Chapter 08

VIII.

Hermione fluttered nervously by the display cases. She just couldn't figure out a way to cast the soul-scanning charm without anyone else noticing. Especially Professor Flitwick. Filius had been around the block more than once; he was very competent at Charms, and would probably be able to tell exactly what kind of medical charm she was casting. And maybe he'd even understand what it meant if and when the wand started scintillating, if it really was a Horcrux. That was something she couldn't allow him to realize. The success of their mission to destroy the pieces of the Dark Lord's soul depended very strongly on secrecy.

They had less than twenty minutes before the exhibits had to be ready, since that was when the hall would open. Ron was chatting with Yorsen, helping him set up his own display as they discussed chess maneuvers. That left her and Harry to help their short ex-teacher. Sidling up to her brand-new brother, Hermione whispered in his ear. "Harry...you have to distract Professor Flitwick and all the others, somehow. I need to cast the spell before the last of the protective wardings go up around these cases, and the use of magic on their contents becomes impossible!"

Harry grimaced, but nodded. She left him to it as she returned to studying the cases, some lined with black velvet, others in white, depending on which material would offset the colour of the wand-wood lying within. She studied the plaques of the two most famous wands in the Charms professor's collection: Rowena Ravenclaw, and Albus Dumbledore. Rowena's wand was oak, with the core of a phoenix feather, from some phoenix named "Gullveig".

That's an awkward, ugly name, she thought, wrinkling her nose.

Next to it in equal prominence was the wand of Albus Dumbledore. Willow, like Ron's, though this one had been made with the core of a phoenix's tail-feather, not a unicorn-hair. The name listed on the plaque made her blink.

Gullveig, too? That's one heck of a coincidence! I know they live forever, constantly being reborn from their own ashes, but...well, it might explain a little bit of why Fawkes chose Albus...

"You know, it's a real pity you can't put my own wand into your collection, Professor," Harry stated abruptly, and loudly enough for the exhibitors in their section of the large room to overhear. "You did say my wand would be quite a coup for your collection. I can't give it up, of course; not while I still need it," he added, twirling the length of holly in his fingers when Hermione looked up, as distracted as everyone else by his words, "but it did face down the wand of Lord Voldemort himself, and helped me survive!"

Half the people listening gasped. Most everyone in the room twitched. All save for two people. Hermione, who quickly turned back to the display case, mouthing, "Psyscandum!" ...and Ron, who called back through the shocked silence, "--Don't you mean Lord Voldiedork?"

"What, Moldiemort?" Harry shot back.

"Voldiebutt?" Ron suggested.

"Snake-Face?"

"The Basilisk-Snogging Bastard!"

The crowd of exhibitors stared at the two young men, shocked to their core at the blatant display of brave but juvenile disrespect.

The wand glowed with sickly colours, much the same as the locket had. "Finite incantatem!"

It stopped scintillating, and Hermione quickly turned away from the case to check and make sure no one had seen what she'd done. They were all too busy staring at the two young wizards. Even Flitwick gaped as his two former students, his bearded mouth sagging open.

"--Do you two mind? I didn't eat breakfast that long ago!" Hermione chided her two best friends. "You'll make me sick to my own soul, if you keep on mentioning that putrid, slimy blowhard!"

Harry's gaze sharpened, and Ron's laughing expression sobered. They'd caught on to her meaning. Harry nodded. "Sorry, Hermione. Sorry, Professor."

"Er...no harm done. Hand me that case, the one with Nicholas Flamel's wand in it!"

"You've got Flamel's wand?" someone else called out, a fellow exhibitor.

Flitwick beamed with pride as he replied, "I had an 'in' with the old man through Albus Dumbledore, you know! You'd be surprised at how well a 'mere' teacher can be connected, in the wand-collecting world..."

...

"...And though I do regret the highly untimely nature of its presence, I think it the finest example in my collection, having Albus Dumbledore's wand as a part of my display," Filius Flitwick relayed to his audience, standing on a stool brought out to him by a house-elf for the duration of his presentation. "Any questions?"

A veritable forest of hands shot into the air. Calling on one of them--an act which reminded Hermione rather amusingly of his classroom demeanor--Filius bade the wizard in question to speak. It was Roland Ollivander, the grey-haired wand-maker.

"--How do you know, for absolute certain, that this other wand is truly the wand of Rowena Ravenclaw?"

"Well, I've performed all the standard tests!" Filius squeaked matter-of-factly. "Spectral analysis charms, material component revealers, age-gauging spells...you name it!"

"A lot of that can be faked," Mr. Ollivander pointed out. Several heads nodded in agreement. He gave the shorter wizard a shrewd look. "I noticed that Albus Dumbledore's wand holds a core feather from the same phoenix as Rowena's. This is a fact backed by my shop's records from the time-period of Rowena Ravenclaw, and the other three founders of Hogwarts. Most phoenixes hand out only a dozen tail-feathers at most, and the records for Gullveig show that she hasn't donated a tail-feather in over three hundred years, save for Albus Dumbledore's. If it is Rowena Ravenclaw's wand...then wouldn't Priori Incantatem prove it, beyond all shadow of a doubt?"

"Well, yes, I suppose it would..." the Charms Professor allowed.

"Then why not prove it?" Roland Ollivander offered, stepping forward, out of the crowd, his eyes shrewd under the shock of his bushy grey eyebrows. "You could take up Dumbledore's wand, and I'll take up Ravenclaw's, and we'll have a little duel, to prove or disprove the matter! Nothing harmful, of course..."

Hermione's breasts burned. Stifling a gasp, she shifted back behind Ron, pulling out the ring. Words were etched into it, scrolling out of the scale-pattern.

Do not let Ollivander touch that wand!

Of course; if Ollivander was under the Imperius Curse, he probably had a Portkey on him, like Russel did. The moment he had the wand, he'd be yanked away, and there would go their chance to get the Horcrux. "--Professor!" she called out quickly, shifting far enough to plant her hand on her brother's back. "Why don't you have Harry wield the wand against you? He's actually experienced Priori Incantatem, when he faced Lord Voldemort upon his initial return, two years ago!"

Harry stumbled forward as she shoved him, but recovered quickly, improvising a smile as he followed her lead. "I would be honored to help, Professor. Priori Incantatem is quite difficult to handle, if you're not prepared for its side-effects."

"That's actually a splendid idea!" Filius agreed quickly. "You've always had a good aim with the milder jinxes, when you were my pupil--here, you take Dumbledore's wand," the Charms professor added, "and I'll take the wand of my House Founder. It wouldn't do to let this beauty fall into the hands of a Gryffindor, after all," he added with a merry wink, playing to their House rivalries.

