Johnny opened his eyes and was dazzled by gold and green; he had no idea what had happened, he only knew that he was lying on what seemed to be leaves and twigs. Struggling to draw breath into lungs that felt flattened, he blinked and realised that the gaudy glare was sunlight streaming through a canopy of leaves far above him. Then an object twitched close to his face. He pushed himself onto his hands and knees, ready to face some small, fierce creature, but saw that the object was Harry's foot.

"Are you alright?" Johnny asked shaking Harry.

"He's fine," said Hermione a few feet away, attending to Ron. "Harry's knocked out."

Johnny's first thought was of the Forbidden Forest, and for a moment, even though he knew how foolish and dangerous it would be for them to appear in the grounds of Hogwarts, his heart leapt at the thought of sneaking through the trees to Hagrid's hut. However, in the few moments it took for Ron to give a low groan and Johnny to start crawling toward him, he realised that this wasn't the Forbidden Forest; The trees looked younger, they were more widely spaced, the ground clearer.

He met Hermione, also on her hands and knees, at Ron's head. The moment his eyes fell upon Ron, all other concerns fled Johnny's mind, for blood drenched the whole of Ron's left side and his face stood out, grayish-white, against the leaf-strewn earth. The Polyjuice Potion was wearing off now: Ron was halfway between Cattermole and himself in appearance, his hair turning redder and redder as his face drained of the little color it had left.

"What's happened to him?"

"Splinched," said Hermione, her fingers already busy at Ron's sleeve, where the blood was wettest and darkest.

Johnny watched, horrified, as she tore open Ron's shirt. He had always thought of Splinching as something comical, but this... His insides crawled unpleasantly as Hermione laid bare Ron's upper arm, where a great chunk of flesh was missing, scooped cleanly away as though by a knife.

"Babe, quickly, in my bag, there's a small bottle labeled 'Essence of Dittany'-"

"Bag- right-"

Johnny sped to the place where Hermione had landed, seized the tiny beaded bag, and thrust his hand inside it. At once, object after object began presenting itself to his touch: He felt the leather spines of books, woolly sleeves of jumpers, heels of shoes-

"Quickly!"

He grabbed his wand from the ground and pointed it into the depths of the magical bag.

"Accio Dittany!"

A small brown bottle zoomed out of the bag; he caught it and hastened back to Hermione and Ron, whose eyes were now half-closed, strips of white eyeball all that were visible between his lids.

"He's fainted," said Hermione, who was also rather pale; she no longer looked like Mafalda, though her hair was still gray in places. "Unstopper it for me, Johnny, my hands are shaking."

Johnny wrenched the stopper off the little bottle, Hermione took it and poured three drops of the potion onto the bleeding wound. Greenish smoke billowed upward and when it had cleared, Johnny saw that the bleeding had stopped. The wound now looked several days old; new skin stretched over what had just been open flesh.

"Wow," said Johnny.

"It's all I feel safe doing," said Hermione shakily. "There are spells that would put him completely right, but I'm not trying in case I do them wrong and cause more damage.... He's lost so much blood already..."

"How did he get hurt? I mean-" Johnny shook his head, trying to clear it, to make sense of whatever had just taken place, "-why are we here? I thought we were going back to Grimmauld Place?"

Hermione took a deep breath. She looked close to tears.

"Darling, I don't think we're going to be able to go back there."

"What d'you-?"

"As we Disapparated, Jakob caught hold of me and I couldn't get rid of him, he was too strong, and he was still holding on when we arrived at Grimmauld Place, and then- well, I think he must have seen the door, and thought we were stopping there, so he slackened his grip and I managed to sake him off and I brought us here instead!"

"But then, where's he? Hang on... You don't mean he's at Grimmauld Place? He can't get in there?"

Her eyes sparkled with unshed tears as she nodded.

"Johnny, I think he can. I- I forced him to let go with a Revulsion Jinx, but I'd already taken him inside the Fidelius Charm's protection. Since Dumbledore died, we're Secret-Keepers, so I've given him the secret, haven't I?"

There was no pretending; Johnny was sure she was right. It was a serious blow. If Jakob could now get inside the house, there was no way that they could return. Even now, he could be bringing other Death Eaters in there by Apparition. Gloomy and oppressive though the house was, it had been their one safe refuge; even, now that Kreacher was so much happier and friendlier, a kind of home. With a twinge of regret that had nothing to do with food, Johnny imagined the house-elf busying himself over the steak-and-kidney pie that he, Harry, Ron, and Hermione would never eat.

