Disclaimer: I do not own these characters.
Author's Note: I apologize for the delay in getting this posted. I hope you enjoy this relatively short chapter. I hope to have more time to concentrate on telling this story when it settles down at work a little bit. Please let me know what you liked or didn't (as always.) And enjoy.
Harry had trouble getting around most of the time. He would wince when he sat most days, no matter how careful he was not to. Something about his dreams while unconscious kept floating up to the surface. Dumbledore had said he was no longer in a vacuum that he was fighting a war now. Wars need leaders. He was not that guy, he was painfully aware of it. He had to get smart, and he had to do it fast. He would avoid eye contact with his closest friends, out here in the middle of some godforsaken forest in the middle of nowhere, whenever he had a wave of pain wash over him. He was useless to them now. A bad leg and a broken nose. Worthless. They would be out all day gathering supplies, stocking food and stoking the fire to keep it going. All the while Harry would sit in the tent doing the stupid exercises Hermione had told him to. Speed up his recovery.
Harry shifted uncomfortably against the tent wall sending a fresh spasm up his thigh. The pain was blinding as always. The skin was scarred up already, even now Harry was aware that his worst fear was likely a very astute possibility, that he would always have a bum leg. A lifetime of walking with a gait and an inability to run at full speed. He was in trouble here. He looked down at his leg before putting his hand on the magic induced scar. He would learn. He would learn to live with it, he would learn to function properly with the pain. This was his life now. Except the present and embrace the future. Harry's eyes narrowed and his features went stern. He looked over to the branch Ron has transfigured into a cane for him. It was a nice gesture. It was a cage.
"Fuck it." Harry uttered as he forced himself to stand without aide of the cane. His face rocked with tics and convulsions. A sweat began to build on his forehead. He soon found himself standing on his own with no cane. The pain was intense but the pride was overwhelming the pain. The corner of his mouth turned up in a smirk for the first time in what felt like forever. Then a giant noise like an explosion cracked outside. The shockwave from whatever it was knocked Harry clean off his feet. He dragged himself to the end of the tent where he kept his belongings. He needed his wand. When he had it he began to magic everything he could get in eyesight into Hermione's bottomless bag.
The flap of the tent flew open and Ron shot into the room wild eyed. He was panting, his clothes were torn. He'd been in a fight. Before Harry could even ask where she was Hermione followed Ron into the tent. She was looking just as worse for the ware as Ron. Her clothes torn and her face and hands covered in dirt and fresh blood. They didn't have to say it Harry already knew. Somehow the Death Eaters had found them. Harry forced himself once more to get to his feet, they needed to see him on his feet. He stood and barked out an order to ready for a quick departure. Suddenly a red flash shot through the tent flap. Harry saw Hermione and Ron's face get splashed with blood. He felt an odd deeply sharp pain in his chest. He looked down to see a very large, deep bleeding gash, like a sword slash, across the area where his heart and lungs should be. Blood began to dribble out of his mouth. He must have a collapsed lung, he thought briefly.
The red light, it was a Sectum Sempra, Snape was bearing in. Harry knew he was losing too much blood. Way too much. He had to lead. He had to be a leader. He pointed his arm toward the tent flap, hoping to hit something, and fired a disarming charm. Then another. He looked down at Hermione and Ron, they were rushing toward him. Everything seemed to be moving slowly. He was sure that if he just turned to look out the flap he would still see his charms moving out of the tent. Time was slowing down. His perception was fuzzy. He was injured again. Fatally, possibly. He didn't know. He couldn't black out, and he couldn't leave them here. He reached out to Ron and Hermione. When they arrived to his hands there was a loud crack and they were all gone. Harry had brought them both through with him.
They fell four feet onto a beach in the English countryside. Harry had been out here once. It was brief and he was largely in the car the whole time, but it was safe for now. They would do better when able. He passed out then and his world went dark.
* * *
Harry Potter is insane. Neville could think of no other excuse as he stood across from the Ministry of Magic on another overcast day in London. The plan was either absolutely brilliant or he was just lucky and brave. Having known Harry for as long as Neville had it was a tough call to make. Harry had always been intermittently genius and crazy brave. Neville watched as Muggles made their way up and down the busy city streets. It was hard to believe that less than a year ago the world was a very diferent place, and he himself a very different man. He finally ducked into a lonely corner of some London side street. He had places to be.
After several minutes of walking he found himself standing before the ginger headed dynamo who had lead the DA this far into enemy territory chasing after Harry Potter. He loved her. He knew he did. He just didn't really know what or how or really when the right time would be to tell her, or if there was even a right time for them at all. It was a very confusing time to start a relationship with someone. He was very confused. When she noticed him approaching her skin seemed to glow and her smile widened. He fell in love with her again in that moment. He did a quick check to make sure that no one from the DA was around before sweeping her into his arms and spinning her around. She laughed in pure dizzied happiness as she spun. He pulled her closer and kissed her.
"I hope this all ends tomorrow." He said against her warm flush face, "I'd finally have some time to show you proper how great I think you are."
"You realize that once she's mad about you, you can stop flirting with her, right?" Ginny replied with her characteristic humor.
