Chapter 8
"They're coming!" Ron shouted, understanding what was happening. "His name, it'll bring them!" The others knew, but they hadn't had a run-in with the Snatchers, they didn't know how quickly they would show up. He looked out the window Harry was just as Harry shoved Ron down beside the table nearby.
The windows were blasted in, the shattering the first noise of the attack. Hermione and Rebecca were the first two to their feet, their wands out to defend against the curses the Death Eaters flying around the outside of the house sent in.
Xenophilius dodged the flying furniture and crumbling stone to run to the door, holding his hands up at the arrivals. "Stop! I've got them! I've got them both! I can have Luna back now! That's all I-"
Hermione pulled Rebecca back to the floor. Harry and Ron were caught in the middle of the house and they were calling for the girls to get to them so they could apparate to safety. The blasts from his house sent Xenophilius sprawling down the steps, his voice raising higher for Luna to be returned at last.
The Death Eaters in the air coordinated their next move, raising the top of the Lovegood home away from the bottom to bury those inside in the rubble.
Rebecca closed the circle by grabbing one of Hermione's hands and one of Ron's. The four disapparated as the first rocks began to fall.
Ron jumped to his feet in the trees they landed in. "That treacherous little bleeder!" He was shocked that someone so close to home, literally, could have betrayed them. "Is there no one we can trust?"
Harry grabbed Hermione's arm to make sure she was alright. Then he held his hand out for Rebecca to get up from where the stayed. "It was because he supported us so proudly."
"He was desperate. Luna's been gone a while, especially-" Rebecca's voice cut off abruptly. They weren't alone.
The Death Eaters had followed them.
Fenrir was with the group, his teeth bared as they recognised their presence. "Hello there, beauties."
The little one, the leader who had been with Fenrir months earlier, waved at them.
Hermione took a half-step back, her mind running through options. There were too many Death Eaters there to fight there way out. And the Snatchers hadn't done anything yet--they were just staring at them.
Rebecca and Harry launched into simultaneous motion, sprinting with Ron and Hermione just steps behind.
Scabior grinned. He loved a good chase. "Don't just hang about, snatch 'em!"
Rebecca pumped her arms and legs faster than she thought possible, her feet flew on the leaves passing under her feet. Harry turned his head to make sure Ron and Hermione were close behind, and the first spell broke out. The Snatchers sent jinxes ahead of where Harry and Rebecca were leading their escape, the Death Eaters hoped to slow them down enough to grab the four madly running undesirables.
Hermione cried out as the tree less than a foot ahead of her shattered into pieces.
Rebecca sent a counterspell back over her shoulder blindly, catching one of the Snatchers chasing after them in the chest. He flew through the air and landed on a Death Eater farther behind.
The path Harry had chosen brought the four runners to the top of a hill. Once over the crest, gravity propelled them faster.
"Incarcerous!" One of the Snatchers' curses caught Ron in the back. He let out a grunt as the chains that wrapped around his ankles and wrists sent him to the ground in a pile.
"Split!" Harry cried out, shoving Rebecca off to the right while he went to the left.
Hermione continued ahead, weaving between the directions Harry and Rebecca had gone in. Harry's path was fairly clear, but Rebecca's was littered with fallen, dead trees. She continued at the breakneck pace they had been at since the chase began, her wand still in hand.
Chains wrapped around the trees around her, but the Snatchers pursuing her could never manage to get her.
Rebecca looked over her shoulder to see if the Snatchers were far enough behind she could loop back to the others. She never noticed the tree that laid over the path ahead.
Didn't notice, that is, until she looked back to where she was going just in time to run face first into it.
Harry forze in the clearing his path ended in, Hermione ahead of him just barely. There was no sign of Rebecca joining them, no sight, no sound.
A flicker of movement in the corner of her eye gave Hermione an idea. She jumped theatrically and fling her wand at Harry with a jinx under her breath. Hopefully, the Snatchers would think Harry caught it from one of their own.
Harry fell backwards, holding his face. A line of fire went through his lightning bolt as a vision began.
"Where is it?" Voldemort demanded of an old man in a cell. "Tell me, Ollivander!"
"With him, of course." Ollivander smiled weakly. "Buried in the earth. That is where it rests."