"Darling, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry!"

"Don't be stupid, it wasn't your fault! If anything, it was mine...."

Johnny put his hand in his pocket and drew out Mad-Eye's eye. Hermione recoiled, looking horrified.

"Umbridge had stuck it to her office door, to spy on people. I couldn't leave it there... but that's how they knew there were intruders."

Before Hermione could answer, Ron groaned and opened his eyes. He was still gray and his face glistened with sweat.

"How d'you feel?" Hermione whispered.

"Lousy," croaked Ron, wincing as he felt his injured arm. "Where are we?"

"In the woods where they held the Quidditch World Cup," said Hermione. "I wanted somewhere enclosed, undercover, and this was-"

"-the first place you thought of," Harry finished for her, sitting up and glancing around at the apparently deserted glade.

"D'you reckon we should move on?" Ron asked.

"I dunno."

Ron still looked pale and clammy. He had made no attempt to sit up and it looked as though he was too weak to do so. The prospect of moving him was daunting.

"How about we stay here for now?" Johnny said. The others agreed. Looking relieved, Hermione sprang to her feet.

"Where are you going?" asked Ron.

"If we're staying, we should put some protective enchantments around the place," she replied, and raising her wand, she began to walk in a wide circle around Harry, Johnny and Ron, murmuring incantations as she went. Johnny saw little disturbances in the surrounding air: It was as if Hermione had cast a heat haze upon their clearing.

"Salvio Hexia... Protego Totalum... Repello Muggletum... Muffliato... You could get out the tent, Johnny..."

"Tent?"

"In the bag!"

"In the... of course," said Johnny.

He didn't bother to grope inside it this time, but used another Summoning Charm. The tent emerged in a lumpy mass of canvas, ropes, and poles. Johnny recognised it, partly because of the smell of cats, as the same tent in which they had slept on the night of the Quidditch World Cup.

"I thought this belonged to that bloke Perkins at the Ministry?" he asked, starting to disentangle the pent pegs.

"Apparently he didn't want it back, his lumbago's so bad," said Hermione, now performing complicated figure-of-eight movements with her wand. "So Ron's dad said I could borrow it. Erecto!" she added, pointing her wand at the misshapen canvas, which in one fluid motion rose into the air and settled, fully constructed, onto the ground before Johnny, out of whose startled hands a tent peg soared, to land with a final thud at the end of a guy rope.

"Cave Inimicum," Hermione finished with a skyward flourish. "That's as much as I can do. At the very least, we should know they're coming; I can't guarantee it will keep out Vol-"

"Don't say the name!" Ron cut across her, his voice harsh.

Johnny, Harry and Hermione looked at each other.

"I'm sorry," Ron said, moaning a little as he raised himself to look at them, "but it feels like a- a jinx or something. Can't we call him You-Know-Who- please?"

"Dumbledore said fear of a name-" began Harry.

"In case you hadn't noticed, mate, calling You-Know-Who by his name didn't do Dumbledore much good in the end," Ron snapped back. "Just- just show You-Know-Who some respect, will you?"

"Respect?" Johnny repeated, but Hermione shot him a warning look; apparently he wasn't to argue with Ron while the latter was in such a weakened condition.

Harry and Johnny half carried, half dragged Ron through the entrance of the tent. The interior was exactly as Johnny remembered it; a small flat, complete with bathroom and tiny kitchen. He shoved aside an old armchair and lowered Ron carefully onto the lower berth of a bunk bed. Even this very short journey had turned Ron whiter still, and once they had settled him on the mattress he closed his eyes again and didn't speak for a while.

"I'll make some tea," said Hermione breathlessly, pulling kettle and mugs from the depths of her bag and heading toward the kitchen.

Johnny found the hot drink as welcome as the firewhisky had been on the night that Mad-Eye had died; it seemed to burn away a little of the fear fluttering in his chest. After a minute or two, Ron broke the silence.

"What d'you reckon happened to the Cattermoles?"

"With any luck, they'll have got away," said Hermione, clutching her hot mug for comfort. "As long as Mr. Cattermole had his wits about him, he'll have transported Mrs. Cattermole by Side-Along-Apparition and they'll be fleeing the country right now with their children. That's what Harry told her to do."

