Adult-FanFiction.org : Harry Potter

It's Not Just Sex	By : Daye Category: Harry Potter > Het - Male/Female > Harry/Pansy Views: 52112 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 3
Disclaimer: I do not own the Harry Potter series, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 10
- 11
As ever all my thanks for to Salon_Kitty for her beta work. This is actually a completely re-written second draft based on her invaluable suggestions and guidance. I hope she finds it better than my first attempt but since its been re-written all the typos and flaws are entirely my bad.

Anyway, this chapter lacks gratuitous sex but makes up for it with gratuitous violence and wizard duels.

Chapter 11: Broken.

Bound with his wrists above his head and attached to the ceiling of the wardrobe in which he had been concealed, Harry hung in the fires of hell. It was possible, a slightly more rational part of his brain interjected that he was being slightly melodramatic, but that was honestly how he felt. He was on fire, anger roared through him, boiling out him as raw uncontrolled magic. The chains rattled and shook under its influence as Harry glared at Draco Malfoy, who’d just shagged his girlfriend’s brains out right in front of him.

Draco tried to keep his familiar smirk on his face. He really did, but faced with the sheer strength of Harry’s glare and the creaking of his supposedly secure bonds, it withered and died on his face. Beneath the anger Harry felt a glimmer of satisfaction; Draco’s one moment of triumph was already over. However, as it faded he could see the fear underneath turn to anger; an echo of Harry’s own feelings of frustration and powerlessness. Draco lifted his wand again, pointing the length of hawthorn at Harry’s chest.

“Stop it!” He shouted, “Stop it, Potter!”

Harry didn’t stop. Quite apart from the fact that he didn’t think Draco actually had the balls to do anything to him, he just didn’t care much at this point whether Malfoy did attack him or not. Instead he started shifting his weight back and forth, straining at his bonds, so ominous creaking sounds were added to the rattling of chains.

Malfoy seemed completely transfixed on him, and completed missed Pansy Parkinson behind. She was sweaty and dishevelled but her face might as well have been carved from marble it was so still. Still Harry hadn’t missed the flash of shock that crossed over her when the doors to his wardrobe had swung open. Whatever else she’d done, she hadn’t known he was here and right now she was very slowly moving across the room to where her jeans, with her wand in the pocket, lay abandoned. Relentlessly Harry rocked back and forth on his bonds, staring at Malfoy with menace in his eyes.

“I said stop it!” Malfoy’s voice cracked and sparks shot out the end of his wand and landed on Harry’s chest, crackling and sizzling and leaving tiny burns where they found his skin. The pain was slight but the unexpected shocks only furthered Harry’s rage and he funnelled the emotions into his magic. This sudden surge of power finally had some results; there was a sudden crack of splintering wood as the bolt holding his chains to the ceiling came partially loose.

Letting loose a small squeal of surprise, Malfoy backed away, light gathering at his wandtip as he prepared a serious curse to stop Harry but behind him Pansy was faster, snatching up her wand and shooting a curse at his back. In her haste, she missed by a clear foot but Malfoy still flinched away from the jet of light and started to turn towards the new threat, which was when the bindings gave way entirely and Harry fell to his knees on the floor with a dull thump.

Caught between two threats; Pansy with her wand and Harry, who was much closer and much angrier, Draco froze with indecision. And that moment of hesitation was enough for Harry to tackle him. Neither of them had had much experience with physical fighting but Harry had the advantage of the initiative as well as the lumps of heavy metal at the ends of his arms. Swinging both arms at once, he clubbed Draco’s wand arm, sending his wand flying from his grasp and then bore the blonde boy the ground, hammering heavy blows down on his face and skull.

Malfoy was screaming in fear but the shrill screeches were cut off into a pathetic gurgling sound as Harry’s fingers found the soft flesh of his throat and squeezed tight, cutting off the bastard’s air.

