Disclaimer: I do not own these characters.
Author's Note: Okay! We have some more stuff with the Das struggle in Hogwarts, which I like. I hope you guys do too. And finally we're getting back on track with the hunt for the Horcrux. I'll try to put in some nice moments for H/HR (Because they deserve it), but we'll see. Anyway, I'm going on and on, I hope you enjoy the story, and as always let me know what you think. The comments you guys leave really help me tell this story.
Anthony was pacing. Again. Hannah was sitting in a reading chair watching him. She would say something about how he needs to calm his nerves, but she had chewed her fingernails to the quick. They were nervous. It was hard not to be. They had Ernie skipping potions class to reinforce some of the older escape tunnels to Hogsmeade. He had been gone for too long. He had his Galleon and he was supposed to check in ever half hour. It had been forty five minutes since his last message.
Finally Anthony stopped pacing. Hannah watched closely, afraid of what he might do. He took a deep breath and punched the wall so hard his knuckles split. Hannah looked on shocked. She couldn't believe how much rage was building in him. He looked down at his bleeding hand and punched the wall again. He left an ovoid spot of blood on the wall. He stared at that for a second before he began punching the wall repeatedly. With no real regard for his well being.
Hannah leapt to her feet and rushed across the room. She didn't have any kind of plan and just let her self work on instinct. She circled to his back and put her arms around his shoulders. She pulled him close and held him there. When she moved without thought to protect she had ended up hugging him. She worried, in that abstract way that young people do, that he would realize that this hug meant something.
He didn't. He just leaned his head into the crook of her arm and started sobbing gently. She held him all the more firmly. Pressing him to her. She would refuse to let him go if the walls around them began to crumble. He collapsed onto his knees and she followed him. He hunched his back and shook from his tears. She pulled him gently, as if to suggest that he turn towards her. She wanted him to rest his head against her and be at peace. He didn't shrug her arms away, but he didn't turn either.
They both feared the worst about Ernie. They both reeled from the notion that the very small resistance dwindled every day. There they sat. Not looking at one another. Not speaking. Just racking themselves with too much guilt for young people to handle. She knew he would never forgive himself if anything happened to Ernie. It was his idea to send him down there.
She saw his head turn slightly. As though he had heard something she didn't. With no warning he jump from the safety of her arms to his feet and raced over to the door. She stood up and followed him, and sure enough she began to hear the noise to. Pads hitting the polished stone floors in the hall outside. Ms. Norris was walking nearby. Anthony took a quick step back to clear the entrance and in so doing bumped into Hannah. They didn't have time to be worried. He just helped her to her feet and summoned a bed.
They both knew that Argus Filch would never come to the Room of Requirements unless something bad had happened. Sure enough within moments their fears were justified. Filch stormed into the room holding a very limp, very bloody person in his arms. Filch had a look of pure rage boiling on his face as the door shut behind him. He made his way immediately to the new bed and deposited the person on it. Anthony came quickly to the bed side and began casting healing spells and counter hexes.
Hannah ran to the other side. It was then that she got her first look at him. She knew it was Ernie, but not because he looked like Ernie. There was so much blood. His skin looked like hamburger meat in spots and burnt leather in others. His hair had been badly burned away on massive areas of his skull. Hannah cast a glance over to Filch.
"He came up behind him." Filch said with his head hanging low, "Carrow did. Slipped by me and Ms. Norris." There was a tear working it's way down the old man's face, "Carrow said he was dead. Said I would be if I took him to the infirmary. I couldn't think of anywhere else to go."
Hannah nodded and moved to put her hand on Filch's shoulder. In the last year this man who had tortured them had become so different. He had become an ally. He had done what he could for their war effort including lying for them on several occasions. He had taken some of them under his wing. He had begun to truly care for many of the children. Ernie, though, Ernie was Filch's favorite. Hannah felt compelled to comfort him. Anthony had no such compulsion. Anthony was fighting a war.
"Were you followed?" Anthony barked out never once turning around.
"No, I don't believe so." Filch answered shakily, "Carrow went back to his room before I could find..ehem..'scuse me. Before I could find Ernie."
"Hannah." Anthony barked out, "Check him for anything suspicious. Just because he wasn't followed doesn't mean the old fool wasn't tracked."
"Anthony, Don't you think you're being a little too harsh here?" Hannah tried to smooth the situation.
"Harsh?" Anthony repeated, "Harsh?" He turned around, "I'm leading! I don't goddamn lead and people die! Look at him, Hannah. Look!" He pointed at Ernie, "I go easy and people get hurt! It's over this time. The Carrows will pay for this!"
Anthony rushed from the bed to his dresser. He pulled out his wand and stomped toward the door. Hannah ran to block him. He was being careless. She couldn't let him.
"Where are you going?" She demanded. Anthony had something dangerous burning in his eye and she had to set him straight before he got himself killed.
"I'm going to kill those two miserable shits. Then I'm going to get Seamus back." He said too calmly.
"I really don't see how you getting yourself killed is going to help the cause, Anthony." Hannah reasoned. If there was one thing she loved about Anthony it was that he listened to reason. Of course he had never been this upset before.
"Some times a war needs a martyr." He said darkly, "Now get out of my way."
Hannah did just that. She let him by her and a few steps closer to the door.
"Langlock!" She shouted as she cast the Locomotor Mortis hex. Anthony's legs buckled under him and he hit the floor. His wand spun out across the room before hitting a wall and stopping. Anthony lay on the floor screaming his outrage.