Voldemort apparated out, leaving the old man with the knowledge that he had just provided Lord Voldemort with the location of the Elder Wand.
"The Hallows!" Harry whispered as Hermione crouched by his side. "They're real. He only wants the last one. He knows where it is! You-Know-Who has found the Elder Wand!" Hermione took of Harry's glasses and tucked them into her pocket. "Where's Rebecca and Ron?" He asked, unable to see.
More Snatchers filed into the clearing, one carrying a scraped and bloodied-nose Rebecca and one dragging a fighting Ron.
"Don't touch her!" Ron shouted. "Don't touch any of them! I'll-I'll-"
"You'll what?" Scabior asked. "What are you going to do?"
Ron fought harder against the one holding his arms back. "What'd you do to her?"
Her glasses dangled from one ear loosely, the lens spiderwebbed with cracks. Her nose continued to bleed, as did the scrapes Ron could see now that she was closer.
Scabior laughed. "Didn't do nothing to her, she did that all herself." He glanced at Hermione. "Your little boyfriend's going to get a lot worse than this if he doesn't behave himself." Scabior turned and punched Ron in the stomach hard enough to force him to double over.
Scabior approached Harry and looked him over. "What happened to you, ugly?" The Death Eater was nearest was taken aback, thinking that Scabior had been talking to him. "No, not you. You. What's your name?"
Harry realised that they didn't know who they were, not yet at least. "Dudley. Vernon Dudley."
Scabior turned his nose down at Rebecca's swelling face. "And her?"
"Petunia Dudley."
Scabior barked for the Death Eater holding the logs to check the names before marching over to Hermione. "And you, lovely? What do they call you?"
Hermione stared up at him. "Penelope Clearwater, half-blood."
Scabior traced a hand alongside Hermione's face before turning at the sound of the Death Eater flipping through the book clearing his throat. "There's no Vernon Dudley in here."
"Do you hear that, ugly? The list says you're lying. How come you don't want us to know who you are?"
Harry shook his head. "The list is wrong. I told you who I am!"
Scabior grabbed Harry by the face and tilted it up so he could see better. Harry's hair shifted and the bottom of his scar showed. Scabior used the end of his wand to lift Harry's hair further. "Change of plan, gents. We're not taking this lot to the Ministry."
They were disapparated to an unknown location and forced to walk, though to the three conscious travellers, this was nothing new. Rebecca had been flung over Fenrir's shoulder for the first leg of their journey, but came to shortly into the trek.
Fenrir dropped her to the ground without bending, leaving her to groan and curl onto her side.
"Petunia!" Harry shouted, using the opportunity to fill her in on the story they had fed the Snatchers in case they managed to fool them--though it seemed unlikely. "Petunia, are you alright?"
"Peachy." Rebecca winced as Cabior grabbed the neck of her shirt and pulled her to her feet. Before she walked, she held her glasses out. "Are you gonna fix these or is the hairy one a seeing-eye dog too?"
Scabior held his hand up to stop Fenrir from attacking her. "Course we'll fix 'em, lovely." He charmed her glasses back into one piece and then dangled them over his shoulder as they walked.
Fenrir took over the hold on Harry with extra force after her dog remark.
On they walked, stumbling and cursing over every tree root Scabior seemed to be aiming for. In the distance, a hedge appeared with wrought iron gates at the end of a long pavement. Fashioned up on top of the gate was a familiar coat of arms.
Bellatrix was on watch at the gate that night. She approached the gate as the visitors arrived and put her face against the cool metal with her boredom obvious. Scabior tilted his head and grabbed the top of Rebecca's hair force her forward while showing off the scar on her forehead and around her eyes. At Scabior's instruction, Fenrir did the same to Harry to show off his lightning bolt.
Bellatrix turned to the servant beside her slowly, almost as if she were afraid of scaring away the best thing that could have been brought to them. "Get Draco." She whispered.
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Malfoy Manor was frigid. That was the first thing Rebecca noticed. It was hardly warmer inside than it was outside and the snow had only just begun to leave in earnest. Then, she noticed that the house was very dark and very green. An array of different hues of emerald graced any of the furniture that wasn't black, and the walls were adorned only with solemn portraits.
Lucius and Narcissa stood behind Draco as their son was charged with looking over the two bodies in front of him. Both faces were disfigured, but he knew who they were in an instant.
