All Kinds of Directions

Harry shut the door behind him and turned. “Where’s Ginny?” he asked.

“She said she was going to send whoever wasn’t too tired to watch the shop,” Ron told him. “She’ll come up when she’s done; I told her we’d be in our room.”

“Oh, yeah. I’m glad she remembered,” Harry said, chagrined. He went and took a chair beside Hermione and Ron’s bed. “Well, let’s wait until she gets here before going into details about everything, but we can fill you in on the basics, Hermione.” Hermione nodded. “Overall, everything went great. I had a bit of trouble telling everyone apart, but that was the point, right? And we ended up in a duel with two Death Eaters, which we wanted to avoid, but it ended up being really fortunate, because Voldemort’s snake Nagini was there.”

Hermione gasped. “Oh no! Did she bite someone?”

“No. She almost got me…I didn’t even see her coming,” Harry admitted. “I was too busy with the duel. But one of the Death Eaters threw the Killing Curse at me at just the right time; I dodged, and it hit Nagini.”

Hermione’s mouth was an O of amazement. “You—you mean she—?”

“She’s dead,” Harry said with a satisfied nod.

“And when she died, she exploded,” Ron added. “Knocked us all arse-over-head. If that’s not a good clue she was a Horcrux, I don’t know what is.”

“She exploded?” Hermione repeated incredulously. “Oh my…If that’s what’s going to happen when we destroy the Horcruxes, we’ll have to be extra careful!”

“Who knows?” Harry said. “The ring Dumbledore destroyed hurt his hand badly, but we don’t know if it exploded, exactly. And Riddle’s diary didn’t explode at all. It might be different for each Horcrux.”

“Damn, that’s true,” Ron agreed reluctantly. “We don’t even know how to destroy them, and now we have to worry about what’ll happen when we do!”

“Well, I think it’s reasonable to assume that the Killing Curse will destroy them, considering what happened to Nagini,” Hermione pointed out.

“And you’ll be casting it, then?” Harry asked sardonically.

Hermione frowned. “Erm… That’s a good point.”

There was a knock on the door, and Harry got up to let Ginny in. “The others are back,” she told them once the door was shut again. “Fred said everything went smoothly, including the hand-off—Narcissa was a bit shocked when three Scrimgeours snatched her, but she tried to bluff her way through instead of casting hexes. Fred took her wand and gave it to McG—er, Minerva when they turned over Narcissa to the Order. Luna and Sally-Ann stayed hidden the whole time, and they’re confident no one knew they were there—not that it would have mattered since they were Scrimgeour too,” she added with a chuckle.

Harry let out a long breath. “That’s great news,” he said with a grin. “Tonks really came through with those hairs of Scrimgeour’s. I think everything went as well as we could expect. Did Fred give Minerva our message about being prepared for an attack tonight in case Voldemort decides to retaliate? Once Voldemort hears about what happened through his spies at the Ministry, he’s most likely to assume it was the Order that pulled off the raid.”

Ginny nodded. “Fred did warn her that they should anticipate an attack, although he didn’t tell her why, exactly. He said her response was to say very sarcastically ‘I might well have guessed’.” Harry laughed.

“The Polyjuice did last until after they were back from the drop-off, right?” Ron asked nervously. “I don’t like to think that most of the Order knows we were involved.”

“You’re just worried Mum will go off again if she hears,” Ginny retorted with amusement. “Yeah, they were all Scrimgeour until they got back here, and Minerva promised not to tell anyone who we were. Tonks and Dung know, of course, and I bet Lupin figures it out. Oh, and everyone’s Polyjuice has worn off now…No strange side effects.”

“Draco is in the room we prepared, I take it?” Hermione asked.

“Yeah, and I sealed the door from both sides,” Harry confirmed. “From the way some of the others talked about him and looked at him, Draco needs protection from the D.A. almost as much as we need it from him.”

“You did remember to Stun him before you brought him through, didn’t you?” Hermione asked nervously. “He didn’t hear you say the name of the house when you Flooed?”

“Yeah, he was unconscious,” Ron confirmed.

“And his wand?”

“Oh yeah,” Ron said, and pulled Draco’s wand out of his pocket. “Nicked it off the floor after Malfoy dropped it,” he said, handing it across to Ginny, who opened up the magical chest and placed Draco’s wand next to Snape’s.

“Ginny, who’s watching the shop?” Harry asked.

“Sally-Ann, Luna and Padma,” Ginny said. “They all said they weren’t tired at all. I got the feeling that Sally-Ann and Padma plan on trying to cheer Luna up.”

