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OOXXI. NO TIME TO DIE
twenty one
THE OUTCOME OF THAT QUESTION LED TO CERTAIN EVENTS—WHICH THEN ENDS UP TO LUPIN LEAVING EARLY BECAUSE OF A CONFRONTATION WITH HARRY. He'd left so abruptly, without so much as a goodbye that to Ivy's chagrin, had triggered a damned panic attack.
She had already locked herself in the bathroom by the time it dawned on her, a quiet sob escaping her lips.
Her hands are trembling—why does it feel like she was underwater? Her body wasn't wet, not engulfed in a body of water... god, was this how it felt when you're drowning? Ivy hyperventilates, realizing this was the kind of drowning that you can't escape, can't swim from.
There were flashes in her head, her body feels hot and cold at the same time—the helplessness, weak, the fear—Ivy gave another cry, unable to breathe properly as her trembling hands wove into her hair, digging through her scalp and shut her eyes so tight as if it'd protect her at all.
It didn't.
Eleven-year old Ivy Lane Malfoy cried and begged as her mum was forced out of the cellar by her father, left in the company of Bellatrix Lestrange—a cruel, cruel woman who had no taste for mercy... not even for her own niece.
Little Ivy felt the trepidation, the stroke of fear and anticipation for pain because once again—once again... she failed. "What was the first rule I gave you, Ivy Lane?"
God, she hated that. Ivy Lane meant she was in deep shit. Crocodile tears rushed down Little Ivy's cheeks, "When—When emotions get in the way, l—lock them—lock them out."
"And what did you do?" Bellatrix snapped, jabbing her wand under the eleven-year old's chin. "Look at you! LOOK AT YOU, IVY LANE! Pathetic!"
"No," Ivy choked out, silent sobs spilling from her lips that came out wheezed, unable to breathe. "No, no, no, no—"
"Crocodile tears, and a pitiful face! Mummy and daddy can't save you now—you've been a little brat, and they must be punished," Bellatrix shrilled, utter pain riddling Ivy's body. "Did I not teach you better, Ivy Lane?! DID I?"
"You taught me better!" Little Ivy wailed, knowing better than to express her emotions to the Cruciatus or else it'd be worst.
"DID I? THEN WHAT WAS THAT, IVY LANE? I raise you in my image and you embarrass me by befriending a mudblood! A MUDBLOOD, IVY LANE!" Little Ivy cries out even more. "IF I TAUGHT YOU BETTER THEN TELL ME THE SECOND RULE!"
"Get—out—of—my—head!" Ivy wailed, her voice breaking. She pressed her hands to her ears, desperate for it to end.
"Never show yourself," Little Ivy whimpered. "Because no one would like you—"
"THAT'S RIGHT!" Bellatrix snapped—
"Ivy—"
"No!" Ivy choked out, scrambling away from said person. Her eyes are blurred with tears, literally on the verge of passing out from how much she's hyperventilating right now—there was a slam from the door, probably. "Stay away! Please! Please!" Ivy sobbed, her hands, which were covering her ears, dart up to shield her head. "I'll do better, I promise! Please don't hurt me!"
Hermione could feel her heart physically break for the broken girl in front of her. "Ivy, it's Hermione. I—Ivy," The muggleborn witch moved slowly, and felt her heart jump in achievement when she successfully managed to grab one of Ivy's hands. Hermione pressed it against her cheek, "I'm real, see? You need to breathe."
"I can't—"
"Yes, you can," Hermione says patiently. "Here—" She laced their hands together. "—count with me. One, two, three..."
With every count, Ivy's chest shudders, and it hurts. It fucking hurts to breathe that the effort to remind herself that she wasn't physically drowning is out of reach. It hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts—
"Please don't leave me," Ivy whimpers so quietly as she wheezed.
It hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts.
"I'll do better, I promise," She cried. "I won't fail again, just don't leave me—"
"Oh, Ivy," Hermione's eyes are glassy with tears, but she can't let them go. Not in front of Ivy, whom she needs to be strong for because Ivy's been strong for too long. "You don't need to try hard to be perfect."
"But people would never leave if they think I'm perfect—"
Hermione cupped Ivy's cheeks, brushed her hair away from her forehead tenderly, "But I don't think that. I think that you are enough, and I don't need you to be perfect because I'd never leave you, Ivy."
But it hurts, Ivy whimpered in her head. It hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts, and it hurts so fucking bad, and even if she's a good swimmer, why does she feel like she's drowning?
