"We can die like the heroes before us, or live to be the wicked ones, the wicked ones we're running from." - All Time Low, Take cover
The moment her finger touches the Mark, my scar burns savagely, the starry room vanishes from sight, and I'm standing upon an outcrop of rock beneath a cliff, and the sea is washing around me, and there is a triumph in my heart - they have the twins.
A loud bang brings me back to where I'm standing, Harry and I gripping each other in an attempt to stay upright. Disorientated, I raise my wand, but the witch before me is already falling backwards: she hits the ground so hard that the glass in the bookcases tinkles.
"I've never Stunned anyone, except in our DA lessons," says Luna, sounding mildly interested. "That was noisier than I thought it would be."
And sure enough, the ceiling has begun to tremble. Scurrying echoing footsteps are growing louder from behind the door leading to the dormitories: Luna's spell has woken the sleeping Ravenclaws.
"Luna, where are you?" I hiss, as Harry and I stumble. "We need to get back under the Cloak!"
Luna's feet appear from out of nowhere: we hurry to her side, and she lets the Cloak fall back over us all as the door opens and a stream of Ravenclaws, all in their nightclothes, flood into the common room. There are gasps and cries of surprise as they see Alecto lying there unconscious. Slowly, they shuffle in around her, a savage beast that might wake at any moment and attack them. Then one brave little first year darts up and prods her backside with his big toe.
"I think she might be dead!" he shouts with delight.
"Oh, look," whispers Luna happily, as the Ravenclaw's crowd in around Alecto. "They're pleased!"
"Yeah...great..."
I close my eyes, and as my scar throbs I choose to sink again into Voldemort's mind...he's moving along the tunnel into the first cave...he's chosen to make sure of the locket before coming...and that won't take him long...
There's a rap on the common-room door and every Ravenclaw freezes. From the other side, I hear the soft, musical voice that issues from the eagle door knocker: "Where do vanished objects go?"
"I dunno, do I?" snarls an uncouth voice that I know belongs to that of the Carrow brother, Amycus. "Alecto? Alecto? Are you there? Have you got them? Open the door?"
The Ravenclaws are whispering amongst themselves, terrified. Then, without warning, there comes a series of loud bangs, as though someone is sounding a gun into the door.
"ALECTO! If he comes, and we haven't got the Potters -- d'you want to go the same way as the Malfoys? ANSWER ME!" Amycus bellows, shaking the door for all he's worth, but still, it will not open. The Ravenclaws are all backing away, and some of the most frightened begin scampering back upstairs to their beds. Then, just as I start to wonder whether I should open the door and stun Amycus, a second, most familiar voice rings out beyond the door.
"May I ask you what you are doing, Professor Carrow?"
"Trying -- to get -- through this damned -- door!" shouts Amycus. "Go and get Flitwick! Get him to open it, now!"
"But isn't your sister in there?" asks Professor McGonagall. "Didn't Professor Flitwick let her in, earlier this evening, at your urgent request? Perhaps she could open the door for you? Then you needn't wake up half the castle."
"She ain't answering, you old besom! You open it! Garn! Do it, now!"
"Certainly, if you wish," says McGonagall, with awful coldness. There is a gentle tap of the knocker, and the musical voice asks again, "Where do vanished objects go?"
"Into non-being, which is to say, everything," replies McGonagall.
"Nicely phrased," replies the eagle door knocker, and the door swings open.
The few Ravenclaws who remain sprint for the stairs as Amycus bursts over the threshold, brandishing his wand. Hunched like his sister, he has a pallid, doughy face and tiny eyes, which fall at once on Alecto, sprawled motionless on the floor. He lets out a yell of fury and fear.
"What've they done, the little whelps?" he screams. "I'll Curciate the lot of 'em 'til they tell me who did it -- and what's the Dark Lord going to say?" he shrieks, standing over his sister and smacking himself on the forehead with his fist. "We haven't got 'em, and they've gorn and killed her!"
"She's only Stunned," says McGonagall impatiently, who has stooped down to examine Alecto. "She'll be perfectly all right."
"No, she bludgering well won't!" bellows Amycus. "Not after the Dark Lord gets hold of her! She's gorn and sent for him, I felt me Mark burn, and he thinks we've got the Potters!"
"'Got the Potters'?" says McGonagall sharply. "What do you mean?"