"Blimey, I hope they escaped," said Ron, leaning back on his pillows. The tea seemed to be doing him good; a little of his color had returned. "I didn't get the feeling Reg Cattermole was all that quick-witted, though, the way everyone was talking to me when I was him. God, I hope they made it... If they both end up in Azkaban because of us..."

"So, have you got it?" Harry asked Johnny, who jumped in surprise.

"Got- got what?" Johnny said with a little start.

"What did we just go through all that for? The locket! Where's the locket?"

"You got it?" shouted Ron, raising himself a little higher on his pillows. "No one tells me anything! Blimey, you could have mentioned it!"

"Well, we were running for our lives from the Death Eaters, weren't we?" snapped Johnny. "Here," nd he pulled the locket out of the pocket of his robes and handed it to Ron.

It was as large as a chicken's egg. An ornate letter S, inlaid with many small green stones, glinted dully in the diffused light shining through the tent's canvas roof.

"There isn't any chance someone's destroyed it since Kreacher had it?" asked Ron hopefully. "I mean, are we sure it's still a Horcrux?"

"I think so," said Hermione, taking it from him and looking at it closely. "There'd be some sign of damage if it had been magically destroyed."

She passed it to Harry, who turned it over in his fingers. The thing looked perfect, pristine.

"I reckon Kreacher's right," said Harry. "We're going to have to work out how to open this thing before we can destroy it."

Harry tried to pry the locket apart with his fingers, then attempted the charm Hermione had used to open Regulus's bedroom door. Neither worked. He handed the locket back to Johnny and Hermione, each of whom did their best, but were no more successful at opening it than he had been.

"Can you feel it, though?" Ron asked in a hushed voice, as he held it tight in his clenched fist.

"What d'you mean?"

Ron passed the Horcrux to Johnny. After a moment or two, Johnny thought he knew what Ron meant. Was it his own blood pulsing through his veins that he could feel, or was it something beating inside the locket, like a tiny metal heart?

"What are we going to do with it?" Hermione asked.

"Keep it safe till we work out how to destroy it," Harry replied as he took it from Johnny, he hung the chain around his own neck, dropping the locket out of sight beneath his robes, where it rested against his chest beside the pouch Hagrid had given him.

"I think we should take it in turns to keep watch outside the tent," he added to Hermione, standing up and stretching. "And we'll need to think about some food as well. You stay there," he added sharply, as Ron attempted to sit up and turned a nasty shade of green.

With the Sneakoscope Hermione had given Harry for his birthday set carefully upon the table in the tent, Johnny, Harry and Hermione spent the rest of the day sharing the role of lookout. However, the Sneakoscope remained silent and still upon its point all day, and whether because of the protective enchantments and Muggle-repelling charms Hermione had spread around them, or because people rarely ventured this way, their patch of wood remained deserted, apart from occasional birds and squirrels. Evening brought no change.

"Are you okay?" Johnny asked Hermione when he switched with Harry at ten o'clock that evening. He sat sideways on the bench facing her, and placed his left hand on her thigh, tracing small circles.

"Im worried about mum and dad," Hermione admitted in a whisper, pushing herself closer so she could rest her head on Johnny's chest. "They're probably having the time of their lives in Australia."

"With all the spiders, I doubt it," said Johnny, grimacing. Hermione sighed and placed a kiss to Johnny's jaw. An hour later, Johnny was led in bed, talking quietly to Ron as they listened to another argument between Hermione and Harry about You-Know-Who.

"What's You-Know-Who doing?" Johnny asked.

"He found Gregorovitch. He had him tied up, he was torturing him."

"How's Gregorovitch supposed to make him a new wand if he's tied up?" Asked Ron, snorting.

"I dunno.... It's weird, isn't it? He wanted something from Gregorovitch," Harry said, eyes closed tight. "He asked him to hand it over, but Gregorovitch said it had been stolen from him... and then... then... He read Gregorovitch's mind, and I saw this young bloke perched on a windowsill, and he fired a curse at Gregorovitch and jumped out of sight. He stole it, he stole whatever You-Know-Who's after. And I... I think I've seen him somewhere..."

The noises of the surrounding woods were muffled inside the tent; all Johnny could hear was Ron's and Harry'sbreathing. After a while, Ron whispered, "Couldn't you see what the thief was holding?"

