Chapter fourteen; Splinching

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The sound of a haunting and painful scream burst his eardrums. No matter how long it had been, the familiarity of it continued to give him nightmares. It never failed to resurface the horrid memories of the night everything went wrong in his life. In their lives. A rabid knocking on his bedroom door pulled him awake following the excruciating pain he felt pulsating through his skull. The white sheets were twisted and tied around his legs and arms and he had to fight to untangle himself from them.

He was absolutely sweating, covered from head to toe due to the terrors he'd been subjected to. The struggle to detatch himself from the clutches of his white and crinkled sheets was almost impossible. He had wrapped himself inside and outside of them, twisted them around his body and curled into them all at the same time.

The knocking on his door came again and his distressed state worsened. He relaxed into his mattress after another failed attempt and his door opened as he tried again. With more concentration, will and a calmer mind he freed himself of his sheets and shoved them onto the black wooden planks of his floor.

The person who had been knocking on his door, the person behind the wood, made themselves noticeable and he turned to face them. Wide and ageing eyes of a faded blue colour met his own. A person who had once oozed confidence and power now released anxiety and stress. It was trapped in her eyes and heartbreaking to watch as she feared for her life.

Her chest heaved against the tight black fabric of her robes and despite how together she looked her demeanour proved opposite. It exposed her facade.

"Get up." She hurried, rushing into the room after closing the door behind her and opening the curtains. The morning light filtered into his room and he lifted his arm to shield his eyes from such light.

"Mother, what's the matter? Why are you rushing around?" He asked of the woman, his morning voice raspy.

His mother threw a white shirt in his direction, then moved over to his wardrobe to withdraw a black suit jacket. She threw that at him too, "They broke into the Ministry this morning. Yaxley, he couldn't stop them and so they got away. He's coming Draco and we must be ready for when he arrives."

They? How long had he been asleep? What time was it? He thought it to be considerably odd, he never slept past eight in the morning regardless of what time he went to bed or how much sleep he acquired either. On a rare occasion his body chose to sleep past eight o'clock they picked that day to break into the Ministry of Magic — or whatever they did.

Draco had many questions but he could only stare blankly at his mother as she pulled a pair of folded trousers from a drawer. Narcissa walked over to her son, where he sat in his bed flabbergasted and clicked her fingers directly in front of his face, "Draco, now is not the time to ignore me."

Draco gently pushed her hand away and met his mothers anxious gaze, "Who are they? What time is it?"

"Of everything I've told you, you ask what time it is?" Narcissa gaped.

"Mum." He said sternly.

Narcissa sighed, "It's almost past ten Draco. I thought I'd leave you to catch up on your sleep with the little amount you've required lately."

His mouth fell agape, "Past ten?" Narcissa nodded and he pushed himself up onto his feet. He still had the question of 'they' whirling around in his head and so he looked back to his mother, "They?"

Narcissa sighed deeply and shook her head, "Potter and his friends, Draco, now is not the time. The Dark Lord will be here any minute, as will Yaxley and Thicknesse."

Draco's eyes widened, Potter and his friends. Did that mean Olivia was with them also? Or was she alone after the ambush at the Weasley wedding. A shiver ran down his spine when he thought of that ambush and the people they had questioned. Not him personally, but he had been told who. He had learnt of what Olivia had done to protect herself, how she killed a Death Eater who tried to fire at her and Potter. How she was the first of everyone to fire. He knew that Viktor Krum had been in attendance and, to a big surprise, Alexander — the same boy from their fourth year Draco had punched in the face. Thinking about that made him uneasy.

He knew that Olivia wouldn't dream to kill someone unless it was absolutely necessary. He didn't think that she would've had it in her to have fired such a curse but he had been proven wrong. Regardless he knew it had to of been provoked. She wouldn't of done that out of the blue. The Olivia he knew wouldn't of done that.

