Run || Harry Potter FF

viii || grimmauld place

Draco, Neville, and I stood at the opening of the cave while McGonagall was preforming the spell on Harry in the back. "Do you think it'll work?" I said after listening to her quiet murmurs for a few minutes. 

"Oh yeah. McGonagall knows what she's doing," Neville said, pushing his dyed ginger hair out of his face. "Where do you suppose we'll go after this?"

Draco shrugged. "Maybe Harry'll have an idea."

It was quiet again and I noticed that the murmuring had stopped altogether.I turned around and saw Harry standing there, blinking rapidly. McGonagall said something to him and he nodded. She turned around. "Alright, you four need to get out of here as soon as possible. It may be easier to do magic in Hogsmeade but that was an unsual spell. They might come here. Good luck to you all," she said, nodding to us and Harry before walking out of the cave. All I saw was an inch of a cat's tail as she fled.

"Harry? Is that you?" Neville asked hesitantly.

"Yeah, Neville. Listen, is Yaxley dead?" he asked, an urgency and determination surfacing in his tone.

"What? Why?"

"Is he dead, Neville? I'll explain later."

"Yeah, he's dead," Draco answered first.

"Alright, grab hold everybody. We're going to Number Twelve Grimmauld Place," he said, sticking his arm out and enuciating every word as if it were very important that we knew the exact address. We all grabbed it without missing a beat. Again, I was sucked through that too-tight tube. This time, the sensation was less overwhelming but it still made me nauseous. I was glad when it was over. 

We stood in a damp hallway. Old-fashioned gas lanterns hung on the wall, casting a dim ominous light over it. There were old portraits hanging on the wall and I could hear banging going on within the house. "Someone's here," Harry said, reaching for his wand before remembering that he didn't have one. He motioned for Neville and Draco to take out their's. "Stay back, Layla," he said to me, pushing me behind him. 

I didn't know why we didn't just use the invisible tube to leave again. Why were we walking into a situation that could be potentially dangerous if we didn't have to? But still, I followed them further into the hallway. There were footsteps easing in from the opposite direction that seemed to be mimicking our own. "Who's there?" Harry called out.

"You first," a voice yelled.

But Harry didn't reveal our identities. Instead, he took us further into the house. The floorboards creaked so they had to know we were coming. Finally, we came to the bottom of a staircase but one glance to the top and we realized there were many more wizards here than we could handle. "Harry?" I heard someone cry--I mean, really cry.

Everyone raced down the stairs and enveloped Harry. They seemed to know him and nobody seemed hostile so my heart lessened it's pace. "Who are they?" I whispered to Draco who was closest to me.

But before he could answer me, a boy with red hair stepped away from the pack and pointed his wand at Draco. His face was in a scowl. "Malfoy," he said through gritted teeth. I swore he was about to do something rash before Harry made him lower his wand. 

"It's okay, Ron. Him and Neville are the ones who found me, along with this muggle. They're the ones who found McGonagall so I could get my memories back," he explained. Ron looked distressed.

"Your memories? Well, where had they gone in the first place? Did he take them?" he said, gesturing to Draco. "And how is it that you're alive?"

"I was just about to ask the same thing," a girl with bushy hair said, her arms over her chest.

Harry sighed. Neville was greeting everyone while Draco and I standed awkwardly in the back. "And why've you got a muggle with you?" one of the others said. My cheeks heated up.

"Oh, what does it matter? He's alive! He's alive!" the older ginger woman said. She wrapped her arms around him again. "You hungry, dear? Everyone stop crowding the boy. He looks famished. You can tell us all about it after you eat. All of you," she said, gesturing to us, though she did give Draco a sour look. I felt bad for him.

An hour later, after I'd learned that the woman was Mrs. Weasley, we were fed and sitting in the dark and gloomy living room. It was filled to the brim with wizards--all of whom remained nameless to me. Draco and I sat in the back on the floor, away from everyone else. He obviously had a rocky past with these people and I had never even met any of them. We were both the outcasts.

Harry was telling them all what had happened to him. "And then we went to Hogsmeade. Layla went in by herself and found Professor McGonagall. Then I got back my memories..."

Throughout the entire story, I had been getting strange looks from all around. Neville had told them about how Draco and I found him, and everything we did before running into Harry. But the strange looks I was getting were nothing compared to the one's shot in Draco's direction--each one more surprised and shocked than the last. People really couldn't believe the way he was acting. And I couldn't believe that he was so bad before that people were actually staggered that he was acting decent.

 "You must've been a real piece work before this...," I whispered just loud enough for Draco to hear.

"You could say that," he replied quietly.

"Oh, by the way Layla, this is Mrs. Weasley, Mr. Weasley, Ron, Hermione, Charlie, Bill, Fleur, Ginny, Percy, George and Fr--" Harry said, cutting himself off abruptly. The atmosphere of the room changed immediately, going from happy to upset in just a few seconds. Mrs. Weasley started to cry and Mr. Weasley rubbed her back and teared up himself. The one called George was looking misty and he excused himself from the room. 

Whatever it was that they were sad about, I felt it. A deep sense of sorrow welled up in my chest--their mourning was contagious. "What happened?" I whispered just as Ron got up to comfort his mother. 

He leaned over close to my ear--so close that he was almost touching it. "Fred, George's twin, died in the Battle of Hogwarts six months ago," he explained, his hot breath running down my ear canal.

"Oh," I breathed, my heart sinking. They had lost one of their own--a brother, a twin, a son. I got up then, compelled to offer my condolences even though I didn't know them or Fred. It was just something I felt in my heart.

I approached her and she didn't notice me until I grabbed her hand. "I am so sorry for your loss," I said quietly. She smiled up at me, sniffling and blotting tears off her face, though others were quickly taking their place. 

"Thank you, dear," she managed to croak out. She squeezed my hand hard before releasing me. I turned to walk back to Draco but was instead intercepted by Hermione. 

"Hi, Layla, is it? I suppose you'll be staying here then?" she asked.

"Um, yeah, I guess so. I don't really have anywhere else to stay--"

"Of course, of course. We have one extra bed in Ginny and I's room. If you'd like, you can stay with us. Unless you'd feel more comfortable on the couch down here but, I warn you, the house elf really hates muggles--I mean, he's gotten better but he's still--"

"Sure. Especially since I have absolutely no idea what a house elf is and I haven't slept in a bed for a few days..."

Hermione laughed--though it seemed a bit forced due to the incident that just took place. "Come on. It's just upstairs," she said, leading me through the living room and to the stairs that they were on when we first arrived.