Disclaimer: Standard profession of innocent intentions. Please don't sue.
Author's Notes: I knew this chapter would be finished tonight, seeing as how I just returned from England. Well...okay, Epcot, which has a lovely fake England in its World Showcase. I was quite impressed with the cider I bought at the pub, and less impressed by the lack of Harry Potter merchandise. (Damn you, Warner Brothers!! If you're not going to put England in your own parks, set something up with Disney for theirs!!) I was at least hoping to find a red and yellow scarf. Time to dust off the knitting needles, I guess.
Oh, sorry. Got off track there. Where was I? Ah! A few days ago I got an email from a reader asking if I listen to music when I'm writing and if so, what kind. I wrote back to this very nice person, but then thought that maybe someone else is curious. I do listen to music when I'm writing; it's essential, sometimes to the entire tone of a particular section. At the end of the chapter, I've listed some of the things I've had on in the background while I've been writing this story. If you're not interested, feel free to ignore it. If you are, I'd imagine everything is on Kazaa. Good stuff, people;) And I'm picky about music.
Once again, thank you so much for your kind words and support. It tickles me beyond pink to hear that ya'll are enjoying it. I hope I don't ever disappoint. On that note, on with the show!
PS: Merry (or Happy) Christmas everyone!!! Make it jolly and safe. Jolly safe.
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An Organ of Fire
by Kristen Elizabeth
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"Harry."
With lazy movements, Harry turned his head to look at the woman lying beside him. "The sun is going down."
"I know," she replied. "Night comes so much quicker these days." She lifted her chin enough to look down the length of her body. "I like my present."
"Be careful." Harry watched her run a finger up and down the smooth length of the garden snake coiled on her lower stomach. "They bite, Hermione."
She smiled at him. "Nothing can hurt me when I'm with you."
Harry settled back, tucking one arm behind his neck. "We should probably go. It'll get cold before long."
"Just a few more minutes." Hermione let the creature wrap around her wrist. "She likes the dark. And there's no rush, Harry."
"You're right," he easily agreed, sitting up to stretch. Harry glanced around. The rock on which they had spread their picnic blanket balanced precariously on top of another rock, which rested on another rock, a hundred feet off the ground. "It's not like we can get down anyway."
"What goes up, must come down. Broomsticks and birds, Snitches and scaffolding."
"Yes." Harry took a breath of night air. "I'm glad we had this time together, Hermione."
"So am I, Harry. I've...ow!" She frowned at her hand and the two fresh puncture marks that marred it. "She bit me. Is she poisonous?"
"I think I used to know, but...I can't remember." He reached for her bleeding palm and raised it to his lips. "What does poison taste like?"
When he looked back up at her, her face was white, like a freshly washed bedsheet. "It's all right, Harry," Hermione whispered. "It doesn't hurt."
"Hermione?"
The snake had made its way up to her neck; its head danced around the base of her throat. "You can't stop what's to come, my love. But I promise, it'll all be over soon..."
****
"No!" Harry's eyes flew open; he jerked his cheek up from its resting place on his arm. "I can!!"
"Harry." Lupin was at his side in a second. "What is it?"
"Hermione! She..." He blinked several times. "It was...a dream. She was in my..." Harry swallowed heavily. "I'm sorry."
The large hand that landed on his back could only belong to Hagrid. "Yer barely outta th' hospital wing, 'arry. We ought not ter be keepin' yer up."
Harry shook his head, clearing away the lingering images. "No, I'm fine. I just...won't doze off anymore." He looked up at Lupin. "I don't suppose it's all just been a dream?" He tried to smile at his own meager joke. "Didn't think so."
"Harry, are you sure about this? It's what you want to do, and damn the consequences?"
His brain raced to catch up. Before he had fallen asleep, they had been discussing...what? Then, he looked down the papers spread before him on Hermione's dining room table. One in particular, a map, caught his eye. Then, he remembered. "Yes," he said, the chill in his voice startling even him. "If he's got her there, I'm going there to get her back. And I'd like to see him try to stop me."
