Author's Notes:
Yes, I am aware that my update is rather early today, but it is a holiday, and I imagine a bunch of US readers will be busy tonight. I might even post another chapter as a special treat, if I get enough written this afternoon.
Chapter Eleven: The Old Folks Home
"Albus, do you think we are going to have to keep the Order active this time?" McGonagall said with a sigh, seated across the desk from the Headmaster.
"Yes, Minerva, I think we will have to. Voldemort's final attack destroyed too much of the Ministry, they don't have the personnel left to fight the rest of this war," the silver-haired man replied with a sigh. The famous twinkle was completely missing from his blue gaze.
"I had hoped there would no longer be a war with Vol… Voldemort gone."
A new voice broke in from behind the Deputy Headmistress's chair. "They don't have a choice, Professor." Harry stepped around from behind her chair. "And they're continuing it the same way they always have, taking the people closest to me." The rage in his voice was a physical, powerful thing, and the Transfiguration professor's face paled slightly.
"What's going on, Harry?" Dumbledore asked calmly.
"They took Hermione." As he said her name, the torches lighting the room flickered slightly. "I need to get her back. Now."
The Headmaster was nodding calmly. "Of course. I assume you want assistance from the Order? Who do you want?"
At the same moment, it finally percolated through McGonagall's usually sharp mind that Harry Potter was standing in the Headmaster's office without the door having opened. "How did you get in here, Mister Potter?"
"The wards are easy enough to bypass with a Portkey, or I could have blown my way through, but that seemed excessive, Professor." He turned his gaze back to the Headmaster. "Tonks, Kingsley, yourself, sir. I'd ask for Remus, but he's not ready after last night."
"Quite," The Headmaster replied calmly, noticing how well Potter was controlling his anger, compared to two years prior.
McGonagall was not so easily put off. "Easy enough?" Her voice was rather desperate, for she had always thought of Hogwarts as quite possibly the safest place in the magical world. "And Albus, you're just going to let a student order you around like this?"
Harry though she was vaguely reminiscent of Snape as she said this, and flushed the anger from his voice. Unfortunately, that had the affect of darkening the lighting in the room, letting only Harry's eyes be seen. "I'm not a student any more, Professor."
"Certainly not," Dumbledore agreed, illuminating the room with a wave of his hand. "I would say Harry has more than earned the right to call on whatever support the Order can provide him with, wouldn't you agree, Minerva?"
She could only nod her head, slightly frightened of the display of power from Potter. It was something she had only seen from two sources before, one of which was dead and the other of which was sitting calmly across the desk from her. Dumbledore continued, "Harry, while we wait for Tonks and Kingsley to arrive, shall you explain to us exactly what has occurred?"
He did, curtly, with a full explanation of everything that had occurred from the time they had left the Leaky Caldron following breakfast. Tonks and Kingsley had arrived relatively early into the report, and asked no questions, knowing they were here to get the young witch back. The only change in Dumbledore's expression was a slight paling when he heard the words "Death Exchange." Harry apparently did not notice.
Harry withdrew the Death Eater's wand at the conclusion of his story, and tapped the cobblestone he had brought with him, muttering an incantation considerably more involved than the simple spell 'Portus'. But the stone glowed bright blue, and Harry held it out for the others.
Dumbledore turned to McGonagall. "Lock the school down until my return."
"Where are you going?"
"After Miss Granger," he replied calmly.
McGonagall was still stunned by the turn of events, and had not followed what Harry had muttered with the Death Eater's wand, which had, to the Headmaster's ears, been an instruction to force the wand to repeat exactly the same spell it had just done. "Where? How?"
But her words were to empty air. The four traveling as the rescue squad were gone.
* * * * *
The rush of displaced air away from the four as they reappeared on the other end of the Portkey journey prevent Harry from blinking in surprise for a small moment, but then, as the scene before him was revealed, he definitely did so.
"Welcome back to Little Hangleton," he muttered, staring around at the graveyard, his gaze fixed on a single tombstone. Tonks and Kingsley gave a start as they turned to look at it as well. They both knew Voldemort's real name, after all. Dumbledore was already in motion, though, Harry with him. The two Aurors shook themselves and quickly moved after the two more powerful wizards. Everyone there knew what had happened three years before in this graveyard, which was suspiciously empty.
Moving through the daylight, with wands out, they looked ready for anything as the group proceeded towards the house some distance away. Anything, that is, except for the shout which echoed from the opened back door. "Ahhhh! Mudblood bitch bit me!" The slap and the soft cry which followed it were also clearly audible.