"He told us the Potters might try to get inside Ravenclaw Tower, and to send for him if we caught 'em!"
"Why would Harry and Haylee Potter try to get inside Ravenclaw Tower? They belong in my house!"
Beneath the disbelief and anger, I hear a little strain of pride in her voice, and affection for Minerva McGonagall swells inside my heart.
"We was told they might come in here!" says Carrow. "I dunno, why, do I?"
Professor McGonagall stands up, and her beady eyes sweep the room. Twice they pass over the place where we're standing.
"We can push it off on the kids," says Amycus, his pig-like face suddenly crafty. "Yeah, that's what we'll do. We'll say Alecto was ambushed by the kids, them kids up there," he looks up at the starry ceiling towards the dormitories, "and we'll say they forced her to press her Mark, and that's why he got the false alarm...he can punish them. Couple of kids more or less, what's the difference?"
"Only the difference between truth and lies, courage and cowardice," says McGonagall, who has turned pale, "a difference, in short, which you and your sister seem unable to appreciate. But let me make one thing very clear. You are not going to pass off your many ineptitudes on the students of Hogwarts. I shall not permit it."
"Excuse me?"
Amycus moves forwards until he is offensively close to Professor McGonagall, his face within inches of hers. She refuses to back away, but looks down at him as if he is something disgusting she has found stuck to a lavatory seat.
"It's not a case of what you'll permit, Minerva McGonagall. Your times over. It's us what's in charge here now, and you'll back me up or you'll pay the price."
And he spits in her face.
I pull the Cloak of off us, raise my fist, and in unison, Harry and I shout, "You shouldn't have done that."
As Amycus spins around, I'm already swinging, and my fist collides with his jaw with a crack. Immediately after, Harry shouts, "Crucio!"
The Death Eater is lifted off his feet. He writhes through the air like a drowning man, thrashing and howling in pain, and then, with a crunch and a shattering of glass, he smashes into the front of a bookcase and crumples, insensible to the floor.
"Nice," I say through a wince, shaking out my stinging hand.
"I see what Bellatrix meant," Harry tells me, blood thundering through my brain, "you really need to mean it."
"Potters!" McGonagall whispers, clutching her heart. "Potters -- you're here! What --? How--?" She struggles to pull herself together. "Potters, that was foolish!"
"He spat at you," Harry says.
"Potter, I -- that was very -- very gallant of you -- but don't you realise --?"
"Yeah, we do," I assure her. Somehow her panic steadies me. "Professor McGonagall, Voldemort's on the way."
"Oh, are we allowed to say his name now?" asks Luna, with an air of interest, pulling off the Invisibility Cloak. This appearance of a third outlaw seems to overwhelm McGonagall, who staggers backwards and falls into a nearby chair, clutching at the neck of her old tartan dressing gown.
"I don't think it makes any difference what we call him," Harry tells Luna, "he already knows where we are."
In a distant part of my brain, the part that connects to my angry, burning scar, I can see Voldemort sailing fast over the dark lake in the ghostly green boat...he's nearly reached the island where the stone basin stands.
"You must flee," whispers McGonagall. "Now, Potters, as quickly as you can!"
"We can't," I say. "There's something we need to do. Professor, do you know where the diadem of Ravenclaw is?"
"The d-diadem of Ravenclaw? Of course, not -- hasn't it been lost for centuries?" She sits up a little straighter. "Potters, it was madness, utter madness, for you to enter this castle --"
"We had to," Harry says. "Professor, there's something hidden here that we're supposed to find, and it could be the diadem -- if we could just speak to Professor Flitwick --"
There is a sound of movement, of clinking glass: Amycus is coming round. Before Harry, Luna, or I can act, Professor McGonagall rises to her feet, points her wand at the groggy Death Eater and says, "Imperio."
Amycus gets up, walks over to his sister, picks up his wand, then shuffles obediently over to McGonagall and hands it over along with his own. Then he lays down on the floor beside Alecto. McGonagall waves her wand again, and a length of shimmering silver rope appears out of thin air and snakes around the Carrows, binding them tightly together.
