Stylistic Harmony

Chapter Thirty Three
"Draco," He prodded him in the arm, "Draco, wake up," another prod, Draco grunted and turned over, then mumbled,
"Fuck off, I'm sleeping." Blaise kicked him in the leg,
"Get up, for fucks sake. Didn't you feel it? We've gotta go." The blond stirred and sat up, shaking out his arm that had gone to sleep,
"Feel what?" Blaise looked pissed off, and was grabbing up his clothes that had been strewn across Draco's room the night before,
"That shooting pain you feel in your arm?! Draco, its him. We have to go." Draco did a double take then automatically looked down, the mark scorched in his skin was writhing and turning black, burning as it went. He shot out of the bed and pulled a couple of garments from his wardrobe, his dark Death Eater cloak among them,
"Damn it!" Blaise was loitering by the door watching with haughty annoyance on his face. After several minutes Draco was ready, and they both apparated out with a crack, landing with practiced grace in the entrance hall of the Riddle house. The house was buzzing, there were people everywhere. Draco grimaced, a gathering like this could mean one thing and one thing only. The Dark Lord was mustering his forces, he was getting ready to make his next move. Through the throng of cloaked people scurried a squat, rat-like figure, headed straight for them, he spoke with a tremble to his voice,
"Master Malfoy, Master Zabini, his Lordship wishes to see you in the drawing room immediately." Blaise and Draco looked at each, then down at Wormtail with disgust, shoving him aside, the two young men made their way through the house. Stopping in front of a pair of ornately carved double doors, Draco had barely raised his hand to knock when the door swung open automatically, and a sinister voice rang out through the darkness,
"Ah, my young friends, come in." They stepped warily into the centre of the room, the door behind them shut with a bang, in front of them, sat in a high backed leather armchair was Voldemort, sallow skinned and red-eyed. Draco and Blaise bowed their heads in fake respect,
"You called for us my Lord, what is it you require?" said Draco questioningly. The Dark Lord chuckled,
"So eager young Malfoy, just like your Father was when he was first in my service," Draco cracked his face into a humble smile, though inside his head he was imagining throttling the thing where he sat, Voldemort smiled evilly, "Well, being as cunning and as Slytherin as the two of you are, you may have already figured out that I am planning the next wave of my attack against the Wizarding world." Blaise stepped forward, a look dripping with awe and amazement on his face,
"We have deduced that something is going on my Lord," Draco fought the urge to snigger, Blaise's loyal servant act was so good that he put the Dark Lords real followers to shame. Voldemort stood and started towards the fireplace, turning his back to them, the two men looked at each other, then back towards the skulking creature that so many served. He Who Must Not Be Named was watching the flames, light flickered across his face, illuminating the inhumanness of it, Draco repressed a shudder, he never wanted that thing in front of them to get hold of Hermione, the torture he would inflict on her would be dire. Blaise could feel the tension in the room mount, Draco was close to breaking point and the air around them began to shudder. He whacked the blonde on the arm, it wouldn't do to lose control like that in front of Voldemort, the though of the consequences it would bring was making him ill to think of it. Luckily Voldemort was to engrossed in his own brilliance to notice the shift in the atmosphere. Seeming to remember that they were there, he turned to address them,
"Tonight, my sons, will be to beginning of the end for those who oppose us. Tonight shall see the dawning of a new era of wizardry. You two will be at the heart of it, instrumental in the execution of it. Hogwarts castle will fall and all those unworthy will be purged. It will be my finest achievement. I wish for you to return to the school tonight and to rally those in the noble house of Slytherin, those who wish to fight for what is true in this world. I ask you now, do not hesitate to destroy those who get in your way. Show no mercy. What say you my young friends?" Draco held back the bile that rose in his throat, all those children, granted Draco had never really liked the younger kids at school but to slaughter them because this thing thought them unworthy, it was sickening. Blaise looked at his blonde lover, the look in Draco's eyes was enough to know that he was thinking the exact thing he was, this plan was disgusting, dirty, and it made him sick to his stomach. But to achieve what they wanted, they had to agree. Holding their heads up high, they nodded, Draco stepped forward and said,
"Do you wish us to leave now my Lord? How long should we wait before we begin to attack?" The words tasted like ash in his mouth, the Dark Lord smiled at his young proteges eagerness for battle,