"You'd let a youth handle such a valuable wand?" Mr. Ollivander protested.

Hermione leaned forward and whispered into Harry's ear as Filius replied that he had absolute faith in 'the boy'. "If you can hold Priori long enough, Harry...it might force the fragment out of the wand!"

"I'd rather destroy it outright, by snapping it in half!" he muttered back, turning so that his words reached only her own ear.

"We don't know if that's even the way to kill it. We'll find some other way to destroy the fragment," she promised him, wincing at the thought of destroying such a historical artifact. "If nothing else, I might be able to cage it with the Ghost Trap spell. I learnt it during our research, in case I ever needed to deal with a malevolent ghost, or with Peeves in a bad mood."

"--Come forward, Harry! Don't be shy," Filius beckoned him. Harry obligingly stepped forward, accepting the wand of their former Headmaster.

"...Oy!" Ron hissed, glancing at Hermione. "Did you see that?"

"No, what?" she whispered back.

"That woman, with the dark hair, in the brown dress...she just vanished!"

"That's impossible," Hermione muttered under her breath. "The Mansion has an anti-Apparation charm laid on it, just like the school."

"I'm telling you, she disappeared!" the redhead hissed back.

"On the count of three, we'll both cast the Jellylegs Jinx. Ready?" Filius instructed his ex-pupil.

Harry gripped his borrowed wand a little tighter. "Ready, sir."

I do believe in Ron, Hermione thought as the two wizards prepared themselves.

"One..."

If he says some woman disappeared, she disappeared...

"Two..."

But if she didn't Apparate, that leaves only Portkeying--oh!

"Three!"

Harry and Filius flung their curses at each other. Blue light leapt at blue light as the two sparks of magical intent raced at their targets...and snapped into a beam of gold, connecting the two wands. Priori Incantatem had begun.

Hermione's mind raced with the implications of that witch's vanishing act. If she went to report to the Dark Lord on what's happening, he's going to be furious about not getting his hand on Ravenclaw's wand. And he'll know that if Priori Incantatem is held long enough, it just might release the fragment of his soul, exposing it to danger--he's probably going to launch an attack, to try and get at that wand! An all-out attack!

"Th-th-that's enough, b-b-boy!" Professor Flitwick stammered as the wands began vibrating with the thickening of the golden bolt connecting the two. "You c-can let g-go, now!"

They didn't dare risk losing that wand in the coming battle. They had to get that soul-fragment out now! "--No, Harry! Keep it going!"

Harry's brow furrowed with determination, and his knuckles whitened with visible effort as he clung to the late Headmaster's wand. Phoenix-song pierced the confused babble of voices, achingly sweet and higher-pitched, more feminine than she remembered Fawkes' song to be. The single beam broke into a thousand threads that threw themselves into a cage, forcing the crowd and the display cases back from the pair as a webbed dome of energy formed around them. Beads of light built up rapidly in the central beam of magic arcing between them. It didn't take more than two or three rapid heartbeats for them to thicken, nor for them to shift and tremble their way towards the wand being gripped now in both of Filius' hands.

And then the golden bead struck the tip of Rowena Ravenclaw's wand. Ghostly sparks shot from the wand. A bouquet of flowers. A loud banging noise. Strange sigils formed out of smoke, the sound of uncontrollable laughter, a whistling teakettle, chopping vegetables, the roar of a crackling fire from an Incendio charm. The shape of a rabbit morphing into a knapsack and back. Every charm, hex, and spell wielded by the wand was being repeated in reverse order, as the phoenix-song sang on and on--

The air filled with a new sound, the banging of several bodies arriving via Portkey, slamming through the others in the crowds and knocking them down. Instantly, the air in the crowded ballroom dropped from being stiflingly warm to dreadfully icy--dreadfully in the Dementor-ized sense, for two of the cowled figures rose up from the tangle of bodies sprawled along a length of what looked like the velvety, aged rope torn from an old curtain or something. Someone had made themselves a Portkey long enough to haul along nine or ten Death Eaters, two Dementors...and a giant?

Scared, Hermione grabbed for her wand, her own action far more sensible than the screaming of the exhibitors and guests around them. Those on their feet scrambled for the doors, some even crashing through the French-glazed windows into the atrium in their haste to escape the black-robed, silver-masked foes in their midst. Wand-cases smashed, as the giant stood up, flailing his brutish arms. Hexes started flying, and she started ducking and snapping Protego charms as fast as she could.

The only two in the ballroom who were safe from the conflict were Harry and Filius, wrapped in their Priori cocoon as they were. The giant waded through the others and started smashing his fists on the cage, but it was a futile effort. The golden web-work only flashed and seared his flesh, making him roar deafeningly. Hermione dropped and rolled under one of the display cases to get away from the insane glare of Bellatrix Lestrange--who wasn't the dark-haired witch; she was guarding the other witch's back with a grimace of distaste--and found herself face-to-hood with one of the Dementors the moment she rose on the other side.

Fear sapped her energy, fear that the creature enhanced by its very nature. As it lifted skeleton-like hands to its cowled hood, preparing to move it back for the Kiss, Hermione grasped for the happiest thought she could imagine, shouting, "Expecto Patronum!"

Silvery mist flung itself from her wand...but her otter Patronus didn't form. The hood lifted higher, scaring her further. She tried again, groping for the thought her and Ron in a decade's time, of Harry now being her brother--

"Expecto Patronum--Expecto PATRONUM!"

A body slammed into hers as a hideous, scabby mouth came into view. The hard warmth of her assailant knocked her to the ground, rolling her over. Scared, she grappled with her attacker, trying to shove him off of her as he ended up on top. Until she realized she was staring up into a pair of very concerned pewter-grey eyes. Russel. He'd saved her from the Dementor's Kiss, and now lay sprawled over her, his kilted legs entangled with her trouser-clad ones. He felt warm, heavy, and masculine, incongruous sensations given the current blasting of hexes and screaming of victims around them.

The Dementor reared over both of them, its scabby, vacuum-like mouth still visible, its too-long fingers still pushing back the deep folds of its hood. It looked hungry, and it looked like it wouldn't care if it sucked out her soul, or Russel's. She remembered the kiss they'd shared, not more than five or six hours before, and tore her wand arm free of his grasp. She couldn't let Russel die!

"EXPECTO PATRONUM!"