Filch stared at her with an odd mix of pity and pride. She stuffed her wand back into her sleeve where she hid and walked over to Anthony. The walls were soundproofed, but nothing is perfect. If anyone was walking close enough to the wall they might hear him screaming. She knelt down and put her hand on his forehead. He stopped screaming and looked up at her with venom.
"Why." He asked in a cold whisper.
"You would've died." She explained herself.
"We're all going to die." Anthony spat out, "We don't all get to go out heroes."
"Stop sulking." She scolded, "You know perfectly well what an ass you were being. Now apologize to Argus and stop acting like a git. We need a plan, not a temper tantrum." Every ounce of HufflePuff poured out of her in her words. They were a nurturing, paternal group of people.
"You're touchy feely stuff is irritating." Anthony responded, "But it's also right. We need a plan." He was finally sounding like a RavenClaw again, his cool logic winning out. He dropped his voice then, clearly speaking only to himself, "Better be a damn good plan too."
* * *
"You ask me, the plan hasn't really changed." Hermione said, holding the locket, "We still need the sword from Godric's Hollow."
"What do you mean? Of course it's changed." Ron countered, "We have a list of tasks ahead of us, not to mention a good lead on another Horcrux. We have to decide what to do."
"My reading suggests that the only way to destroy a Horcrux is with a very powerful magical item. We need the sword and we need to go to Godric's Hollow." She cut in, "We can't ignore that issue. We'll have to make time for everything else along the way."
"Yeah, but why go to Godric's Hollow now?" Ron asked, "Why don't we get as many of the Horcrux as possible then get the means to destroy them?"
"Because it's too dangerous." Hermione answered, "As long as the Dark Lord doesn't know we're hunting them we're safe. He just thinks we're hiding. The more we have and the longer we hold on to them the greater the risk becomes that he finds out and we lose them. We have to make sure they're destroyed as we go, it's the only safe way."
"I don't know." Ron scratched his chin. Her logic was sound, but somewhere deep in his tacticians heart he saw the potential to use the Horcrux as a threat as well as a weapon. He knew it was risky, but war is won on risks, "What do you think, Harry?"
Harry barely responded. He had been sitting in the chair reading the book about Dumbledore since Ron had shown it to him. The thing clearly bothered him. He looked out of it. Ron repeated himself. Harry looked up. He blinked twice then shook his head. He looked at them both sternly. Considering his next words very carefully. Ron had thought he wasn't listening, but this wouldn't be the first time Harry Potter had surprised him. Finally Harry spoke;
"You're both right." He said diplomatically. They looked at him confused so he continued, "Hermione's right. We need the sword. It's safest to destroy them as we go."
"We could use them as a bargaining chip." Ron said betraying one of his thousand of plans, "We tell the Death Eaters that we'll hand over the Horcrux in exchange for the release of the imprisoned students of Hogwarts."
"That's not a bad plan." Hermione nodded approvingly. Ron smiled. Harry shook his head again.
"No." He said finally, "The risk is too large. Besides-" He paused. His defense left him vulnerable to questions he didn't want to answer. However he had no choice, "The Dark Lord wouldn't have told the Death Eaters why the Horcrux are important. He wouldn't have even told them that they were important."
Ron and Hermione stared at him in confusion. They didn't expect a deep personal insight about Voldemort from Harry. Harry seemed to have not noticed.
"He's paranoid." Harry's eyes narrowed, "I wouldn't be famous if he wasn't. He'd never leave himself open like that. He can't trust the Death Eaters, he never could. RAB had to figure it out all on his own the way Dumbledore did." Harry paused, lost in thought, "They aren't barging chips to the Death eaters. They're just old junk."
Ron nodded. He should have seen that himself. He ran some quick scenarios through his head and confirmed for himself that if the objects had no meaning to the Death Eaters they were just liabilities. One more damn thing to get done before he had to watch his best friend march to what could be death. Ron hung his head.
"You're right. You're absolutely right." He turned to Hermione, "Okay, we go to Godric's Hollow."
"Then you better get back to practicing your transfiguration." She reminded him.
"It has changed though." Harry interrupted.
"What?" Hermione asked.
"You said the plan hadn't changed, it has." Harry answered, "We know how they were tracking us, which is great."
"It really is a load off." Ron agreed.
"But now's not the time to rest on our laurels." Harry spoke with his command voice. They listened, "We can't get lazy and we can't get sloppy. We've already done that. Percy found you." He pointed to Ron, "We got too comfortable here. We have to back into hiding."
"Why? This place is hidden, and Percy's on our side." Hermione argued.
"Doesn't matter." Harry said far too quickly to have been really listening to her, "Someone found us means others could too. We know how not to be tracked, now we have to get off the grid again."
"What about practice?" Ron asked.
"We'll find a safe place." Harry assured him, "We'll never stay anywhere for more than three days from here on out. We leave no evidence we were there. I'll go into town for supplies alone since I'm the only so far to master Metamorphmagus. We'll take turns keeping watch and sleep in shifts."
"We had a plan, Harry" Hermione insisted, not the least of which because if they went off the grid again it would be impossible to get a minute alone with Harry. He still hadn't said if he loved her or not. It was selfish, she hated herself for it, but love is selfish in it's way.
"Plans changed." Harry said. All three of them knew that it was finally. They packed in silence. Harry went out to get a map of Europe to find spots to hide. Ron had gone into to bathroom to practice in front of a mirror, he said it was his best hope so far. Hermione just sat on the edge of her bed and allowed herself to cry. It had all changed. She just didn't know yet if it was for the worst.