Title: War Within a Breath
Author: Muddgutts
Rating: PG-13 (for strong language)
Ships: H/Hr
Summary: Following the events in OoTP the gang from the DoM must live a life in hiding. They are constantly on the run from Voldemort and his Death Eaters. Voldemort will stop at nothing to finish the 'Potter' problem that keeps plaguing him. No place is safe now for Harry and the gang as they are forced to move from one hiding place to the next all summer long. As the danger increases so does the tension between the kids when cabin fever sets in, and Harry and Ron clash in the argument that could rip the trio apart for good.
AN: I would like to thank everyone that reviewed last chapter. I was very surprised that everyone liked it honestly. You're reviews really lifted my spirits and I love going back and reading them when I think that I just don't have it in me to finish writing. I know some of you have question about why some things are happening, and I hope this chapter clears a few of those questions up for you. So please enjoy and don't forget to review. Please ^_^ Special thanks goes out to AnneU for your help with this chapter. I know I couldn't do it with out you. Honestly!
Chapter 2
Dolohov shifted again trying to pull his arms free from his bonds, but it was no use; the magical ropes were too strong and wouldn't give way. For all his struggling all he accomplished was to rub his arms raw against the shattered rock and the ropes holding him in place. 'If only I had my wand I would be free in a minute, and those damn kids would be dead at my feet right now,' he thought to himself. Looking around the clearing behind the house he saw an enormous break in the trees where the giant had wandered off into the woods after the car fled the battle scene. Without his wand he couldn't control the giant. He was powerless to stop him from leaving, and in doing so he knew to whom he would have to answer, because of his failure. The thought made the bile in his stomach rise, burning his throat.
The cracks of many people Apparating into the area broke Dolohov from his dream of snapping Potter's neck in two. "Who's there?" he cried into the black night. "I can hear you!"
Only the sound of footfalls echoing of the surrounding trees answered him. Desperate to see who it was, he tried to crane his head around to look behind him, but there was nothing and no one in sight. His heart raced and sweat rolled down his grimy neck, and he sucked in a deep breath when the sounds of the walking stopped.
Dolohov whipped his head back around and saw three Death Eaters standing in front of him, "Loki's blood! You scared me half to death! Untie me damn it!"
The tallest Death Eater, standing in the center, had long black hair that spilled out from the sides of her hood, and the white porcelain mask that covered only the top of her face seemed to have an eerie glow in the moonlight when she spoke in a low voice. "Half to death you say . . .hmm interesting choice of words, Dolohov."
The blood rushed from Dolohov's face and his voice cracked when he spoke. "Bellatrix, it...it wasn't my fault. I swear to you! It was Bragi, and those two new guys! They were supposed to catch Potter's group as they ran from the Giant!"
"Shhh . . ." she cooed kneeling down in front of him. She closed on him like a tigress. From his waist she slid upward, hovering inches away from his body, sucking in his scent. "Tsk tsk, Antonin, that's twice you've failed our Lord." Bellatrix paused by his earlobe and flicked it with her tongue. "I told him you were worthless, and he should just leave you in there to rot, but he thought you still had some value left in you."
Dolohov reeled from her touch. He knew she loved to play with her prey before finishing them off. "Please, it's not my fault. Don't . . ." He stopped talking when her wand slid out from under her robes.
She tapped the wand against his inner thigh lightly and whispered in his ear. "You're not going to die-yet! The Dark Lord has plans for you," she said as she moved her face directly in from of his, and her eyes flashed wildly at him. "Of course you must be punished for your failure, and he has left it up to me to decide what to do with you."
Pulling away from him she pointed her wand at the ground, and with a flick of her wrist a soft green light poured from the end of her wand. The ground beneath him came to life as long thorny vines sprouted from it. He desperately tried to free himself but it was no use. The vines started wrapping themselves around his legs, and the thorns dug painfully into his skin. They continued up his body to his waist leaving deep ragged cuts across his bare skin. His screams pierced the lonely night sky causing birds nesting in near by trees to flee in shock.
Bellatrix stood back and watched with curiosity and rolled her head to the side to get a better view. Every so often she would renew the spell, or wake Dolohov from passing out. Some time later another Death Eater called to her from the rubble of the old house. He was down on his knees and his wand was lighting the area of debris in front of him.
"What have you found?" she demanded, striding over to his location.
The Death Eater tossed a few random pieces of wood away and lifted a tattered old photograph from the rubble, "This belongs to the Potter boy. His parents' names are on the back, but I don't know the other man."