"No... it must've been something small."

"Guys?"

The wooden slats of Ron's bunk creaked as he repositioned himself in bed.

"Guys, you don't reckon You-Know-Who's after something else to turn into a Horcrux?"

"I don't know," said Harry slowly. "Maybe. But wouldn't it be dangerous for him to make another one? Didn't Hermione say he had pushed his soul to the limit already?"

"Yeah, but maybe he doesn't know that."

"Yeah...maybe," said Johnny, breathing through his nose.

Early next morning, before the other three were awake, Johnny left the tent to search the woods around them for the oldest, most gnarled, and resilient-looking tree he could find. There in its shadows he buried Mad-Eye Moody's eye and marked the spot by gouging a small cross in the bark with his wand. It wasn't much, but Johnny felt that Mad-Eye would have much preferred this to being stuck on Dolores Umbridge's door.

"Rest easy, Dad," Johnny smiled sadly, his hand placed on the carved tree trunk. Then he returned to the tent to wait for the others to wake, and discuss what they were going to do next.

Johnny, Harry and Hermione felt that it was best not to stay anywhere too long, and Ron agreed, with the sole proviso that their next move took them within reach of a bacon sandwich. Hermione therefore removed the enchantments she had placed around the clearing, while Johnny, Harry and Ron obliterated all the marks and impressions on the ground that might show they had camped there. Then they Disapparated to the outskirts of a small market town.

Once they had pitched the tent in the shelter of a small copse of trees and surrounded it with freshly cast defensive enchantments.

"Are you alright?" Johnny asked, noticing Hermione looked very green that morning. Hermione shook her head, and ran into the tent, Johnny following behind her. As she began to vomit, Johnny held her back, grimacing.

"I need you to go into town for me...." Hermione whispered, producing a list.

"Lemons? P-?" Johnny went to ask.

"Shh!" Hermione held her hand to Johnny's lips. "I don't know, I'm just taking a precaution."

Johnny entered the two under the Invisibility Cloak, and succeeded in thieving the items Hermione asked for. His way back, however, didn't go as planned. He had barely exited the town when an unnatural chill, a descending mist, and a sudden darkening of the skies made him freeze where he stood.

"But you can make a brilliant Patronus!" protested Ron, when Johnny arrived back at the tent empty handed, out of breath, and mouthing the single word, dementors.

"I couldn't... make one." he panted, clutching the stitch in his side. "Wouldn't... come."

Their expressions of consternation and disappointment made Johnny feel ashamed. It had been a nightmarish experience, seeing the dementors gliding out of the must in the distance and realising, as the paralysing cold choked his lungs and a distant screaming filled his ears, that he wasn't going to be able to protect himself. It had taken all Johnny's willpower to uproot himself from the spot and run, leaving the eyeless dementors to glide amongst the Muggles who might not be able to see them, but would assuredly feel the despair they cast wherever they went.

"I got your items," Johnny told Hermione, passing her a white plastic bag.

"Thanks, love," Hermione whispered nervously, kissing Johnny's lips.

"So we still haven't got any food," Ron whined.

"Shut up, Ron," snapped Hermione, turning back to her fiancé. "Johnny, what happened? Why do you think you couldn't make your Patronus? You managed perfectly yesterday!"

Ron kicked a chair leg.

"What?" he snarled at Hermione. "I'm starving! All I've had since I bled half to death is a couple of toadstools!"

"You go and fight your way through the dementors, then," said Johnny, stung.

"I would, but my arm's in a sling, in case you hadn't noticed!"

"That's convenient," Harry scoffed coldly.

"And what's that supposed to-?"

"Of course!" cried Hermione, clapping a hand to her forehead and startling both of them into silence. "Johnny, give me the locket! Come on," she said impatiently, clicking her fingers at him when he didn't react, "the Horcrux, Johnny, you're wearing it!"

Harry and Johnny had switched that morning.

She held out her hands, and Johnny lifted the golden chain over his head. The moment it parted contact with Johnny's skin he felt oddly light. He hadn't even realised that he was clammy or that there was a heavy weight pressing on his stomach until both sensations lifted.

"Better?" asked Hermione.

"Yeah, loads better!"

"Darling," she said, crouching down in front of him and using the kind of voice he associated with visiting the very sick, "you don't think you've been possessed, do you?"

