Broomsticks and The Wizards Gauntlet

Broomsticks and The Wizards Gauntlet

Chapter 15

Harry led them across the front yard and into the woods next to the house.

“The first portkey is just over here. I knew I’d need one close. I had a feeling this night was coming eventually.” Harry mumbled as he frantically searched the forest floor for the portkey.

“What’s the portkey, maybe we can help you find it?” Hermione asked.

“We have to get them out of here. How long do you think it’ll take the aurors to decide to search up here? Bloody hell Potter! Do you know where it is or not?”

“It was a muggle flip-flop, and I don’t see it here anywhere. I know I placed it on this dead log.”

“Are you sure Harry? Perhaps it’s covered by leaves is all,” Hermione said, moving the dead leaves and branches around the rotting and mossy log that lay on the ground.

“It was pink Hermione! I didn’t want it to be hard to find. Not this time. I knew we might have to flee quickly!” Harry was starting to lose it. Hermione knew his moods better then anybody, except perhaps Ginny. The portkey was gone. The sooner everyone realized that, the sooner they could come up with a new plan. Draco was bitching too, pissed off that he allowed himself to trust Potter in the first place.

“Look, what’s that?” Hermione said pointing to far away headlights coming up the narrow pot-holed dirt road.

“It’s a car Hermione. You know, muggles drive them?” Harry said pointedly.

“I know it’s a bloody car Harry! Why is it coming up the road though? I thought you said you had no neighbors for miles in either direction?”

“I don’t.” Harry said finally understanding where Hermione was going with this.

“It’s not a Ministry car. Nobody in the Ministry would ride in such a shabby piece of shite,” Blaise said. Jessie was squirming and Draco hugged her to his chest.

“It’s going to be alright Jessie. Uncle Draco won’t let anything happen to you.” He said it, but even Draco was worried.

The car pulled up and a man exited the vehicle.

“Bloody fucking hell! Where did I step on gum? Now it’s allover the ruddy pedals!”

“Ron?!” Both Hermione and Harry said leaping from their cover in the woods. Draco tried to grab Hermione’s robes but she was already running across the lawn towards Harry’s drive.

“Ron! Am I glad to see you!” Hermione threw her arms around Ron’s neck. Harry was also happy to see Ron, and more specifically, happy to see that he had flown/driven the enchanted car of his fathers. It still had a few dents from Harry and Ron’s scrape with death in the Forbidden Forest, but otherwise it looked virtually the same.

“Ron, we need you to drive us north. Now! Aurors are here. Can you do it?”

“Of course Harry. But what’s going on?” Hermione motioned to Luna and Blaise and Draco and the children to come quickly. Draco reluctantly led the pack out of the woods. “Harry, this isn’t a bus. Just how many people am I taking?”

“Ron, no time! Everybody in,” Harry shouted, opening the creaky door of the old Ford Anglia. Luna held two of her kids on her lap and Draco passed Jessie to Blaise as he tried to cram himself and Hermione into the car. It was a damn tight squeeze, but finally they were all able to pack themselves in, like sardines. Ron began to drive away, when the faces of aurors popping in all around them could be seen. They were wearing their maroon colored auror’s robes and were carrying wands.

“Drive Ron, drive!” Harry shouted. The car sped down the road and then Ron pushed the button and the car stalled out, everyone’s faces dropped.

“My Dad and I fixed it, I tell you! Every weekend we would work on the car. Of course that was a while ago, before I went to America and then Romania, and we did sock back a bottle of firewhiskey while we were working on the car.” Harry looked at him with a deflated expression, but Ron smiled.

“No I’m serious! It really works Harry.” He started it again and by a stroke of luck it turned over. He pushed the button and this time, the car was launched into the sky. Draco finally breathed a sigh of relief.

They traveled through the dark foreboding skies, the dark bands of clouds stretching out across the vastness of Northern Scotland. Harry didn’t want to take any chances with the British coast. He needed to get as close to the coast as he could, but as far away from aurors as wizardly possible. The kids were asleep in the backseat while Hermione snuggled up on Draco’s lap. She stroked his hair and whispered in his ear, how everything was going to be fine and how she had done this numerous times for other families with squibs. Still, Draco felt nervous. Not for himself, but for his sister and her beautiful children, and for his wife. Draco observed Blaise, cradling the sleeping Jessie in his arms with tender loving care. He knew Luna was going to be alright with Blaise at her side. He smiled at his sister and she blushed, but nuzzled her head against Blaise. They were in love and it was written allover both of their faces. Draco turned away and looked out the window, when he thought he saw the car skim the tops of the treetops.