Pansy was yelling at him and Draco was clawing at his chest and face but Harry ignored them both, his rage finally finding a solid path to vent as he tried to choke the life out of Malfoy. He looked down at Malfoy. Malfoy’s face was distorted with terror, Harry’s blows had split a lip and flattened his nose and his red blood was hideously vivid across pale flesh. His grey eyes were round and bulged with horror at the prospect of his own very imminent demise.

It was that look that did it; almost instinctively Harry’s grip slacked off slightly, even as Draco’s flailing limbs slowed as he ran out of energy to fight. Harry’s grip relaxed enough that Malfoy managed to hiss in the tiniest of breaths. Harry was furious with himself, what was he doing? It wasn’t like he hadn’t killed before. He remembered the Death Eater in the forest after Bill’s wedding that he’d blasted with a lethally strong reductor curse but that had been in the heat of combat. He hadn’t had a choice.

Yes, Harry thought, he was a killer but that didn’t meant he was a murderer. Here, he had a choice, he didn’t have to kill Draco, he just wanted to. His rage was demanding it.

Afterwards, Harry told himself that he wouldn’t have done it. When it kept him awake at night, he told himself that he would have chosen mercy. But at that moment the choice was taken away from him.

The door burst open and two rough men strode inside, shouting and raising wands. Cursing himself as a fool, Harry abandoned his chokehold on Malfoy and instead lunged for the boy’s wand on the floor next to them.

Bellatrix had put him in that wardrobe, Harry thought, so he could see what was going to happen, but she wasn’t fool enough to entrust her prisoner to Draco Malfoy alone. These two had the rough-hewn, dirty look of the Snatchers to them. Full Death Eaters were obviously far too important to be wasted on guard duty and they must have heard Draco’s screams. Luckily however they didn’t seem to be expecting a fight, a disobedient but bound prisoner was all they expected. Two teenagers armed with wands were what they got.

“Expelliarmus!” Harry shouted, in his mind at least as no sound got past the gag that was still lodged in his mouth. It was his old standby and he hadn’t had time to think of anything fancy especially not anything fancy that he could do non-verbally. A scarlet burst of light lanced out at the snatcher with enough force that it would have hurled him back through the door and across the corridor if it had landed. If it had landed; the snatcher twisted aside at the last moment and the spell shot by him without effect but Harry hadn’t waited to see the result. He’d just sent another spell after the first and third one after that. The snatcher flung himself sideways for the second spell but was unable to stop the third one clipping him in the shoulder, throwing him off balance and almost wrenching the wand from his grip. Harry’s forth spell, a stunner, slammed him in the gut and folded him up on the ground unconscious.

The second man was giving Pansy much more of a fight, pressing her back with a series of nasty looking purple curses that were shattering Pansy’s hastily erected shield charms. He was so focused on breaking through her defences that he didn’t notice Harry flanking him until the banishing charm picked him up and propelled him bodily until the wall with teeth-rattling force. The snatcher left a torso sized dent in the wall, rebounded from it and fell to the floor, defeated.

Suddenly the fight was over. Reality snapped back into place for Harry as the rage and adrenaline faded from him, he was naked and had heavy metal manacles around his wrists and had been exerting himself far too much considering he only had his nose to breathe through. He was tired and cold. He shivered uncontrollably and was practically hyperventilating. He found himself on the floor again but had no real recollection of sitting down.

Pansy approached him, but she was still naked and still had Draco’s speed splattered over her face and neck. Harry flinched and shied away from her, repulsed. But she ignored his reaction and tapped her wand against the manacles unlocking them and releasing his arms.

“Easy, Harry,” she said as she reached around his head to get at the gag and removed that as well. Harry sucked in cool refreshing air but looked away from Pansy.

“Get...” he said between pants, “get away from me,”

Pansy blanched and stumbled away from him and back to the bed. Jerkily, she pulled a sheet from Draco’s bed and started to wipe her face and neck with it.