"What? No!" Johnny said defensively, "I remember everything we've done while I've been wearing it. I wouldn't know what I'd done if I'd been possessed, would I? Ginny told us there were times when she couldn't remember anything."

"Hmm," said Hermione, looking down at the heavy locket. "Well, maybe we ought not to wear it. We can just keep it in the tent."

"We are not leaving that Horcrux lying around," Harry stated firmly. "If we lose it, if it gets stolen-"

"Oh, all right, all right," said Hermione, and she placed it around her own neck and tucked it out of sight down the front of her shirt. "But we'll all take turns wearing it, not just you two."

"Great," said Ron irritably, "and now we've sorted that out, can we please get some food?"

"Fine, but we'll go somewhere else to find it," said Hermione with half a glance at Johnny. "There's no point staying where we know dementors are swooping around."

In the end they settled down for the night in a far flung field belonging to a lonely farm, from which they had managed to obtain eggs and bread.

"It's not stealing, is it?" asked Hermione in a troubled voice, as they devoured scrambled eggs on toast. "Not if I left some money under the chicken coop?"

Ron rolled his eyes and said, with his cheeks bulging, "Er-my-nee, 'oo worry 'oo much. 'Elax!"

And, indeed, it was much easier to relax when they were comfortably well fed. The argument about the dementors was forgotten in laughter that night, and Harry felt cheerful, even hopeful, as he took the first of the three night watches.

This was their first encounter with the fact that a full stomach meant good spirits, an empty one, bickering and gloom. Harry was least surprised by this, because be had suffered periods of near starvation at the Dursleys'. Hermione and Johnny bore up reasonably well on those nights when they managed to scavenge nothing but berries or stale biscuits, their tempers perhaps a little shorter than usual and their silences dour. Ron, however, had always been used to three delicious meals a day, courtesy of his mother or of the Hogwarts house-elves, and hunger made him both unreasonable and irascible. Whenever lack of food coincided with Ron's turn to wear the Horcrux, he became downright unpleasant.

"So I got news," said Hermione, exiting the bathroom. "I've done Muggle tests and magic tests, and it turns out I'm a month pregnant, and the magic tests said with a baby girl."

Ron and Harry cheered, both leaping to their feet to congratulate Johnny and Hermione. Johnny sat there in shock, a tear rolling down his face as he smiled.

"I'm going to be a dad..." Johnny cried as Harry pulled him into a tight embrace. "I'm going to be a dad!"

"Yes you are," said Hermione, pulling Johnny into a passionate kiss. "The best father in the world!"

"So where next?" Ron asked when the excitement of Hermione's pregnancy died down. He didn't seem to have any ideas himself, but expected Johnny, Harry and Hermione to come up with plans while he sat and brooded over the low food supplies. Accordingly Johnny, Harry and Hermione spent fruitless hours trying to decide where they might find the other Horcruxes, and how to destroy the one they already got, their conversations becoming increasingly repetitive as they got no new information.

"Yeah, let's go to Albania. Shouldn't take more than an afternoon to search an entire country," said Ron sarcastically.

"There can't be anything there. He'd already made five of his Horcruxes before he went into exile, and Dumbledore was certain the snake is the sixth," said Hermione. "We know the snake's not in Albania, it's usually with Vol-"

"Didn't I ask you to stop say that?"

"Fine! The snake is usually with You-Know-Who- happy?"

"Not particularly."

"I can't see him hiding anything at Borgin and Burkes," said Johnny, who had made this point many times before, but said it again simply to break the nasty silence. "Borgin and Burke were experts at Dark objects, they would've recognised a Horcrux straightaway."

Ron yawned pointedly. Repressing a strong urge to throw something at him, Johnny plowed on, "I still reckon he might have hidden something at Hogwarts."

Hermione sighed.

"But Dumbledore would have found it, darling!"

Johnny repeated the argument he kept bringing out in favor of this theory.

"Dumbledore said in front of me that he never assumed he knew all of Hogwart's secrets. I'm telling you, if there was one place Vol-"

"Oi!"

"YOU-KNOW-WHO, then!" Johnny shouted, goaded past endurance. "If there was one place that was really important to You-Know-Who, it was Hogwarts!"

"Oh, come on," scoffed Ron. "His school?"

