New Chapter Progress: [ 50% ]

Progress Notes: I will be on vacation for 20 days starting tomorrow, and where I'm going, there is zero internet service. Please stick around! I've sent chapter 12 (the corrected and ready-to-go version) to my beta. She hasn't responded yet, but hopefully she'll post it soon.

Keep reading! I'll be back soon!

Rain pounded down on Ginny like a thousand tiny fists as she dodged across the road towards the seemingly abandoned warehouse. The muggle street was nearly empty except for a few homeless families that sought shelter from the rain in these broken-down buildings. It made Ginny feel sick inside to see their hungry eyes peering out at her, as if searching her for something they could wrangle from her grasp. As their itchy fingers twitched, Ginny shuddered and quickened her pace. Although her family had not been the richest, they still had a roof over their head. These people had nothing.

Her destination was the gloomiest and most intimidating of all the buildings. Its exterior was gray and cracked with graffiti decorating its walls. The windows were shattered from fights in this particular London alley and its smell pierced Ginny’s nose almost painfully.

She skipped over a puddle of sludge and ducked under a rotting overhang that gave cover to the doorway. The door itself appeared battered and falling off its ancient hinges. The wood it was once made of had been stripped and vermin gnawed hungrily at its remains. She observed the doorframes carefully, making sure she had the right incantation in mind. If she misspoke, an intense protection spell would backfire on her and would probably leave her singed and lying in the street.

“Nitwit. Blubber. Oddment. Tweak” Ginny whispered softly into the door. There was a groan and the entire building shuddered. There was a flash of shimmering, white light and the door became a hazy oasis in front of Ginny’s eyes. The air around her hummed with energy and she had to squint as the magic swirled in hectic circles around the door. It melted and twisted like molasses and morphed into something absolutely majestic until Ginny was standing in front of an entirely different door.

It greatly resembled the doors that once occupied the hallways of Hogwarts. It was arched and made of a deep oak with metal clasps locking it into place. It looked oddly beautiful and mysterious in its dark, rank location. The building sheltering it hardly did the door justice; it was so beautiful! Ginny ran her hand over the smooth wood before gently twisting the ironclad handle and stepping across the threshold.

As soon as Ginny was inside the building, the door shut itself behind her, melting into the wall until it appeared simply of layers of cold, grey stone. The torches hung on the walls burst into life, but still, the building was damp and cold. Shivering, Ginny pulled her sweater closer to her neck as a definite chilly draft swept up the dark hallway.

Somewhere above her, a bell rang. Almost immediately, quick, sharp footsteps approached and Ginny merely waited where she was until the stern figure of Minerva McGonagall emerged from the shadows.

“Miss Weasley.” The professor’s haggard and weary face twisted into a painful smile. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Professor,” Ginny returned the smile less enthusiastically. “How’ve you been?” She slipped off her coat, now drenched with rain, and hung it on a peg on the wall. She gave her head a shake, letting the water the fly everywhere. McGonagall winced.

“As well as to be expected,” the woman responded, shifting her lantern to the other hand and beckoning Ginny to follow her. “Very few parents will send their children here to be taught by the remainder of the staff, although I hardly understand why.”

She sniffed audibly and Ginny glanced around the twisting hallways, hardly illuminated save the torches engraved into the walls that blazed upon their arrival. However, even with the fire, the windowless corridors were dark and depressing, closing in on its inhabitants like a smothering glove. Ginny could not help but notice that the air they breathed was stuffy and dry and her lungs desperately clawed for air. Every time she inhaled, it sounded as if she were suffocating. McGonagall seemed unaware of Ginny’s difficulties. In fact, the stern headmistress appeared to have no trouble at all to breathe the foul excuse of oxygen. Ginny supposed that spending so much time in this horrible building allowed you to become used to its lack of proper air.

“Right,” Ginny nodded awkwardly. “I don’t see why either.” I became an Auror for a reason, she thought. To fight Death Eaters and to get out of this stuffy prison. “Er, Professor?” Ginny frowned, glancing around at her surroundings. She could hardly tell where she was; all the walls looked the same. “Professor, where are you taking me?”