"Potters," says McGonagall, turning to face us again with superb indifference to the Carrows' predicament, "if He Who Must Not Be Named does indeed know you are here --"
As she says it, a wrath that is like physical pain blazes through me, setting my scar on fire, and for a second I'm looking down upon a basin whose potion has turned clear, and see that no golden locket lay beneath the surface --
"Potters, are you all right?" says a voice, and I come back: I'm clutching McGonagall's hand to steady myself.
"Ah -- sorry," I say quickly, grabbing Harry's shoulder. "Look, times running out, Voldemort's getting nearer. Professor, we're acting on Dumbledore's orders, we have to figure out what he wanted us to find!"
"But we have to get the students out first," Harry adds, taking the words from my mouth. "It's us Voldemort wants, but he won't care about killing a few more or less, not now--"
Not now he knows we're hunting Horcruxes; I finish the sentence in my head.
"You're acting on Dumbledore's orders?" she repeats, with a look of dawning wonder. She draws herself up to her fullest height. "We shall secure the school against He Who Must Not Be Named while you search for this -- this object."
"Is that possible?"
"I think so," McGonagall says drily, "we teachers are rather good at magic, you know. I am sure we will be able to hold him off for a while if we all put our best efforts into it. Of course, something will have to be done about Professor Snape --"
"Let us --"
"-- and if Hogwarts is about to enter a state of siege, with the Dark Lord at the gates, it would indeed be advisable to take as many innocent people out of the way as possible. With the Floo Network under observation and Apparition impossible within the grounds --"
"There's a way," Harry says quickly, and we explain about the passageway leading into the Hogs' Head.
"Potters, we're talking about hundreds of students --"
"I know, Professor, but if Voldemort and the Death Eaters are concentrating on the school boundaries, they won't be interested in a few kids Disapparating out of the Hog's Head."
"There's something in that," she agrees. She points her wand at the Carrows, and a silver net falls upon their bound bodies, ties itself around them and hoists them into the air, where they dangle beneath the blue and gold ceiling, like two large, ugly sea creatures. "Come. We must alert the other Heads of House. You'd better put that Cloak back on."
She marches towards the door, and as she does so, she raises her wand. From the tip bursts three silver cats with spectacle markings around their eyes. The Patronuses run sleekly ahead, filling the spiral staircase with silvery lights as we hurry back down.
Along the corridors, we race, and one by one, the Patronuses leave us: Professor McGonagall's tartan dressing gown rustles over the floor while we jog behind her.
We've descended two more floors when another set of quiet footsteps join ours. Scars still prickling, Harry and I hear it first, and we reach for the Marauder's Map, but before we can reach it, McGonagall becomes aware of our company. She halts, raises her wand ready to duel, and says, "Who's there?"
"It is, I," says a low voice.
From behind a suit of armour steps Severus Snape.
Hatred boils up inside me at the sight of him: I've forgotten the details of Snape's appearance in the magnitude of his crimes, forgotten how his greasy, black hair hangs in curtains around his thin face, how his black eyes have a dead, cold look. He's not wearing nightclothes but is dressed in his usual black cloak and he, too, is holding his wand ready for a fight.
"Where are the Carrows?" he asks quietly.
"Wherever you told them to be, I expect, Severus," says McGonagall.
Snape steps nearer, and his eyes flit over McGonagall into the air around her, as if he knows Harry and I are here. We hold up our wands too, ready to attack.
"I was under the impression," says Snape, "that Alecto had apprehended an intruder."
"Really?" says McGonagall. "And what gave you that impression?"
Snape makes a slight flexing movement on his left arm, where the Dark Mark is branded into his skin.
"Oh, but naturally," says McGonagall. "You Death Eaters have your own private means of communication, I forgot."
Snape pretends not to have heard her. His eyes are still probing the air all about her, and he is moving gradually closer, with an air of hardly noticing what he's doing.
"I did not know that it was your night to patrol the corridors, Minerva."
"You have some objection?"
"I wonder what could have brought you out of your bed at this late hour?"
"I thought I heard a disturbance," says McGonagall.
"Really? But all seems calm."
Snape looks into her eyes.