"Yeah, his school! It was his first real home, the place that meant he was special: it meant everything to him, and even after he left-" Harry explained, seeing the vein in Johnny's neck about to explode.

"This is You-Know-Who we're talking about, right? Not you?" inquired Ron. He was tugging at the chain of the Horcrux around his neck.

"You told us that You-Know-Who asked Dumbledore to give him a job after he left," said Hermione.

"That's right," said Harry.

"And Dumbledore thought he only wanted to come back to try and find something, probably another founder's object, to make into another Horcrux?"

"Yeah," said Harry.

"But he didn't get the job, did he?" said Hermione. "So he never got the chance to find a founder's object there and hide it in the school!"

"Okay, then," said Johnny, defeatedly. "Forget Hogwarts."

Without any other leads, they traveled into London and, hidden beneath the Invisibility Cloak, searching for the orphanage in which Voldemort had been raised. Hermione stole into a library and discovered from their records that the place had been demolished many years before. They visited its site and found a tower block of offices.

"We could try digging in to foundations?" Hermione suggested halfheartedly.

"He wouldn't have hidden a Horcrux here," Harry said.

Even without any new idea, they continued to move through the countryside, pitching the tent in a different place each night for security. Every morning they made sure that they had removed all clues to their presence, then set off to find another lonely and secluded spot, traveling by Apparition to more woods, to the shadowy crevices of cliffs, to purple moors, gorse-covered mountainsides, and once a sheltered and pebbly cove. Every twelve hours or so they passed the Horcrux between them as though they were playing some perverse, slow-motion game of pass-the-parcel, where they dreaded the music stopping because the reward was twelve hours of increased fear and anxiety.

Harry's scar kept prickling. It happened most often, they noticed, when Harry was wearing the Horcrux.

"What? What did you see?" demanded Ron, whenever he noticed Harry wince.

"A face," muttered Harry, every time. "The same face. The thief who stole from Gregorovitch."

And Ron would turn away, making no effort to hide his disappointment. They knew that Ron was hoping to bear news of his family or the rest of the Order of the Phoenix, but after all, Harry wasn't a television aerial; he could only see what Voldemort was thinking at the time, not tune in to whatever took his fancy.

As the days stretched into weeks, Harry, Hermione and Johnny began to suspect that Ron was talking to himself about this ordeal. Several times he stopped talking abruptly when one of them entered the tent.

Autumn rolled over the countryside as they moved through it. They were now pitching the tent on mulches of fallen leaves. Natural mists joined those cast by the dementors; wind and rain added to their troubles. The fact that Hermione was getting better at identifying edible fungi couldn't altogether compensate for their continuing isolation and her ever growing stomach, the lack of other people's company, or their total ignorance of what was going on in the war against Voldemort.

"My mother," said Ron on night, as they sat in the tent on a riverbank in Wales, "can make good food appear out of thin air."

He prodded moodily at the lumps of charred gray fish on his plate. Johnny glanced automatically at Ron's neck and saw, as he has expected, the golden chain of the Horcrux glinting there. He managed to fight down the impulse to swear at Ron, whose attitude would, he knew, improve slightly when the time came to take off the locket.

"Your mother can't produce food out of thin air," said Hermione. "no one can. Food is the first of the five Principal Exceptions to Gamp's Law of Elemental Transfigura-"

"Oh, speak English, can't you?" Ron said, prying a fish out from between his teeth.

"It's impossible to make good food out of nothing! You can Summon it if you know where it is, you can transform it, you can increase the quantity if you've already got some-"

"Well, don't bother increasing this, it's disgusting," said Ron.

"Harry caught the fish and I did my best with it! I notice I'm always the one who ends up sorting out the food, because I'm a girl, I suppose!"

"No, it's because you're supposed to be the best at magic!" Shot back Ron.

Hermione jumped up and bits of roast pike slid off her tin plate onto the floor.

"You can do the cooking tomorrow, Ron, you can find the ingredients and try and charm them into something worth eating, and I'll sit here and pull faces and moan and you can see you-"

"Will you both shut the fuck up?!" Yelled, Johnny, rubbing his forehead. "This isn't good for the baby!"

"How can you side with him, he hardly ever does the cook-"

"Hermione, be quiet, I can hear someone!" said Harry

Johnny began listening hard. Then, over the rush and gush of the dark river beside them, he heard voices again. He looked around at the Sneakoscope. It wasn't moving.