"You will leave soon, your Father will brief you to the details in the meeting room. I shall be sending your Uncle, Lestrange with you." The two young men said their thanks and backed out of the room. After seeing Lucius and having the plan outlined for them, they tore out the door and into the garden. When out of range of anyone, Draco burst in a fury,
"That fucking psychotic moron!!" Blaise was seething, he felt ill from the mere thought of the attack,
"We have to do something Draco, I can't, we can't let him just kill all those kids, its not right! No matter what or who they are. We have to warn the Order." Draco nodded and pulled from his robe a letter he had written to Hermione the night before, they didn't have a quill so they improvised. Blaise drew his knife over his arm, cutting it open, using the tip of his wand, he dipped it on the blood and scrawled three words across the bottom of the parchment. When he was done, Draco whistled into the night, out of the darkness came a jet black eagle owl. He attached the note to the birds leg and said,
"Find her, she's in London somewhere. Don't stop until you have delivered that letter to her." He threw his arm upwards and watched as the bird took flight. Turning, he saw his Uncle thundering towards them, pulling Blaise's arm, he started towards him, "Come on, we gotta move."

"Its Hogwarts. They're going to attack the school. Tonight." Anyone who had been holding anything dropped it, Harry came towards her, horror and suspicion etched on his face,
"How do you know that?" Hermione snapped angrily,
"Does it matter how I know? Its happening we've got to do something!" Her outburst seemed to snap everyone into motion, papers were thrown everywhere and the whole place descended into disarray, Harry who was still glaring at Hermione, as if challenging her to run, go and join the forces that they were fighting against, but he then seemed to compose himself, turning to the room, he said loudly,
"STOP! For fucks sake we have to deal with this in an organised manner, or we could be looking at a massacre. We need to come up with a strategy and fast. Lupin, write to McGonagall, get her to start to organise the students, keep the Slytherins out of it, we don't know how many of them we can trust. We have to get them ready to be led to safety. Mrs. Weasley, I need you to think of a place safe enough to hold that many people. Right, I need teams, one will have to lead the students out. Fred, George, I need you to come up with some diversions, and if you've got some of your defensive gear around that would be useful," the twins nodded,
"On it mate," they said together, before apparating out to their shop in Diagon Alley. Harry turned to the various redundant Aurors that had joined their ranks since the destruction of the Ministry, "I need you lot to head up the attack, spread yourselves out through the grounds. Fight to kill, show no mercy." He swung round to face his comrades, the Order of the Phoenix, Ron, Ginny and Hermione, "You'll defend the castle, anything that gets through the defences. Use everything you have," he turned to Hermione, "Do you still have the coins? The one's we used in fifth year for the DA?" She shrugged,
"Somewhere or other," he scowled,
"Helpful thanks. Do you want to go and find them? Then use them to call the DA to fight. Now-ish would be good Hermione." The on-lookers in the kitchen were shocked at the coldness Harry showed towards his best friend. Hermione, however, was indifferent to their obvious discomfort, she smiled sarcastically and left the kitchen. Broken from the spell of Harry and Hermione's inter-play, the army of the light prepared for war. Each of them scattering the directions Harry told them to. Unbeknownst to anyone, Ginny slipped upstairs after Hermione. Harry himself disappeared with Ron into the sitting room, he was worried,
"We're no closer to finding the last Horcruxes! I don't like this, going into this battle with nothing going for us!" Ron paced up and down, and up and down, Harry sank down onto to the sofa, his head in his hands, "And Hermione? I can't do it Ron, I can't trust her. I'm half expecting her to run for it, and now with this fight ahead of us, what if she switches sides and fights against us?!" He got up again and walked to the vast tapestry that spanned to walls of the room, staring blankly at the name under the gold thread that ran from the names Lucius and Narcissa. Draco Malfoy. His poison had spread, taking over one of his best friends, he couldn't help feeling Hermione was lost to them now. He resolved then and there, this time Malfoy wouldn't walk away. He had shown his true colours, Harry remembered the crude mark burned into the pale skin of Malfoys arm, his being a Death Eater was an added bonus. Tonight Malfoy's blood would stain the earth and Hermione would be free. He looked to Ron and smiled cruelly, Ron nodded, understanding what he was intending to do, the red head glowered, throwing his normally soft features into a jagged, harsh edged look,
"I'm with you." Harry turned back to the name in front of him, and blasted it with a flick of his wand, leaving a charred, smoking hole.

