sorry, this is all my fault, they tricked me, too. I was so stupid. We need to get out of here!"
And she didn't have to tell him twice. But it wasn't as easy as planned. When Lynnea tried to get up, she immediately fell back to the floor as if her feet couldn't carry her. Harry lifted her up, holding the tightly as her legs were shaky and weak. "Don't worry, I got you", he told her.
"It's not that bad, just bit dizzy", she mumbled. "Just a few seconds and I can walk on my own ..."
"Harry?" Neville's voice reminded him of his friends still being around. For a moment he was so overwhelmed by the feeling of actually having a sister that he simpley forgot the world around him. "Harry, there's your name on this."
Curious Harry turned to Neville, who was pointing on one of the small crystal balls in the shelves.
"Take a hold o her", he told Ron, pushing Lynnea carefully in his best friend's arms. She stumbled and Ron took an arm around her waist zo give her hold. Harry threw his sister one last gaze before he turned to Neville again.
•••
Lynnea felt completely numb. Leaning against Ron to not fall back on the floor again her eyes followed her brother making his way to the shelf.
"Please, Harry, let's go now", she whispered, glaring into the darkness with a sinister feeling in her gut. "They're probably still here, they're after you." Her eyes pinched on the shadows, she was almost awaiting Voldemorts pale white face to appear right in front of her. But she couldn't see a thing.
"I don't think you should touch this, Harry", Hermione hissed in an alarmed voice.
"But there's my name on it", Harry replied. Lynnea's eyes flickered back on him, just to see his outstretched hand closing around the ball. She held her breath, sure that something miserable would be happening, but it didn't. Everything remained silent and calm.
"Well done, Potter", a drawling voice spoke from behind. "Now turn around, nice and slowly, and hand it over."
Black shapes were emerging out of thin air all around them, blocking their way left and right; eyes glinted through slits in hoods, a dozen lit wand tips were pointing directly at their hearts; Ginny gave a gasp of horror.
"To me, Potter", repeated the drawling voice of Lucius Malfoy as he held out his hand, palm up. "And you, Weasley, give us the girl." Lynnea's eyes widened. "The Dark Lord wishes her back." She felt Ron's arm tighten around her as he raised his wand higher. Harry's eyes snapped on Lynnea, then to Ron.
"Don't do anything'", Harry muttered. "Not yet-"
A woman let out a raucous scream of laughter.
"You hear him? You hear him? Giving instructions to the other children as though he thinks of fighting us!" It was Bellatrix Lestrange, of that Lynnea was sure.
"Oh, you don't know Potter as I do, Bellatrix", said Malfoy softly. "He has a great weakness for heroics; the Dark Lord understands this about him. Now give me the prophecy, Potter."
"Go on, then", said Harry, raising his own wand to chest height. As he did so, the four wands of Hermione, Neville, Ginny and Luna rose on either side of him. Lynnea felt completely naked and helpless, for my wand was taken from her when they had kidnapped her. Also she still felt extremely weak and wasn't sure if she would be able to stand on her own two feet, if Ron'd let go of her.
"Hand over the prophecy and no one need get hurt", said Malfoy coolly.
It was Harry's turn to laugh.
"Yeah, right!", he said. "I give you this - prophecy, is it? And you'll just let us skip off home, will you?"
"This bores me", Bellatrix said. "Take his sister. Let me play a while with her. Maybe that would change his mind."
Harry moved in front of her, holding a tight grip of the prophecy. "If you get near to her, I'll smash it!"
"He knows how to play", Bellatrix said, grinning.
"So what kind of prophecy are we talking about?", Harry asked.
The smile faded away of Bellatrix' face. "What provecy? Are you joking?"
"No, not joking", he replied. "So why does Voldemort want it?"
Lynnea looked around, fiercely, desperately trying to find a way to get out of here. But they're surrounded by death eaters. It was pointless. There was no chance to get out of this alive. The moment they would start running, a dozen wands wouldn't be hasty to fire spells at them.
A loud cracking noise snatched her back to reality. Some spells were shot and one of the prophecy fell to the floor and broke. A tall white nebulous figure raised out of the splitters and started talking. But Bellatrix shrieks were louder than the white shadow.
"Smash shelves -", Harry muttered quietly, while Lucius Malfoy talked on. "- when I say now -"
"Someone made a prophecy about Voldemort and me?", he said quietly, gazing at Lucius Malfoy. "And he's made me come and get it for him? Why couldn't he come and get it himself?"
"Get it himself?", shrieked Bellatrix, over a cackle of mad laughter. "The Dark Lord, walk into the Ministry of Magic, when they are so sweetly ignoring his return? The Dark Lord, reveal himself to the Aurors, when at the moment they are wasting their time on my dear cousin?"
"So, he's got you doing his dirty work for him, has he?" said Harry. "Like he tried to get Sturgis to steal it - and Bode?"
"Very good, Potter, very good ..." said Malfoy slowly. "But the Dark Lord knows you are not unintell-"
"NOW!" yelled Harry.
Six different voices around me bellowed, "REDUCTO!" Six curses flew in six different directions and the shelves opposite them exploded as they hit; the towering structure swayed as a hundred glass spheres burst apart, pearly-white figures unfurled into the air and floated there, their voices echoing from who knew what long-dead past amid the torrent of crashing glass and splintered wood now raining down upon the floor ...
"RUN!", Harry yelled, as the shelves swayed precariously and more glass spheres began to fall from above. And Ron lifted me up from the ground and he started running.