Disclaimer: They belong to JKR, I'm only playing.
A/N: I'll quit saying sorry for being late because it sounds rather lame now. Many, many thanks to beta miconic who, as always, is the best. She's done a lot of hand-holding for me over these past weeks, but her axe is as sharp as always *hugs*
***
--Chapter Ten--
Soon, she takes charge.
You need food Harry, and sleep, and for heaven's sake, take that shirt off; it reeks of grease.
Obediently, he shuffles off to the shower while she clatters in the kitchen, wondering why she's nagging him about sleep; he's wide awake inside.
But very quickly, he finds he can barely keep his eyes open. It irritates him; he wants to keep looking, watch her move around him, every familiar gesture suddenly something extraordinary. Has she always had to stand on tiptoes to get something out of the top cupboard, calves arched, hair dipping past the small of her back? Did she always turn her nose up opening the jar of pickle? She makes him eat--he has no idea what--then stacks the dishes in the sink. She pulls the window down; night's falling fast outside but a star's found his night sky. If I can't look, then can I touch you? As if she reads his mind, she slips her hand in his. Come on, off to bed.
In the passage leading to their rooms, he tugs her hand, aware of a merciless blush on his cheeks. Your quilt and pillow are already on my bed. They smell like you. She giggles and kisses him, both his hands in hers. He stares, trying to remember the last time she'd giggled. Well then, she says and ducks into her room to change into pyjamas, then returns to his.
Initially there are elbows, legs and long loops of hair to negotiate. They eventually settle as if stumbling on the reason for the way their bodies were measured and moulded, the true purpose of each other's curves and folds. The hollow of his shoulder was just so she could nestle her head, the fold of her knee simply to keep him close. Within minutes of laying heads on pillows, both are asleep.
*
But she never holds off thinking for long, so just a few hours into the night, she props herself up next to him in a rumpled, wild-haired bundle, her legs tucked beneath her. Having woken up when her warmth moved, he regards her in the glow of candle light. Her hair catches flecks of light. Her cheeks have colour now; he's insanely proud of himself. I'm not dreaming, I'm awake. He clasps her knee with a hungry hand as if to make sure.
"I've got something to tell you," she says.
He raises himself on elbows. It's the hour that night begins for real, the city pared down to back-alleys and night trade, evening traffic diminishing into suburbs. With a sigh, he counts everything he has to tell her--Malfoy, Sally, Ron. Well, now it's most certainly real.
"Me too. Lots. Would take half the night, actually."
"You go first, then." She smiles and squeezes his hand.
He sits up and leans against the headboard, propping a pillow at his back.
"I told Ron about us. About the curse."
She draws a slow breath.
"Oh."
She looks down at her hands. "Harry, I'm sorry I badgered you about it, I was really awful--" her head shoots up "--is that why he went home?"
He smiles. "No. I mean, yes, but not because of what you think. He was strange about it, really. He seemed fine with it." He shrugs at her wide-eyed look. "He said that it was all done, in the past, and that we should stop…wallowing."
"And…" She presses a finger into the criss-cross weft of the quilt.
"Us?" He smiles.
She motions oddly, a shrug and a nod, and a lip bitten from inside.
"Seemed fine with that too. I don't know if he was just saying that…but I don't think so. I really think he's all right."
"Oh." She returns his smile, her shoulders relaxing a little. He can sense her casting about for words, a prickle of shame spreading up her neck. He tugs her hand to pull her towards him, wanting to change the subject, to halt further apologies he doesn't need.
"And you were right. He said he knew Mr Weasley was dying."
She raises her head, a thoughtful look on her face. "So is that why he went home, finally? Something must have settled for him. Talking to you."
He shrugs. "Something like that."
She shifts closer, sighing and leaning into him, folded knees pressing past his side, cheek pressed to his shoulder. He wraps his arms around her, pushing his face in her hair. A sleety wind blows outside, the house shivering and creaking like a bare branch. The candle's in its last hour, a small fat pillar of wax falling in on itself.
"Speaking of the Burrow, did you know that Nick's been spending a lot of time there?" She murmurs against his neck. "Apparently he's getting along famously with Fred."