A winged shape tore out of her wand, flaring bright and strong. For a moment, she thought it was a phoenix, but it wasn't. It was a raven, as silvery as moonlight, and ten times as bright. That was a far cry from her original otter. Hermione almost lost it from surprise, before she firmed her concentration with a hard frown. Pulsating light pushed the hideous thing into the ceiling over their heads, throwing it hard enough that some of the moulded ceiling cracked and plaster-dust rained down on the battle raging below. She didn't know what had happened to the other one, but it wasn't about to come anywhere near the ballroom, given how far-reaching the power of that Patronus-raven had spread, lighting up the chamber around them.

"--Hermione!" The shout was Harry's voice. Russel rolled off of her, letting her scramble to her feet. She saw Harry looking at her, at the slim shaft in Professor Flitwick's hands--where an incredibly tiny but incredibly bright spark had floated out of the tip of Ravenclaw's wand--and glancing up at the ceiling. Where the Dementor was pinned. Harry shouted at her again. "Let it go!"

...Bloody fucking brilliant!

A flick of her wand, and Hermione ended the Patronus, just as Harry tore his own borrowed wand away from the conflict with the one in Flitwick's hands. The golden web-work of light faded as the Dementor pushed itself out of the cracked dent in the plaster. It shook itself, oriented on her--then jerked and oriented on that tiny, bright spark. Diving down, it charged the fragment of soul, as Harry ducked around it, pushing their stunned Charms professor out of the way.

The diving Dementor pounced on the soul-fragment, glomming onto it like a hungry teenager at a free buffet. The rasping sound of its suctioning was accompanied by a faint but hideous, high-pitched shrieking, the skreeling of a soul in mortal agony. Hermione flinched, hating what was happening even as she knew it was necessary. The keening cut off, the Dementor moaned in ecstasy--an obscene sound that made her stomach churn--and Professor Flitwick's high-pitched voice cut through the noise with remarkable authority.

"--Expecto Patronum!"

A shining, silver centaur leapt out of the wand in his grip, charging into the Dementor and smashing it back through the glazed windows overlooking the autumn-faded gardens.

"Avada--"

Hermione's head whipped around, looking for the source of that feminine snarl: Bellatrix, glaring at Ron!

"--Kedavra!"

Her palm rasped hard against her wrist, as that deadly bolt of green raced at her boyfriend. Instantly the battle silenced, freezing in place as she shot the mother-of-pearl band of the bracelet halfway around. Peering through the treacle-slow confusion, she checked on the danger to her boyfriend from the Killing Curse.

The bolt was still moving, too fast for her to intervene. Hermione shoved the bracelet again, until it jammed up against the far end, dialing in all twenty-four segments. The Curse slowed to an icy-treacle crawl. She had four minutes at this speed in which to act, but she didn't know if that would be enough time.

Shoving her wand into her pocket, Hermione started counting the seconds in her head even as she moved. Picking her way quickly through the seemingly unmoving bodies, Hermione dodged several frozen, flying shards of display cases, ducked between the giant's legs, since the path to either side around him was blocked, and grabbed Ron by the shirt, hauling on his body.

He barely budged. She pulled harder, until she heard his time-stiffened shirt start to rip. The green-glowing curse inched closer. Switching position, she pushed on Ron's shoulder, heaving against his body. She might be beyond the effects of mass and inertia, using up her four minutes of super-speed magically...but he was still trapped in the physics of normality.

Seconds ticked by in her head, and the segments of her bracelet clicked one by one from mother-of-pearl to abalone. The clicking was unnaturally loud in the silence of the ballroom battle, a silence broken only by her grunting efforts as she went so far as to brace one leg behind her against the back of the giant's calf. It didn't work. Ron wasn't budging fast enough. The Killing Curse was just too close. It would strike Ron before she could free him, and even a glancing blow would be enough to end his life.

If only she could've hauled a Death Eater between him and that deadly--

A Death Eater? Shoving away from Ron, she scrambled over to Harry. She couldn't grab another Death Eater to throw in the path of that deadly ray; their own inertial mass would defeat her as surely as Ron's had. But there was something small enough for her to drag over there, hopefully in time! Grabbing the chain that lay around Harry's neck, she pried the Horcrux locket out of his clothes and over his head. Pulling hard on the time-stuck metal, she hauled it over to Ron's side, ignoring the aching effort it took to get the metal object into place.

The green fire had moved very close, fraction by fraction. It now lay within a hand-span of Ron's chest. Time hadn't stopped, after all, just slowed down to an agonizing crawl. Pushing on the locket itself, she positioned it just so in front of the bolt, then snatched her fingers out of the way. The curse struck and seeped into the locket just three frantic heartbeats and a click of her bracelet after she cleared her fingers. It crawled around the edges of the golden case, brightened...and sucked itself rapidly inside, faster than expected. A moment later, the last of the greenish light winked out.

Hermione felt an hysterical urge to laugh. First the Horcrux soul-fragment from the wand had been eaten by a Dementor--an ally of the Dark Lord's--and now Bellatrix Lestrange's own Killing Curse had killed the Horcrux in the locket? Oh, she wanted to laugh! But she didn't have enough time, as her bracelet clicked again, cutting her off mid-chuckle. A glance down showed she had just two pearlescent slots left.

Grabbing the chain, she hauled it back to Harry again, shoving the golden links down around his head and stuffing the locket back under his shirt. The last thing they needed was for anyone to realize that the locket, too, had been destroyed. She turned to check on Ron--and time snapped back into place with an exhausting jolt.

Ron dropped, dragged off-balance by her efforts. Harry screamed his name and bolted towards his fallen friend. Hermione, bumped by him as he thrust past her, staggered back, unable to catch her balance. Hands caught her arms, she thought to help right her--but one of those hands held an age-worn bit of rope, pressing it into her wrist, and before she could get her time-numbed body to react, the Portkey activated. She was jerked away while still caught in the grip of what she realized too late were robed and masked Death Eaters.

They landed awkwardly in a tastefully, if serpently, decorated parlour. Hermione was too exhausted by her bracelet-ordeal to catch her balance; she tripped and dropped, and was yanked painfully upright again by her arms before she could hit the ground. There were other masked and robed Death Eaters here, but as she was hauled around by a jerk on her right arm, the other released, she saw the most frightening figure of her life: the slit-nostriled, red-eyed, pallid-skinned face of Lord Voldemort himself.

"Accio wand!"

Her wand jerked out of her pocket, flying somewhere behind her. She was disarmed, trapped in the lair of the Basilisk Bastard--her left hand snatched at her bracelet one last time, but she was out of minutes. Hermione twisted it again, knowing she would be defenceless, helpless while it charged--

"Impedimenta!"