McGonagall cast a superior glance over her shoulder. “To Ms. Lovegood, of course. That is why you came, is it not?”

Ginny raised an eyebrow, “Yes, it was,” she said apprehensively. “How did you know?” As they walked, Ginny could see the dimly lit classrooms flash by with fewer than five students in each.

“I know,” McGonagall said, grabbing Ginny by the arm before she fell down an invisible staircase to her left. “Because that is the only reason you ever come here unless you are on an Auror inspection.” Ginny shrugged and said nothing. Finally, they reached the top of a long, slippery staircase, which ended in front of a dark door.

“Have Ms. Lovegood take you back down when you wish to leave,” McGonagall instructed her, opening the door. “Merlin knows what would happen with a Weasley locked up and lost in this place.” With a sigh, the professor began to make her way back down the steps.

“Thank you, Professor,” Ginny said gratefully, truly meaning it. McGonagall smiled and disappeared around the corner. With a grin, Ginny pushed open the door.

~**~

It was precisely midnight when Harry sat up in bed, fully clothed, and began to tug on his shoes. The noise awakening him, Ron woke up as well, bleary-eyed and yawning.

“What’s going on?” He moaned. He squinted at the milky moonlight leaking through the curtains. “S’late, Harry, what’re you doing?”

“I’ll be right back,” 

Ron rubbed the sleep from his eyes and frowned, trying to focus on the dark form of his friend. “You’ve gone bloody mad. Where are you going?”

“Go back to sleep, Ron,”

“I think not!” The redhead sat up, pulling back the covers.

“What’re you doing?” Harry looked over at him. “You can’t come with me.”

“Tell me where you’re going!” Ron snapped, angrily now. Neville stirred in his sleep and Harry winced, hoping that Ron’s outburst woke no one.

“It has to do with the plan, Ron, I wouldn’t want—”

“Oh, the plan!” Ron rolled his eyes and shook his head. “You going to get yourself killed for this ‘plan’, mate? That’s all you ever talk about now. What happens if the guards barge in here and do a midnight check on us, hmm? You know that Malfoy mentioned something of the sort.”

“This is important!” Harry exclaimed, trying to calm his frustration. “I need to do this Ron! Just make sure they don’t know I’m gone.” With that, he slipped out of the dormitory and down the steps of the tower, leaving his friend behind him. The door shut behind him with a small snap and he padded silently as possible towards the bathrooms of Gryffindor tower. What was it that Ron had said only a few weeks ago? “Last night was my shower night, wasn’t it? Crabbe took me down to the water hose and waited outside. I heard the whole conversation through one of the air vents.” All Harry had to do was find one of those air vents and he could climb into it…

Harry paused at the foot of the stairs. It was a crazy idea. Would it even work? Grimacing, he checked his worn watch. He didn’t have much time. It was either now or never.

~**~

Draco gave his orders sharply to the sleepy buffoons downstairs.

“Be quick about it,” He said, giving them a stern look. “If you go slowly, they may have time to regain composure and hide things from you. I want everyone accounted for, do you hear me?”

Goyle yawned and nodded his head, eyes fluttering with exhaustion. Draco hit him in the chest. “Pay attention! If you fail as you did last time, the blame will go to me. I will make no exceptions, understand?”

“Draco.” The voice was quiet and strained in the darkness. Draco spun around to find himself face-to-face with Blaise Zabini. “Your father wants you.” The boy’s eyes were heavily lidded and his face pale from exhaustion. The only light brightening his face was the single-flame candle in the palm of his hand. Draco nodded to him.

“Thank you,” he replied. Giving his men one last glare, he turned on his heel and brushed past Blaise. Draco hardly felt the haunting gaze of the tortured boy he left in his wake.