"Hmm. Interesting."
"Yeah. He came over the other day to brag about it. He even stayed over once, it seems."
"Well, Fred did seduce him with fireworks…"
She chuckles. "When was that?"
"That day, when…he came to pass on your mother's message."
"Oh."
She sighs when his fingers sift through her hair. The candle flame sways, shadows keeping step. Idly he riffles through everything else he's supposed to tell her and wonders whether they're all that important.
"What did you want to tell me?" he kisses her forehead.
She stirs sleepily. "Mmm, it's about that scroll case."
She yawns, trying to burrow further into him. "That can wait too, I suppose. You've made me sleepy now."
"Oh, fantastic. Just the thing to tell a bloke. I hear it works wonders on their self-confidence."
She grins and kisses him as if that's the natural way to end a conversation. Scooting back down the bed, he pulls the covers over them. She pushes the pillow back under his head. A flurry of sleet drums past the window. Raindrops blink on the window, starry-eyed. She lets out a deep breath. He cast a heating charm when they went to bed but he can't tell if it's still working; the warmth in him has nothing to do with magic. He reaches over to blow out the candle and closes his eyes.
*
Deep in the night, he dreams about the Mirror of Erised.
He dreams that he found the Mirror when he went looking for it that third night, the night he found the bike instead. It's a strange dream; instead of staring into the Mirror, he's staring out of it. Someone else stares in, a boy, open-mouthed, 11-years old.
It takes him a moment to realize that the boy standing in front of the Mirror is himself. He finds no real resemblance. Sure, he can see the scar, glasses and the green eyes behind them but to him they're tokens, the insignia of Harry Potter; things other people recognise him by, rather than aspects of him, Harry. The younger Harry looks unguarded, way too innocent, eyes filled with wonder, holding his brand new wand awkwardly. Not at all like himself.
How can you look so trusting after ten years with the Dursleys? You really were born thick, Harry.
And do you know one day you're going to learn to kill with that wand?
Someone stirs next to him and he shifts to make room. A folded arm opens, the inside of an elbow releasing the scent of a well-loved but newly found body. The dream recedes for a moment. When he looks out the Mirror again, the boy's gone. The dusty room stands in silence, cobwebs fluttering in the breeze.
Suddenly, the Mirror shatters. He has an astonished glimpse of a million luminous pieces of glass, then nothing. The glass seems to have fallen in on itself, his view with it, the dream with it. The silence too is gone, shattered by a consistent, almost demented rapping. Someone whispers his name, once, then more urgently the second time. A sense of foreboding spreads through his half-dreaming mind, ink in water. He wakes up.
*
Hermione snaps open the window. The small owl shoots inside, tumbles across the room and plops on the bed. She shuts the window quickly against the wind. It's still dark outside. Harry sits up, wide-eyed. She lights the candle and turns his wrist towards her to look at his watch.
"What's going on? What time is it?"
"I don't know. It's five past five." She hands him his glasses and pulls the scroll tagged to Pigwidgeon's foot.
"What does it say?"
He leaves the bed to dig out some of Hedwig's treats for Pig and returns to sit beside her.
Pushing her hair out of her face, she reads out the message in Ron's scrawl.
Harry,
Strange stuff going on at Hogwarts. We're heading out now. Come as soon as you can.
Ron.
Dropping the letter in her lap, Hermione glances at the owl, then at Harry. Pig had slowly become the family owl for the Weasleys rather than Ron's pet. One of his wings was broken when he was intercepted sometime during the war, never fully healing. Since then, he'd hardly been used as a messenger--except in an emergency, when there was no other way.
Without a word, Harry lights another candle and hands it to Hermione. She steps across the corridor and into her room to look for clothes.
Just seconds later, she hears his footfall outside her door.
"We're going to have to Apparate," he says quietly.
She nods. "I know."