She froze in place, with only a single click reaching her ears. One minute. She would have only one minute of stored time, once the Stunning Charm wore off... Don't think about that! Forcing her mind and heart to calm down, Hermione threw up the barriers she'd learned in her Occlumency studies with the boys. She'd devoted herself harder than them to the study, and had picked it up faster, surpassing Harry's own rusty skills rather quickly, but then that was her nature. Her mind was disciplined from years of sticking to study-schedules, and some of that had translated into the magic of obscuring her thoughts through concentration.

"This is that Mudblood girl, the friend of that boy," Voldemort hissed, rising from a chair that was carved around the edges and padded in a rich, emerald green satin. It looked like a throne, and his Death Eaters were serving as his courtiers. "I sent you to get the wand, not a girl!"

"We saw the wand fall to the floor, milord. It was broken."

Voldemort's face contorted with fury. The twisted, pallid face, with those reddish eyes, looked frighteningly inhuman. Hermione prayed for a shot at freedom, so that she wouldn't be around when his temper broke.

"We snagged the girl, knowing you would want to torture her for her interference," the Death Eater who had hauled her around muttered warily. Hermione could only look at what was within her frozen field of view, but she was pretty sure she saw an ornate monogram on an oval at the top of that chair-back. The letter 'M'...for 'Malfoy'? The man showed his bravery by adding, "She's quite a prize, herself."

"Yessss... Narcissa said it was her decision to make the Potter brat face down the midget-freak, instead of our...emissary," the Dark Lord hissed.

Narcissa. Of course! No wonder that disguised witch had protected her sister's back, during the fray. And, being married into the Malfoy family, she'd know how to move about in high society without drawing attention to herself...

"Yes, it was Narcissa, at the exhibition," the Dark Lord agreed, staring into Hermione's eyes.

Hermione had forgotten to maintain her mental discipline. She quickly stilled her mind, thinking about nothing other than the flat, calm, reflective surface of a lake, unrippled by wind or wave. Mirror-smooth in its perfection, unruffled by thought or emotion. Voldemort hissed in frustration.

"--Someone has been teaching you Occlumency! Crude, but powerful--do you think that imagining still waters will save you from your fate? Rape her! Beat her down and break her spirit! Entertain us with her torture! You will find, little Mudsssslut, that it is impossible to remain calm while experiencing the deepest torments of humiliation and pain!"

Shite!

"Finite Incantatem--"

Hermione slammed the one-click-worth she had of her bracelet into play, the instant the Stunning Charm was removed. Time slowed around her. Not nearly as slowly as it had during the Killing Curse, but it would hopefully be long enough. Turning, she looked for her wand. It wasn't in sight. She quickly patted down the robes of the wizard beside her, then the witch behind him--she couldn't find it! Frantic to save herself, Hermione knew she couldn't save up any more minutes. She was going to be beaten, tortured, raped, brutalized and robbed of her chastity--

The ring! Grabbing the chain in both hands, she faced Voldemort again as she yanked on it, breaking the clasp. Snatching the ring in her right hand, she flung the chain free with her left, and jammed into onto her left ring-finger--

Time jolted back into full play, while the ring was between her first and second knuckles. Voldemort blinked as she shoved the ring home. The wizard at her side grabbed her arm, sneering a frighteningly amused, "It'll be my pleasure, milord!"

Magic roared out of the ring, gleaming with golden scales. Voices screamed and bodies scrambled, and even the Dark Lord staggered back, shocked by the apparition that filled the space behind her. Craning her head, Hermione looked over her shoulder. Into a wall of muscular golden scales. She looked up to identify the rest of it...and her lips parted, her jaw sagging in shock.

A dragon.

A fucking huge golden dragon, solid enough to make the floorboards creak ominously from its sheer weight. The ring had conjured a dragon to protect her?

"SSSSSHE ISSSS THE PRINCSSSESSSS! YOU WILL NOT TOUCH HER!"

A talking golden dragon?!

Someone got the brilliant idea to fling a hex at the creature, instead of screaming or fainting like the others. "Conjunctivitis!"

The dragon's scaly foreleg snapped out, grabbing and piercing the man with its claws. Its metallic, horn-studded skull snapped down an instant later, biting the Death Eater's head and shoulders from his body. Clearly unhindered by the eye-harming curse. There hadn't been time for the man to scream, just time for severed arteries to spurt blood in sickening, dark red splatters during the few seconds it took for his heart to stop pumping. Thankfully it fell away from her, spraying several of Voldemort's followers. Hermione didn't know what she would've done if any of that blood had landed on her. Several of the Death Eaters screamed again, wizards and witches alike.

Hermione wanted to scream. But what she really wanted was for this nightmare to be over! To be safe back at Headquarters, where no Death Eater could find her, where there were no man-eating dragons that needed to so violently protect her--

The dragon spat out the bloody bits of the man with a meaty thump, shifting its weight. A golden, clawed forelimb lifted, touching her shoulder with startling gentleness--and the yanking sensation of a Portkey jerked at her nauseated belly. She found herself flung onto a threadbare carpet. Unable to keep her balance, too drained by her time-escapades and too shattered by what she'd seen, Hermione fell to her hands and knees with painful awkwardness.

She stayed there for a moment, trembling. Then her eyes squeezed shut, and her body heaved, retching the remnants of the buffet luncheon she'd eaten shortly before Professor Flitwick's scheduled presentation. All she could think of were the scabrous mouth of the Dementor, the bodies of the victims in the ballroom, the evil gleam of the Dark Lord's eyes, and the spurting blood and meaty thump of the dragon tearing that Death Eater apart. She retched until it felt like she was trying to vomit up her toenails.

"--Merlin's Sweet Arse!" A body dropped to its knees beside her, bringing a shock of lavender hair into view. Tonks scraped Hermione's hair back from her face, holding her head as she retched again. "Wotcher, Hermione, what happened to you? "

Unable to answer, Hermione focused on breathing in short, shallow pants between heaves, until they slowly subsided. Tonks stroked her forehead, holding her steady, then Summoned a washcloth and a glass of water from the kitchen. Another pass of her wand, a muttered charm, and all traces of her sickness vanished from the Black family parlour carpet, and from Hermione's hair.

Wetting the washcloth, Tonks pressed it to Hermione's forehead, then to the back of her neck. "Easy, there...what happened?"

"Battle," Hermione managed, torn between panting and moaning from her misery. "Death Eaters...Marselle Mansion..."

"Oy! I've got to warn the Order!" Leaping to her feet, the Metamorphmagus raced out of the parlour.