“Oh…That’s good,” Harry said, feeling guilty again—after all, he and Ginny had a lot to do with Luna’s being depressed in the first place. George had flat-out refused to participate in the raid on the Death Eater stronghold. “They each have an Invisibility Cloak?” Ginny nodded. “Good. Parvati and Lavender have the other two Cloaks, and they’ve left to guard Neville; Dean’s probably running out of things to talk with Neville about by now.”

“All right,” Hermione said, scribbling notes of the conversation. “How many Death Eaters were there? Did you manage to get them all?”

“There were eight not counting Draco, so our estimate was pretty accurate,” Ginny told her. “And we got all of them, and got hairs for Polyjuice before sending them off.”

“That’s excellent,” Hermione said with satisfaction. “I’ve counted back, and Voldemort has lost fourteen Death Eaters since we started fighting back in late July, including his three most dangerous supporters!”

“Snape, Lucius Malfoy and Bellatrix Lestrange,” Harry agreed. “Those three were a big blow to Voldemort, and he keeps losing soldiers as well. From now on, the one we have to worry about the most is Fenrir Greyback. Hmm, too bad we don’t know how many people Voldemort actually has.”

“That’s true, but still, eight more Death Eaters are in the hands of the Ministry, and Draco’s missing,” Hermione said. “No matter how you look at it, it’s a huge depletion of his forces.”

“Only seven of them went to the Ministry today,” Ginny corrected. “Harry made another Portkey to send the other one to St. Mungo’s.”

Hermione paused in her writing. “St. Mungo’s? What happened to him?”

“Ginny tried out that variation of the Self-Punching Hex on him,” Ron said with a chortle.

“It’s not funny!” Ginny snapped.

“Was it a bit too… exuberant?” Hermione asked carefully.

“He beat himself bloody,” Harry said. “The hex kept repeating. We had to Stun him to get it to stop.”

“And when we woke him, it started again,” Ginny said uncomfortably. “I had no idea it would be that violent… Merlin, what if I had given in to my impulse to try it on Lee?” She shuddered.

“I’m sure they’ll sort him out in St. Mungo’s,” Harry said reassuringly. “And they can temporarily tie his arms down, or cast Cushioning Charms on his face or something.”

“Well, I don’t think I’m ever casting that Hex again, anyway,” Ginny said.

“Wait a minute!” Ron exclaimed. “Okay, I agree it was pretty vicious, but you think the Death Eaters aren’t going to do worse? You saw one of them fling the Killing Curse at Harry today! I say we use everything we can, if we have to!”

Ginny bit her lip. “Ron, I’ve seen—and cast—a lot of really, really mean hexes, but nothing compared to that… especially since there’s no way to counter it. What if it can’t ever be stopped, and that Death Eater ends up like that for the rest of his life?”

Ron looked like he thought that wasn’t such a bad thing, but didn’t comment. “It’s also not a hex that should be widely known,” Hermione said. “Considering how nasty it is.”

“Hermione, once something’s been created it’s going to get out there, no matter what,” Harry said. “There’s a man lying in St. Mungo’s now who tries to punch himself if he’s awake—people are going to hear about it.” He grimaced. “Ginny, I know you don’t like it, but I think you should be prepared to teach all of us how to do the hex. Maybe if we have time we can do some research and try to come up with the counter-hex, but if it comes down to fighting Death Eaters again, I think we should be prepared to use every weapon we have.”

Ginny scowled at Harry, not liking the situation at all. “I’ll think about it,” she conceded.

“Fair enough,” Harry agreed. “So, we have Draco. Ron, you found him—did you have any trouble with him?”

“No,” Ron said smugly. “Actually when I got there a Dementor was going for him; I cast a Patronus, and it scared the snot out of Malfoy… I think he thought it was a ghost or something,” he added, chortling again.

“A ghost?” Hermione repeated with a frown. “I don’t know about that, Ron…It would mean Malfoy had never heard of a Patronus.”

“Well, he looked even more scared of my Patronus than of the Dementor,” Ron said.

“Huh, that doesn’t seem right,” Ginny said thoughtfully. “From what we saw, Draco’s been around Dementors since he fled Hogwarts. How could he not know about Patronuses?”

“What I’m wondering,” Harry said, “is why the Dementor would be going for Draco. That was been before anyone knew we were there; Ron, Malfoy didn’t see you until after, right?” Ron nodded. “So the Dementor was going for Draco on its own. Were they sucking happiness from him intentionally? And if so, why didn’t Draco complain to the other Death Eaters, and have them put a stop to it?”

“Maybe Malfoy’s being punished,” Ron suggested. “He did screw up the assignment he was given—maybe Voldemort ordered the other Death Eaters not to stop the Dementors.”

“But that was months ago!” Ginny said. “Why would Voldemort punish Draco for so long?”