*
She tries to move calmly, pulling on jeans, reaching for a warm jumper and boots but keeps getting distracted by the picture in her head. It's such a clear picture too, her mind hasn't learned the trick of forgetting. The last time she Apparated, in the wee hours of the morning after Harry destroyed Voldemort, the sky was tender at the edges, clouds puckering around the rising sun like blood congealing over a wound. Harry was right behind her, stunned and wild-eyed, holding up Ron. The streetlights had gone out and there wasn't enough dawn to see by, but the burning city lent its orange glow. She raised her shaking wand-hand to release the charm on the door at Number Twelve and found a ragged heap at her feet--curly brown hair, a familiar shirt, and brown eyes open in surprise in a familiar face.
Her hair wrenched into a rough knot, she steps into the dark bathroom to splash cold water on her face. On her way out, she pauses at her desk, staring at her wand. Annoyed at herself, she shoves it in her pocket.
Harry leans against the railing near the landing, her cloak in his hand. He holds it out and she shrugs into it. Then he slides his warm hands in hers and squeezes gently, willing her to look at him. The night looks pitch black beyond the window, the way it is just before dawn.
"You're going to be fine."
She swallows and nods, trying to breathe evenly.
"Do you want to do Side-Along, just for this once?"
"No. I'll be fine."
He waits a few more minutes. She steps closer, her face almost touching his cloak. Her freezing fingers hang on to his for dear life.
"Ready?"
"Yeah."
She closes her eyes. There's a frantic moment when she thinks she's failed, Harry's gone on without her. Then abruptly, the air lifts her up and squeezes her. Seconds later, her feet touch the ground. She keeps her eyes savagely pinched shut.
"Hermione? Come on, open your eyes. Look, we're here."
It takes a minute for his presence to trickle through. She follows the trail of his palms on her face, his breath on her forehead, his voice. She opens her eyes.
It's Harry. It's not Dad, dead…it's Harry, very much alive.
"Are you okay?"
He holds her hands again, and her fingers stop trembling. She takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly, nodding. He hugs her and kisses her forehead.
Suddenly, he stiffens.
"What on earth--?"
She pulls back to look at him. "What? What is it?"
He points over her shoulder. They're standing on low ground to one side of the lake, where the road runs around to Hogsmeade. The castle rises beyond in a dark mass against the sky, the shingled beach at its base shimmering. It's too dark to make out much more than the castle's rough outline, but Hermione thinks that it's an odd shape. Like it's a lump of clay someone's remoulded overnight. The air's filled with smoke and the babble of voices, the ground swarming with lights and darting shadows of a great crowd. As Harry and Hermione stare wildly about, more people straggle past them in twos and threes, some towards the castle, some away, throwing up scraps of conversation.
"--No one from the Ministry's turned up yet, what do they think they're--"
"Probably still trying to wake up--"
"This Apparation business--"
"Shocking, shocking, never seen anything like that in my life--"
"The Quidditch Pitch is gone--not a trace of it!"
"--did you see that woman when we passed Hogsmeade? She Side-Alonged her son but splinched herself--"
"That was horrible! Rosemerta was trying to get the poor mite to come inside but he wouldn't leave his Mummy's hand--"
"There's some crazy woman there telling everyone--"
"Gulping gargoyles! Is that--"
"--that this happened because of magic running out! Have you ever heard such--"
"Did you see those Muggles!"
"But I thought you couldn't Apparate in here, that's why I popped in at Hogsmeade--"
"That was before, love, after the castle fell during The Defeat you can just about do--"
"Oi! Watch where you're going--"
Hermione tugs at Harry's hand. Hearts racing, they begin to run up the lip of the Lake. More people pass them, their faces blinking in and out of light. Hermione does a double-take as a Muggle flashlight waves past her. Looking up, she notices that the castle grounds are criss-crossed with the broad beams of flashlights as well as the pinpricks of wands, and the shimmer of normal wizarding lights. The snaps and crackles of Apparation fill the air, sometimes followed by wails. Harry squeezes her hand and she looks around to see a group of uniformed men being led up the slope by two Muggles.
"It's been there for ages, as long as I can remember…I don't know what these people are doing--"
"Well, my grandmother used to say it was haunted, but I've never--"
"Haunted? Bullshit. It's just some rotten old ruin--the sign's probably just to keep the kids out--"
Finally, reaching the flat lawn leading up to the front doors, Harry summons up a handful of light. Hermione dodges two witches stumbling across her path and scrambles after Harry. He holds up his hand, trying to see the front doors.