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IVY'S EPISODE WAS LEFT QUIET THE FOLLOWING HOURS—IT'D BECOME AN UNSPOKEN RULE NEVER TO SPEAK ABOUT IT BECAUSE THEY KNEW THE ONLY PERSON SHE'D OPEN UP TO WAS HERMIONE. However, that doesn't mean it didn't bother and disturb them.
A deafening crack echoes from the kitchen—Ivy's first thought was that Lupin came back, but later dissolved that particular thought in her mind. Why would he come back for you? The voice in the back of her head snarked at her. He left you, remember?
Kreacher disentangled himself and, bowing low to Harry and Ivy, croaked, "Kreacher has returned with the thief Mundungus Fletcher, Master, Miss."
Fletcher scrambled up and pulled out his wand—Hermione, however, was too quick for him. "Expelliarmus!"
Mundungus Fletcher's wand soared into the air and Hermione caught it. Wild-eyed, Fletcher dived for the stairs, where Ivy stood, currently with her back against him—Ivy rolled her eyes, purposely sticking out her elbow where Fletcher's nose collides with it and Fletcher hit the stone floor with a muffled crunch.
Ivy faked a gasp, "Oh, I'm so sorry," She mocked. "I'm such a clumsy, clumsy klutz."
Ron rugby-tackled Fletcher just as he moved to stand up again, holding onto his bleeding nose. Hermione pursed her lips as Ivy winked at her, shaking her head.
"What?" Fletcher bellowed, writhing in his attempts to free himself from Ron's grip. "Wha've I done? Setting a bleedin' 'ouse-elf on me, what are you playing at, wha've I done, lemme go, lemme go, or—"
"You're not in much of a position to make threats," Harry threw aside the newspaper, crossed the kitchen in a few strides and dropped to his knees beside Fletcher, who stopped struggling and looked terrified. Ron got up, panting, and watched as Harry pointed his wand deliberately at Mundungus Fletcher's nose. He stank of stale sweat and tobacco smoke, his hair was matted and his robes stained.
Ivy wrinkled her nose, "God, he stinks."
Hermione jabbed an elbow into Ivy's gut, silencing the other girl with a roll of her eyes.
"Kreacher apologises for the delay in bringing the thief, Miss Ivy," The elf croaked. "Fletcher knows how to avoid capture, has many hidey-holes and accomplices. Nevertheless, Kreacher cornered the thief in the end."
"You've done really well, Kreacher," Ivy told him kindly, and the elf bowed low.
"Right, we've got a few questions for you—"
"I panicked, okay? I never wanted to come along, no offence, mate, but I never volunteered to die for you, an' that was bleedin' You-Know-Who come flying at me, anyone woulda got outta there, I said all along I didn't wanna do it—"
"For your information, none of the rest of us Disapparated," Hermione cuts in curtly.
"Well, you're a bunch of bleedin' 'eroes, then, aren't you, but I never pretended I was up for killing meself—"
"You almost got them killed, you fucking asshat!" Ivy snapped, advancing towards him. Hermione and Ron held her back. "It was your goddamned plan and you fucked it up! Now pull it together, shut the fuck up and listen, you unreliable piece of scum!"
"I'd listen to her," Ron warned. "Everyone knows you're nothing but a thief, Dung. Piss her off and Voldemort'll be the least of your concerns because I wouldn't want to be in the crosshairs of her homicidal rage."
Harry's wand was now so close to the bridge of Mundungus Fletcher's nose that Fletcher had gone cross-eyed trying to keep it in view. "When you cleaned out this house of anything valuable," Harry began, but Mundungus interrupted him again.
"Sirius never cared about any of the junk—"
There was the sound of pattering feet, a blaze of shining copper, an echoing clang and a shriek of agony: Kreacher had taken a run at Fletcher and hit him over the head with a saucepan.
"Call 'im off, call 'im off, 'e should be locked up!" Fletcher screamed, cowering as Kreacher raised the heavy-bottomed pan again.
"Kreacher, no!" Harry shouts.
Kreacher's thin arms trembled with the weight of the pan, still held aloft. "Perhaps just one more, Master Harry, for luck?"
Ron and Ivy laughed at that.
"We need him conscious, Kreacher, but if he needs persuading you can do the honours," Harry negotiated, amusement very clear on his face.