Taking the picture, Bellatrix's eyes widened at the sight of her dead cousin Sirius. "Yes I know who this is . . ." she said trailing off in thought. 'Still clinging to the past baby-Potter boy?' Bellatrix mused to herself walking away from the kneeling Death Eater. She spun on her heel and pointed to the masked Death Eater, "Summon an Owl and get this worthless piece of flesh ready to move."
"Do you know where they're headed next?" he asked without standing up.
Bellatrix took one hard step towards him and stomped her foot hard to the ground screaming, "NOW!" The Death Eater sprang to his feet and rushed off into the darkened forest. Bellatrix returned to the photo in her hand and traced the outline of her cousin's face.
"Nous verrons." *
~*~
After their daring escape in the middle of the night Remus and Kingsley drove the group around England for two and half days straight. They stopped only for food and fuel, and on the second day they pulled into a park for an hour to give everyone time to stretch their legs before heading off again to who knows where. Harry was starting to think maybe Kingsley didn't even know where they where going after they passed the same rest station three times.
Everyone was tired and starting to become more and more cranky by the hour, and as the sun slowly drifted toward the horizon the sky turned into a field of reds and orange. The car gave a little jerk as Kingsley downshifted and turned off the highway onto an un-named road. After about five minutes the road beneath them ended and turned into dirt, and the trees reached overhead from either side of the road forming a canopy above them. The trees were bare and twisted as if withering in pain as they reached for their brothers across the road.
As Harry watched the last rays of light pass behind the trees, he sighed. He wondered where they had ended up this time, and decided it didn't matter anyway. There was nothing for him here, or any of the other places he rested his head this summer. It didn't matter any way, it wasn't his home. None of these places were. He didn't have a home, not a real one anyway. Harry rested his forehead against the window glass and closed his eyes. His scar throbbed against the cool surface. It was tingling a lot today. He wondered if Voldemort was angry with his Death Eaters for letting them slip away again.
"Are we almost there yet? I'm starving back here."
Harry's head flopped back on to the headrest and looked around the car. Ron was massaging his aching stomach, Neville was biting his nails again, and Luna was reading an out of date copy of The Quibbler in her hands, Ginny had fallen asleep long ago. She bounced a little when the car hit a bump in the road. She hadn't been talking a lot lately, and when she did speak it was a roar. Maybe the stress was starting to eat away at them all. Well, maybe not all of them, Hermione was a rock; nothing bothered her when she was set on finishing something, and right now she was set on finishing her reading. Still nestled on his lap she perched her book, The Standard Book of Spells Grade 6, on her knees, and was about halfway though it now.
No one bothered to answer Ron's questions anymore. He seemed to always be hungry or tired or bored, and everyone was growing tired of it. They just choose to ignore him, and before long the car came to a halt. Kingsley turned the car off and turned around to everyone. "Well here we are."
"Huh, where are we?" Ginny said rubbing her eyes.
Ron fumbled around for the latch and the door sprung open spilling all the their packs onto the ground. He leaped from the car spreading his arms wide into the air. "Ahhh that's great. After two days this feels so good!"
Everyone exited the vehicle feeling sore and very stiff. When Ginny got out and saw all of her belongings falling out of her pack into the dirt she nearly exploded, and gave Ron a hard shove in the back. "Look what you did, you stupid idiot!"
Ron spun around and closed on her. "Don't blame me! If you had closed your bag in the first place it wouldn't have happened! What is all of that crap anyway? Love letters from your boyfriend no doubt!"
"Ron!" Hermione hissed under her breath.
Kneeling down Ginny started throwing her clothes and books back into the bag roughly. "Well I'm sorry, but I need more to live on besides a stupid chess board and TWO pair of underwear!" Ron's fist clenched as he opened his mouth to fire back at her, but she cut him off, "AND! For your information whom I write to and who I date is none of YOUR business. So get out of it!"
Neville chuckled as he walked around the car, but stopped the second Ron glared at him, "Shut it Neville! This is none of your business." Ron shouted as his anger increased.
Everyone started yelling and cursing at each other all at once. Even Tonks was screaming trying to break up the fight as Ron and Ginny started squaring off with each other.
Harry rubbed his forehead hoping to stop the increasing pain, but that didn't help, not with all of this yelling, and he snapped and screamed.
"Would all of you just shut the hell up already!"
Everyone turned and stared at him. He knew they were waiting for him to explode into a rant like he did all last year. He could feel the pressure building inside of him aching to come out, and his throat burned as the bile in his stomach rose again. He reached down and grabbed his bag off the ground and gave it a hard smack knocking the dust off it. When he stood up he met Hermione's troubled gaze. She looked scared, but concerned all in the same breath, and he couldn't speak. His mouth worked as he tried to think of something to say, and he couldn't so he just flung his bag over his shoulder and started off towards the house.