“Weasley, take us up, you’re flying to low,” Draco said and Harry now too was looking out the window from the front seat. Ron peered into his car mirror back at Draco and then gulped. Draco lunged forward.

“What is it?”

“Well, this is a muggle car and…it still needs petrol. I think we are closer to running out of petrol.” Just then, the car sputtered and died and the car drastically dropped in altitude.

“Get it started again, Ron!” Harry shouted.

“I’m trying, I’m trying!” Ron stomped on the gas pedal and turned the key once again, but it was too late and they were heading through the trees.

“Hold on everyone! Going to be a rough landing.” Ron steered the car into a clearing as best he could and suddenly the tires were bouncing on the ground. Draco hit his head on the ceiling of the compact car and cringed in pain as he felt blood drip down over his forehead. They ploughed through the trees at great speeds, finally slowing down when they heard sloshing sounds. The car came to a complete stop and everyone looked around at each other, surprised that nobody had been seriously injured.

“Draco your head!”

“Just a scratch. I’m okay. Let’s get out of the bloody death contraption already!” One by one, they exited the car into the darkness of the forest. Luna splashed down in the muddy muck and the cold squishiness didn’t seem to bother her or her twin boys.

“Come on Malfoy,” Draco said to Hermione, holding his arms out.

“What? You’re going to carry me?” Hermione asked in surprise.

“I spent twenty-five thousand galleons on that dress. Do you think I’m going to let you ruin it in this filth?” Draco said referring to the wedding dress Hermione was wearing.

“Oh, Draco…No…This isn’t my wedding dress. I just conjured a sheet to look like it. My wedding dress fit me like a glove and was comfortable and I ran out of ideas for outfits with such short notice. My real dress in hanging in a closet, packed in a box. I thought Jillian could wear it one day.” Draco picked Hermione up and started through the muddy water. If anyone who knew Draco as a child had seen this chivalrous act, they wouldn’t have believed it. Draco Malfoy, pureblood, carrying mudblood Granger through the mud, so she didn’t get dirty? It was nearly laughable. She threw her hands around his neck and flicked her wand, healing the gash on his head with a simple incantation.

“I love you Draco. I know it’s not really the time, but I just wanted to say it.”

“Yes, apparently I love you too, because I’m ruining a rather expensive pair of dragon boots,” Draco smirked and Hermione kissed his cheek.

Harry lit his wand, once they had all cleared the mud hole. Ron moaned about the car being stuck and how it would take him bloody years to get it into working condition again- that is, if he could ever get it out of the mud.

“You did good Ron. According to the vague map I made, you landed us quite close to the portkey. We won’t have to walk far. It’s just through the woods and next to a local fishery on the beach.” They all walked silently through the leftover snow. The crunching sounds of their feet in the snow couldn’t drown out the screaming worry in Draco’s mind. This was just too easy. They had gotten away without any skirmishes. Draco pulled his wand out, ready for whatever was coming. Harry too was on guard, as he held his wand out in front of him. Ron however was apologizing to Hermione for his treatment of Luke. Apparently that’s why he was coming to see Harry on this night. He wanted to find out from Harry what the best way to apologize to Hermione was. He had received a letter from Molly, after the custody hearing and was completely shocked. He bid Charlie farewell and returned to his home. Somehow, the fact that Luke wasn’t the father eased Ron’s mind. As selfish as it was, he didn’t like Hermione and her son being twisted up in this mess and he didn’t have the heart to fight it out with them like Molly did. In the end, he fled to Romania to avoid all the confrontation, admitting to himself that he had no idea how to raise a teenage girl on his own, and since Parvati cared more about her causes then she did her only daughter, Ron left Drew with Molly.

“There it is!” Harry said excitedly, pointing to an old rubber boot just up ahead. They all hurried their steps. Luna was smiling, the taste of freedom on her lips and Blaise was rejoicing and telling the kids it was all over now and they wouldn’t have to be afraid anymore. They all stopped at the portkey-- all but Draco. It just didn’t smell right. Something was awry. And then popping sounds were heard all around them. One auror crept out from behind a weathered ice fishing shanty and Harry shot him with his wand. Another shot and Draco looked at his family cowering in fear by the portkey. Luna was covering Jessie and Blaise had captured the boys in his arms and was trying to shield them from the bolts of red light that streaked past them.