“It’s because of Lucius,” Harry said quietly. “Remember the memory Pettigrew gave us, when Narcissa got Snape to make an Unbreakable Vow? She said Draco was only ordered to kill Dumbledore as punishment for Lucius failing to get the prophecy. Well, Lucius failed again—he broke into our home and not only didn’t get me, he died. Draco’s being punished for Lucius’s failure again.”

“But—but Lucius died!” Hermione exclaimed. “Isn’t that punishment enough?”

“Not for Voldemort, it isn’t,” Harry replied.

“Maybe Draco will be more willing to help us if he’s been at the mercy of Dementors for months,” Ginny suggested.

“Yeah, what about that?” Ron asked. “When I found him he was all alone in this room, with nothing around… It didn’t look like he’d been involved with anything important. Maybe he hasn’t seen as much useful stuff as we were hoping.”

“That would certainly make capturing him less of a success,” Hermione said needlessly, biting a nail.

“Even if he doesn’t give us anything, we’ll still have fulfilled our promise to Pansy, and that’s important,” Ginny pointed out. “And that’s not counting the Death Eaters out of circulation and the destroyed Dementors.” Everyone nodded at that.

“I really doubt Malfoy’s going to give up much,” Ron said skeptically. “He was pretty tight-lipped, you know… even after we returned his voice.”

“Yeah, I noticed that,” Harry said with a scowl. “He’s realized that the information he has is his best bargaining piece now, so he’s shut up until it suits him.”

“Well, we can afford to wait and see if Pansy has any luck with him,” Ginny pointed out. “And if not, we always have Veritaserum—he can’t have an immunity to it like Snape does.”

“I don’t think we can afford to wait,” Harry said with a grimace. “We’re running out of sources of information.”

“That’s true,” Hermione said, clearly frustrated. “Luna hasn’t been getting anything from The Quibbler—although really, she hasn’t been going in much anyway—and Rita Skeeter said that since Scrimgeour is leaning on The Daily Prophet, she hasn’t been hearing anything. Even Tonks hasn’t heard anything useful from inside the Ministry lately, beyond what’s already public knowledge.”

“And Ernie’s died,” Harry said sadly. “Plus, Seamus hasn’t come up with anything—”

“Oh!” Hermione said suddenly. “That reminds me—oh, I can’t believe I forgot!—we got a message from Seamus!”

Harry, Ginny and Ron were stunned to hear that. Seamus Finnegan had spurned Harry and the D.A. after his parents were murdered and he was forced to infiltrate the D.A. under the Imperius Curse. That was what the rest of the D.A. believed, anyway…Only the four of them knew that Seamus was actually making himself out to hate Harry, so he would appear open to recruitment by Voldemort’s side; the hope was that he could glean information for the D.A. “What did he say?” Harry asked.

“Here,” Hermione said, pulling out a note. “The summary is that he wants to meet with us, as soon as possible. Of course he can’t come out and say anything or he’d give away his cover, but from what he hinted at, he’s heard a few rumors, and one in particular leapt out as possibly being important.”

Harry read the letter carefully, and decided that Hermione’s interpretation of Seamus’ hints was accurate. Ron and Ginny came to the same conclusion. “Okay, so we need to meet with him,” Harry said. “All four of us, and we’re going to be really cautious this time. Let’s set it up for tomorrow night at eight; Hermione, will you send Seamus the Charmed message?”

“Certainly,” Hermione agreed.

“So what are we going to do about Draco?” Ginny asked. “Veritaserum straight off?”

“We’re going to give Pansy a chance to convince him to help us,” Harry said, ignoring Ron’s skeptical look. “And while she’s trying, she’s going to be listening for anything that might be useful. If that doesn’t work reasonably fast…I think we’ll have to resort to Legilimency or Veritaserum.”

“Only as a last resort,” Hermione insisted. “We’ll never convince him to switch sides after that.” The others nodded their agreement, albeit Ron reluctantly. “Is there anything else I should know about what happened today?” Hermione asked.

“We managed to destroy three Dementors,” Harry said. “I got two and Ron got another. And I’m confident we caught all the Death Eaters too—no one got away.”

“That means it might take a bit of time before Voldemort even realizes anything happened,” Ginny said with a grin.

“He might even hear it first from his spies at the Ministry,” Harry said. “I wonder what he’ll think about the multiple Scrimgeours?” Everyone chuckled. “All right,” he said firmly. “We can get details from the other group tomorrow—oh, and tomorrow I want to meet with Terry, Sally-Ann and Padma to talk about the progress they’ve made with figuring out how to reverse the Memory Charm on Neville. But unless there’s anything urgent, that’s enough for tonight. We just pulled off a major victory—we should be celebrating!”