They watched him for a minute in silence before anyone moved. Remus walked alongside Harry without speaking and pulled a rusty old key out from his pocket. Harry stopped and looked at the house. It was a simple one-story home with dirty white panels on the outside and the paint on the front door had peeled under the hot rays of the sun. The grass was overgrown, and a wooden fence wrapped behind the house enclosing a large field. Off in the distance was another structure that looked like a barn.
Remus cranked the key into the lock and with a hard push opened the door. Returning the key to his pocket he said, "Well it's not the royal palace, but it'll do for now."
"Whose house is this?" Harry asked as he stepped through the entranceway.
"A woman I used to know, she . . .she's dead now. I don't think she'd mind us using the place for awhile." Remus walked in and flicked on the light. "At least the lights still work, that's a start."
Harry walked into the living room, which still had all the furnishings intact. It reminded him of Mrs. Figg's house in Little Whinging; it smelled like old people. He dropped his pack in the corner of the room and sat down on the couch.
Remus stood by the doorway still watching him. "Are you ok Harry? Is anything the matter?"
Giving a little shrug Harry looked at him deadpan and said, "Tip top, just have a headache is all." Remus again eyed him closely, and Harry sighed, lying back on the couch. "It's from being in the car for so long. Don't worry alright?"
"Right well," Remus said, giving the rug a little kick, "I'll go get things set up. Just rest for awhile, and I'll call you when we scrape together some food." Harry kicked off his shoes and curled up on the couch feeling totally exhausted. After about twenty minutes the pain in his scar stopped hurting and sleep overtook him.
Tonks had left right after they arrived to report to the Ministry of Magic about the giant's attack. Now that Fudge knew of Voldemort's return and the attack on the Department of Mysteries Harry and the gang were given special permission to perform magic outside of school. Of course this was only for emergency use and each time they did use magic it had to be reported and catalogued at the Ministry. Kingsley and Tonks speculated that the Auror divisions were trying to gather any information possible about the Death Eaters and how they functioned to help track them down.
Over the next few days a roaring silence fell on the dirty old house as everyone seemed to retreat into their own space within it. Harry felt like everyone, including himself, was just waiting for the other shoe to drop. At any moment Voldemort himself would step through the door and end it all. After awhile he didn't care anymore just as long as it would end the loneliness in his heart. The only time people were in the same room together was in the living room which had a television, but there wasn't anything good on.
Kingsley also brought with him all of the latest newspapers and magazines for the last week when he was away on normal work for the Ministry and not guarding the kids. Working in pairs, two on and two off, Tonks, Remus, Kingsley, and Moody rotated in shifts, each pair watching over the group for about three days at a time.
The night of the third day Harry had gone to sleep a bit earlier then everyone else. He felt like he just didn't have the strength to do anything that day beside lie around and read his Transfiguration book, but what he was really thinking about was the prophcey. He had been mulling it over in his mind a lot the last few days. It was the last thing on his mind when he went to sleep and the first thing he thought about when he woke up in the morning. The words rolled around in his head as the darkness of sleep overcame him.
He was walking now wand in hand through the Forbidden Forest to Hogwarts Castle. A fog covered the land, thick and hot, clinging to everything. When he came to Hagrid's hut on the edge of the forest, it was empty and dark. The hut was covered in vines and overgrown with weeds that swallowed the fence to the garden and everything within it.
Harry's body moved on towards the castle without his consent; it was like he was just along for the ride watching. As he got closer to the main gate he noticed that this wasn't just a fog but smoke as well. Hot embers floated on the wind into his hair and his cloak. The ground started to become uneven and wet. When he kneeled down to get a closer look he almost fell over at what he saw. The ground was covered with bodies. Everywhere he looked were bodies, hundreds of them. Their eyes, cold and unblinking, stared back at him.
Closing his eyes Harry ran as fast as he could towards the open doors of Hogwarts. A shape in the doorway beckoned him closer. He tried to run, but his feet became stuck in the mud below him. The more he struggled the further he sunk. Water lapped at his face, warm and sticky, foul and rancid. He raised his hands to his face and they were red. Thick crimson blood ran down his hands, and he stopped his fighting and waded in the grass that had now become a lake of blood. Bodies bobbed up and down in the current. A strong force under the water started to push him violently towards the castle, faster and fast. Harry smashed into arms and legs along the way, and he closed his eyes and mouth trying not to swallow the blood washing over him. Then suddenly he was tossed into the air and sailed onto the hard flagstones of the stairway leading into the castle, and a gentle hand reached down touching him shoulder.