"Have you seen Harry and Haylee Potter, Minerva? Because if you have, I must insist --"
McGonagall moves faster than I can believe: her wand slashes through the air and for a split second I think that Snape is going to crumple, unconscious, but the swiftness of his Shield Charm is such that McGonagall is thrown off balance. She brandishes her wand at a torch on the wall, and it flies out of its brackets: I abandon my plan to curse Snape to pull Luna out of the way of the descending flames, which become a ring of fire that fills the corridor and flies like a lasso at Snape --
And suddenly it is no longer fire, but a great black serpent that McGonagall blasts to smoke, which reforms and solidifies in seconds to become a swarm of pursuing daggers: Snape avoids them by forcing the suit of armour in front of him, and with echoing clangs the daggers sink, one after the other, into its breast --
"Minerva!" says a squeaky voice, and looking behind me, I see Professors Flitwick and Sprout sprinting up the corridor towards us in their nightclothes, with the enormous Professor Slughorn panting along at the rear.
"No!" squeals Flitwick, raising his wand. "You'll do no more murder at Hogwarts!"
Flitwick's spell hits the suit of armour behind which Snape has taken shelter: with a clatter, it comes to life. Snape struggled free of the crushing arms and sends it flying back towards his attackers: Harry, Luna, and I have to dive sideways to avoid it as it smashes into the wall and shatters. When I look up again, Snape is in full flight, McGonagall, Flitwick, and Sprout all thundering after him: Snape hurtles through a classroom door, and moments later, I hear McGonagall cry, "Coward! COWARD!"
"What's happened, what's happened?" asks Luna.
Harry and I drag her to her feet, and we race along the corridor, trailing the Invisibility Cloak behind us, into the deserted classroom where Professors McGonagall, Flitwick, and Sprout are standing at a smashed window.
"He jumped," says McGonagall, as we run into the room.
"You mean he's dead?" Harry and I sprint to the window, ignoring the yells of shock at our sudden appearance.
"No, he's not dead," says McGonagall bitterly. "Unlike Dumbledore, he was still carrying a wand...and he seems to have learned a few tricks from his master."
With a tingle of horror, I see in the distance a vast, bat-like shape flying through the darkness towards the perimeter wall.
There are heavy footfalls behind us, and a great deal of puffing: Slughorn has finally caught up.
"Harry! Haylee!" he pants, massaging his large chest beneath his emerald-green silk pyjamas. "My dears...what a surprise...Minerva, do, please explain...Severus...what...?"
"Our Headmaster is taking a short break," says McGonagall, pointing at the Snape-shaped hole in the window.
"Professor!" Harry and I shout, hands at our foreheads. I can see the Inferi-filled lake sliding beneath me, and I feel the ghostly green boat jump into the underground shore, and Voldemort leap from it with murder in his heart --
"Professor, we've got to barricade the school, he's coming now!"
"Very well. He Who Must Not Be Named is coming," she tells the other teachers. Sprout and Flitwick gasp; Slughorn lets out a low groan. "The Potters have work to do in the castle on Dumbledore's orders. We need to put in place every protection of which we are capable, while they do what they need to do."
"You realise, of course, that nothing we do will be able to keep out you You-Know-Who indefinitely?" Flitwick says.
"But we can hold him up," says Sprout.
"Thank you, Pomona," says McGonagall, and the between the two witches there passes a look of grim understanding. "I suggest we establish basic protection around the place, then gather our students and meet in the Great Hall. Most must be evacuated, though if any of those who are over-age wish to stay and fight, I think they ought to be given a chance."
"Agreed," says Sprout, already hurrying towards the door. "I shall meet you in the Great Hall in twenty minutes with my house."
And as she jogs out of sight, we can hear her muttering, "Tentacula. Devil's Snaree. And Snargaluff pods....yes, I'd like to see the Death Eaters fighting those."
"I can act from here," says Flitwick, and although he can barely see out of it, he points his wand through the smashed window and starts muttering incantations of great complexity. I hear a weird rushing noise, as though Flitwick has unleashed the power of his mind into the grounds.
"Professor," I say, approaching him, "Professor, I'm sorry to interrupt, but this is important. Have you got any idea where the diadem of Ravenclaw is?"
"...Protego horribilis -- the diadem of Ravenclaw?" he squeaks. "A little extra wisdom never goes amiss, Potter, but I hardly think it would be much use in this situation!"
"She only meant -- do you know where it is? Have you ever seen it?"
"Seen it? Nobody has seen it in living memory! Long since lost, boy!"
I feel a mixture of disappointment and panic. What, then, is the Horcrux?