"Thank you very much, Master," Kreacher bowed, and he retreated a short distance, his great, pale eyes still fixed upon Fletcher with loathing.
"When you stripped this house of all the valuables you could find," Harry began again, "You took a bunch of stuff from the kitchen cupboard. There was a locket there, what did you do with it?"
"Why?" Fletcher inquires. "Is it valuable?"
"You've still got it!" Hermione cries out.
"No, he hasn't," Ron says shrewdly. "He's wondering whether he should have asked more money for it."
"More?" Fletcher retorts. "That wouldn't have been effing difficult... bleedin' gave it away, di'n' I? No choice."
"What do you mean?"
"I was selling in Diagon Alley an' she come up to me an' asks if I've got a licence for trading in magical artefacts. Bleedin' snoop. She was gonna fine me, but she took a fancy to the locket an' told me she'd take it and let me off that time an' to fink meself lucky."
"Who was this woman?" Ivy raised an eyebrow, bringing her glass of water up to her lips.
"I dunno, some Ministry hag," Fletcher considered for a moment, brow wrinkled. "Little woman. Bow on top of 'er head," He frowned and then added, "Looked like a toad."
Ivy spat out her drink all over the sink in surprise. Harry dropped his wand—it hit Fletcher on the nose and shot red sparks into his eyebrows, which ignited. Panicking, Ivy threw the remaining water in the glass at Fletcher's face, making him splutter and choke.
Harry looked up and saw his own shock reflected in Ron and Hermione's faces, then at Ivy, who wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, and looked bloody constipated. "Son of a bitch," She croaked.
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AS AUGUST WORE ON, THE SQUARE OF UNKEMPT GRASS IN THE MIDDLE OF GRIMMAULD PLACE SHRIVELLED IN THE SUN UNTIL IT WAS BRITTLE AND BROWN. The inhabitants of number twelve were never seen by anybody in the surrounding houses, and nor was number twelve itself.
And yet the square was now attracting a trickle of visitors who seemed to find the anomaly most intriguing.
The lurkers were never the same two days running, although they all seemed to share a dislike for normal clothing. Most of the Londoners who passed them were used to eccentric dressers and took little notice, though occasionally one of them might glance back, wondering why anyone would wear such long cloaks in this heat.
The watchers seemed to be gleaning little satisfaction from their vigil. Occasionally one of them started forwards excitedly, as if they had seen something interesting at last, only to fall back looking disappointed.
On the first day of September there were more people lurking in the square than ever before. Half a dozen men in long cloaks stood silent and watchful, gazing as ever at houses eleven and thirteen, but the thing for which they were waiting still appeared elusive.
Meanwhile, inside Number Twelve, Ivy had just finished a more detailed copy of a map of the Ministry of Magic—a certain Dolores Umbridge's office, particularly. Several more of her hand-drawn maps littered around her, Hermione, and Ron, poring over sheafs of notes.
(Ivy was going to be honest—it wasn't fun pretending to be a goddamned figurine inside the Ministry of Magic but beggars can't be choosers, especially since she made it to a lot of places.)
"There are still a load of Death Eaters watching the house," Harry told Ron as he ate—from what Ivy finally came to, after another bout of trying to complete the rune, "More than usual. It's like they're hoping we'll march out carrying our school trunks and head off for the Hogwarts Express."
Ron glanced at his watch. "I've been thinking about that all day. It left nearly six hours ago. Weird, not being on it, isn't it?"
"More strange that I'm not panicking by this point," Ivy piped up, grinning at Kreacher as he hands her a bowl of soup. "And going to fly as my animagus to Hogsmeade. I think I like being a bird than apparating on the top step and risk breaking my own neck."
"They nearly saw me coming back in, just now," Harry said. "I landed badly on the top step, and the Cloak slipped."
"I do that every time. Oh, here she is," Ron added, craning round in his seat to watch Hermione re-entering the kitchen. "And what in the name of Merlin's most baggy Y-fronts was that about?"
"Hermione Jean... lovely, why are you—?"
"I remembered this," Hermione panted. She was carrying a large, framed picture, which she now lowered to the floor before seizing her small, beaded bag from the kitchen dresser. Opening it, she proceeded to force the painting inside, and despite the fact that it was patently too large to fit inside the tiny bag, within a few seconds it had vanished, like so much else, into the bag's capacious depths.
"Sirius's ancestor?" Ivy raised an eyebrow. Hermione knew Ivy would never agree to a painting of a grown man taking refuge in her bag.
