-- HOGWARTS

"Harry we have to ask someone!" Hermione cried, running after him on the switching staircases. 

"Hermione, I saw it!" He insisted in panic. "He has Sirius, and he's torturing him right now." 

Fred and George ran after them. They'd seen Hermione rush towards Harry when he'd collapsed, and they'd been right after her. They followed the pair of friends, glad that they'd stayed behind now. If they'd continued with their original plans, they'd have just left Hogwarts and the young ones would be dealing with all this by themselves. 

"She's right, mate," George spoke up. "Sirius is under some heavy protection, it wouldn't have been easy to capture him. We've gotta be sure if we're risking lives here." 

"We have to confirm it, Harry. We can not risk this being a fake memory planted to draw you out!" Hermione said.  

"How?!" Harry asked, finally turning to her.  

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It was stupid of them, thinking about it in retrospect, to try and use Umbridge's office. They should've gone to Snape; as unhelpful as he often is, he was still an Order member. 

Even still, by some miracle Hermione had drawn Umbridge straight to the centaurs, though that wasn't really her intention. Either way they circled back for their friends only to find that Fred and George had ingeniously slipped their Slytherin captors some of their sweets, which only resulted in rushed trip to the infirmary for them. 

"Brilliant," Hermione said in awe. 

"I think you've already admitted that, Granger," Fred winked at her. 

In the tense rush of the group no one noticed the small flush that rose to Hermione's face, except perhaps George who glanced between the two curiously. 

Luna led them all to the Forbidden Forest, guiding them to the Thestrals. 

"No way," Hermione said instinctively. Her friends couldn't even get her on a broom, and they expected her to climb on top of an invisible skeletal bird that was going to fly them all the way to London? 

"Hermione," Harry growled in frustration. "We don't have time." 

Hermione frowned at Harry. He knew her fear of heights ran deeper than a mere dislike. And she'd never wavered in her loyalty to her friends, yet Harry's biting tone had her hackles rising in defense. 

"She can ride with me," Fred said, sensing the tension between the friends. 

Hermione frowned at Fred. How was that supposed to make anything better? But he merely shot her an urgent look as Harry quickly agreed, already climbing onto one of the creatures. 

Fred settled himself atop one of the birds after awkwardly feeling around for the joint behind its wing. He extended his hand towards Hermione, who simply stared at it anxiously. 

"Come on, Hermione. I won't let you fall. Besides, I've fallen off brooms plenty of times, and I'm fine." 

"Is that supposed to reassure me?" she snapped at him.

"It means I know how to save myself from a fall, should we by some catastrophe end up falling." 

He patiently waited for her to finally put her hand in his before he pulled her up easily onto the Thestral, settling her in front of him, his arms going around her. She tensed slightly at his embrace but he was answering her before she even asked the question. 

"You're less likely to fall this way," he said, effectively shutting up her protests before they could start.       

Unlike Buckbeak's running start to flight, the Thestrals merely started flapping their wings in great swinging motions to propel them in the air. The motion sent them soaring vertically, unsettling Hermione, sending her throat straight to her stomach and unleashing her tangle of curls which had been clipped loosely.   

Fred could feel the tremors running through her body and it was in that moment that he realized this girl really did not like flying. But she did it anyway because her friend needed her. He'd always wondered why she wasn't sorted as an eagle, but in this one moment he knew she could never be anything but a lion. 

Fred tightened his arms securely around her, pulling her back firmly against the length of his steady body. "I've got you," he whispered in her ear. "I promise you won't fall." 

Hermione didn't know why, but for some reason even with the biting wind whistling through the air and her mind jumbled up in a web of 'what-if' catastrophes, she believed him. 

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-- DEPARTMENT OF MYSTERIES 

It all went downhill the moment they'd entered the Hall of Prophecies. They were surrounded by death eaters at all angles. They were outnumbered and out skilled. To her surprise, Fred did not stray from her side once. While George had for all intents and purposes turned into Ginny's human shadow and shield, Hermione expected Fred to do the same for Ron. Maybe they thought Ron could handle himself. But part of her didn't know whether to feel insulted at his lack of confidence as she'd proved on multiple occasions that she could beat Ron in a duel.

When Harry and Lucius reached an impasse, they were all running down the long corridors of the Hall. The group had split up. The room was collapsing around them, shelf by shelf, and they were in a dead locked run for the only exit. The burst out the door only to fall straight to nothingness. Luckily Hermione was quick enough to slow their momentum, and they landed on the ground with soft thuds.

"Wow," Fred mumbled next to her. "Guess you don't need me to handle your falls after all."