Hermione sagged onto her side, half-curled into a miserable ball. She wet the washcloth again with trembling fingers, then risked rinsing her mouth with a sip of it. Unable to swallow the acrid taste without risking another bout of sickness, she spat it out on the carpet, then reached shakily for her wand to Evanesco the evidence...and remembered that her wand was still in the hands of some Death Eater. Probably at Malfoy Manor, but Tonks had vanished, and she didn't have the strength to go crawling after the other woman. Too many minutes of living too fast had passed; she would have to wait until she'd regained her strength to act on the possibility that Narcissa had opened up her home for the Dark Lord's use.

She did, however, push her bracelet back around with trembling fingers. One minute at a time, rather than twenty-four in one go, but then she didn't know if she'd have to react to Tonks' return or not. But the other witch didn't return, and though storing time left her dizzy from hyperventilation and sick to her stomach with bone-deep exhaustion, she got all twenty-four minutes stored. Not that anyone could attack Headquarters without torturing the secret of it out of Mrs. Figg, or killing the old lady outright, but she didn't ever want to be caught without a means of defending herself again.

One of Mrs. Figg's cats came to investigate her as she lay there, recharging her body and bracelet on the floor. It sniffed at the bilious spit, sniffed at her mouth, then head-butted her breasts, rubbing its siamese-coloured flank against her chest. By the time Hermione came out of storing away that particular minute, the cat had moved on in the fickle fashion of most felines.

It was Crookshanks who came to her next, as she finished the with bracelet. He, too, sniffed at her, head-butted her, and lingered until she was free to lift a trembling hand to his ears. Tears seeped from her eyes, as she recalled the battle scene, and wondered if her two friends were still alright. Her stomach rumbled with hunger. It rumbled again, as footsteps shuffled into the room.

"Oh! Oh my goodness! Hermione, dearie! Whatever is wrong with you? Are you hurt?"

"Exhausted, Mrs. Figg," she managed, twisting onto her back. Crooks followed, nuzzling her hand for more attention. She peered up at the elderly Squib. "And...sick to stomach..."

Her stomach rumbled a third time. Mrs. Figg pursed her lips. "Exhausted and sick to your stomach you may be, but that stomach is also hungry! A little chicken broth will set you to rights; the salt will settle your stomach, and I'll throw in a pilot-cracker, too. They were used to cure the seasickness of first-time sailors in the Royal Navy, once upon a time. Can you stand up? Or at least crawl to the couch? I'm afraid that oddly-haired young lady has left to go join the others on some mission, and I cannot lift you myself."

She did feel a little better. Nodding, Hermione rolled over, pushed to her hands and knees, and managed to crawl to the parlour couch. It unsettled her stomach to heave herself onto the cushions. Mrs. Figg hovered nearby until she was on the sofa, then spread an afghan over Hermione's trembling frame. Shuffling off, she went to fetch the broth, muttering about hardtack and saltine crackers.

Voices spilled through the door into the hallway. With the silencing of Mrs. Black's portrait, none of the other paintings had dared complain, so the voices had to be from actual bodies. Sure enough, several spilled into the parlour, the most vociferous pair belonging to an angry Harry and a frustrated Ron.

"--But we have to go after her! They're going to kill her!"

"Or worse!" Ron shouted at Mad-Eye Moody. "We'd be lucky if it was only the Imperius Curse, and a few bouts of Cruciatus!"

Alastor drew in a breath to reply, then stopped, jerked, and peered over his shoulder with his good eye. Apparently his magical one had spotted her. The blatant look in her direction drew the attention of the others, and with a strangled cry, Harry and Ron flung themselves at her. Harry got to her first, sweeping her up into a sitting position as he hugged her.

"Hermione! You're alive! You're alive!"

"Can't keep a good know-it-all down," she muttered, eyes stinging with tears. They were echoed in Harry's green gaze as he pulled back. Ron tugged him away, leaning in to take his place. Her ring tingled and the floorboards creaked as a voice roared over their heads.

"SSSSSHE ISSSS THE PRINCSSSESSS! YOU WILL NOT TOUCH HER! "

"--Shite! "

The expletive leapt from several mouths. Moody and Harry whipped out their wands, Ron scrambled back in an awkward crab-scuttle, and Hermione screamed, leaping to her feet, and throwing out her arms as she whirled to face the dragon.

"NO!! " It stopped, head pulling back slightly. She yelled again, adrenaline giving her the energy she hadn't had a moment ago. "Don't hurt my friends!"

Its head pulled back further, then it bellowed, "THEY SSSSHALL NOT TOUCH YOU! YOU ARE THE PRINCSSSESSSSS!"

"--Moody's my friend, Harry's my brother, and Ron's my boyfriend--and you will not touch them!" Hermione dared to argue, mind racing. It was the ring, of course; this was one of those betrothal rings with a guardian enspelled into it...and lucky her, she got a huge dragon. This time it wasn't quite as big as it had been in the Malfoy parlour, but then the Black parlour was considerably smaller, and the dragon had been forced to materialize behind the sofa she'd been lying upon. He stepped over the furnishing, swelling in size as he lowered his snout to within an inch of hers.

"YOU ARE THE PRINCSSSESSSS!"

Apparently even the most talkative of magical dragons--and there was an oxymoron if she'd ever heard one, from a Muggle perspective--couldn't be reasoned with. Especially one that smelled of charcoal at such close range. "Okay--okay! I'm the bloody princess, and no one will touch me!"

A whuff of hot, charcoal-barbeque breath, and the dragon dissolved into a stream of sparkling, golden glitter, whipping back into the ring on her finger. She sagged to her knees, the adrenaline rush fading from her trembling limbs. Harry crouched beside her, extending his hand hesitantly. He touched her shoulder, flinching...but nothing happened. No dragon materialized.

"Hermione...what was that? " he whispered, visibly shaken. Ron shuffled onto his knees, but didn't move any closer. Even Moody looked like he was going to keep his distance, just in case. "And why am I the only one who can touch you?"

Miserably, Hermione lifted her left hand. Displaying the ring that gleamed on her third finger. "I think it's because you're now my brother...and because of this."

Alastor Moody was the first to realize the significance. His blue, magical eye fixed on the ring intensely for a moment, before swiveling to study her. "That's a betrothal ring. An old and powerful one, from the look of it. I've never heard of one that could conjure a dragon for its guardian, before. Where did you get it, girl?"

"--Betrothal ring?" Ron yelped, looking sharply between the two of them. "Hermione--take it off! Take it off!"

She tugged on the ring. It didn't budge. She pulled harder, and only made her finger sore. From the moment she'd slipped it past her second knuckle, the ring had squeezed itself into the perfect size to cling to her flesh. She couldn't even make it slip as far as her knuckle, yet the ring didn't feel tight. "...I can't. It's stuck. Magically."