"I'll decide which rules I'm going to follow, thank you much." He smiled before he kissed her once more, "Besides, can't fault a bloke for getting mushy when he's actually allowed."
"If it helps, I'd like you to be allowed all the time." She said with a hint of longing. He understood what she meant. The DA couldn't know about them. Neville was afraid they would stop taking her seriously as a leader. She was one of the younger members, and Harry's ex. She had certain expectations to live up to. They both did. The DA didn't know anyone better to have her leading them, Neville was not going to rob her thunder from her. All the same, it hurt them to have to hid their blossoming feelings. A spot of light in all this darkness. Still the call had to be made, and they had made it.
"Harry was there." He said to change the subject.
"The Ministry?" She looked hurt to have the light fade back to reality, but she overcame quickly, "He's totally insane."
"Or he had a hell of a plan." Neville nodded, "Doesn't help us much but he's gone now. Some reports say he was killed racing through the main hall, others that he slipped away." He shrugged, "Either way he's not her now. I think if he was dead or captured, though it would've been all over the place by now."
"As it stands, no one knows where he is." She added to his line of thought. "That's good news for Harry…"
"Bad news for us." Neville concluded. "He's not making it easy to find him, that's for sure."
She pulled herself close to his chest and nuzzled her face there. A chill breeze swept passed and he felt her shake slightly against him. He would face down Voldemort without a wand for this woman, he knew it. He loved her. He wrapped his arms around her and breathed in the sweet scent of her hair. Their love story had started with a bang, but like all great love it became something more honest and more pure. He wished they could stay this way forever.
He knew, however that what was coming up was likely a battle. He knew only one way to get the information they needed. He had figured it out. If the Death Eaters kept running into Harry they knew something. Neville knew Harry was running, that Harry was doing something behind the back of Voldemort. Running wasn't Harry's style. Harry would take the fight to them, it was just how his brain was wired. But the sightings were too erratic. Harry's seen here and there and always under attack by Death Eaters. They were tracking him. They knew something Ginny didn't. Had some way of finding him. There was only one way to find out. They had to capture a Death Eater.
* * *
Hermione had blasted rail after rail of stunning spells behind her before she hit the opening of the tent. Harry looked confused. She swept her eyes around and noticed how bare the tent was. Her bag was stuffed full of their supplies. She dove to her bedroll and threw her hand under it. Her fingers searched and eventually found themselves wrapped around the locket. She had put it there for safe keeping. She threw it over her neck and let it slip under her shirt. She looked up in time to see Harry throw spells almost at random out of the tent flap with a military precision. As he put his arms out to indicate that he was going to perform a sidelong with them a bright red light hit Harry square in the chest.
It sliced into him so deeply and so quickly that the blood went everywhere. Harry seemed to go pale. Hermione's eyes filled with tears. He was getting better. He was going to be better. She shouted out in rage to the very Death Eater she knew was out there. Snape cast that spell. Sectum Sempra. A cursed cut so bad it could actually kill. Her vision was clouded with the haze her murderous mindset populated. She stood on her heel and began to storm out when suddenly she was suspended a few feet above sand.
They hit with a soft thud. The smell sea salt flooded her nose. She ignored it. She raced to Harry and began to magically heal his wound. She did a very good job of curing and counter cursing. The scar could have been worse when she was done, but it was visibly not the work of a professional healer. One more scar for her love to carry. The burden of the goddamn war on his form. Physical manifestations of the hatred that spawned this sick clash.
She bent low to kiss his cheek softly. When she began to pull her head back his eyes were opening. Her eyes met his and for a minute the terror and the pain were clearly evident there in the emerald depths of his gaze. She could see the weight of it all as it pushed down on the poor man. He looked so frail and hurt. Like an abused animal. She longed to take his pain. To reach into his destiny and rearrange it. He deserved better than this. But as quickly as it had been revealed his wall made it disappear. She wondered briefly if she had even seen it at all. She knew that was what he hoped for, and that pained her even more. He may have been hurt and sad and lost, but more so he was jaded. He had become cynical.
"We need to get out of the open." Harry commanded through his grunts. His leg wasn't healing right. She could tell from the way he moved. She had to get him off of it.
"We need an actual shelter this time." She frowned. "That leg needs attention."
"There are hotels a few miles from her." He said now without a hint of lingering pain in his voice. Ever the warrior god she thought bitterly to herself.
"Then we need to get there before nightfall." Ron said. "We should probably stay a few days so we can all heal. We'll drop dead of exhaustion at this rate."
Harry looked down for a moment. He was clearly weighing the options of each decision. Was it better to heal or would it hurt the cause too much to lose that sort of time. Finally he nodded and began to limp off. She stood to follow him. Ron came up on one side and she the other. They nodded to each other before sliding moving closer to Harry and letting him put his weight on them. She felt his body give a relieved shutter before it stiffened up in reaction to the idea of appearing to weak to move on his own. She slid her hand into his and squeezed gently. After several long seconds he squeezed back. She loved this man. She would die for this man. She had to be sure that he wouldn't die for everyone else first.