Meanwhile, Hermione was upstairs, wearing a hole in the floor with her frantic pacing. Ever since she had received Draco's letter she had been sick with worry, he and Blaise would undoubtedly be at Hogwarts tonight, standing against those downstairs, ready to fight for that maniac Voldemort. Could she justify fighting with them, when she knew what Voldemort would do to her if she was found with two of his precious purebloods? Could she fight against the men she loved? All of this was swirling in her head, when a knock on her door distracted her. She wrenched it open, expecting to find Harry or Ron, ready to call her out on her 'behaviour', instead Ginny was in front of her. She scowled, if she had come to say her piece, well, Hermione didn't know if she'd be able to keep her temper,
"If you've come up here to have a go, then save your breath. I've got no patience for your hypocrisy Ginny." Ginny merely shrugged and walked past her,
"I haven't. So you can stop that," Hermione looked confused, Ginny inclined her head towards the window, where storm clouds had begun to gather all of a sudden. Hermione closed her eyes and tried to calm down. Ginny sat down on the bed, a strange feeling had been growing in her, a feeling of claustrophobia, being back here in this house again, with Harry suddenly paying her too much attention. It felt stifling, and she wanted out. If Hermione was planning on giving Ron and Harry the slip tonight, she wanted to go with her, however uncertain a future with Blaise Zabini was. Hermione finally calmed down enough to turn and face her,
"Well?" She said, venom dripping from her tone. Ginny suddenly felt nervous, what if she went and Blaise didn't want her? Maybe Hermione and Draco were enough for him, maybe Hermione wouldn't let her do it. "Spit it out Ginny, what do you want?"
"Um.....er....I....miss him." She said in a small voice, Hermione's brow furrowed,
"Excuse me, speak up?" Inside Hermione was smirking, she was going to make Ginny admit what she was feeling, admit what she wanted. She looked over to the red head expectantly,
"I miss him," she said in a clearer voice. Hermione folded her arms across her chest and said,
"What do you miss about him?" Ginny's head snapped up, Hermione raised her eyebrows in amusement, tilting her head to one side, she walked slowly to her friend and said in a slow voice, "Would you do anything, anything, to be with him again?" Ginny looked up, the Hermione she had grown up with, the one that was constantly bickering with her older brother and forever with her noise in a book was gone for good. Was Ginny herself prepared to sacrifice everything, including her family for the sake of a man so wrong in so many ways, but so right in others? Hermione snapped her fingers, "Well?"
"Yes." The betrayal was sealed by the strength in her voice and the bubble of excitement she felt rise in her stomach. Hermione smiled,
"We've got work to do."

A lone figure stood in the shadows of the Forbidden Forest. His silver eyes gleamed, the only light in the dark. He watched the candles flicker out in the windows, as the students of Hogwarts settled for the night. He raised the cigarette to his lips and took a long drag, the smoke unfurling into the air, twisting and coiling like a writhing serpent. He leant on a tree, his lithe figure sloping gracefully against the trunk, his look was set as he awaited his companions arrival. He watched as a steady number of students led by various different teachers made their way over the grounds and were led to safety via the secret passage by the lake. He made no move to stop them, that wasn't his goal tonight. A sound behind him made him flinch, his wand arm twitching in anticipation, ready to attack. He relaxed when the air around him cracked with the magic of a concealment spell being lifted, he knew that magic and it calmed him. A hand rested on his shoulder and his nostrils were filled with the smell of Italian tobacco and something else more alluring,
"Its done," the newcomer said in a low voice, "I modified his memory and sent his arse packing back to Bella," the first man turned, smirked, the other grinned. The first turned back to the castle and said,
"Lets go." Together Draco and Blaise made their way towards the castle, ready to face inevitability.