“Stop! Take me, but just stop this fighting.” Harry shot another red light from his wand and looked at Draco as if he must be crazy.

“Get to the portkey Malfoy!”

“Hermione was already at the portkey and she begged Draco to come to her.

“I can get you all out of this mess. There is no reason we should all go down. Harry, you have to be able to come back to this country. You have kids. Hermione and Weasel, the same. I’m the Minister…I’m the only one who stands a chance of getting us out of this mess! Get Luna out of here Hermione. You are brave and strong and I trust you more then anyone else Sweetpea. Take them now!” Harry fired a warning shot and backed up.

“I can do this Malfoy. You don’t have to risk it! I can take them!” Just then, a dozen aurors popped in and Draco dropped his wand and lifted his arms up over his head, walking towards them.

“Just take care of my wife…Bring her back to me safe once you hear from me. I’ll owl when it’s safe to come back.” Draco turned his attention to Hermione at that.

“Don’t cry Sweetpea. I love you…”

“I love you too Draco…Please, just come with me!”

Harry gulped and looked back at Hermione who was crying frantically and calling out Draco’s name. Harry knelt and touched the portkey. The last thing he saw was Draco falling to his knees as the aurors swarmed him.

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The air was warm and salty. They found themselves on a white sand beach staring up at the full moon. Blaise didn’t hesitate to gather some driftwood and seaweed in order to make a fire. As Luna and her kids and Blaise sat around the fire, peacefully sleeping on the Bermuda beach, Hermione made her way down to the shore.

“I knew this was going to happen! I knew it! DRACO!!” She shouted into the crashing waves, the deafening roar of the sea drowning out her cries. She collapsed on the shore in a daze. She couldn’t believe how the events of the night had played out.

“ It’ll be okay ‘Mione,” Harry said sitting down next to his friend and slinking an arm around her shoulders. Hermione fell into his neck and wailed. Her tears rolling down her cheeks and soaking Harry’s collar.

“He could have come with us. We could all be here right now!”

“He’s right you know. I know you don’t want to hear it but the auror’s…We wouldn’t be able to come back to Britain ‘Mione. You have kids, I have kids, Ron has kids. Draco was right. He sacrificed himself for all of us. It’s a really non-Slytherin thing to do. But then if you think about it…It was the logical thing to do. Draco is the Minister. If anybody can get us all off, it’s him.”

“Harry, you know he’s going to fry for this! You know it as well as I do!”

“I dunno ‘Mione. Maybe not. You saw all the support for him tonight after he won the Gauntlet. They can’t just kill him. There would be public outcry. He’s going to be okay Hermione. He will clear all of us and then send word and then we can all go home.” Hermione nodded her head and gave Harry a lopsided smile before asking him if she could be alone.

“Try to get some rest Hermione. We have a big day tomorrow. I lit the signal fire. A witch will be here tomorrow to take us to the next portkey. Don’t collapse on me. I need you to have your wits about you. Okay?” Hermione nodded, pulling her knees up to her chest and shivering at the thoughts of her Draco in Azkaban.

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Draco was shot with a stunning spell. He could hear some of the aurors arguing with others over how he should be processed. At least one of the auror’s, seemed to be siding with Draco, clearly one of his supporters.

“You read the auror instructions! This is a radical criminal faction. He is to be sent to Azkaban where he will await trial.”

“He confessed! He’s hardly a flight risk. His kids attend Hogwarts with my kids. I think the local jail would be more then enough to hold him in. I don’t think he’s gong to try to escape,” one of the aurors plead with the other. With a familiar pop, Draco found himself at Auror headquarters. Draco was thrown back into a chair, where a crowd of aurors gathered around him.

“We need to get your statement. If you wish to have counsel here it is your right.” Draco thought about it. Hermione was his lawyer. She was obviously not here, so he went ahead without her. Draco took the blame…for all of it. He said that the Gauntlet was his idea. He set the plans in motion to free the squibs. He was the wizard who fought off numerous aurors. He planned and carried all of it out. He felt it would be easier to clear only his name, then to have to try to free Hermione and Ron and Harry. Now only one name carried suspicion…his. When Draco was finished, the friendly auror leaned down with a benevolent expression and whispered.

“You know these are high crimes against the Ministry? This is treason Sir.” Draco nodded.

