COLOR="#000000">It was supposed to be over, Ron."
"Shh. I know, I know."
"It's not over. It's never going to be over."
"It's okay, I'm here." He narrowed his eyes, "We have to get everyone out of this house."
She nodded, set her jaw, and resumed the persona of a girl that once fought a war, and won. They rounded up their parents and fled from the Burrow. Grabbing tents and bedding down for the night in a heavily wooded area, miles away from Ottery Saint Catchpole.
* * *
Draco could hear the muffled voices above him. They were confirming that the letters had been sent, that the Potter boy would die before months end, that the world would be cleansed of muggle kind within the year, and further more that the ancient being they worshiped would rise once more. He felt a fresh wave of sick float up his windpipe. He swallowed it back down. Chastised himself for succumbing to weakness and redoubled his efforts. He stared at the wall. Waiting as ever he did. But not for much longer.
* * *
Harry woke up the following morning to smell he didn't recognize and didn't care for. He shifted around trying to decide if they had installed a waste treatment plant over night and chose to burn it down for laughs, or if some malevolent spirit had eaten nothing but curry and taken up residence in his nose. When his eyes adjusted he realized that neither of those, totally plausible, options were fact. It had just been the smell of the safe house he had forgotten he was stashed away in. He took a quick shower, partially because the space was cramped and partially because hot water had not flowed from those pipes in lifetimes, though he would have preferred a much longer one. He dressed, looked at his hair in the mirror, decided not to bother and went to his window. He opened it, hoping to air it out, and discovered a letter sitting there.
He grabbed the letter, hoping it wasn't from Hermione complaining about his absence last night, Ron complaining about his presence, Lavender inviting him over for some of both in repeated order, or more fan mail. He hated fan mail. He didn't like reading it, he didn't like responding to it, and he was uncomfortable with the sheer number of women offering to bear him striking young sons. He unrolled the parchment and examined it. All at once he felt his brain go numb.
The handwriting was terrible, as though written in the dark with only the vaguest idea of the shapes of letters. The ink was the color of old blood, though he was certain that it was ink, as it didn't pool before it dried the way blood does. The missive was short.
Harry Potter,
I will kill/destroy everything you love. Then I will watch you beg to die. And you will. Die, but first I will ruin you.
~The True Blood Brotherhood
Harry crumpled the letter up and threw it beside his bed. It wasn't the first time he had gotten death threats of this type. It was the most gruesome looking he had ever received, but wholly unoriginal. While the name True Blood Brotherhood was a new one, the intent was all too familiar. Sometimes, in the early days of his death threats, he would investigate them, track down the senders. It usually turned out to be old Death Eaters, unable to handle the changing world, but with no real power to do anything about it or Harry, himself. A few times it had ended up being sent by kids looking to make a name for themselves by putting a fright into the great Harry Potter. But it had always been benign, nothing to concern himself over, and eventually he stopped looking into the letters, in favor of disposing them. He would have dismissed this one entirely, and in fact in that moment he did with only a few words. However in the moment, as a method of clearing his mind of the nastiness aimed at him, he said simply;
"How in the world does someone 'Kill/Destroy' something anyway?"