But the more he thought about it the more he came to think what if she wasn't the girl he knew anymore. After all, she did punch him in the face back July. When she was held at the Manor, from what he'd heard, she made everything hell. And then the wedding. What if she had changed because of what had happened? What if the cause of her change was ultimately his fault?

If that was the case, it made him feel even more guilty for lying to her in the first place.

"Potter and his friends? Was she there?"

He watched as his mother looked away from his pleading eyes and swallowed forcefully, "Yes, Draco, she was. I don't know what exactly happened as of yet, but from what I've heard so far Yaxley seems to be placing the blame of his failure on to her."

"Why-why would he do that?" Draco stuttered.

"I'm unsure myself, but it doesn't sound good. In the mean time you need to get ready, he'll be here any minute now."

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Olivia landed on her back after rolling to the side several times. She opened her eyes and blinked when she was sure she wouldn't move again and adjusted to the light above her. Her vision was blurred as first but the more she blinked the clearer it became. Above her green and brown blurs turned into leaves that belonged to trees that surrounded her.

She drew in a deep breath after remembering that part of her normal function had been disabled during the rush of the apparition. The cold air filling her lungs was like music to her ears and she exhaled normally. Sat in her left hand was something of an unfamiliar shape and she lifted her arm to see what it was. In the midst of the chaos they had just come from she had completely forgot that Hermione had tossed the Horcrux to her when she retrieved it from around Umbridge's neck.

It felt weird in her hand. Not only was it making a ticking but it felt warm inside of her cold palm. I created a weird, throbbing sensation. It was almost as if it had a heartbeat of its own. It was disturbing to say the least.

She pushed herself up and through the pain as she became more aware of her surroundings. In the distance she could hear birds chirping and groaned again when she sat upright. Her brain pounded inside of her head and created a painful throbbing sensation to pulsate through her. When she looked around she frowned. She had landed by herself yet she swore she could hear Hermione calling for Harry nearby.

With that in her mind she rolled onto her knees and unfolded her legs from underneath her, using her hands on the floor to steady herself before straightening up fully. Near where she had landed she saw the cloak in a heap lying on the ground on top of the dirt and leaves. A little way away from that sat her wand and she shook her head to herself.

How was it that during her harsh landing she managed to keep ahold of the Horcrux but dropped her wand?

She walked over for the two items, still clutching to the Horcrux in her hand. Her legs were wobbly at first, still kind of numb as they tingled while she took the first few steps. Once she reached the cloak they were fine and she bent over to retrieve it before taking her wand also. It was then Harry's voice called out to her. He sounded breathless and almost panicked, and so she rushed to the direction it had came from.

The closer the got towards where Harry's voice was the louder a strange noise that resembled a person staggering for breath and sobbing at the same time grew. She pushed her legs up a small hill and almost collapsed when she saw the three over the top.

Harry and Hermione were sat either side of Ron as he withered on the ground in pain. His entire left arm, stemming from the top of his shoulder downwards, had swirls caved into the skin. Where the inside of the swirls were Ron's skin was missing. While she stumbled over her breath the high-pitched words of Wilkie Twycross echoed around her mind, 'Splinching, or otherwise known as the separation of random body parts, occurs when the mind is insufficiently determined.'

She then remembered Ron telling her he'd failed his apparition exam for supposedly leaving behind half of his eyebrow.

"Hermione what the fuck?!" She yelled in shock, stumbling down the hill and running over to the three on the ground. She dropped the cloak onto the ground besides her and fell to her knees at Ron's head with her wand in her right hand and the Horcrux in her left. She quickly shoved the Horcrux into Harry's chest and looked helplessly down to Ron, "What happened?"

"I thought we were going to go back to Grimmuald Place?" Harry asked.

"We were, we were." Hermione stuttered quickly, her shaking and bloodied hand dropping a liquid into Ron's cuts while shushing him, "It's alright, one more, one more. We were there, we were there but .. Yaxley had hold of me and—"

"Hermione breathe." Olivia instructed as she began to heave.