"We shall meet you and your Ravenclaws in the Great Hall, Filius!" says McGonagall, becking us to follow her.
We've just reached the door when Slughorn rumbles into speech.
"My word," he puffs, pale and sweaty, his walrus moustache aquiver. "What a to-do! I'm not at all sure whether this is wise, Minerva. He is bound to find a way in, you know, and anyone who has tried to delay him will be in most grievous peril --"
"I shall expect you and the Slytherins in the Great Hall in twenty minutes, also," says McGonagall. "If you wish to leave with your students, we shall not stop you. But if any of you attempt to sabotage our resistance, or take up arms against us within this castle, then, Horace, we duel to kill."
"Minerva!"
"The time has come for Slytherin House to decide upon its loyalties," interrupts McGonagall. "Go and wake your students, Horace."
We don't stay to watch Slughorn splutter: we run after McGonagall, who has taken up a position in the middle of the corridor and raises her wand.
"Piertotum -- oh, for heaven's sake, Filch, not now --"
The aged caretaker has just come hobbling into view, shouting, "Students out of bed! Students in the corridors!"
"They're supposed to be, you blithering idiot!" shouts McGonagall. "No go and do something constructive! Find Peeves!"
"P-Peeves?" stammers Flitch, as if he has never heard the name before.
"Yes, Peeves, you fool, Peeves! Haven't you been complaining about him for a quarter of a century? Go and fetch him, at once!"
Flich evidently thinks McGonagall has taken leave of her senses, but hobbles away, hunch-shouldered, muttering under his breath.
"And now -- piertotum locomotor!" cries McGonagall.
And all along the corridor the statues and suits of armour jump down from their plinths, and from the echoing crashes from the floor below, I know that their fellows throughout the castle have done the same.
"Hogwarts is threatened!" shouts McGonagall. "Man the boundaries, protect us, do your duty to our school!"
Clattering and yelling, the horde of moving statues stampede past Harry and me: some of them smaller, and others larger than life. There are animals too, and the clanking suits of armour brandish their swords and spiked balls on chains.
"I've always wanted to use that spell," McGonagall says in an undertone before snapping back into her senses. "Now, Potters, you and Miss Lovegood had better return to your friends and bring them to the Great Hall -- I shall rouse the other Gryffindors."
We part ways at the top of the next staircase: Harry, Luna, and I run back towards the concealed entrance to the Room of Requirement. As we run, we meet crowds of students, most wearing travelling cloaks over their pyjamas, being shepherded down to the Great Hall by teachers and prefects.
"That was the Potters!"
"Harry and Haylee Potter!"
"It was them, I swear, I just saw them!"
But we don't look back, and at last, we reach the entrance to the Room of Requirement. I lean against the enchanted wall, which opens to admit us, and we speed back down the steep staircase.
"Wh --?"
As the room comes into view, I slip down a few stairs in shock, stumbling once again into Harry's side. It's packed, far more crowded than when we left. Dad, Sirius, Kingsley, and Lupin are looking up at us, as are Oliver Wood, Katie Bell, Angelina Johnson, and Asher Saunters, Bill and Fleur, and Mr and Mrs Weasley.
"Harry, Haylee, what's happening?" Dad asks, meeting us at the foot of the stairs with a brief hug.
"Voldemort's on his way, they're barricading the school -- Snape's run for it -- what are you doing here? How did you know?"
"We sent messages to the rest of Dumbledore's Army," Fred explains. "You couldn't expect everyone to miss the fun, Hayles, and the DA let the Order of the Phoenix know, and it all kind of snowballed."
"What first?" calls George. "What's going on?"
"They're evacuating the younger kids and everyone's meeting in the Great Hall to get organised," Harry says.
"We're fighting," I add, and the reality of this situation hits me like a tidal wave. This is it. The endgame.
There is a great roar and a surge towards the foot of the stairs: we're pressed back against the wall as they run past us, the mingled members of the Order of the Phoenix, Dumbledore's Army, and our old Quidditch team, all with their wands drawn, heading up into the main castle.
"Come on, Luna," Dean calls as he passes, holding out his free hand; she takes it and follows him back up the stairs.
The crowd is thinning: only a little knot of people remain below in the Room of Requirement, and Harry and I join them. Mrs Weasley is struggling with Ginny and Asher. Around them stands, Dad, Sirius, Lupin, Fred, George, Bill, and Fleur.