"Aye," Moody growled. "Those rings come from the days when women were chattel. Some of 'em are permanent, others can be released only by the word of your betrothed...who would have to be wearing the other ring himself, for it to take effect. Which begs the question of who is wearing that other ring, if it ain't one of these two?"

Bowing her head, Hermione confessed her sins. "...Russel is wearing it."

"Who?" Ron asked, confusion furrowing his brow.

"You know him as Rorik Ferguson. He's...he's a spy in the ranks of the Death Eaters. The other spy," Hermione emphasized. "One known only to Professor Dumbledore. He contacted me by a letter this last summer, and sent the ring with it. So long as I didn't put it on, I was fine, but I could communicate with him--and before you ask," she added to Mad-Eye, who had drawn breath to argue the matter with her, "--I've already tested the truth-forcing properties of the ring myself. Anything we communicated to each other wound up being the truth. We could bend it, but we couldn't dodge it. He is a spy for our side, but he didn't dare reveal himself to anyone, after what that bastard did to the Headmaster."

Silence met her rough admission, until Ron drew a breath; Hermione, anticipating his comment, interrupted him before he could begin.

"And before you ask, Ron, he warned me against putting on the ring! He said it would create an unbreakable betrothal between us if I did so...but that it would also give me a powerful form of protection, if I wound up having no other choice. And I wound up having no other choice. If you haven't noticed, I'm kneeling here without my wand, because it's still in the possession of some stupid Death Eater!"

"You are my girlfriend, Hermione!" Ron reminded her sharply. "How could you put on the betrothal ring of another wizard? What could possibly have made you betray me like that?"

"--I was going to be raped, you selfish arsehole! " she screamed at him, overwrought by his thoughtless accusations. Breathing heavily, glaring at him, Hermione fought to control her temper, until she growled with a bit more control, "I'm sorry if that doesn't seem important enough to you! But they were going to beat me, and torture me, and rape me, and break me! I didn't have my wand, I didn't have a chance in hell of storing up enough time to find it before they could hurt me, and it was the only thing left I could think of doing to save myself!"

"Storing up enough time?" Harry asked her, frowning in confusion.

Hermione drew in a breath to reply, and found the watchful eyes of Moody fixed upon her face. To hell, if she was going to tell him! Jerking her chin at the door, she snapped, "Moody! Out!"

His eyes narrowed, but he stumped out of the room, closing the door behind him. Ron eyed her warily, but drew his wand and cast an Imperturbable Charm on the room, sealing them away from potential spies. "You'd better start talking, Hermione."

Letting Harry support her, Hermione began from the beginning. "I got the letter the last evening Harry spent at the Dursleys. I didn't know if it was genuine or not, so I waited and kept silent, in case it was a trap. But then Russel sent word that Mr. Lubbock was going to be attacked...and that's why I managed to save him. I poked my head through the Floo with my wand at the ready. You know what happened, then. Out of gratitude, Mr. Lubbock gave me this bracelet," she added, lifting her right wrist slightly. "It's a time-storage device. He called it a Velocitemplet. Basically, by giving up twenty-four minutes of my life in a sort of paralysis...I can get those minutes back, at up to four minutes at a time...and up to six different speeds of time.

"I used the bracelet today during the battle, when Bellatrix cast the Killing Curse at you, Ron."

He blinked, at that. "Is that...is that how I managed to survive? You pushed me out of the way of the Curse?"

"Sort of. I was free to move about, but you were still stuck in time," she told him. "And the Curse was moving in so fast, I had to put the bracelet at the topmost speed--I never told you or Harry about it, because I'd discovered that using it drains me until I'm literally ill with exhaustion, at that speed. I didn't want either of you pestering me to use it casually, or for selfish means. So I kept the secret of it to myself.

"And I couldn't push you out of the way of the Killing Curse," she continued. "I managed to tip you off-balance, but I knew I wouldn't be able to get you out of the way in time. So...I grabbed the locket from Harry, which was easier to drag into place, and put it between you and that scary green bolt. It impacted on the locket, and the Curse went away. So I presume it killed the soul that was trapped inside."

Harry reached under his shirt, pulling out the locket. A touch of his thumb to the edge, and it popped open, revealing a tiny profile-carving of some woman, possibly the profile of Salazar Slytherin's wife, given the way her features had been carved out of the alabaster cabochon with a medieval hairstyle. Lifting his gaze from the locket, Harry absently snapped it shut again. "So you killed it."

She managed a wry smile. "I thought it was rather ironic that the Ravenclaw Horcrux was devoured by a Dementor, and the locket Horcrux by a spell from Mrs. Lestrange's own wand. I don't think old Moldiebutt picked very competent allies to come and attack us, today."

"I'll say," Ron snorted. "I'm a bit disappointed to learn I'm not another Boy Who Lived, but I am glad the locket's dead."

"But what happened after that?" Harry asked her. "I saw you being snatched away by two Death Eaters!"

"I'd just put the locket back, when time snapped back to normal speed. I couldn't stop them from grabbing me, and the next thing I knew..." She shivered. "I think I was in Malfoy Manor. Narcissa was one of the 'guests', besides Russel in the guise of 'Rorik', who was there to try a snatch-and-grab of the Ravenclaw wand. Ollivander has been under the Imperius Curse, I'm sure of it; Russel warned me to not let him get his hands on the wand, which is why I suggested you. But...I had my wand stolen when they kidnapped me, and just had enough time to click the bracelet once, for storing one minute at the slowest speed, before I was frozen by Impedimenta.

"That was when Uglymort berated his followers for breaking Ravenclaw's wand, and ordered them to torture and brutalize me. The moment they took the Stunning Charm off of me, I activated the stored minute, but I couldn't find my wand before that minute ran out, and I didn't have enough time to store up extra minutes to look some more."

"Why couldn't you?" Ron demanded.

"Because I am frozen in time, when I do!" Hermione retorted. "I told you that, Ron; I literally cannot react! I'd have been an all-too-easy target for their brutality," she scolded him. Harry squeezed her shoulder gently, and she forced herself to calm back down and continue her narrative. "...So, with my last few seconds, I took the ring off the chain I'd strung it on, and shoved it onto my finger. I couldn't risk them binding me so that I couldn't try to use my bracelet again...and if I'm not ready to have sex with someone I care about, what makes you think I'd want it with someone I don't?"

"Easy," Harry soothed her. "Go on--when you put on the ring, I take it that dragon-thing appeared?"