"I knew once he'd seen where we were we, we couldn't stay so I brought us here but .." Hermione's voice started to crack as both girls eyes welled with tears, "Ron got splinched."

Ron's heavy breathing was the only sound that could he heard, besides the birds chirping in the trees. Absentmindedly Olivia ran her trembling fingers through Ron's still wet hair and Hermione sat back on her knees, dropping the pipe and stood up. She walked away from them and lifted her wand to start casting spells.

"What're you doing?" Harry asked, taking Hermione's place.

"Protective enchantments," Hermione said, "give me a hand will you Liv?"

Olivia sniffed and nodded her head. She collected her wand from the ground and walked over to stand by Hermione, "Yeah, okay."

Hermione looked to Harry, "You can get started on the tent."

"Tent?" Harry echoed disbelievingly, "Where am I supposed to find a tent?"

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Harry hadn't done a bad job in putting up the tent. Olivia's first impression was that it looked exactly like the tent they had stopped in at the Quidditch World Cup. She supposed that it would be somewhat similar on the inside too, she was after all living in a world of magic.

Inside it wasn't as big as the one from the Cup, but it was big enough for them. They had space to move around comfortably without stepping on each other's toes and they had their own space too. It was ideal, pretty perfect as a matter of fact.

Once they had gotten Ron inside and settled down into bed they could relax a little and Olivia sat with Harry and Hermione at a small table and chairs set. She blew into the warm mug of tea that warmed her hands up and sniffed again, her nose slightly runny from a mix of the cold and tears.

Opposite her, Hermione sat up in her chair, "So where do we go from here?"

"Well Dumbledore had a theory," Harry said from besides Olivia, "these Horcruxes would be made from random objects and they wouldn't be hidden randomly either. We know three so far; the ring, which according to Dumbledore belonged to Tom's grandfather. The Diary which obviously belonged to Tom himself and then this—"

"—Salazar Slytherin's locket." Olivia said.

Harry nodded, "According to Dumbledore it belonged to Tom's mother."

"Scares me a bit that," Hermione muttered, looking to the locket on the table, "thinking it's a piece of—"

"—no, don't. Don't say it." Ron interrupted, half awake.

Olivia got up out of her seat and rushed over to Ron, sitting down on her bed opposite him, "Hey, how're you feeling?"

"Alright I suppose." He muttered, leaning on his good arm for support while pushing himself up, "It's a taboo though, his name. That's how he's catching people now."

"How'd you know that?" Harry asked, lifting his leg out from underneath the table and looping it over the bench.

"I heard people in the Ministry saying it."

"Tea?" Hermione asked, sitting on the side of his bed.

"Yeah." He whispered, looking to her. Hermione nodded and got up to fetch the pot she had made not five minutes ago and Ron looked to Harry again, "Is that it?"

"Yep." Harry said, retrieving the locket and fetching it over to him. He handed it to Ron while he examined it and Hermione retuned with the tea.

Ron set it down on the side and Olivia cleared her throat when she saw the look on his face, "It's awful, has this horrid feeling."

"I know," Harry agreed, "I feel it too, this ticking."

Olivia nodded, "It's almost like it's got a heart."

"It's like it's alive." Ron added.

"I hate it," Hermione said, "It's like he's here with us."

Olivia looked down to her tea and swallowed, "A part of him is."

There was a silence amongst them until Harry spoke up, "And that's why we're going to kill it."

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I didn't realise it's been almost a week since I've updated, so I'm sorry for that. I'm undecided over the next few chapters to come, part of me wants to scrap the entire plot around them but the other part wants to carry on with it. I'm unsure of what I should do.

On another note I hope you liked this chapter. What were your thoughts with regards to the beginning bit involving Draco and his mother? That's how I imagined it would happen after the break in.

Let me know your thoughts!