“Or sleeping,” Hermione suggested wryly.

“It’s only just 9:00 pm!” Ron said, and he did look very awake. “Besides, who could sleep now? After all that excitement! And anyway, we should be on alert in case anything happens at the shop—I bet Voldemort’s going to go absolutely mental when he hears what happened!”

“He’s already mental,” Harry pointed out with a grin.

“Mentaler, then.”

“That’s not a word, Ron,” Hermione said, but she was giggling.

Ron was giving Hermione a stern look, which was ruined by the smirk he was wearing. “I think it’s time for us to go,” Ginny said pointedly, dragging Harry to his feet and toward the door.

“Are you sure?” Harry asked innocently. “Ron, Hermione, we’d be happy to stay and chat some more—” Ginny shoved him through the door, gave Hermione an apologetic grin, and pulled the door closed.

“You’re no fun,” Harry teased once Ginny had shut the door.

“Follow me to our room and I’ll show you how much fun I can be,” Ginny suggested with a leer. “I might even let you go flying.”

Harry shivered, thinking of Ginny’s extremely suggestive tattoo. “That sounds like a good idea,” he said.

“Oh Merlin, spare me,” Pansy drawled from the stairwell.

Harry smirked at her. “Nice job on the kidnapping, Pansy.”

“Strategic relocation,” Pansy corrected, the corner of her mouth twitching as she walked over to them. “Narcissa wasn’t too happy about it, but she changed her tune fairly quickly once I suggested she didn’t want to lose any more family.”

Harry frowned a bit at the suggestion, but shrugged. “Well, Draco’s safe, so we did our part. She can stop worrying.”

Pansy’s expression changed instantly. “You really pulled it off, then,” she said as if she couldn’t believe it. “Draco’s really here?”

“Yeah. Locked up in that room…for his protection and ours,” Harry confirmed.

“Can I see him?” Pansy asked in a small voice.

Harry shouldn’t have been surprised. He glanced at Ginny, who nodded. “All right,” he said, “but give me your wand.”

“My wand?” Pansy repeated. “Afraid I’m going to try to break him out?”

“No,” Harry said instantly. “But I wouldn’t put it past him to try and nick your wand, and do it himself.”

“True,” Pansy acknowledged, and handed over her wand. “Now come on,” she ordered, and started up the stairs.

“Go on,” Ginny said to Harry. “I’ll be in our room…waiting,” she concluded, and licked her lips.

Harry sprinted up the stairs two at a time, catching up to Pansy easily.

When they reached the appropriate door, Harry turned to Pansy. “I know you’ll know this stuff, but I’m going to say it anyway,” he said. “Don’t tell Draco anything about the D.A.; no names, no location—although you can’t tell him where we are—and nothing about what we’ve been doing. If he asks about his mother, tell him she’s in the hands of the Order; he knows that’s what our plan was.”

“You expect Draco to believe that he’s safe just because you say so?” Pansy asked scathingly.

Harry thought about it. “You can tell him he’s in a location protected by the Fidelius Charm,” he said finally. “We know that Voldemort knows about that already.” He hesitated. “Er… Do you want me to wait for you out here, or cast a Charm on you so I’ll know if anything bad happens to you? Just in case?”

Pansy scowled. “Draco would never hurt me! No, don’t you dare say I can’t be sure! I know you hate him from before, but he’d never harm someone he cares about!”

Harry considered arguing, but decided it was pointless. “Okay, fine; sorry. I thought I’d better offer, that’s all.”

Pansy nodded shortly. “Anything else?” she asked impatiently, clearly desperate to see Draco again.

“Yeah. I know you’re happy and everything, and you, er, have feelings for Draco, but remember that we need to get information out of him. If he says anything that we should know, come tell us.”

“You’re telling me to use my feelings for Draco as a ploy to get information out of him? How very Slytherin.”

“I was almost sorted into Slytherin, Pansy,” Harry said with a smirk as he turned and headed back down the hall. “Oh, and when you leave just shut the door behind you and the protection charms will reseal themselves.”

“Potter!” Pansy shouted before he reached the stairs.

“What?”

Pansy seemed very uncomfortable, almost embarrassed, when she spoke. “Thank you,” she said sincerely. “You’re better at this than I thought you were. The one promise you made to me when I agreed to help you, you actually delivered. It’s—Draco is all I’ve got now, and I didn’t honestly think I’d ever see him again, but you made it happen. So thanks.”

Harry stared at Pansy for a long moment before responding. “You’re welcome. And Pansy, you may not have your family or your fortune any longer, but you have more than just Draco, if you want it. We’re all of us together in this, and that includes you.” Harry smiled weakly, and disappeared down the stairs.