There is no front door.
Nor are there windows, turrets or spires.
No sign of extensive lawns or halls and chambers built to house hundreds, towers or ornate arches. Not the faintest trace of an elaborately, ingeniously hewn home for generations, a castle sprawling across time.
In front of them is a pile of tumbled stone, its shape vaguely suggestive of having once been a building of some sort, little larger than a large manor house. Snow has claimed it, broken icicles hanging off edges. The only recognisable entrance, a square arch, seems to have fallen in on itself, choked by rough-hewn rocks, rafters upended. A beaten tree leans against the stone. Taped across the entrance with mouldy black rope is a large, crude sign.
DANGER, DO NOT ENTER, UNSAFE.
Harry steps closer, she wants to stop him, tell him to be careful. Instead, she reaches out herself to touch a blackened crease between stones, feeling beneath her fingers the springiness of lush black moss. As Harry's light wavers, she spots long coarse grass pushing through the fallen stones. She's trying so hard to think, but her mind refuses to cooperate. She lets go of Harry's hand. He looks back, then resumes his stumbling around the stone heap. Hermione turns in the opposite direction. Just minutes later, they emerge back out the front.
Someone speaks in a quiet voice.
"It's all the same from every side. It's like the castle was never there. The gamekeeper's hut, the Quidditch Pitch, the greenhouses…all gone."
Hermione whips around. A pale creature steps into the light, short hair quivering around her face.
"Funny, isn't it? The illusion's won. We thought to fool the Muggles forever, but we're the fools now."
*
It takes Harry a moment to find his voice.
"Sally. When did you get here?"
She smiles. "Hi, Harry. News spreads fast, doesn't it?" She crosses her arms over her chest, bending in the cold.
"Been around for a while now. Looks like everyone's out tonight." Her glance flutters over Hermione.
Harry tugs Hermione's hand. "Oh…you didn't get to meet Hermione. Hermione, this is Sally. Sally Page. She's the Unspeakable who…I was helping."
Sally holds out a hand and Hermione takes it. Harry's mind scampers in crazed circles, thinking how ridiculous it sounds, making casual introductions at a time like this.
A time like what?
Abruptly, he curls his hand, the light snuffed out. He looks behind him, at the wavering outlines of people standing around, some scurrying around the stone heap as he and Hermione had done. He runs a hand through his hair and speaks to the dappled dark.
"How did this happen? I mean, what IS this?"
After a moment's pause, Sally clears her throat.
"This is what Muggles see, Harry. Whenever they wander near the castle."
He makes an impatient noise.
"Yes, but what--why are we seeing it? Where's the castle?" A bird swoops down to the blackened tree, unleashing a shower of dew. He pulls Hermione away from under it, shaking his head. "I mean--" he casts about for words, then sighs. "What's going on, really?"
"I've already told you, Harry. Magic's running out. This is just one manifest--"
Hermione interrupts. "But this is magic." Her hand stabs at the old ruin in front of them. "This is the bewitchment that keeps the castle from Muggle eyes. If magic was running out, shouldn't it happen the other way round? Shouldn't the charm fall off, revealing the castle, rather than it falling in on itself, hiding the castle altogether?"
Sally makes a small movement, a soundless laugh perhaps, or a loud shrug.
"That's what we believe, isn't it? That magic is perfectly rational, predictable, a very human element. We can bend it to our will, use it as we please, and it'll last forever.
"The truth is, magic is much more temperamental than we will ever know." She waves a hand at the ruin. "I can't explain exactly why the bewitchment's taken over, but I can tell you for certain that it's because of deep disturbances in the flow of magic. Such things are known to have happened before, elsewhere in the world."
Hermione opens her mouth to argue but doesn't get far. Snow crunching underfoot, Fred walks up behind Sally.
"Which means, you were right all along." He nods. "Hey, Harry." His eyes narrowing, he tilts his head at Hermione. "I thought you went home." Ignoring him, Hermione gapes at a spot behind him.