"You should not be here Harry."
He knew that voice, it was Professor Dumbledore and just the sound of it relaxed him a bit as he got to his feet, but what met his eyes what not the noble man he knew. Instead, Dumbledore was a broken man clothed in rags and filth. Then Harry stopped looking and gasped when he saw Dumbledore's face. He had no eyes!
"We did it all for you, Harry," Dumbledore said. "You should have run far away from here so he couldn't find you."
Harry couldn't speak, he couldn't look at him, so he ran. With tears in his eyes he ran as fast as he could through the halls of Hogwarts. From behind him echoing off the halls he could still hear Dumbledore's voice calling to him, "Isn't this what you wanted?"
Harry ran for an eternity, stepping over the bodies of people he knew along way. He couldn't stop moving to look at them. Sadness felled his soul and it threatened to overtake him if he stopped moving. The stairs to the North Tower came into view and grew with each step he took.
The sounds of a battle carried from high above him. Harry froze as a scream echoed in his ears. It was Hermione-he would swear it was her. She's not dead! Casting all other thoughts aside he tore up the steps two at a time. When he reached the top a spell of brilliant green light bounced off the wall next to him. There was Voldemort dueling with Ron and Hermione.
Voldemort laughed loudly deflecting their spells with little effort, "Why do you bother even trying? You do not have the power to defeat me. None of you do!" Ron cursed at him and sent another Stunner at him. Voldemort disappeared in a flash of light and reappeared behind Ron, and before he could react Voldemort had him by the throat and a wand pointed to his head.
His eyes flashed bright red and Voldemort hissed, "Drop your wand, my dear, or your friend here dies!"
Harry watched in horror as she did just that, and Voldemort raised his wand over his head ready to finish her. Before he even thought of what to do Harry was running straight for her. As the flash of Voldemort's wand clouded Harry's vision he grabbed hold of Hermione. They both went sailing over the edge of the castle together, but Harry grabbed hold of the edge just in time. Hermione clawed at Harry's left arm as he held tight to the stone edge with his right hand.
"Harry! Please don't let go of me!" she screamed. Desperately trying to hold on with all of his strength Harry held onto her wrist for dear life.
"I'm not going to let you fall, Hermione! Hang on please!" he screamed down to her as a shadow blocked out the sun above him. Harry looked out and there was Ron standing there watching him. He seemed to be thinking it over in his head whether or not to help them. Summoning every ounce of strength Harry called up to him, "Ron! Help us up! Hurry!"
Ron scowled at him defiantly, "There you go again ordering me around! I'm not your slave, Harry, you can't tell me what to do!" Then from behind him Harry watched as Voldemort's face appeared over Ron's shoulder. Then Voldemort whispered into his ear and Ron laughed, and when he did Harry saw that Ron's right hand was made of silver. Slowly Ron moved forward and stepped on Harry's hand. He growled at him and gave his hand a sharp stomp with his foot, and Harry and Hermione fell!
"Harry!" he heard her cry to him. He reached out and pulled her to him tightly waiting for the impact.
"Harry! Wake up!" he heard again through the black and he opened his eyes. Hermione was there in his arms, but they were not falling. He was still in his room, and Hermione looked terrified.
She pushed sweaty clumps of hair away from his forehead and looked deeply into his eyes. "It was just a dream, Harry. You're okay now." He breathed a sigh of relief and rested his head on her shoulder. He didn't speak for a few minutes as she stroked his wet hair back. "I heard you calling my name so I came to see what was happening and you were thrashing around in your bed calling to me."
"I'm sorry if I scared you, Hermione," he said lifting his head a little but not looking at her. "It was just a bad dream."
"What was it about?" she asked.
In truth he didn't know what to make of the dream so he just summarized what he thought it was about and said simply, "The war."
Hermione lifted his head up to look him in the eyes now. "What did you see? How will it end? Do you know?"
Harry wasn't ready to tell her about the prophecy or whatever it was that he saw about Ron. Looking into her scared eyes he said, "In fire."
~ ~ ~ ~
"Nous verrons." * "Well will see." In French.
AN: Well I hope it wasn't too slow for everyone, but I need this chapter to build on the story. Next chapter we really get into the fun stuff. Harry vs. Ron no hold barred! Stay tuned and don't forget to review. Thanks for reading.
Muddgutts