She nodded, feeling her stomach churn again at the memory. "It appeared, it roared that nonsense about me being a princess and that no one would be allowed to touch me...and then it literally bit off the head and shoulders of...of one of the Death Eaters, and spat it out. All because the man dared to touch me, and to try and cast Conjunctivitis at it. I was scared out of my wits, all I wanted to do was to be back here where it was safe...and somehow the dragon acted like a Portkey, and brought me here. Where I was sick all over the carpet, until Tonks helped me.

"I'm weaker than a newborn kitten, I'm stuck in a betrothal I don't want and which I don't know how to break, and I'm still sick to my stomach with the fear that the dragon was going to do the exact same thing to you, Ron...and I don't need you blaming me for saving myself!" she finished in a half-yell, tears prickling her eyes.

A muscle worked in his freckled jaw. Ron stared at her long and hard for several seconds, then shoved to his feet, cast down the wards, and stalked out of the parlour, slamming the door behind him. The tears that had been threatening her gaze intensified their blurring, and spilled onto her cheeks. Her breath caught in her throat. Harry held her closer as she cried, turning her so that she faced him. Pressing her cheek into his shoulder, Hermione clung to him, sobbing quietly as the last of the adrenaline let-down trembled through her body. At least her tears would help purge the stress-toxins from her body.

Mrs. Figg shuffled into the parlour a short while later, carrying a tea-tray. She eyed Hermione and Harry on the floor, muttered something, and then muttered it louder. "Silly girl! I said you'll catch your death of cold, lying on the floor. It may only be October, but it's a cold October. Get her up on the couch, Harry; there's a good boy."

Harry helped Hermione to stand, assisting her over to the sofa. He had to bear quite a bit of her weight, since her body was still trembling from time-dilation. Hermione suspected it was compounded not only by retching at the memory of all that blood, but because there was something about the way time was squashed about by the bracelet that made anything over the four-minute limit in, say, a twenty-four-hour timeframe a Really Bad Idea.

She let the theory go for now, letting Harry help feed her chicken broth and pilot crackers, ingesting the two in small nibbles to keep her tender stomach soothed. Instead, she listened as Harry filled her in on the aftermath of the ballroom battle. Seventeen dead, the two Dementors sent running, hundreds of wands smashed...but thankfully not Rowena Ravenclaw's, nor Albus Dumbledore's. The exhibition had been ruined, but it could've been so much worse. Four Death Eaters had been captured, including Bellatrix Lestrange, and the giant had been among the fallen, literally, though not exactly among the dead. Someone, Harry told her--possibly Yorsen--had levitated one of the chess bishops at the brute's head, smashing him unconscious...and making him crush a fellow Dark Lord follower as he'd collapsed on top of the luckless wizard.

At least there was a third thing worth laughing about, in an otherwise short, brutal, and very costly battle.

...

It took a full day before Hermione felt well again. Well enough to leave the house, that was. Ron's miraculous avoidance of the Killing Curse had been attributed to a fly that had buzzed through the air at the wrong moment in time, and though the others were skeptical about that theory, it had been spread, to help keep Ron from being another how-did-he-survive target like the Boy Who Lived. But that didn't negate her most pressing concern: she needed to replace her wand. To be an effective witch, she couldn't continue without a wand to help focus her magic, but she wasn't about to go up to Malfoy Manor and politely ask for her vinewood-and-dragon-heartstring original back.

A quick Floo-consultation with Filius Flitwick let her know that he didn't have any similar models among his dwindled collection that she could borrow. If he'd have let her borrow it, that was; even those collectors whose exhibits had been on the fringes of the ballroom hadn't escaped unscathed, and the Charms Professor's display cases had been at ground-zero, battle-wise. The one thing that had protected the majority of his collection had been the proximity of the Priori Incantatem shield, offering several of the wand-cases a modicum of shelter.

That left visiting Ollivander's. Not exactly the best choice, given it was still highly probable the man was under the Imperius Curse by some Death Eater. Or that his nephew was still a Death Eater in disguise...which explained why Redmond Ollivander had been so high-strung, the day the three of them had visited. Having the Boy Who Lived walk into the shop along with his two best friends must've been nerve-wracking. Not that she'd sympathize with someone like that, but it did make more sense.

It also increased the risk of Voldemort figuring out that they were definitely on the trail of his seven Horcruxes. Hermione wasn't sure if anyone besides herself, Harry, and possibly Professor Flitwick had realized what the Dementor had done with that shining-bright dot that had been fragment of Voldemort's soul they'd gone to the exhibition to collect and destroy. She hoped not; the less the Dark Lord knew about their quest and its progress, the better off they all were.

But she needed a wand. Going to Ollivander's meant leaving the safety of the house. Without a wand of her own, she was vulnerable to attack. Oh, not from lustful males; the dragon had made two more appearances to guard her from that. But it hadn't guarded her from Alastor Moody, who had 'tested' the protections of the ring by firing a Jellylegs Jinx at her from a distance. Once the jiggling of her limbs had stopped, she'd thrown sofa pillows and knicknacks, coasters and whatever else she could grab, flinging them at the infuriating old man until he'd wisely retreated. Still, it had been an informative test. Bastard.

Harry was talking to her; hell, Harry was just about the only male who could get close to her, since a visit by Remus set the guardian-thing off, scaring the older wizard to no end. Ron wasn't talking to her, though. If he saw her in a room he was about to enter, he left, mouth compressed and eyes cold with anger. If he was already in the room, he waited until she cleared the door and took the widest berth possible in leaving. And when she tried to talk to him, he ignored her with tight, visible anger.

Maybe she should've flung the throw-pillows and coasters at him, the dunderhead. It wasn't as if she'd known in advance what the protections were, nor that she had any control over the near-mindless thing. She could make it stop an attack, but not if any male who was even the slightest bit interested in her tried to touch her. Or if they tried to attack the dragon. She'd had nightmares about that Death Eater, last night.

Minerva McGonagall startled Hermione, who was lounging in an armchair in the library, trying to plot out a way to get to Ollivander's shop and get herself a wand without either exposing herself to a Death Eater attack, Death Eater treachery, or setting off the damned dragon simply by proximity to the hustle and bustle of all those bodies in Diagon Alley. "--Hermione? We're having an Order meeting to discuss your, er, ring problem. But I'll need you to stand in the parlour doorway, so that you're not close enough to touch anyone. Do be a good dear, and don't touch any males?"

Oh, great. Now I'm the equivalent of a magical leper, a social pariah, a contagion-carrier... Nodding her head, Hermione let the older witch leave. She stayed where she was, listening to the noise of bodies entering the house via the front door and the Floo connection in the kitchen, until things settled down. A single set of footsteps approached, and the Auror woman, Violetta, poked her head in through the door.