As he recovered himself, a small whimpering sound caught Harry’s attention and he noticed Malfoy, wheezing through his bruised throat, crawling away from him, despite the lack of anywhere to go. Harry stood over him, pointing his own wand down at his face,

“Please, please don’t,” Draco whimpered, “don’t. They made me do it, they made me-”

Harry felt curiously numb. Bare moments ago, he’d been filled with murderous rage now, he felt empty and numb. He wasn’t angry at Pansy and Draco, he didn’t want to kill him. He knew he should, he just felt weary and detached from everything. He whispered ‘Stupefy’ and stunned Draco into unconsciousness. A quick look around didn’t seemed to show any other clothes about, in fact, he’d been hanging in the room’s only wardrobe. Stripping an unconscious body was a lot harder than it had any right to be but eventually he managed to get Draco’s dressing gown off his body and wrap himself in its fine material, rubbing it against himself to chase away the chills in his flesh.

Pansy had also been quick to cover her nudity, only she’d been able to find and don her own clothes, instead of scrounging them from other people. She looked at Harry imploringly,

“Harry...” She said, softly, “I-”

“Don’t,” Harry growled, “Not here, not now.”

“But you have to understand,” Pansy continued heedlessly.

“We don’t have time for this. That,” he nodded towards the two unconscious snatchers, “will not go unnoticed. Let’s go find Ron and Hermione,”

He’d stolen the snatcher’s wands and gotten as far as the door before he realised that without Pansy he had no idea where to go. The rough maps she’d drawn for them before they’d started this ridiculously foolhardy plan were all very well and good but even if he’d remembered them accurately he still didn’t know where he was on them. He almost screamed with frustration.

“And which way would that be?” He said shortly.

“I think they’re in one of the disused cellars,” Pansy said, “So... Left, ‘till we see the stairs; they’ll take us down to the ground floor. Cellar should be the first door on the right after that.”

She looked like she’d wanted to say more than that but Harry just nodded and set off without a backward glance to see if she was following him.

~0~

Ron slowly regained consciousness. The first thing that he noticed was that every part of him that he could mention ached, as well as some parts that couldn’t. His head hammered in quite an unpleasant fashion and as he hauled himself to his feet, he noticed his balance was off and the room was spinning, not hugely but enough to be a distraction. These might have been the usual effects of his experience or signs of a more serious concussion. Ron wasn’t sure; it wasn’t like he’d been beaten to the point of unconsciousness before. So far, he’d not enjoyed the experience.

He didn’t have much of a chance to notice anything else however, before an impact almost sent him staggering back to the floor again as Hermione tackled him around the middle. Catching her in his arms, Ron gratefully returned the hug.

“Ron,” Hermione said, still with her head buried against his chest, “Oh Ron, what are you doing here?”

“You have to ask that?” Ron said, trying to sound nonchalant even as his throat thickened with emotion, “I’m going to get you out of here.”

Hermione tugged him tighter to her at those words and looking over Hermione’s head, Ron realised there were two more sets of wide eyes staring at them in the light provided by his deluminator. With a start he recognised Luna Lovegood and Mr Ollivander, the wandmaker, he felt a sudden wave of embarrassment but resolutely held Hermione close to him all the same. Eventually though Hermione pulled away and, against his instincts, he had to let her go.

“That’s not really what I meant though,” Hermione said, “I meant, how did you get in here? And how did you even know where I was? Did you come alone? Where’s Harry?”

As serious as the situation was, Ron could help but cheer up as her questions washed over him in an unending stream. He hadn’t realised how worried he’d been about her; not knowing what had happened to her, what tortures she might be forced to endure here in the mansion until that worry had been lifted. There was no sense of panic in her voice and her questions came quickly but still in a logical, ordered fashion. If she could still ask questions like that she hadn’t been as terribly affected as she could have been. She was still his same old Hermione. He wanted to hold her again, instead he answered her questions as best he could.