"I just want you to be sure. I mean, there are other things we could do. We could find Sirius and..."
"Every second that we sit here debating is another second Hermione could be in pain." Harry's hand curled into a tight ball. "If you're not on board with the plan, then you don't have to come along."
Lupin was quiet for a moment. "Harry. Whoever took Hermione..."
"Malfoy. It was Malfoy. Let's just say it out loud, shall we?"
"...they've done the impossible. Broken through the Hogwarts defenses. And you say it probably wasn't even just this once? But on Halloween, too?" Harry nodded curtly. "Don't you get it, Harry? The amount of power...of skill that doing this takes? The greatest wizards in history created the enchantments that protect this castle. And Malfoy's found a way through them. That means..."
"That means this won't be easy." Harry stood up and paced towards the fireplace. "But it doesn't mean I'm not going to do it. I have to...find her. I have to save her and..." He put one hand on the mantle, resting his forehead on the inside of his elbow. "I was going to ask her to marry me," he whispered.
"What's tha', 'arry?" Hagrid asked.
He squeezed back hot tears. "Nothing. Listen..." Harry turned his head to see his friends. "I don't blame you if you're not terribly keen on going head-long into the fray with me. But just know that I can always use the two of you by my side. I have ever since I was a kid."
"We'll be with you," Lupin said after a long pause. "There was a never a question about that."
"I'll be with you, too."
Harry whipped his gaze around to the other side of the fireplace and the staircase that led up to the bedrooms. Little Harry was sitting on the lower steps, his hands tucked tightly under the arms of his green sweater. He had obviously been there for some time without notice. The boy stood up bravely. "I want to help you find Mum."
"Harry..." The elder Harry sighed softly.
"I'm serious!" His son approached him, unfolding his arms. "I can take care of myself. You won't have to watch out for me. I just...I want to do something! She's my Mum."
"It's just too dangerous. You haven't even started your training. There'd be no way for you to protect yourself from..." Harry shook his head. "I'm sorry. No. It's impossible."
Lupin sat on the edge of the table. "You did say that he's the same age you were when you took on the dark forces single-handedly."
"Tha's true, 'arry. Yer only came up ter my knee when yer an' Ron an' 'ermione went lookin' fer tha' bloody stone tha'..."
"We're not having a debate here. Hermione doesn't want him exposed!" Harry fairly shouted. "I'm not about to go against her wishes!"
There was another pause after Harry's outburst. "Father," little Harry began in a voice almost too quiet to be heard. "I've already been exposed."
The fire in the hearth crackled cheerfully, mocking the heavy silence that draped the room and its occupants. "The entire reason I haven't been in your life until now, the reason I left, was to protect the people I love. After all that, if anything were to happen to one of them..."
Little Harry blinked. "You love me?"
"Harry..." He stared at his son, such a perfect representation of his love for Hermione, and Ron's love for both of them. The question was so small, yet it nearly knocked him over. There was only one way to answer. "Of course I do."
He spoke the words with such unmistakable emotion that Hagrid had to clear his throat. Lupin seemed to be quite interested in something on the ceiling. Little Harry watched his father for another second before breaking into a grin. But only a second passed before it faded.
"I still want to help Mum."
"And I still say that I can't risk you. Can you understand that, Harry?"
The boy looked down at his shoes. One had come untied, making him seem much younger. "I can," he mumbled. "I'll stay here."
After reaching out to touch his son's shoulder, Harry returned to business. He moved back to the table and picked up the map. "The first thing we have to know is just where the hell we're going."
Lupin frowned. "Do you know where the Malfoy's manor is?"
"No." Harry thought for a second. "But I know someone who does."