“You will be taken to Azkaban now. Do you understand this? If you don’t understand I could have you taken to St. Mungo’s. Are you getting what I’m trying to say? I like you…My wife and I voted for you and our son is friends with your oldest boy Scorpius. He taught him how to be a better quidditch player. It’s all my son cares about and Scorpius’s lessons allowed him to get the Seeker position on the Slytherin House team at Hogwarts. I feel like I owe you…but…I can’t help you, if you aren’t willing to help yourself.”

“Just get my wife and my friends names cleared, so they can come home. Can you do that for me?” Draco begged.

“I will do all that I can. You’re a brave wizard. You would have won the election you know? Raspodin’s support is dwindling in the public sector. He still has quite a lot of pull at the Ministry, but he was on his way out. Sir, I’m terribly sorry to have to do this, but I have to take you to Azkaban now.” Draco stood and was cuffed. His legs were shackled and then he was walked down the long halls of the Ministry with the group of aurors guiding him by the arms. He passed by Prunella on his walk of shame. She was crying into a tissue, finally turning her back, unable to look at her beloved employer as he was ridiculed by many envious Ministry employees. Coworkers and colleagues, judges and council members all stared. Some with curled lips and smirks, others with tears in their eyes and heavy hearts. When he reached the floo, labeled Azkaban Prison, he was pushed inside it as the auror sprinkled the floo powder into the fireplace.

“Azkaban.”

Dementors swooped down on him and Draco felt his own dread suffocating him as he collapsed on the cold rock floor.

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The seagulls called overhead and Hermione woke up in the soft sand. The nightmare of Draco in Azkaban seemed all too real last night. His pale, lifeless body was lying on the stone floor and Hermione was shaking him as she begged for him to wake up. This is the same dream that she had been having ever since she and Harry had cooked up The Wizards Gauntlet. Surely, it was her own subconscious guilt and worry, but it was disturbing nonetheless.

“Come on ‘Mione, the witch is here to take us to the portkey,” Harry said tugging on Hermione’s hand. She felt like a zombie. She felt like nobody could understand her pain and she felt like nobody was worried at all about Draco. Harry and Ron were laughing together as they walked along the beach with Luna and the kids. Hermione walked behind the group, cooking up completely ridiculous conspiracy theories against her friends. Had Harry and Ron plotted this all out, in order to finally get Hermione away from their nemesis, Draco Malfoy? She knew the thought was absurd, yet she felt desperate and she wanted to lash out at Harry and Ron. She just wanted to be back in Britain, not here in some tropical paradise!

“Harry I think we should go back…” Hermione said as they reached the final portkey.

“Hermione, for the last time we can’t go back until we hear from Draco! He did this for us. Don’t take his grand gesture and diminish it because you miss him. I understand you wanting to be back and I promise, I swear, I will get you back, but right now we have to get Luna and her family to New York! I think you will feel better once you see who is meeting us there.”

They took the portkey and Hermione was surprised to see her brother in law standing there to greet them. They were in the suite at the Dragon Witch. Hermione had nearly forgotten that Nathaniel and his girlfriend had moved into the suite when Draco and Hermione left The Big Apple. Draco said for him to live here as long as he wanted. The place looked different though. It was filled with foreign antiquities and tapestries; no doubt from Nathaniel’s travels abroad.

Nathaniel greeted his sister Luna with a kiss on the cheek and a hug and then showed them to their rooms. He had an entire room full of toys for the kids and they were immediately playing and laughing and giggling, as if none of the previous night’s events had occurred.

“Hermione. Let’s talk.” Nathaniel said, motioning towards a spare bedroom. Hermione hesitated. While she had mended fences with Nathaniel, there was still a part of her that didn’t trust Draco’s brother, even if Draco did now. Sensing her ambivalence, he handed her his wand as a gesture to make her feel more safe.

“Please, Hermione, we need to talk.” They entered the room and shut the door. Nathaniel looked so much like Draco that Hermione found herself staring. He had cut his hair and it was lighter now, a dark shade of blonde, that he claimed his girlfriend preferred to his darker mane. His face was angular and his eyes were piercing, just like Draco’s. He reached for a paper on the night table and he thrust it into Hermione’s hands. Hermione sat down, her hands shaking, as she read Nathaniel’s copy of The Daily Prophet. It said that Draco was arrested and charged with high crimes of the state. He was to be tried for treason and if found guilty, he was subject to death by dementor’s kiss. Hermione sobbed upon reading this. Her worst fears recognized.

“I have to go back. I’m his lawyer. I’m going back.”