“The deluminator showed us where you were,” Ron said, fishing it out of his pocket again, “Your voice came out of it, and this ball of light as well and it apparated us to Malfoy Manor. I was all for just barging in the front door but Pansy made us come up with a plan first. She pretended to capture us, to get us inside and get her in their good graces so she can spring us all.”

He had to pause for breath at that point and of course, Hermione filled the quiet space with more questions.

“Us? Do you mean Harry came as well? Or did you ask the Order?”

“Of Course, Harry came,” Ron said more forcefully than he intended. Hermione’s eyes filled with tears, and this time Ron did hug her again, stroking her head as he repeated, “of course he did.”

Hermione sniffed.

“You thought he wouldn’t?”

“I-I did say some terrible things to him,” she said, shaking her head.

“We all said some nasty things, Hermione,” Ro said, “Just because of the L-“ Hermione gave him a frantic look so he changed the words into a hasty cough- “Ahem. Because of the stress.” Suddenly, something else occurred to him and hesitantly continued, “I take it you haven’t seen him then? Harry, I mean.”

Another shake of the head.

Well, I’m sure he’s fine,” Ron said firmly.

“So let me get this straight,” Hermione said thoughtfully, “You got Pansy to turn you in, so you could get yourself beaten up and thrown in the cellar here with me and now we’re waiting for Pansy to find us and Harry and bust us all out so we can make our escape?”

“That’s about the long and the short of it.”

“Ron. That’s a terrible plan.”

Ron couldn’t help it. He burst out laughing.

No, honestly Ron!” Hermione said indignantly, “What if one of the Death Eaters had pressed their mark the moment they saw Harry? What if they don’t just let Pansy run around the manor willy nilly? And just how are we going to get out of here if we do break out? We don’t have any wands and I don’t think we’ll be able to disapparate inside the manor’s grounds.”

“Alright, maybe it’s not a great plan,” Ron conceded with a sly smile, “we don’t do so well at it without our genius friend to help.”

Hermione’s worried expression did not diminish.

“Look. We weren’t blind to the dangers here,” Ron said, “we just thought it was worth it to get you out.”

He spared a glance for Luna and Ollivander as well.

“Of course, you two are coming as well,” He said, “We’re not leaving anyone behind if we can help it.”

“Thank you, Ron,” said Luna in the same tone of voice she might have used if he’d passed her the ketchup at breakfast, “that’s very kind of you, of course.”

Silence reigned briefly as Ron watched Hermione’s face. She looked a little drawn and pale as well but in all else she merely seemed pensive and thoughtful. At length he felt compelled to make another comment.

“How long was I unconscious for then?”

“Hard to tell, down here,” Hermione replied, “a couple of hours maybe. I think it’s probably very late evening up there at the moment as far as I can tell.”

“Right,” Ron said, “won’t be too much longer until Pansy comes for us, I imagine.”

“I imagine so,” Hermione replied, without conviction.”

“Yep,” Ron said, “any minute now.”

~0~

In actual fact it was probably the better part of an hour before they heard anything. Finally the sounds of heavy footsteps thudded across the ceiling and then voices; quiet and controlled but still noticeably harsh, drifted through the cracks in the cellar door.

“You’re completely sure this it?” muttered a deep voice.

“Well, no. I won’t be completely sure until we open it up,” said a strained high pitched voice.

“I don’t want to open up the wrong door,” the first voice replied.

“Why? It’s not like any of them are going to be warded or anything,” the second voice hissed back.

“I just don’t want to waste time here.” The voice was mulish and stubborn now.

“Then open the damn door already,” came the reply, which seemed to end the argument.

The door creaked as it swung open, light flooded in; highlighting two familiar silhouettes at the top of the stairs.

“End of the Line, folks,” Harry Potter rumbled, “Everyone out!”

It was obviously supposed to be a joke but the tone struck Ron as entirely wrong, maybe it was just stress, Ron paid it no mind as he ushered the cellar’s captives up the stairs towards Harry. As he did so, he called up the stairs as well:

“Hey there, Harry! We’re ready to go. We’re all ready to go. It wasn’t just Hermione down here. Luna Lovegood and Ollivander are both here too.”