****
They found Severus Snape where he always was when he wasn't presiding over a class of nervous students: in the dungeons, hunched over a boiling cauldron, stirring a concoction of nauseating ingredients. He looked up as Harry, Lupin and little Harry entered; the steam coming from his potion had plastered his greying black locks to his forehead and cheeks, but given his sallow skin an almost pink glow. He was obviously surprised to see them.
"We're sorry to burst in on you," Harry spoke first. "I tried your apartment first, but..." He didn't need to finish the obvious observation.
"It's quite alright." Snape stepped away from the cauldron. After an awkward pause, he asked, "Is there any news?"
Harry shook his head tightly. "Nothing."
Little Harry moved towards the cauldron. "What are you making, Professor?"
"It's only an experiment," Snape told the boy, discouraging any further curiosity. "Don't get too close." The boy stepped back. "I take it you're not here to chat, Potter."
"No." Harry leveled the man with the intensity in his eyes. So much like his father, Snape couldn't help but think. "Dumbledore says this is hard for you. I have no doubt, but honestly..." He lifted his shoulders. "I'm finding it hard to care. You know as well as I who has my...Hermione. And you know me well enough to know I'll stop at nothing to get her back from him."
Snape's hand closed around a bottle of powdered dragon's blood. "And where do I fit into your rescue plans?"
"Do you see anyone else in this room who has been a welcome guest at Malfoy Manor?"
For a long time, Snape watched his former student with a keen, yet somehow tired eye. "That was a long time ago," he finally replied.
"You still know how to get there, don't you?" Harry pressed. "That's all I'm asking for."
The Potions master uncorked the dragon's blood and added a healthy amount to his cauldron. "Are you going to kill him?"
"If needs be...yes."
"You'll go to Azkaban and he'll become a martyr."
Lupin stepped into the conversation, "Harry only meant as a very last resort. The fact of the matter is that..."
"He's killed Ron. It doesn't matter if it was with a curse or his bare hands." Harry stepped even closer to the older man. "Don't you think he should answer for it? Or do you still think, after all these years, that he can do no wrong?"
"He can do wrong," Snape replied. "I've seen it...first-hand."
Harry folded his arms. "Then if you sit back and do nothing, you're as much to blame as him."
"Do you think this is going to be easy, Potter?" Snape threw aside the half-empty bottle and reached for another from his cache of supplies. "Do you think you're just going to Apparate into the Malfoy's parlor and find Hermione tied to a chair? No." He tossed in a Jobberknoll feather. "He knows better than that."
"You taught him better than that."
"Believe what you want." Snape added another feather, causing the mixture inside the cauldron to turn a sickening shade of green.
Harry glanced back at Hagrid and Lupin. "We're wasting time."
"Are you going to help us or not, Severus?" Lupin asked. "Just tell us where the Manor is and what sort of defenses it has and we'll be out of your hair."
Snape gazed into his potion. "I could tell you, but..."
Harry brought his fist down on Snape's worktable, rattling the jars and bottles. "I should have known you wouldn't do anything to help me! I'd have better luck tracking down Dobby the bloody house elf and asking for his help!"
"I'd rather show you," Snape finished, coldly.
Hagrid blinked. "Yer want ter go with 'arry?"
"You want to come along?" Harry's brow crinkled. "Why?"
As he replied, Snape carefully measured out something that Harry couldn't identify. "I have my reasons. But more than that..." He added the mysterious substance; the color turned a darker shade of green. "You can't get there without a guide."
Harry's gaze slid back and forth between the Potions master and his potion. "What is it that you're making?"
The man reached for a ladle and poured a fair amount of the brew into a beaker. "If you need to know, I'll tell you."
"You really are an impossible bastard," Harry snapped, seventeen years of animosity boiling over.
Snape snorted. "Then find someone else to deliver you into the hands of the dragon."
Harry ran his hands through his black locks several times. "When can you be ready to go?"
"Whenever you are, Potter." The older man screwed a lid onto his concoction. "Just so you know...if you face him tonight, one out of the two of you won't make it to dawn."
"Ther's a cheery attitude fer yer," Hagrid muttered.