"Nick!"
Grinning, Nick throws an arm around her shoulder. "Hey, if it isn't my lovely cousin. Where've you been all this time? We've just been to the Forest. Very creepy. Fred says there are centaurs in there, and a giant. Ah, I wish I got to see the place before all this. Say, you don't have photos and stuff, do you? Of the castle, I mean? Hogwarts, what a name--"
There's a small sound and Ginny steps across his path. "This may be some freak show to you, but this is where we grew up!"
In the sudden silence, Harry moves towards lower ground, away from the ruin. Climbing up on a plinth of tumbled stone, he runs his eyes in a full circle, past the dark wall of the forest, past the stone heap with its crooked, wooden blindfold, over the expanse of moor grass that used to be manicured lawns and down towards the lake. The eastern sky is beginning to lighten, a vivid streak of blinding white across the horizon. The lake takes up the theme, its surface obscure with mist. Clusters of heads clamber up the slope like ants, halting to speak to each other, then moving on. Uneven footsteps rustle at his shoulder and Harry turns.
"The lake and the forest are all that's left." Ron gestures vaguely, as Harry lends him a hand up the stone. On his other side, Hermione climbs up.
"How did you find out?" she asks Ron.
Ron glances over his shoulder briefly and shrugs. "Nick and Fred were in Diagon Alley. Some old bloke from Hogsmeade had seen it first."
Silent once again, they watch odd shadows flicker and slide over trampled snow as flashlights and wizarding light are extinguished intermittently. The Forest elbows into Harry's sight from the corner of his right eye, the Lake glistening down below on his left. Despite all the activity and the natural purposefulness of dawn, the valley looks emptied out, effaced. Finally, Ron sighs.
"So, does this mean that Sally Page is right? As far as Muggles are concerned we're pretty much done for anyway. Look at them all…" Laboriously, he lowers himself to sit on the stone despite its dewy damp. A moment later, Harry follows, tugging Hermione's hand.
Balancing his crutch against his knee, Ron carries on. "It sounds stupid now, but I always thought the castle would reopen again. You know, as Hogwarts, as school."
He glances over his shoulder again and gestures hesitantly at the crumbling ruin.
"Do you think that the castle…attacking us that day…had anything to do with this? I mean, that was so bizarre, so out of character, maybe it put pressure on the castle's magic or, or something like that."
"Maybe," says Harry, shrugging. "But it wasn't out of character. Not really." He stares over the mist-smeared lake.
"What wasn't?"
"The castle. The way it attacked us. That was perfectly in character. Nothing bizarre about it at all." He watches a green lizard perched on his shoe. Ron leans over, his pointed glance on Hermione.
"What's he on about? When has Hogwarts ever attacked anyone?"
Hermione sighs, rubbing at a scratch on her arm. "When they built Hogwarts, the Founders imbued the castle with some really extreme magical protection."
"Yeah, I know. So?"
"So, if any of its own were in trouble, in the worst trouble, within the walls of the castle, then each of these charms were to kick into place."
"Yes, once again, I know. The Prophet ran a story about it. Something went wrong and all the charms went berserk. What's normal about that?"
Harry turns to Ron. "The castle was supposed to protect its own, who's everybody, all the houses, not just us and Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw. When they put the charms in place the Founders wouldn't have thought there would ever be a day when the houses turned on each other."
Wind circles them, heightening the cold. He watches a very young witch a few feet below, busily trying to get rid of bits of dew-drenched grass clinging to her boots. She's in the company of several older witches and wizards but completely oblivious to their grave faces.
"Hogwarts is just as much Slytherin as it's Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw. So it tried to help out. All of its own. Nothing bizarre, nothing out of character about that at all."
He wonders why he's still speaking in the present tense. The castle was, Harry. Not is. He sifts inside his mind idly, thinking how odd it is that he doesn't seem to feel more. Ron squints at the lightening valley. The little witch stamps her feet, succeeding only in getting more grass stuck on her boots. Harry glances over his shoulder. A ragged circle of onlookers are still gathered around the crumbling building, hands to mouths, unblinking. As if only they looked hard enough, it'll come back. He can't see Fred or Ginny, but Nick's deep in conversation with a wizened witch who's gesticulating wildly. Harry doubts she's aware that her audience is Muggle.