"You're both underage!" Mrs Weasley shouts at Ginny and Asher as we approach. "I won't permit it! The boys, yes, but you two, you've got to go home!"
"We won't!"
Ginny's hair flies as she pulls her arm out of her mother's grip.
"We're in Dumbledore's Army --"
"-- a teenagers gang!"
"A teenagers gang that's about to take him on, which no one else has dared to do!" says Fred, throwing an arm over Asher's shoulders. "We just got Ash back, Mum, don't scare him away!"
"They're sixteen!" shouts Mrs Weasley. "They're not old enough! What were you two thinking, bringing them with you --"
Fred and George look slightly ashamed of themselves.
"Hey!" Asher bursts out. "I came all the way from France for this! All I've done for the past two years is sulk and run away from everyone, I'm done!" Tears are forming in his brown eyes now. "I'm avenging my sister, you can't stop me -- Haylee, tell her!" He looks at me desperately, and it takes all my willpower not to cry. All I can see is Taylor staring back at me, so stubborn and defiant that it's as infuriating as it is awe-inspiring.
"Ash, you're underage --"
"I'm only a year younger than you!" he says tearfully.
"And I don't want to see you go the same way as Taylor," I say firmly, and my voice breaks. Everyone stares at me: Harry and I have made a habit of not speaking about her, so much so that her name has become a taboo.
"Mum's right," Bill says gently, and I'm grateful for the attention to be taken off me, for it's an immense effort not to cry. "You can't do this. Everyone under-age will have to leave, it's only right."
"I can't go home!" Ginny shouts, angry tears sparkling in her eyes. "My whole family's here, I can't stand waiting there alone and not knowing and --"
Her eyes meet Harry's for the first time. She looks at him beseechingly, but he shakes his head, and she turns away bitterly.
"Fine," she says, staring at the entrance to the tunnel back to the Hog's Head. "We'll say goodbye now, then, and --"
There is a scuffling and a great thump: someone else has just clambered out of the tunnel, overbalanced slightly and fallen. He pulls himself up on to the nearest chair, looks around through lopsided horn-rimmed glasses and says, "Am I too late? Has it started? I only just found out, so I -- I --"
Percy splutters into silence. Evidently, he had not expected to run into most of his family. There is a long moment of astonishment, broken by Fleur turning to Lupin and saying in a wildly transparent attempt to break the tension, "So -- 'ow eez leetle Teddy?"
Lupin blinks at her, startled. The silence between the Weasleys seems to be solidifying like ice.
"I -- oh yes -- he's fine!" Lupin says loudly. "Yes, Tonks is with him -- at her mother's."
Percy and the other Weasleys are still staring at one another, frozen.
"Here, I've got a picture!" Lupin shouts, pulling a photograph from inside his jacket and shoving it at Fleur, Harry, and I, and I see a tiny baby with a tuft of bright turquoise hair, waving fat fists at the camera.
"Aw, Remus, he's beautiful," I coo, my heart swelling with affection for the baby.
"I was a fool!" Percy roars, so loudly that Lupin nearly drops his photograph. "I was a pompous prat, I was a -- a --"
"Ministry loving, family-disowning, power-hungry moron," says Fred.
Percy swallows. "Yes, I was!"
"Well, you can't say fairer than that," says Fred, holding out his hand to Percy.
Mrs Weasley bursts into tears. She runs forwards, pushes Fred aside and pulls Percy into a strangling hug, while he pats her on the back, his eyes on his father.
"I'm sorry, Dad," Percy says.
Mr Weasley blinks rather rapidly, then he too hurries to hug his son.
"What made you see sense, Perce?" George enquires.
"It's been coming on for a while now," says Percy, mopping under his glasses with a corner of his travelling cloak. "But I had to find a way out, and it's not so easy at the Ministry, they're imprisoning traitors all the time. I managed to make contact with Aberforth, and he tipped me off ten minutes ago that Hogwarts was going to make a fight of it, so here I am."
"Well, we do look to our prefects to take the lead at times such as these," says George, in a good imitation of Percy's most pompous manner. "Now, let's get upstairs and fight, or all the good Death Eaters'll be taken."