Harry glanced at his son. "He won't be able to kill me."
"Are you so sure?" Snape asked.
"Yes." His eyes closed briefly; he could almost sense Hermione's body curled up next to his, smell her warm rose scent, feel her expanding belly underneath his hand. "I have a lot more to protect than Malfoy does." His eyes opened. "We'll start for Hogsmeade in fifteen minutes. I don't want anyone to know what we're doing." Harry hesitated. "Not even Dumbledore."
Lupin scratched the back of his neck, worried. "If you're even listening to me anymore, Harry, I don't think that's such a good idea."
"I'm listening. I just don't see how involving Dumbledore is going to help."
"Stop and think, Harry," he continued. "This weight of the world...you don't have to carry all of it. There are people around to help you. You don't have to do this alone."
"You don't understand." His head ached in sheer exhaustion. More than anything else, Harry Potter was tired of being Harry Potter. "It always comes down to me."
****
It had all happened so quickly that it was hard at first for Hermione to accept that it hadn't been a dream. One second she had been following her students as they ran to find the source of the commotion in the castle; the next, she had woken up in the cold corner of a stone room with nothing but a plate of dry bread and a chamber pot.
The first day she had spent in numbing silence, shocked out of her voice. She ate only when she realized that not eating could hurt the baby. She slept only for only brief periods of time; there was soft scratching all around her in the shadows. Even before Scabbers, rats were her least favorite of all creatures.
On the second day, she woke from a few minutes sleep crying. The tears did not stop for a long time. It was only then that she began to really think about what had happened to her. She had been ripped out of the safe nest of Hogwarts, away from her child, away from her lover, away from her life, and dumped into a prison of sorts...and there was only one person in the world who hated her enough to have done it.
She forced herself to talk, whispering words of comfort to her unborn child, but her thoughts were anything but light. Surely her disappearance had been noticed by now; it would take Harry even less time to connect the dots. He would come for her, of that she was sure. But she was even more certain that he would come looking for Malfoy. And she couldn't say she'd be sorry to see what Harry would do to the bastard.
After all, she could remember with vivid clarity what Harry had done to Voldemort when he had threatened her life. It would never go away, that picture of Harry, bleeding and livid, pushing her away and blocking the path of Voldemort's curse. And then, the return curse that had withered the Dark Lord to nothing but an empty robe on the misty field. No...Draco Malfoy stood no chance against Harry if she were harmed.
But knowing that didn't stop the sheer terror that sprung into her throat when a before-unseen door burst open and a shaft of light penetrated her little stone cage. Hermione winced and shielded her eyes.
"You're to come with me," a voice ordered her. "Get up."
Hermione grabbed onto the wall for support as she stood on weak legs. "Who are you? Why are you doing this to me?!" The unidentified person remained a dark blur in the light, but as she slowly began to walk towards the door she could make out features...nose, hair, eyes...
"Sirius?" He stared straight ahead without blinking, but it was him, without a doubt. "Sirius," she repeated, tears welling up. Unmoved, he grabbed the dirty sleeve of her blouse. "What are you.."
"Follow me." Harry's godfather yanked on her arm enough to hurt, pulling her into a stone corridor.
Hermione went along without a fight. Perhaps there was a way to reach to Sirius, through whatever had control over him. "Please..." Her voice echoed off the cold walls. "Please let me go, Sirius. We can get out of here together and...and back to Hogwarts where it's safe. Harry's been worried about you...with good reason, I suppose, but..."
"Stop talking."
She stumbled over an uneven part of the floor. "This isn't you. I know it isn't you. Please tell me what Draco's done to you. Maybe I can help!" His grip on her arm grew tighter. "You're hurting me," Hermione whispered.
Her pain went ignored as Sirius forced her up a long set of stone steps. They emerged into another hallway, only this one was lined with torches which failed to provide any warmth. "Sirius," she tried again. "Do you remember the first time you met Harry? You needed him to trust you...and he did. Please don't break that trust. You are family to Harry, the first real family he ever..."