Bellatrix pulled Harry's hair so that his head was tilted up to the light. "Well? Is it them?"
Draco shook his head, acting like he had to think about it. "I can't be sure."
Lucius stumbled forward. "Are you sure, son?"
Draco flinched as Lucius grabbed the back of his neck.
"If we are the ones to hand the Potters over to the Dark Lord, all would be forgiven! E-everything could go back to the way it was!"
"We won't be forgetting who actually caught them now, will we?" Scabior asked, stepping away from the Snatchers that held Ron and Hermione.
Lucius turned towards Scabior and began to shout, daring a lowly Snatcher to argue with him again.
Draco's eyes fell back to Harry and Rebecca. He looked over the scrapes on Rebecca's face, the marks. He wondered if the Snatchers had done it.
Bellatrix grabbed Draco's hand and brought him closer. "Don't be shy, sweetie. Come on over and take a look." He was pulled down to one knee, held at eye-level to who he had always thought were his enemies. "Now, if this isn't who we think it is and we call him, he'll kill us all."
"What's wrong with his face?" Draco asked, gesturing to Harry's bulbous appearance. "And hers."
"What is wrong with their faces?" Bellatrix asked loudly, interrupting the argument behind.
"He came to us like that, something he picked up in the forest I reckon." Scabior chuckled. "Her? She ran into a bloody tree."
"And you didn't get a glimpse of her before hand?" Bellatrix demanded.
"She was too fast." Scabior muttered. He wasn't going to have it over his head that he brought the wrong people and called the Dark Lord. "They all ran too fast before we got a good look."
"Of maybe!" Bellatrix's voice grew shrill. "Maybe he ran into a stinging jinx! Was it you, dearie?" Bellatrix toyed with her wand as she crossed the room to Hermione. "Let's see what her last spell was. Give me her wand."
Fenrir plucked it from the collection of wands they had gathered from the travellers. Draco stared at Rebecca's eyes, continuing even as Narcissa grabbed him by the shoulder and brought him back to where they had been before.
"What is that?" Bellatrix asked in a low, dangerous voice. The Sword of Gryffindor was in one of the Snatchers hands. "Where did you get that from?"
"It was in her bag when we searched her." The Snatcher sensed a fragility in Bellatrix's tone. "Figured it's mine now."
Bellatrix launched into motion, stunning the Snatcher who had had the Sword into the air so that he landed near the entrance to the house. With another spell, Fenrir was being strangled with the collar of his shirt and a whip shot out of her wand and wrapped around Scabior's throat.
Ron and Hermione stood where they were no longer held in place, petrified at the fit of lunacy taking place.
"GO! GET OUT!" Bellatrix screamed at the retreating figures of the Snatchers. She picked up the Sword and laid it down gently on the cabinet nearby. Bellatrix shoved Ron to the ground towards Harry and Rebecca and narrowed her eyes on Hermione. "Put them all in the cellar! I want to have a little conversation with this one."
Wormtail grabbed the backs of Ron and Harry's necks before either of them could cause any trouble, leaving Rebecca to try and run across the room to get between Hermione and Bellatrix.
"Don't!" Rebecca tried to shout. "Don't-"
Bellatrix cackled and sent a bolt of electricity out of her wand at Rebecca, making her drop to the ground twitching.
Hermione stood tall, trying to keep from showing any weakness. She clenched her hands into fists and held them at her sides to still their shaking.
Draco bit his tongue so hard his mouth was flooded with the hot taste of blood and conflicting feelings. He needed to make a decision. It felt like his had already been made.
Harry scurried across the cement floor as Rebecca was tossed down the stairs to the cellar. He held her head up off the ground it had hit roughly. Her eyes moved under her eyelids quickly, her breath came in quick gasps. Just as the brunt of the bolt of electricity from Bellatrix faded, it renewed itself stronger.
"What are we going to do?" Ron cried out over his shoulder from the gate that Wormtail had locked before he left. "We can't leave her alone with Hermione!"
"Ron?" A voice called out from the back of the cellar. "Harry?" A body stepped out of the shadows.
Ron opened the Deluminator so that a ball of light would fill the lantern that sat unlit. "Luna?" He and Harry asked in unison.