Further off, Sally seems to have gathered an audience of her own, but they seem less enthralled. He can't hear clearly, but the wild cackles and incredulous shaking of heads give him a general sense of the topic in discussion. A small bird dives to perch on a stone. Far away, further even than Hogsmeade, smoke spirals into air, the first breath of the day. With a small sigh, Hermione wraps her arms around herself, her fingers burrowing into the folds of her coat. Thinking that she's been too quiet, Harry shifts closer. Ron looks over at the sudden movement, straight-faced in a rather obvious manner, eyes narrow. Harry hastens to deflect attention; no matter how fine Ron seemed with them, some conversations are better had indoors.
"There's Luna." He waves at a bright yellow beanie bobbing through the crowd towards them.
"Mr Harry Potter, sir!"
All three of them jump, turning around. A short, stocky wizard hurries up to Harry, tripping over his long woollen scarf. A wizard and a witch follow him, pinched and windblown.
"Finally! Someone who can do something. Sure am glad to see you, sir! I'd like to know, what I'd like to know is, where is our sodding Ministry at a time like this? I haven't seen a single one of them Aurors or any of them Ministry officials, and no one has a bleeding idea what's going on. To top it all off, there are Muggles crawling all over the place. My word, never seen the likes of this, never! And some of them are flashing pictures!"
Harry stares at him, trying to find something to say. But the stranger seems happy to fill the silence. He smiles suddenly and holds out his hand, bowing. Green stripes of a pyjama bottom peeks through his coat.
"Of course, I beg your pardon, my name is Wilson Carrington Bligh and this is my brother William Simpson and his wife Margaret. Like I said, you bet we're glad to see you sir, not just because of, er, of all of this--" he gestures over the valley-- "but because, well, it's an honour to meet you, sir."
Dazedly, Harry shakes each of their hands. Carrington Bligh rattles on. "Of course, folks have been saying, they been saying that you might have gone overseas, sir, seeing as so little of you've been seen since, well, you know. Soul-splitting--never in my life --and all those leftover pieces, shocking, shocking! My brother William here owns a pub you see, the Witches Tail in Stoke-on-Trent sir, well, yes, so, no one blames you of course for going away, not at all, after your terrible ordeal, but folks like us, we like to see our--my word, is that the Minister? Well about bleeding time too! Well, now, come along Madge, William, I want some answers! Like I said, Mr Harry Potter, sir, an honour, indeed, indeed."
Harry whirls around to look at Ron and Hermione. For a few seconds, Ron tries to maintain a grave face, then bursts out laughing. A grin touches Hermione's face too, her eyes twinkling. Hearing a rustle of fabric behind him, Harry whips around, alarmed that it's Bligh again, but it's Luna, a pen and notebook in one hand, the other hand trying to hold down her bright yellow beanie.
"Hi Harry, looks like your fan club is thriving," she says, joining Ron and Hermione..
"That was just one person."
"Three, actually." Hermione bites the inside of her lip.
"And one of them owns a pub." Ron chips in. "Where they all sit around tankards of ale and talk about you every evening, all evening, way into the wee hours of the morning." He chuckles louder.
Luna nods gravely. "Well, if you'd asked me, I could've told you about the hundreds of letter we get every day at The Quibbler. From people who want to know how you are, what you're up to."
"What?"
She shrugs. "Well, I didn't think you wanted to know about them," she says, chewing her pen. "You should read them. People don't care about London burning. Well, they do, but to them it's a necessary sacrifice. And some of it can be fixed. But getting rid Voldemort after nearly thirty years--now that's something else."
Desperate to change the subject, Harry gestures at the ruin. "How long have you been here? We didn't see you at all."
"Oh, I've been trying to be everywhere at once. I got here hours and hours ago. Dad's around too, somewhere." She nods at the gaggle of people now surrounding Scrimgeour. "I think he's over there. Quite a mess, isn't it? I think I spotted several Muggle newspaper people too. Oh, what's going on over there?"