"Phineas Nigellus," Hermione explained as she threw the bag on to the kitchen table with the usual sonorous, clanking crash.
Ivy winced, "Good lord, I don't even want to know what kind of furniture is in there—Lovely, please tell me there isn't a bed?" Hermione rolled her eyes at her fondly.
"Snape could send Phineas Nigellus to look inside this house for him," Hermione explained as she resumed her seat. "But let him try it now, all Phineas Nigellus will be able to see is the inside of my handbag."
"Amazing," Ivy tells her with a dreamy look and a lovesick smile.
Hermione turned rosy, "Always the tone of surprise."
"Oi," Ron narrowed his eyes. "Save that for the bedroom, ladies."
"Fight me, asparagus."
"I think we should do it tomorrow," Harry suddenly piped up. Hermione stopped dead, her jaw hanging—Ron choked a little over his soup, Ivy raised an eyebrow.
"Tomorrow?" Hermione repeats. "You aren't serious, Harry?"
"Of course not," Ivy quipped before she could think over her words. "He doesn't turn into a dog, and he's not married to a wolf, isn't he?"
Silence.
Ivy rolled her eyes. Ron snorted, Harry allowed a little twitch of his lips, Hermione pursed her own.
"I am... not kidding," Harry continued. "I don't think we're going to be much better prepared than we are now even if we skulk around the Ministry entrance for another month. The longer we put it off, the further away that locket could be. There's already a good chance Umbridge has chucked it away; the thing doesn't open."
"Unless," Ron scooped a spoonful of soup in his mouth, "She's found a way of opening it and she's now possessed."
"Pretty sure she's worst than Voldemort," Ivy told him. "Probably wouldn't make any difference and no one'd notice."
"We know everything important," Harry went on, addressing Hermione. "We know they've stopped Apparition in and out of the Ministry. We know only the most senior Ministry members are allowed to connect their homes to the Floo Network now, because Ron heard those two Unspeakables complaining about it. And we know roughly where Umbridge's office is, because of what you heard that bearded bloke saying to his mate—"
"I'll be up on Level One, Dolores wants to see me," Hermione recited immediately. Ivy smirked at her.
"Exactly," Harry agreed, sharing a look with Ron. "And we know you get in using those funny coins, or tokens, or whatever they are, because I saw that witch borrowing one from her friend—"
"But we haven't got any!"
"If the plan works, we will have," Harry continued calmly.
Ivy raised her brows. "Of course, it will!"
"I don't know, Harry, I don't know... there are an awful lot of things that could go wrong, so much relies on chance..."
"That'll be true even if we spend another three months preparing," Harry countered back. "It's time to act."
They had spent the previous four weeks taking it in turns to don the Invisibility Cloak and spy on the official entrance to the Ministry, which Ron and Ivy, thanks to Mr. Weasley and Lucius bloody Malfoy, had known since childhood. They had tailed Ministry workers on their way in, eavesdropped on their conversations and learned by careful observation which of them could be relied upon to appear, alone, at the same time every day. Occasionally, there had been a chance to sneak a Daily Prophet out of somebody's briefcase. Slowly, they had built up the sketchy maps and notes now stacked in front of Hermione.
"All right," Ron relents slowly, "Let's say we go for it tomorrow... I think it should just be me and Harry."
"Excuse me, Ronald?"
"Oh, don't start that again!" Hermione sighed. "I thought we'd settled this."
"It's one thing hanging around the entrances under the Cloak, but this is different, Hermione." Ron jabbed a finger at a copy of the Daily Prophet dated ten days previously. "You're on the list of Muggle-borns who didn't present themselves for interrogation!"
"I can just infiltrate the Ministry by myself!" Ivy added.
Ron rounded on her, "Because a red-winged Blackbird wouldn't look weird with a large locket hanging off of it?"
"And you're supposed to be dying of spattergroit at The Burrow, and Ivy's supposed to be in a mental ward in America right now! If anyone shouldn't go, it's Harry, he's got a ten thousand Galleon price on his head—"
"Fine, I'll stay here. Let me know if you ever defeat Voldemort, won't you?"
"Well, if all three of us go, we'll have to Disapparate separately," Ron was saying. "We can't all fit under the Cloak any more."
"God, I hate Apparition," Ivy muttered.
They did not get to bed until late that night, after spending hours going over and over their plan until they could recite it, word-perfect, to each other.
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