"So, you're my sister-in-law now?" says Percy, shaking hands with Fleur as they hurry off towards the staircase with Bill, Fred, and George.
"Ginny! Asher!" barks Mrs Weasley.
Ginny and Asher have been attempting, under cover of the reconciliation, to sneak upstairs too.
"Molly, how about this," Sirius says. "Why don't Ginny and Asher stay here, then at least they'll be on the scene and know what's going on, but they won't be in the middle of the fighting?"
"I --"
"That's a good idea," says Mr Weasley firmly. "Ginny, you stay in this Room, you hear me? You, too, Asher. You're an honorary Weasley, so you have to listen to me."
Ginny doesn't seem to like this idea much, but under her father's unusually stern gaze, she nods. Asher, on the other hand, seems touched by Mr Weasley's words and agrees to stay behind, also. Without another word, Mr and Mrs Weasley head for the exit, leaving us alone with Dad and Sirius. Both of their eyes seem glassy.
"How d'you feel?" Harry asks, and I take this oppurtunity to catch my breath -- to breathe before before the storm begins.
"It feels just like old times," Sirius says thoughtfully. "Hm, might be the last chance we get to say that."
My heart gives a strange sort of palpatation inside my chest. "You think we're going to lose?"
"No," Sirius says firmly, and I can see a fire burning behind his eyes, "I think you're about to kick Voldemort back into whatever hell the bastard crawled out of."
"And then we're going to retire to somewhere nice and tropical," Dad adds with a chuckle, juxtaposing his best friend's grim seriousness, "and I'm going to lock you two in a cellar so I can finally stop worrying about you."
Harry and I laugh. "Sounds good to me," I say, and I feel tears pricking beneath my eyes. "I think our days of saving the world are over once this is done."
Dad smiles tearfully. "Don't forget to leave room for all the autographs."
Silently, Harry takes my hand and squeezes. "We just need to beat Voldemort to get there," he says through a sigh, but when I look into his eyes, I know we're both thinking the same grim thought; there are still two Horcruxes out there.
As if he can read our minds, Dad drops his attempts at humour, his entire persona changing. "Your Mum told me once that there's this old Muggle saying: May you be in heaven half an hour before the devil knows you're dead. I've never been a religious man, but if things go sideways and we all end up there, meet me at the bar."
Under normal circumstances I might have laughed, but the impeding doom in the air is pressing down on my lungs. "Hey, we're a family, all of us," I say, grabbing Sirius' hand, "and we only just got each other back, so you two had better stay alive."
"Well, my track record's pretty bad in that department, but I'll try my best. And Harry, Haylee," Dad says, reaching forward and cupping the sides of our faces. "I know I'm technically only seven years older than you, but your old Dad has an order for you: go out there and give them hell, you were born to do this."
"And if we're up there in that bar and you're not, we'll be looking down," Sirius adds, tears streaming down his cheeks. "We'll always have your back. 'Till the very end."
And then the four of us hug as if we'll never see each other again, and James Potter and Sirius Black step into the fray, knowing that if we say anything else, we'll never have the courage to part ways.
"Where's Ron?" I ask, wiping stray tears from my cheeks. "And Hermione? And Riley?"
"They must have gone up to the Great Hall already," Asher says.
"I didn't see them pass us," Harry says.
"They said something about a bathroom," says Ginny, "not long after you left."
"A bathroom?"
We stride across the room to an open door leading off the Room of Requirement and check the bathroom beyond. It's empty.
"You're sure they said bath --?"
But my scar begins to sear, and the Room of Requirement vanishes: I'm looking through the high, wrought-iron gates, with winged boars on pillars at either side, looking through the dark grounds towards the castle, which is ablaze with lights. Nagini lays drapes over my shoulders, and I'm possessed with that cold, wicked sense of purpose which precedes murder.
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Hey everyone! Just a super quick note for anyone who might have missed it: the first few chapters of my new George Weasley fic, Take Cover, are live on my profile, and it would mean the world to me if you all checked it out and told me what you thought :) I'm trying to pump out the first couple of chapters, so updates will be pretty frequent for a little while!
And one more thing for anyone who likes a little more insight into the writing of these chapters! I highkey reccomend listening to the songs at the beginning of each chapter while you read for maximum pain. Music has always been one of my key inspirations while writing, but the next few songs just hit different.