~**~

Harry looked with distaste at the bathroom. Times had turned for the worst and with few house elves still alive, no one did much cleaning anymore. Mold nestled itself along the edges of the sinks while small beetles scuttled over top of each other, trying to avoid the light from the flickering candle Harry held. Grimacing, he took another step inside the tiled floors and glanced around the walls. Immediately, his eyes fell upon an air vent high from where he was standing, locked into place with metal bars. Frowning, Harry focused intently on the air vent.

Wandless magic, he thought, remembering Hermione’s stern face once more. If it is used incorrectly, it can be exceedingly dangerous to the caster.

Harry gritted his teeth, remembering Dumbledore’s casual abilities with wandless magic. Harry was less trained in this area; although the magic came spontaneously (as in his third year, when he blew up Aunt Marge) and in powerful bursts, he was still inexperienced and could not control it very well. Before the Final Battle, Harry had been desperate to learn anything that could have helped him defeat Voldemort. Wandless magic had been one of many defenses Harry had rushed through in the weeks before the encounter to train himself. The technique generally worked when he was angry, so memories of the Dursley’s had always been ready to help him practice. With the grueling preparation for his fight with Voldemort, Harry had secretly developed this ability with crude command over it. Because of this, his power over wandless magic was still developing, yet very strong.

Again, thinking bitterly of Halloween night, Harry focused all his energy and concentration on that single vent. The bars were made of iron and Harry doubted very much if the Death Eaters or Dumbledore had thought to enchant the air vents; hopefully this would be easy. His eyes narrowed and he pictured Uncle Vernon yelling at him as he snarled: “Open!”

The metal gave a great shudder and groaned as the screws of the vent began to twist out of their places. The bars leaned backwards until barely hanging onto the ledge and Harry just managed to catch the falling iron before it crashed to the ground. Gently, he placed it at his feet, took one last glance around him, and leaped up to the ledge of the vent, his fingers gripping the edge. The metal cut into his palms, stinging painfully as the rusty frame dug into the soft flesh.

Harry heaved himself up and into the open-air vent. The muscles in his arms strained against the weight of holding his body up until finally he lay on his stomach, half of his body within the dark confinements of the vent, his legs dangling out into the bathroom. Grunting with effort, he pulled himself all the way into the vent, breathing the dust through his nose and stifling a sneeze. Squinting, Harry waited as his eyes grew accustomed to the darkness, then peered down the long, endless hallway. The vent carried on downwards, spiraling, while small pockets of light flooded the twisting passage—each grate a small window into abandoned classrooms.

He began to crawl. With his hands slick and stinging with blood, it made being silent rather difficult. He hated the idea of what the Death Eaters would do to him if they found him crawling around in the air vents.

The air was stuffy and hot. Sweat dripped down Harry’s neck and his eyes blurred when his glasses slipped down his nose and he had to stop to push them back up. His filthy clothes clung to him, his skin sticky and his hands shaking. His hands left blood swipes on the sides of the vent and the grime stuck to the walls grounded into his palms and made him bleed even more.

About five minutes later, he had found a barred grate directly below on the floor on which he was crawling, opening down to what appeared to be one of the abandoned offices.

“I tell you, I don’t know where they are!” Exclaimed a loud and agitated voice. It echoed through the airshaft and vibrated the cool metal beneath Harry’s fingers.

Perhaps the office was not abandoned after all. He grinned and inched forward.

“Then perhaps you should send someone to look, someone with brains instead of those…those…fools! Crabbe and Goyle can hardly tell what’s in front of them, let alone the location of—” The second person was abruptly cut off.

“That’s not the point, is it?” Thundered the first voice.  It was a male’s, with a familiar drawl to it. Harry pushed himself as quietly as possible so that he was hanging over the grate. Below him paced the slim, dark figure of Bellatrix Lesterange. Sitting comfortably in a velvet chair, Lucius Malfoy crossed his arms and scowled furiously. His hair looked like a glossy circle from Harry’s view. He nearly jumped out of his skin when a faint squeaking emitted from in front of him. A closer look told him that it was simply a. rat, twitching its nose curiously in his direction. Harry prayed that it was not Wormtail doing midnight spying.