“Crap,” Harry muttered, “Really? How quickly can he move?”

“As quickly as you need me to,” came Ollivander’s hoarse voice. With Luna’s aid he was already at the base of the stairs.

Seeing how Luna immediately moved to help Ollivander up the short flight of stairs to the cellar’s exit, Ron offered his arm to Hermione to do the same. She ignored it and went up on her own as Ron hurried after her. The look on her face as she passed him had been strange; it was a mix of discomfort and steely hard determination. Her lips were pressed into a thin pale line and, not for the first time, Ron reflected that Hermione must have been taking lessons from McGonagall in more than just transfiguration. When Harry offered the wands he’d managed to find on his way to the cellar from... wherever it was that he’d been held, Hermione actually snatched it right out his hand before he even got the words out, her eyes oddly agleam with manic energy. Ron himself took the other wand; a length of pine that was bent unevenly in a couple of places and felt extremely odd to his hand.

Ron glanced up and down the corridor. He and the other cellar dwellers were blinking owlishly in the sudden bright light of the corridor’s many lamps. There no other people in sight but he knew that could easily change.

“Hello Hermione,” Harry said softly.

“Hello Harry,” Hermione replied briskly, “how are we going to get out of here?”

Harry’s response to Hermione’s automatic questions was much the same as Ron’s own. A smile flashed across his face but only briefly. His face quickly resumed his sombre demeanour as he outlined the plan that he, Pansy and Ron had worked out over the course of, well, yesterday afternoon, actually.

“Time is of the essence here everyone,” he said, “We’re going to have to move quickly but we can’t disapparate until we’re off the grounds and none of us know how to create a portkey”-Harry suddenly glanced at Ollivander, “unless of course, you do, Mr Ollivander?”

“I’m afraid I should not like to attempt it, Mr Potter” Ollivander replied, “unless I had the use of my own wand.”

“Right then,” Harry said, shooting at dark look at Ollivander for wasting his time, “looks like the floo network seems to be our best bet. We find the nearest grate and hot tail it out of here.”

“Oh come on, Harry,” Hermione said, “Do you think that the Death Eaters won’t have figured that out as well?”

“No but that’s why we have to move quickly,” Harry insisted.

“We can’t just blunder right in though,” Hermione said, not willing to let it go. Ron could almost see the cogs in her mind turning as she worked through the problem, “this is a big building. There have got to be lots of fireplaces. We don’t need to go to closest, not if any of them will do. If only...” Hermione trailed off deep in thought but then realisation blossomed over her face, “Pansy! You’ve been here before. You must know if there’s an out of the way fireplace we can use?”

Upon hearing that she’d been addressed directly, Pansy jumped and turned to face them, Ron had assumed that already knowing the plan she’d hung back to keep an eye out but now he doubted that she was even aware of anything at all.

“Sorry, no,” Pansy said hurriedly, “the only grate hooked up to the floo network is in the main drawing room.”

“There’s got to be a better way than just walking in though,” Hermione said, her brows creased with thought.

“Well,” Pansy said, “There are the service corridors for the servants. There’s probably another way into the room from them. We wouldn’t meet anyone on the way there either. Me and... me and Draco used to play in them when we were little.”

“This is coming up for the first time now, why exactly?” Harry said sharply.

“I only just remembered,” Pansy snapped back, “it’s not like you gave me a lot of time to figure things out before you demanded we run off half-cocked.”

“Okay!” Hermione drew attention back to herself with a wave of her hand, “These corridors sound good but won’t Lucius and Narcissa know about them as well? They’ve lived here for years as well.”

“Hermione, these corridors were put in when Muggles owned this manor,” Pansy said, with a smile that had more than a hint of sadness to it, “Lucius wouldn’t lower himself by knowing about them. They only have house elves as servants and they don’t need corridors.”