The three younger members of the group broke into a run towards the building, knowing Dumbledore would bring up the rear and reinforce them easily enough. Harry drew out his invisibility cloak and vanished, slipping through the back door at a slow jog while Tonks and Kingsley waited by the outer wall, out of sight from the door, which suddenly slammed shut.
"Trap," Tonks mouthed to the elder Auror, and he shook his head. When she looked at him quizzically, he sighed.
"It's been less than an hour, they can't expect Harry to find them that fast," he whispered. "Hell, I don't know how he did find them that fast." To this, Tonks had no reply but a shrug as Dumbledore caught up with them.
"Shall we wait on Harry to ask for our assistance?" the old wizard asked with a slight grin, which completely confused the two to whom he was speaking.
* * * * *
Meanwhile, inside the house, Harry crept forward under his invisibility cloak, tracking the sounds of the voices until he stood watching the scene play out before him. Four unhooded Death Eaters were now sitting sprawled on furniture, Hermione was bound and unconscious in a straight backed chair. Her cloak was missing, her clothing torn, a bruise was appearing on her cheek, and her hair was in utter disarray.
Harry thought he had never seen a more beautiful sight as he watched the slight rise and fall of her breasts. Her breaths were steady and slow, but she was clearly alive. For now, he listened to what they were saying.
"The Portkey will be here in the morning for us to take her to the main base."
"Well, what do we do until then?"
"Make sure that Potter doesn't get her before then."
"How could he?"
"Don't know. He got Franks, though. He might have gotten something from him before the curse took effect."
"Possibly. Potter's brave, but he's not completely stupid. If nothing else, he learned from the incident with the prophecy. He'll know it's a trap. He'll want help, and it will take him a while to get it."
"Dumbledore dotes on the boy. He'll help him as soon as he gets there."
"Hogwarts is a long way from Diagon Alley. Even if Potter can Apparate that far, he'll bounce right off the wards on that old castle like nothing else. He'll never find us with help before we're gone."
"Once we have our lord back, we'll be able to free our compatriots, and with Potter dead, there will be no one to stop us. Not even that fool Dumbledore can stop the Dark Lord."
That was when Hermione moaned softly, lifting her head up slowly. "Oh look, the Mudblood is awake. Think anyone would be upset if we were to torture her a bit?" There was just laughter at that, and Harry closed his eyes slowly counting down from ten, nine….
He felt his mind reaching out across space…
…eight, seven, six….
The door was opening to him again…
…five, four, three…
The connection flowed through him, torn open by his anger, flooding him with love…
…two…
He opened his eyes…
…one.
The lights in the Riddle house died completely. The Death Eaters shouted in confusion. Spell light flared, red, blue, yellow, slashing outward from Harry's wand, each one lighting the room bright as day. Crashes of sound accompanied the flashes of light as the Death Eaters failed Moody's lesson. Constant Vigilance.
Five seconds later, the lights came back up as Harry used a severing charm on the bonds that bound Hermione to the chair. Of course, channeling pure force as he was, he also severed the chair and about ten meters of the ground, but Hermione was free. "Harry?" she murmured, her gaze not quite tracking him. He helped her to her feet, holding her easily with his right hand, pressed against him. Then her eyes got wide, and she shouted fuzzily "Harry!"
The alarm in her voice gave it away. There was a fifth Death Eater. "Protego." The spell bounced off the shield erected behind his back, and he waved with his free hand, muttering "stupefy" under his breath and watching in delight as the red bolt threw the man in black through a wall.
A surprised shout from Kingsley betrayed that the three Order members had indeed followed Harry in, just after he killed the lights. But Harry did not hear the dark skinned man as he turned to Hermione. "Are you okay, 'Mione?"
She was crying into his chest, and Harry divested himself of his robe to wrap around her shoulders, while Kingsley and Tonks picked through the wreckage of the sitting room. He repeated his question, and this time, got a nod and a gasped "Yeah."
Dumbledore entered the room a moment later, and in his calm, quiet voice pronounced. "We have what we came for." He waved his wand and the five dark wizards were suddenly tied up and strapped to a large broomstick, only to vanish a moment later in the swirl of a Portkey transport. "So unless you have any desire to fight more Death Eaters, I suggest we go. They will be here soon." He picked up the leg of a table Harry had blown apart and tapped it, causing it to glow blue for a moment, before extending it in his hand. Still holding Hermione, Harry grabbed on, after tucking Hermione's new wand in his belt, Tonks and Kingsley a moment later and with a gut wrenching tug, and a swirl of air and color, they were gone…
The house burst into flame as a burning phoenix exploded out of it, gleaming brightly even in the full light of day, a shriveled green serpent hanging loosely in its beak…