“How is it not the point?” screeched Bellatrix. “They have been searching for nearly a year now. How could they not have found—?” She stopped herself quickly, as if afraid of voicing her doubts of the Dark Lord’s existence. Lucius raised an eyebrow, but said nothing. A different voice added their opinion and Harry craned his neck and squinted through the flickering candlelight to see who it was.

“Bella, have faith,” said her sister softly. Narcissa Malfoy stood from her chair and placed a comforting hand on Bellatrix’s shoulder. “The Dark Lord shall rise again, and we shall be his most trusted servants. We alone have proved ourselves more than any other of his followers—”

“But even if he was to return, would he forgive us for not succeeding sooner?”

“Be quiet, Draco,” Lucius snapped. Harry jumped. He had not known that Draco was in the room. Harry could not see his archenemy, but could imagine the ugly scowl painted across his face. This must be where they meet, Harry thought, remembering what Ron had told him. The leaders, the plotters—that’s what they were. It was the Malfoy family.

“But Father, don’t you see—?”

“I said be quiet!” Lucius hissed. “Spies could be anywhere, you fool, and you jabber about the Dark Lord as if it were midday tea!”

Draco remained silent and Harry swallowed hard. Although Lucius could not possibly know that he was there, the mentioning of spies seemed to be directed right towards him and he shrunk back among the shadows. The voices in the room grew fainter as he retreated a safe distance and Harry strained to hear them.

“As if we needed anymore trouble…” Said Bellatrix’s voice. “The ministry… again…but…cannot work….”

Harry could hardly hear her and groaned inwardly. Feeling as if he were standing right in front of the Death Eaters and singing the National Anthem while performing a jig, Harry crawled over top of the grate once more. This way he could both see and hear the four family members clearly.

“He sent a message nearly two weeks ago,” Bellatrix said, breathing heavily. “They should be back soon.”

Who were ‘they’? Harry wondered. And why had they been gone so long?

“Then we wait,” Lucius said stiffly. The rat beside Harry scuttled curiously over to him and nibbled on his sleeve. He shook it off and it gave a small squeak. “We wait until they return.”

“But Father,” Draco’s voice seemed almost concerned. “We hardly have any food or resources! We have overturned every abandoned stone in Hogsmeade, but there is nothing. How are we to survive, keeping these filthy blood-traitors hostage, with nothing to keep us alive?”

“If I had deemed it relevant that you should be given that information,” said Lucius coldly. “Then I would have informed you, wouldn’t I? Perhaps you have not brought yourself up to the required standards to be trusted with such information, Draco. When you prove yourself as something other than a spineless excuse for a Malfoy heir, then…then you may be privileged enough to learn of our plans.”

Narcissa shuffled uncomfortably beside her sister. Harry could hear Draco breathing heavily, as if in pain.

He cocked his head to the side. What was that sound? Almost as if water were dripping onto the floor. He frowned. Was there a leak?

“Do you hear that?” Bellatrix demanded, breaking the uncomfortable silence. Apparently she had heard the sound as well. “That trickling sound, do you hear it?”

The others paused and listened. And that’s when Harry realized—it wasn’t water that was dripping onto the floor of the room where the Death Eaters stood.

It was blood. His blood!

He pulled back his hands, wiping them hastily on his pants. Bellatrix knelt down and inspected the small puddle he had left there. It must have dripped through the grate!

“Blood,” she said softly, rubbing her fingers with the liquid. Lucius and Draco crowded around her, but Narcissa stepped back—disgusted. And quite suddenly, Bellatrix stood up and pointed her wand directly at the air vent behind which Harry was hiding.

“Avada Kedavra!” she cried.

~**~

Chapter Navigation:

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0. Prologue1. Living with the Enemy2. The Truth Hurts3: Brewing Plots4: Festival of Horror5: Mixed Emotions6: Painful Healing7: Death's Favourite Victim8. Reforming the D.A.9. Airshafts10. Visitors11. Close Shaves

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