“Fine,” Harry said, “Let’s go. When we reach the grate, the destination is Shell Cottage. It’s Bill Weasley’s place. He’s a member of the order.”

Ron nodded. He’d been the one to suggest that in the brief planning stage of the operation.

“If nothing else,” he said aloud, “It’s only Bill and Fleur there. Worst comes to worst it won’t be hard for them to evacuate.”

Pansy handed out bags of purloined Floo powder; any one of which was large enough to get all six of them out of there and then started up the corridor, silently motioning for them to follow. Ron had imagined he was going to bring up the rear for this part of the operation. Pansy, who knew where she was going, would of course be at the front, and of course, Harry would be right alongside her. Now Harry was waving everyone past him, so he could take up that spot, maybe to make sure everyone did make it out.

Ron found himself second in the line, closely following Pansy. Hermione was just behind him and wandless, Luna and Ollivander followed her with Harry watching over them from behind. Pansy led them further down the corridor into the depths of the manor house. Though he could not see her face very often, Ron was sure that she was concentrating hard. Once they had to briefly backtrack (Ron heard Harry’s muttered complaints) until she found what they were looking for. She looked over the spot on the wall carefully for a few moments and then banged it with her fist in a controlled sort of way.

With a creak that would put any number of haunted houses to shame, the door to the service area of the manor opened and belched dust all over them. Following Pansy inside Ron’s nose crinkled as the thick musty air washed over him, carrying with it a strong odour of mothballs. It wasn’t hard to believe Pansy when she’d said that no-one’d been in here in a decade. Ron felt like he was wading through it the dust on the floor, which must have been half an inch thick at least.

For all the area’s faults, it got them where they needed to go. Ron could only assume that Pansy’s memories of this place were coming back to her quickly because she unerringly led them through its labyrinthine depths.

Eventually they came to another door and since they were on the inside, it was easy to tell that this one was a door. A handle and sliding mechanism were clearly present. Carefully and very slowly, Pansy slid it open and breathed a sigh of relief. They’d found the drawing room and were entering through a concealed door in the far right of the room. To the right of that door, opposite the main entrance to the room was the massive wrought iron fireplace. It stood there, dark and fireless but it would be no problem for wizards armed with wands to start a blaze.

Ron wanted to join her in that sigh of relief but something was causing the back of his neck to prickle with unease. Their objective was right in front of them and apparently unguarded. It was all... too easy. Ron had played too many strategy games to like that. In chess, the only time you ever left a piece vulnerable was when... you wanted it taken.

He stopped dead in his tracks and felt Hermione come to a halt behind him, he reached out and pulled Pansy back by her collar just as four crimson stunners passed in front of them. Then the group surged forward into the room, with wands raised.

There, with their disillusionment charms fading as a result of their attack, stood Fenrir Greyback, Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy, and Bellatrix Lestrange.

It had almost been a perfect ambush Ron realised, if he hadn’t stopped them moving forward or if they hadn’t known about the side entrance to the room, they would have been taken in by it and re-captured nearly effortlessly by the Death Eaters. Now at least, Ron thought as Harry pushed past Ollivander to face them, it would be a fight.

No words were said. None were needed. There was just a moment’s pause, like gunfighters waiting for the first chime of noon and then: a flurry of action. Ron was facing off against Lucius Malfoy. Lucius was also holding a borrowed wand but would likely still be a skilled duelist with it. Ron had time for maybe one spell before Lucius was all over him. He took careful aim and yelled;

“Incendio”

The spell shot three feet wide of Lucius and he sneered in contempt at Ron’s aim. Ron however was well satisfied with the result as the fireplace had erupted into flames. Tactically speaking, defeating Lucius was not his aim. The objective was to get out of there and for that they needed a fire to reach the floo network with.

He got a weak shield charm in place before Lucius cursed him with enough force to send Ron staggering back. He’d sacrificed his ability to easily defend himself from Lucius but if there was one thing that chess had taught him, it was that sacrifice was necessary for victory and he’d much rather sacrifice himself than his friends. Behind him Luna and Ollivander stared at the pitched battle that had erupted in front of them. They were wandless and helpless to affect it.