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Rebecca opened her eyes and found that the ache emanating from the back of her head was only rivaled by the ache coming from the extremities of her body.
"Drink some water." Luna said softly, handing Rebecca the spoon from the bucket that Draco brought them each evening.
"Luna?" Rebecca asked, confused. Maybe she was dreaming, maybe nothing had really happened, maybe Hermione hadn't-"Hermione. Where's Hermione?"
A scream echoed through the house above and Rebecca's heart leapt to her throat.
"We have to do something!" Ron shouted, shaking the bars to the gate that locked them into the cellar. "I'LL KILL YOU! I'LL KILL YOU, Y-YOU-"
"There's no way out of here." Rebecca turned to the old man speaking and could hardly believe that it was Ollivander. This man had aged decades since he had last been seen in Diagon Alley. "We've tried everything. It's enchanted." She looked behind Ollivander to see who else was in the Malfoy cellar. There was Dean, as well as a goblin from Gringotts based on his uniform.
Ron flipped the Deluminator behind his back so that the cellar was plunged back into darkness as the door at the top of the stairs turned and Wormtail descended again.
"Let her go." Ron blocked the gate's opening.
"Shut up!" Peter hissed, his hand shaking as he held his wand out at Ron's chest. "Goblin--Griphook! Come!"
Rebecca grabbed Griphook's arm as he walked past her and brought him into a hug, hoping it looked as if she were only wishing him goodbye. "It's fake. Please, it must be a fake." She whispered.
"No pissing about!" Peter shouted, prompting Griphook back into motion.
The goblin made no indication as to whether or not he would lie for them.
"What as that?" Harry asked, taking Rebecca's arm and pulling her to her feet. "What did you do?"
"Something." Rebecca shook her head and brought the bottom of her shirt to her face. The blood that had dried left her skin feeling tight and scrubbing it away gave her hands something to do.
Dean stood where Harry had been. "So you're here now."
"So we are." Rebecca looked him over. "It's good to see you."
Dean looked down and spoke softly, not looking her in the eye. "You never heard anything from...from anywhere about Seamus, did you?"
Rebecca shook her head and laid her hand on his shoulder. "Not a word. That's all we can hope for."
Hermione let out a scream, renewed in its agony. Rebecca went to the gate and looked it over. The bars were close together, but not like they were on the windows. She stuck her arm out and got up to her shoulder out. Her mind was moving through possibilities, magical rules from prank making, ideas. Enchanted may not have blocked the most basic of ideas.
"Keys not in it." Ron muttered, shaking with rage. "I already tried that."
Rebecca winced as she slipped farther through the bars. "I'm not looking for a key."
Harry crossed his arms, holding himself together as he realised what she was thinking--as he realised it could work. "You don't have you wand! How are you supposed to fight-"
"We need a distraction for Hermione!" Rebecca turned her head and winced as the bars caught on her ears. She wedged her way through the best she could, forcing through what didn't fit. She dropped to the ground and caught herself with her hands, her shoes slipping off as her feet were the last bit to get out.
"Griphook's head was too big." Ollivander spoke weakly. "We tried, all of us. We couldn't fit."
"It's alright." Rebecca took her shoes from Harry and turned to look up the stairs as the door opened and someone descended.
Draco ignored the fact that Rebecca was on the wrong side of the gate. "Silent, blood traitors!" He shouted and then held a finger to his lips. "Punch me." He whispered to Rebecca. "A good one."
Rebecca cocked her fist back and launched it into his cheek, hoping it would bruise darkly.
Draco stumbled back into the wall and grinned. "Knew you'd do it."
"What are you doing?" Harry demanded quietly. "Why are you helping us?"
"Because it's a choice." Draco looked at Rebecca as he repeated himself. "It's a choice."
Rebecca nodded once. There was no time for anything else to be said on the subject. "Where's Hermione upstairs?"
"Left, then right. Keep right until there's an arch, that's the room." Draco turned his wand around, holding the handle out to her. "You knocked me out and took it from me, yeah?"
"I thought I already did." Rebecca crept up the stairs, her grip on the wand tight. She was ascending into a house full of Death Eaters, but she the only fear she felt was that she wasn't moving fast enough. Another of Hermione's screams tore through the air, prompting Rebecca on faster.