"I said stop talking." Sirius thrust her into an open doorway.
Her knees slammed onto hard wood as she fell. Hermione bit her lip to keep in her cry of pain; she would not give anyone the satisfaction of seeing her down-trodden. With all the strength she had left, she picked herself off the floor, brushed off her ruined skirt and took her first look at her new surroundings. More of a hall than a room, it stretched across an impossible length of space. A huge fireplace sat at each end, the kind that could swallow a person whole, drowning them in flames.
And at the one closest to her, a man in black, floor-length robes stood. But it would take more than even the largest fire to warm that man in particular; he turned a moment later to face her, his eyes more grey than blue...so clouded over with hate. "I trust you found your accommodations of the past two days suitable?"
Hermione lifted her chin, staring back at Draco Malfoy with an equal amount of loathing. "I find nothing about being here suitable. Just who do you think you are?! I demand that you let me go immediately, Draco!"
He began to laugh. "Spirited little Mudblood. You are hardly in a position to be making demands of any kind."
"What do you want with me?"
Smiling cooly, he stepped away from the fireplace. "Who says that I want anything from you?"
Hermione licked her lips nervously. "What have you done to Sirius Black?"
"I'm not really all that interested in revealing anything to you quite yet. Petrificus Totalus." Her captor snapped his long, pale fingers. She had no time to do anything before her entire body froze. "Who needs a wand when one has the power of the mind? I'm sure that's one thing you've never learned to do from your books."
She could say nothing, but her eyes were windows into her fear, only shaded by a curtain of brave malice.
"What a pleasant sound. Silence when the Head Girl of Hogwarts is present." He moved around her rigid body, which seemed to be standing up only by the sheer force of her willpower. "You asked what I want with you and I answered nothing. Well...that's not entirely the truth." Draco reached out to touch a stiff lock of her hair. "You're merely the bait for what I want." He glanced up at the arched ceiling as though he could see through to the moon. "He should be here at any moment." His gaze drifted back down to hers. "Then...the real fun can finally begin." Draco's eyes grew even colder. "And end."
**Oh god....Harry. You're walking straight into a trap.** Inside her head, Hermione screamed, but outside, there was no noise but the sound of Draco Malfoy's laughter.
****
"This is it." Snape pointed at the dark house at the very top of a sloping peak just outside of Leeds. "Malfoy Manor."
Harry barely flinched at the slap and crash of thunder and lightning. It seemed fitting, the storm that was brewing. Why should it have been pleasant on an evening when he had come looking for a fight to the death?
"Lovely place," Lupin commented, dryly. "Perhaps I'll build a summer home here."
Snape started across the short moor that lay between them and the manor. "A little less sarcasm would do just fine, Remus."
"Sarcasm's all that I've got left," he replied, following his old schoolmate. When he didn't hear footsteps behind him, he glanced over his shoulder. "You've come this far, Harry. Nowhere to go but forward."
Harry closed his eyes. He didn't want to say anything, didn't want it evident on his face, but his scar had been burning from the moment they Apparated onto the moor. He forced his eyes open. Just as he did, a light came on in the manor. A tiny square of light...a guide to follow to reach Hermione...a beacon to whatever the night held in store for him.
After taking a calming breath of damp air, Harry started towards it.
****
To Be Continued
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Soundtracks:
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (of course)
Practical Magic
Dawson's Creek Volumes I and II
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Romeo and Juliet
Albums:
Sarah McLachlan- "Surfacing"
Madonna- "Ray of Light"
Singles:
Sarina Paris- "Baby Look at Us"
E Nomine- "Vater Unser"
Sarah Brightman and Andrea Bocelli- "Time to Say Goodbye"
Evanescence- "Imaginary"
Malice Mizer- "Gekka No Yakusokyou"
Bjork- "Bachelorette" and "Dancer in the Dark"
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