Trust Fred Weasley to be able to crack a joke in the middle of this. Hermione was just about to smile when they noticed the whooshing sounds from above.

"Get behind me!" Harry instructed them.

Fred kept Hermione carefully positioned at the center of the group, making sure she wasn't exposed in any way. Not that it helped when the Death Eaters attacked. They didn't even see it coming; in a moment everything had gone dark and they were being plucked away one by one.

Hermione watched her friend helplessly as Lucius tried to bargain for the Prophecy with their lives. She did not envy his position. Harry began to reluctantly hand the orb over when a bright flash filled the dark cave-like room.

"Get away from my Godson," Sirius Black said coldly, punching Lucius flat in the face.

And that was when all hell broke loose. Order members apparated in one by one and the Death Eaters holding them at wand point all started to flee to regroup. The Order tried to gather the kids towards some form of cover, but they were also easily pulled away by the randomly apparating Death Eaters, trying to get a shot at them.

In the end, everyone was dueling, somehow trying to save the people they cared about.

Fred and Hermione were dueling back to back, as was George and Ginny, both pairs making a formidable team.

In a shout of surprise, Fred leaped out of their circle of protection, extending a panicked spell towards a fellow Order member.

"Sirius!" Fred yelled in warning, shooting a repelling spell straight at him that made him stagger back a few steps in confusion. But by moving those few steps, Sirius just narrowly missed the killing curse his deranged cousin, Bellatrix, had aimed towards him. In absolutely fury, Harry, Sirius, and Remus all turned to Bellatrix, forcing her to scatter.

Fred, who'd been too preoccupied by Sirius' near death encounter, had forgotten entirely to watch out for himself and missed when Dolohov apparated onto a stone not far from him seconds later with his gaze pinned on the redhead.

"Fred, no!" Hermione yelled, rushing forward. Fred turned in time to feel Hermione's back collide with his torso as she threw herself in front him, yelling a silencing spell at his offender. But that didn't stop the impending spell; Fred watched in frozen horror as an inky purple jet of light shot straight towards them, hitting Hermione squarely in her sternum. The spell impacted her with a sickening crack that had Fred's stomach churning.

Hermione choked out a ragged breath, before dropping to her knees. The more experienced Order members were after Dolohov in a heartbeat, quickly pushing the ranks of Death Eaters back.

"Hermione," Fred cried in a strangled voice, cradling her in his arms. "Oh Godric, Hermione why'd you do that?" He pleaded helplessly.

The young girl however had no words, and her panicked gaze was entirely unfocused as she struggled to breath though her gasping wheezing. Ginny and George rushed to them, George still guarding them all with his wand at the ready.

"What's wrong with her?" Ginny asked in alarm as Hermione started coughing up blood.

"I don't know, I don't know the curse he used," Fred said helplessly.

Seconds later, when the Order finally got the situation under hand and most of the Death Eaters had fled, Tonks rushed to them, assessing Hermione carefully. She slicked open her shirt with a fluid motion of her wand. While normally Hermione would be outraged at being exposed like this, she was barely coherent at the moment, and a little too focused on not choking on her own blood.

The others gasped at the view before them. Hermione's pale and delicate skin was branded with the jagged mark of the curse: a deep, bruising purple mark that started at the center of her sternum and crept along her lower ribs towards her waist. The mark seemed to remotely outline and skirt around the borders of her bra, making it clearly visible to Tonks, Fred, Ginny, and George.

Tonks sucked in a sharp breath at the sight. "I think I know what this is," she said in a rushed voice. "She needs to be taken to a medical facility immediately, it's a miracle she's still alive."

Tonks' words jarred Fred into motion, as he swept Hermione into his arms, looking to Tonks for direction. "Well come on then," he said agitatedly.

Without a word, Tonks grabbed a hold of Fred's arm, whisking them away into a vortex as she disapparated.

"What just happened?" Ginny spit out, rounding on George.

"What do you mean?" He asked in wary confusion.

"That," Ginny gestured vaguely to where they'd just disappeared. "Fred, with Hermione. What was that."

"I don't know," George said blandly.

"What do you mean you don't know!?" Ginny cried. "Even I can see it."

"Yes, and clearly I can too. But it wasn't there yesterday," George said, slightly miffed at how he hadn't recognized Fred's feelings until it was right in the open.

"Come on kids," Kingsley said, rounding them all up. "It's time for us to head back to Hogwarts."

"And Harry?" Ginny cried, looking around frantically.

"Sirius and Remus have got him," he assured them.