Downstairs, Draco could feel Harry and Ron's eyes boring holes into him, he could hear their whispers. The only reason either boy looked away from the blond was because the crack of an apparation sounded out behind them.
"Dobby?" Draco asked, recognising the shadowy form.
"Master Draco!" Dobby's voice carried no fear or pain, but the joy in greeting an old friend. "And Harry Potter!"
"What are you doing here, Dobby?" Harry asked, kneeling to one knee and pulling the house elf into a hug. "It's not safe here!"
"Dobby has come to rescue Harry Potter, of course." Dobby smiled and stepped out of Harry's embrace. "Dobby will always be there for Harry and Rebecca Potter."
"You can still apparate in and out of the Manor?" Draco enquired from outside the gate. He had tried unlocking it with his wand days earlier, but only Wormtail's could. "Does that mean you can take them with you then?"
"Of course, sir." Dobby took the hand Draco held through the gate and held it tightly. "I'm an elf."
Harry sprang into action, finally feeling like there was a way he could be of use. "Dobby? I want you to take Mr Ollivander, Luna, and Dean first. Okay?"
Dobby nodded.
Ron looked up with an idea. "Take them to Shell Cottage on the outskirts of Tinworth. There'll be help there."
Luna took Dean's arm and stepped next to Dobby, Ollivander already on the other side. "Whenever you're ready, sir."
Dobby smiled grandly up at Luna. "'Sir?' I like her very much!" Dobby gave Harry and Ron a hard stare, concentrating before he transported so many. "Meet me at the top of the stairs in ten seconds."
Harry was shocked at the commanding tone Dobby took on, it was the first order any of them had ever heard Dobby give.
Draco laid his head back against the wall as he heard movement outside the door at the top of the stairs--he hoped that Rebecca had gotten away from whomever was approaching.
Wormtail gasped at the sight of Draco lying limp against the bars and, once he got to the bottom, he opened the gate to move farther into the cellar to beat whichever of the prisoners had done this. Peter could already imagine the punishments he would receive simply for Draco being down there in the first place.
Ron brought his fists up to his chin, ready to fight the man-servant. Before Wormtail could even narrow down where the prisoners were in the darkness, a spell hit him in the back and he fell to the ground unconscious.
Draco pushed himself to his feet and rubbed at his cheek where he could already feel the mark beginning. Dobby held up Wormtail's wand warily, never fully trusting the devices that made wizards able to do magic. "Who gets his wand?"
"I'll take it." Harry said, holding his hand out for it.
"No, I will." Draco looked Harry over, thinking over the possibilities of what was waiting for them upstairs. "If we get caught up there, I'll say Wormtail told me to bring you up for his arrival."
"Or you'll kill us with our backs turned and get away with it." Harry shook his head. "I'll take the wand, Dobby."
"We don't have time for this, Pott-Harry!" Draco grit his teeth. "You need to get up there, save Granger, and get your sister before he comes! You won't get out of here alive...not after."
Harry stared at Draco, not understanding why he was acting this way. Then Harry remembered how Draco refused to kill Dumbledore on top of the Astronomy Tower. Harry considered that maybe Rebecca was right--maybe people could choose differently, that they weren't destined to follow the paths of their family.
"Fine." Harry pushed Draco up the stairs to get him moving. "But we go now."
Rebecca had snuck up on the three Snatchers positioned around the ground floor of the manor one by one, still not sure how she managed to do it. Draco's wand seemed to be helping her, keeping the stuns as silent as possible.
While Harry and Ron were getting Luna, Dean, and Ollivander out of the cellar, Rebecca stood at the doorway to the room Griphook had been brought to.
"I'm only going to ask you once more, goblin. Think very, very carefully before you answer!"
Griphook answered Bellatrix plainly. "I already told you. I don't know."
"You don't know?" Bellatrix laughed. "Why weren't you doing your job? Who got into my vault?!"
"Because I've been in a cellar?" Griphook countered. A slap rang out through the room.
Rebecca bent down and peered into the room, relieved to find that Hermione was off to the side and left alone for the moment. Around Hermione, a puddle of blood continued to fill from the deep, jagged cuts down her forearm.
When Rebecca saw what they spelt, she lost control of her choices. Hermione needed revenge. Rebecca jumped and rolled into the room, casting away Bellatrix's wand and catching it as she stood.