“Get through the fire if you can.” Ron yelled to them and pushed himself forward to meet Lucius’ attack. Erecting a shield between them to take the brunt of the blows and then counter-attacking with stunners and impediment jinxes to try and off-balance the older man.

Out of the corners of his eyes he saw his brief snatches of his friend’s fights. He saw Pansy hurl Narcissa against a wall with a bludgeoning hex and Luna dived past them, pushing Ollivander ahead of her and into the fire.

Far off to the left Harry was facing off against Fenrir Greyback, who proved to move more like a beast than a man and had dodged Harry’s stunner entire and proceeded to counterattack with a kind of savage grace that put Harry on the defensive. Luckily for Harry, Ron realised, Fenrir couldn’t risk sending any too powerful spells against him. You-Know-Who would skin him alive if he killed Harry.

Most alarmingly, Hermione had let out a guttural scream, and hurled herself at Bellatrix, shrieking curses and spells so fast, that Ron couldn’t follow them. The air crackled with magical static as she rained spellfire down upon her opponent and Bellatrix just laughed through it all, backing away as she fended off the attack. In a second Ron realised her tactic; she was retreating and making Hermione follow her. In another second Ron realised just how good a plan it was; Harry and Ron had already shown the lengths to which they would go to rescue Hermione so if Bellatrix prevented her escape then Harry and him would likely fall into her grasp again just to try and get Hermione back.

Fear and anxiety added strength to Ron’s wandarm and he attacked Malfoy with sudden ferocity. Rather than aiming more spells at him, which he’d simply deflect, Ron sent a massive curse into the defenceless ground at his feet instead, blasting a foot-wide crater in the floor and lifting Lucius clear off his feet so he missed his block on Ron’s next stunner and was knocked unconscious.

Ron leapt forwards to aid Hermione with Bellatrix and as he did so he saw Harry finally disarming Fenrir with a well practised sweep of his wand, only to fall back as Fenrir simply clawed at him; opening deep furrows in his shoulder. Then they were out of Ron’s line of sight so he only heard Pansy’s outraged screech and a crackling sound that reminded him of his father’s experiments with ekkletricity.

“Ron! ‘Mione! We are leaving!” Harry roared, given a moment’s respite by Harry’s injury, Fenrir had seized a wand from the floor and was now pressing him and Pansy hard but they had the green fire to their backs and were retreating rapidly towards it.

But Hermione didn’t slack off, didn’t stop throwing spells at Bellatrix, didn’t stop trying to wipe the insane smile off her face.

“Hermione!” Ron shouted grabbing her left arm, “We have got to go!”

He pulled her slightly towards him, before seeing the look on her face and nearly letting go in shock. Her eyes were wide and bright; her jaw clenched tight and her face was streaked with shiny tracks of sweat and tears.

“No,” she moaned, “No! I’ve got to stop... stop her!”

Ron ducked as Bellatrix, still laughing, shot another curse at them.

“Leave her,” Ron said, and wrapping an arm around Hermione’s waist, started half carrying her, half dragging her towards the still green fire. Bellatrix’s laughter turned instantly to cries of rage and she attacked them in earnest. Bright golden curse-bolts pelted past them. Ron twisted back and started firing blasting curses upwards; gouging chunks out the chandelier above them and throwing up a screen of dust and debris behind them.

It almost worked as well, they were half a dozen steps away... Five steps. Four steps. Thre-

A curse glanced off Ron’s ribs and he staggered, momentum carrying him forward, even with Hermione in his arms. They were so close. Pain wracked him, it could have stopped him, but to Ron there was no question; He’d come here to get Hermione out and he was going to get her out. No matter what.

Shouting his destination, Ron straightened his legs in one last titanic effort that propelled him and Hermione forward into the Floo.

~~~

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