A Marauder's Guide to Falling Forever

Chapter Thirty Seven

"You bitch!" Marlene's head snapped towards the voice defensively armed and ready to fire. A Death Eater she recognized as Travers.

Before she could react, he sent another curse at her that slammed into her leg causing her to drop to her knees. She raised her wand and fired, but he deflected it with ease. Then he disarmed her. Marlene remained defenseless, kneeling in a growing pool of her own blood. She scowled at him, unafraid. This only seemed to agitate him.

"So this is the great Marlene McKinnon that Lennox wouldn't shut up about." His voice was low and calculated as he stalked towards her. Lennox. He knew Patrick. "There's nothing special about you, is there? Hardly attractive, and from what I've heard from my good friend Bellatrix, fairly useless too." Marlene shivered at the mention of Bellatrix's name but she remained strong and silent.

Travers was close now, close enough she could see the flickering flames of hatred and excitement in his eyes. He was enjoying this far too much. "You're going to pay for what you did to my wife," he snarled, wand still trained upon her. Standing less than a foot away, he took the tip of his wand and placed it under her chin, lifting it upwards and forcing her to look at him. Then he squatted down so that they were eye level. "I'm going to make it excruciatingly painful for you."

"I don't even know who your wife is, but if I did something to her then she probably deserved it," she hissed back. And then she lunged forward to smash her forehead against his. Sparks omitted from the tip of his wand just grazing her so that the smell of singed hair wafted around them.

Then Marlene was on top of him, and she pulled her fist back and drove it into his face. It rekindled the fond memory she had of breaking Avery's nose back in sixth year, and the satisfaction drove a second blow. But his hand shot upwards and enclosed her fist, twisting her arm and rolling her over so that he was on top of her, rendering her submissive to his enormous mass.

The hand that held her fist remained firm as he smashed it against the stone floor, and he used his other one to do the same with her other hand, pinning her hands beside her head. With no wand and no arms, Marlene felt completely helpless and the overwhelming sense of fear began crawling through her body.

"That's not very kind," he snarled, and angry flecks of saliva and blood sprayed her face.

But she wasn't willing to give him the satisfaction of murder. Marlene forced her pinned arms to drag upwards across the floor to stretch above her head and instinctively began thrashing her hips from side to side. The movement caused him to lose balance, and his grip loosened on one of her wrists in order to re-balance himself. She took the opportunity of her loose arm to strike upwards into his face and rolled him over again.

She pushed herself off of him and scrambled, reaching for the wand that had been forgotten in the struggle. Her outstretched fingers curled around it just as his hands grasped around her ankles, nails piercing her skin, and dragged her back towards him.

She twisted her body to fire one last curse at him.

And then there was screaming and his grip released.

Panting, Marlene rolled over onto her back and propped herself on her elbows to watch Travers body convulsing on the floor a few feet away.

"GET AWAY FROM HER!" Sirius's voice was fierce. He came running into view, firing off his own additional blow to the death eater. But it missed, and she watched as Travers shot her one more menacing look before disapperating from view.

And then Marlene realized everything was quiet. Apart from the thundering sound omitting from her chest, that is. She watched passively as a few Order members walked around the floor checking on the status of fallen bodies. It was evident that they were searching for survivors.

She let out a shaky breath of relief. The battle was ending.

"Are you okay?" Sirius was suddenly kneeling in front of her, hands cupping either side of her face, eyes searching into hers with intense concern. In her daze she had nearly forgotten he had been close by.

"I'm fine," she replied breathlessly. "Thanks."

He threw his arms around her, pulling her close. Marlene grasped the fabric of his sweater and she clenched her eyes closed in an attempt to relinquish all the horrendous images that suddenly began to fill her head.

"I can't leave you alone for more than a few hours without you attracting trouble." His body convulsed against her and she knew that he was crying.

"I'm stronger than you give me credit for." She smirked into his sweater, clinging to the fabric and smelling sweat and blood and smoke. Her own tears surprisingly kept at bay. At least, for the time being.

"After watching you take out Travers like that, I couldn't possibly question your strength." The smallest of chuckles vibrated from him and then his arms were crushing her again. Her hands tangled into his hair and pulled him forcefully into her lips. Desperate with a mixture of need and relief that they were both still alive.

In between kisses he choked out, "I love you Mar." He was still crying and she could taste his tears on his lips. She pulled away to look at him, then reached her hand up to wipe a fallen tear from his cheek.

In a time where everything was uncertain, he was only one thing that she was certain of. And there wasn't a shred of doubt in her body. "I love you too."

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A/N: It might be a bit before the next update. I'm going to try to have another chapter up in the next few days, but I can't make any promises. Hope you guys enjoyed the chapter!