As they watch, from the direction where the Quidditch pitch used to be, there's a sudden shout and a flash of smoke, and Harry spots two Muggle policemen struggling with a tall witch brandishing her wand. The Minister barks an order and two of his men rush towards the commotion. Clutching her beanie, Luna hurries off, Harry, Ron and Hermione in tow.
Scrimgeour has arrived with a handful of his staff, either underestimating the situation or overestimating his own capabilities. Quite possibly the latter, thinks Harry. A few wear Auror badges, but others seem to be from different departments. Much of the crowd, following Wilson Carrington Bligh's example, rush towards the Minister. Soon he's surrounded by a dozen earnest witches and wizards, all very vocal. Reaching the edges of the crowd, Harry catches the end of a thunderous sentence, Rufus Scrimgeour's face a seething purple.
"Who? Who says that? This is the work of vandals, nothing more--"
"She says that! Ask her!"
All eyes follow the direction of the stabbing finger. Sally stands near the stone ruin, her inadequate cloak flapping about her knees, her hands wrapped tightly around her. Staring from Sally at the Minister's lined face inset with brown, almost amber eyes, the lift of his chin and the shape of his brow, Harry realises something. He draws a sharp breath, incredulous. He looks at Hermione; her mouth covered with a hand, her glance flits between the faces of Scrimgeour and Sally. Then her eyes dart to Harry's, her fingers to his.
The crowd flares and re-shapes itself as the Minister bears down on his daughter.
"I do not believe this--Seraphina!"
He towers over her, one hand vice-like around her upper arm, hissing ferociously through his teeth. He seems completely unaware of his avid audience.
"How dare you spread your miserable waffle at a time like this! I should never have let you return to England--you simply don't understand, do you? You refuse to see what a troublesome time this is, how hard I have to work--how can I do anything when my own family insists on sabotaging me at every--"
Sally wrenches her arm away, almost toppling backwards.
"Oh, stop your dramatics. If anyone's sabotaging you, it's yourself!"
She curls her fists and tries to stand tall, but her face is bloodless, and her lower lip trembles disastrously. The remainder of Scrimgeour's entourage, a sallow-faced witch and two wizards, shuffle their feet, muttering among themselves.
Sally stabs a trembling hand towards the ruin. Her pupils have ballooned.
"This is your proof. If you don't believe this, then you're blind!"
Hermione's nails dig into Harry's palm. Scrimgeour takes a step closer to Sally again, his jaw grinding. A rustle runs through the crowd. Suddenly aware of the murmuring around him, the Minister stalls, clears his throat and turns around abruptly. His eyes fall on his staff members.
"Cruddens, take her home--careful when Apparating though…"
Cruddens moves towards Sally, and she takes a step back, hissing. "I'm not going anywhere--" Cruddens glances at Scrimgeour, then lunges at Sally again, grabbing her by a shoulder.
Harry steps forward, pushing through the crowd.
"Sally can come home with us."
There's a moment of screeching silence as Scrimgeour takes in Harry's presence. Harry stares Cruddens down and the man moves away. He takes his time to meet Scrimgeour's calculating eyes. The Minister laughs suddenly, a harsh, contrived bark.
He turns to Sally, his capacious cloak sweeping. "Well, I suppose I should be glad you've made at least one friend. A sizeable catch too. Tell me, have you managed to convert him?"
"I'm rather in the habit of making up my own mind." Harry smiles. "You know that, Minister."
Scrimgeour looks at Harry, a dribble of sunlight making him squint, undermining the effect of his steely silence. Harry holds his gaze. A second later, he turns away, beckoning his bodyguards. Near the now non-existent Quidditch Pitch, the tussle between the Muggle policemen and the disgruntled witch has become a fully fledged racket, few more witches and wizards joining in. Harry watches as Scrimgeour strides over, swarmed by his public like ants over a generous morsel. Then he turns to where Hermione and Luna crouch over Sally who's plonked herself on the wet grass, doing her best to avoid all eyes.
--end chapter ten--