Hermione kicked Bellatrix's feet out from under her and swung a leg over her, landing as many blows on her torturer as she could.
Harry and Ron filed into the room, Draco lingering in the doorway. Harry stunned Lucius back into a decorative coat of armour where he lie on the floor and Ron dueled with Narcissa, holding his own.
Draco stepped further into the room, and the actions around the room froze. Bellatrix dragged Hermione to the middle of the room, holding Hermione by the hair with her bloody knife against her throat.
Rebecca took a step forward, but Bellatrix shouted for her to stop. "You can't bring them back without their head, can you?" She pulled Hermione's hair harder, forcing Hermione to her toes.
"I don't know what you're talking about." Rebecca said, standing still. "You're mad."
Bellatrix ignored the jest at her sanity. "Don't lie to me! Drop you wands! All of you!" Bellatrix made a small cut across Hermione's throat when they failed to move fast enough. Three clatters echoed around the room. "Pick them up, Draco."
Draco hesitated, but only momentarily. Bellatrix must not have seen how he had entered the room--what side he had entered on. Draco picked up the wands slowly, slipping the last back into Rebecca's hand. She held it up against the back of her arm, knowing she couldn't act at the moment.
Bellatrix turned and surveyed Harry with a grin. "Well, well, look who's shiny and new! Just in time for the Dark Lord. Call him, Draco!" Draco turned to them, a different wand in his hand. "Call him now!"
Lucius had struggled to his feet from the armour pieces and stared at his son as the boy shook his head. "Worthless swine!" Lucius roared, throwing Draco to the ground and kicking him savagely multiple times before righting himself and pushing his hair away from his face. He held his arm out towards Ron and Harry, pulling his sleeve above his elbow to reveal the mark.
Rebecca wasn't sure why Lucius didn't turn to her, but it was a good thing he hadn't. Rebecca lunged forward and brought Hermione to the floor as Dobby sent the chandelier careening to the floor. It shattered in the exact spot Hermione and Bellatrix had been moments before.
Rebecca pulled Hermione to her feet and shoved her towards Ron's open arms.
Draco looked up at his father from the floor and didn't see the man that had tormented him for so many years, for a lifetime, but the monster that he was. Draco decided right then that he was going to be a coward. Not anymore.
"STUPEFY!"
There was so much anger, so much hurt that Draco put behind the spell, Lucius soared through the room before hitting the ground and sliding further.
Rebecca was still opposite the room from the others, her wand held up at Bellatrix as the woman steadied herself.
Harry, Ron, and Hermione were beside Dobby who stood on the bannister to the stairs. Griphook moved closer to them, sensing an exit coming.
"You almost killed me, elf!" Bellatrix screeched.
"Dobby never meant to kill. Dobby only meant to maim or...seriously injure."
Narcissa went to curse Dobby, but Dobby snapped his fingers so that her wand shot through the air to his hand.
"You dare take a witch's wand? You defy your masters?!" Bellatrix screamed. Her grip tightened on her knife and Rebecca felt as if time had slowed down.
She was still across the room, too far to get to Harry's side in time for the exit she too felt approaching. But there was hope for them still. Draco moved to her side, as if her plan had been shared aloud. They took two steps in their direction when Dobby began to speak.
"Dobby had no master."
They made another step.
"Dobby is a free elf."
They were half way across the room now, perfectly between Bellatrix and the group.
"And Dobby has come to save his friends!"
Bellatrix's arm flung up over her head as Dobby grabbed onto Harry and Ron's shoulders. The others knew to hold onto the web of apparation one way or another. Rebecca launched herself up into the air.
She knew entirely that there was no way she could make it to Dobby before he was gone. But, Rebecca hoped, she would be able to keep the knife from hitting any of them.
The knife sank into the flesh between her shoulder blade and her spine as if her skin was nothing more than butter. Hot fire radiated out from the muscles severing along the blade.
Draco looked over his shoulder as he caught her. The blood had already soaked through the back of her shirt and continued to flow around the knife's handle.
"They got away?" Rebecca whispered. "Draco, tell me they got away?"
Draco nodded, looking back to her. The others were gone. "They got away, they're safe."
Rebecca closed her eyes. "Thank fuck."
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