“Yes. We have to go,” he agreed.

“We?”

“Yes. You will need me to get back and…my brother needs me.”

“So, you aren’t going to try to talk me into staying and waiting for word from Draco, like Harry and Ron?”

“No. We have to go, now. Draco isn’t built for a prison like that. He appears strong and tough on the outside but on the inside…Well, he just can’t take it. We have to get him out of there.”
“Well it’s settled then,” Hermione said with the first glimmer of hope showing on her face since she had left Draco standing there by the fishery on the beach, as the aurors surrounded them. “We will leave by portkey, immediately.”

“No. You’re in America. It takes two weeks to get a portkey set up. Something called a Transportation Commission has to approve it. You have to submit a formal request and then papers have to be filed, an appointment made and then gratuity paid before a portkey can be set up. Besides, it’s public. We need to arrive into Britain under secrecy.”

“But…it says right here that Draco is the only suspect and that he confessed. That means Harry and I and Ron, we are all free to come back to Britain.”

“You aren’t reading between the lines Hermione. Raspodin wants this conviction…It guarantees him the election. He will have his own people watching the portkeys…You’re the top lawyer at the Ministry. Do you really think he will allow you to come back so easily? No, we will not travel by portkey.”

“Then how?” Hermione asked Nathaniel.

“Have you ever flown on a raven?” Hermione looked at him perplexed.

“It’s how I came to America in the first place. Do you want to rest, or are you ready?” “You mean…Me….fly on you… in your animagus form?” Hermione said with a quizzical expression and Nathaniel nodded.

“A simple engorgio spell should make it a comfortable ride for you.” Hermione thought about it. She hated flying, this was true. Nevertheless, she hated the thought of Draco being alone and in Azkaban even more. Hermione agreed and she and Nathaniel slipped through the wall panel in the bedchamber that led to the terrace of the Dragon Witch hotel.

Home…Her home had once been here…but Hermione realized that home wasn’t a particular place…It was a wherever Draco was, and she wanted to go home now, more then ever. She wanted her Draco back.

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Draco was locked in a cell with five other wizards. He collapsed in the corner, all feelings of happiness and his life before Azkaban, fading to near nothingness. One of the wizards approached him and tried to take his shoes.

“Get orf!”

“You can ‘ave his shirt, but I want da shoes Roman.” A rail thin, and toothless wizard said, pawing at Draco.

“I said get orf!” The wizard slashed at the other wizard who was trying to take Draco’s shoes, cutting him with a jagged stone he had tucked in his raggedy pants. The grimy, bearded wizard, known only to inmates as Roman squatted next to Draco. Draco’s lips were so dry, and he had an insatiable thirst. The dirty wizard started pawing at something behind Draco. Draco slumped over, falling onto his back. He couldn’t forget about the dementor’s torment. He was lost in his own sorrow-filled mind.

“Yeel get used to it. ‘Vonce ye been ‘ere a while the beasts torment ‘don mess wit cha as much. Are you thirsty?” Draco barely looked at the wizard, but managed to nod. The wizard dug into the rock wall and slid out a dirty cloth fropm a hole in the wall. He carefully opened the cloth, making sure none of the other inmates saw him and then he pulled out a dirty pear. He picked a piece of pear off and rubbed it against his lips. Draco licked the juice from his lips.

“Best eat. Gots to keep yer strength up in a place like this, else the demntors will win, they will,” Roman said feeding Draco a bite of the pear.

“Ve ‘ave to save the rest for later.” He wrapped the fruit back up in the dirty cloth and shoved it back into the hiding place in the rocks. Draco curled into a ball and closed his eyes. He could vaguely remember Hermione and her giggle. It all seemed to be slipping away though.

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If I missed anyone my apologies! Thank you, thank you,thank you. You all are what keeps me sitting in my chair and typing away instead of going outside lol It's so hot and muggy anyways though. Ya know...just occurred to me why Nathaniel and Hermione don't just take a muggle plane LMAO Oh well, traveling by raven is much cooler if not a tad bit tiring. I guess we will just assume that the bad men are also watching Heathrow airport.

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You are all awesome!! I foreshadowed in the last chapter so you could all get used to the idea that Draco IS going to Azkaban. Can his family work together to save him now? Review and I will update ASAP. I feel kinda bad leaving the story at this place. The hardest part thus far for me to write was the walk of shame through the Ministry. Okay, so you all know how I end my stories…You will never need a tissue at the end of one of my stories.