"They're ready for you, now."

Levering herself up out of the chair. Hermione headed to the doorway. Violetta stepped back, but not very far. Hermione started to brush past her...and the ring tingled.

"SSSSSSHE ISSSS THE PRINCSSSESSSSS! YOU SSSSSHALL NOT TOUCH HER!"

Violetta shrieked and flung herself back from the apparition filling the doorway to the library, hitting the wall and falling to the floor. The dragon faded quickly, now that the threat was over, but it had caused a number of bodies to spill out of the parlour down the hall. Huddled on the floor, Violetta eyed Hermione shakily.

"That's...that's not exactly how I'd planned on 'coming out of the closet'," the witch tried to joke.

"Hmph," Mad-Eye's voice floated up the hall. "At least the ring's egalitarian, in its defence."

"Everyone, back into the parlour--you, too, Violetta," Minerva ordered the others. When they were all inside, she beckoned to the younger witch. "In the doorway, Hermione, but no further, if you please."

Sighing heavily, Hermione took her place. Being the center of everyone's attention made her flush with discomfort. At the Headmistress' pointed look, she sighed again, and began. "I received a letter early this last summer, and a ring. The letter said it was someone naming himself Russel, and claiming to be Albus Dumbledore's man. I was suspicious, so I said nothing, wanting to find out if it was true. When he sent me word that Mr. Lubbock was going to be attacked...well, the lot of you heard how that turned out. And he sent word that the Creeveys would be attacked, too, so I managed to improvise that one as well. And I figured out how to send those memo-messages, calling myself 'Ring of Truth'...because the ring is apparently enspelled to enforce truthfulness over lies, whenever we'd use it to communicate with each other. So this Russel fellow has been feeding me information that has saved several lives.

"He also warned me to never don the ring, because it was a betrothal ring, and it would bind me to him irrevocably. Unless I was in a situation where it was my last resort for defence, and then it would give me protection of an unspecified sort. Yesterday, in the battle...I found myself captured and Portkeyed in the grip of two Death Eaters, and dragged in front of the Dark Lord. My wand was taken from me, and they were going to...brutalize me. Rape, torture, you name it. I managed to get the ring onto my finger, and that's when the dragon first appeared, shouted that ruddy nonsense about my now being a princess of some kind, and...when one of the Death Eaters tried to attack it, the dragon...the dragon bit off his head and shoulders. Literally.

"So I'd really appreciate it if none of you attacked the thing. Nor provoked it in anyway," she finished grimly. "I can't get the ring off. If there is a way to remove it, only Russel would know. And he hasn't contacted me, yet."

"Why haven't you contacted him?" Bill asked her, as Fleur clung to his hand, almost as if she was determined to keep her husband away from Hermione. The eldest Weasley was still handsome, even with his scars, but Hermione had only ever found him attractive; now that he was married, she definitely wasn't attracted to him. She didn't play that sort of game.

"I don't know how," Hermione shrugged, answering his question. "Only Russel knows. And it would've been too dangerous for his end of things, if anyone noticed someone was trying to contact him in the heart of the Death Eaters."

"Who is this Russel fellow, anyway?" Arthur Weasley asked. "I don't know of anyone named 'Russel' among the Death Eaters, though it's possible we've missed identifying some of them..."

Hermione started to offer the theory that 'Russel' was his middle name, but subsided. Russel was still in grave danger, if the Dark Lord figured out there was a traitor in his midst. Minerva spoke up, cutting through the murmurs of speculation now running through the room.

"It doesn't matter who he is. The fact is, we have two problems to deal with: the over-reactiveness of that ruddy ring, and the fact that there's a spy none of us knew about, in the heart of the Dark Lord's camp."

"Professor Dumbledore surely knew," Hermione interjected. "You could ask his portrait."

"I will," the older witch returned crisply. "Now, Harry said this Russel fellow was actually at the wand exhibition. Is this correct?"

"Yes, he was pretending to be a wizard named Rorik Ferguson. He was part of a small team that was there to steal something."

"Why were the three of you there?" Kingsley Shacklebolt asked.

Harry answered that one. "We were there to get our hands on the same thing. But we can't tell you what it was."

"--Well, a wand, obviously," Fred, or George, snorted from the rear of the room.

"The question is, why were you trying to get your hands on a wand?" Tonks enquired.

"We can't tell you that," Hermione said. "But..." She looked at her former Transfigurations teacher. "But we can tell you that we're now two steps closer to finding a way to defeat the Dark Lord, so the battle wasn't a total--" Her finger heated, cutting her off in startlement. Glancing down at her left hand, she watched as the scales etched into the golden band melted out of sight.

"What's wrong?" someone asked.

"Er...Russel's calling," she relayed, digging her tablet and pen out of the back pocket of her jeans, where she'd been carrying it out of habit ever since shortly after making it. There was a flaw in the program, however; the ring was no longer on a chain that she could trap against the page with her thumb. It was on her ring-finger, which wanted to cup the back of the tablet, not the front. That was too awkward.

Twisting, she pinned the tablet against the doorway, watching ink spilling out from under her hand.

We need to talk.

"You're bloody well right, we need to talk," she muttered, pulling the cap from her Muggle ballpoint pen.

"What's he saying?" Molly demanded.

"That 'we need to talk'," she retorted. Speaking out loud, she scribbled her reply on the page. "I am in...an Order Meeting. They know...about you...and the ring."

We need to talk face-to-face. Alone.

"Well?" Minerva prompted her.

"He wants to talk face-to-face, alone. Not...without...my wand."

I'll see what I can do, spilled across the page, even as Minerva protested,

"You will not face him alone, Miss Granger! How do we even know we can trust this fellow?"

"Russel has earned my trust," Hermione returned, waiting for Russel's reply. "He even managed to save me from a Dementor's Kiss during the battle, yesterday."

"No wonder you were so cozy with him!" Ron snapped, losing his temper and his control on his tongue. "You probably had this planned all along, stringing me along and then hopping into his bed while you were laughing behind my back!"

The page flared and vanished from the tablet, making several of the Order members gasp.

"--What was that?" Molly demanded.

"Russel, terminating the communication between us...and your son is an arsehole!" Hermione yelled, turning to glare at Ron, tablet clenched hard enough in her left hand as she took it down from the doorjamb, the pages were being bent. "For your information, you ignoramus, I had told Russel I was your girlfriend, and that I didn't want him flirting with me! That I could see a future with you and not him!--But you know what? I'm glad we've broken up! The last thing I would've wanted was to spend the rest of my life with an immature arsehole!"

Ron flipped her a rude gesture, glaring at her as he drew breath to retort.