"You cast the Muffliato charm over us, right?" Johnny whispered to Hermione.

"I did everything," she whispered back, "Muffliato, Muggle-Repelling and Disillusionment Charms, all of it. They shouldn't be able to hear of see us, whoever they are."

Heavy scuffing and scraping noises, plus the sound of dislodged stones and twigs, told them that several people were clambering down the steep, wooded slope that descended to the narrow bank where they had pitched the tent. They drew their wands, waiting. The enchantments they had cast around themselves ought to be sufficient, in the near total darkness, to shield them from the notice of Muggles and normal witches and wizards. If these were Death Eaters, then perhaps their defenses were about to be tested by Dark Magic for the first time.

The voices became louder but no more intelligible as the group of men reached the bank. Johnny estimated that their owners were fewer than twenty feet away, but the cascading river made it impossible to tell for sure. Hermione snatched up the beaded bag and started to rummage; after a moment she drew out three Extendible Ears and threw one each to Johnny, Harry and Ron, who hastily inserted the ends of the flesh-colored strings into their ears and fed the other ends out of the tent entrance.

Within seconds Johnny heard a weary male voice.

"There ought to be a few salmon in here, or d'you reckon it's too early in the season? Accio Salmon!"

There were several distinct splashes and then the slapping sounds of fish against flesh. Somebody grunted appreciatively. Johnny pressed the Extendable ear deeper into his own: Over the murmur of the river he could make out more voices, but they weren't speaking English or any human language he had ever heard. It was a rough and unmelodious tongue, a string of rattling, guttural noises, and there seemed to be two speakers, one with a slightly lower, slower voice than the other.

A fire danced into life on the other side of the canvas, large shadows passed between tent and flames. The delicious smell of baking salmon wafted tantalizingly in their direction. Then came the clinking of cutlery on plates, and the first man spoke again.

"Here, Griphook, Gornuk."

Goblins! Hermione mouthed at Johnny, who nodded.

"Thank you," said the goblins together in English.

"So, you three have been on the run how long?" asked a new, mellow, and pleasant voice; it was vaguely familiar to Johnny, who pictured a round-bellied, cheerful-faced man.

"Six weeks... Seven... I forget," said the tired man. "Met up with Griphook in the first couple of days and joined forces with Gornuk not long after. Nice to have a but of company." There was a pause, while knives scraped plates and tin mugs were picked up and replaced on the ground. "What made you leave, Ted?" continued the man.

"Knew they were coming for me," replied mellow-voiced Ted, and Johnny suddenly knew who he was: Tonks's father. "Heard Death Eaters were in the area last week and decided I'd better run for it. Refused to register as a Muggle-born on principle, see, so I knew it was a matter of time, knew I'd have to leave in the end. My wife should be okay, she's Pureblood. And then I met Dean here, what, a few days ago, son?"

"Yeah," said another voice, and Johnny, Harry, Ron, and Hermione stared at each other, silent but besides themselves with excitement, sure they recognised the voice of Dean Thomas, their friend.

"Muggle-born, eh?" asked the first man.

"Not sure ," said Dean. "My dad left my mum when I was a kid. I've got no proof he was a wizard, though."

There was silence for a while, except for the sounds of munching; then Ted spoke again.

"I've got to say, Dirk, I'm surprised to run into you. Pleased, but surprised. Word was that you'd been caught."

"I was," said Dirk. "I was halfway to Azkaban when I made a break for it. Stunned Dawlish, and nicked his broom. It was easier than you'd think; I don't reckon he's quite right at the moment. Might be Confunded. If so, I'd like to shake the hand of the witch or wizard who did it, probably saved my life."

There was another pause in which the fire crackled and the river rushed on. The Ted said, "And where do you two fit in? I, er, had the impression the goblins were for You-Know-Who, on the whole."

"You had a false impression," said the higher-voiced of the goblins. "We take no sides. This is a wizards' war. Most creatures have gone to the Wizards side, all down to loyalty to King Johnathan."

"How come you're not with them and in hiding, then?"

"I deemed in prudent," said the deeper-voiced goblin. "Having refused what I considered an impertinent request, I could see that my person safety was in jeopardy."

"What did they ask you to do?" asked Ted.

"Duties ill-befitting the dignity of my race," replied the goblin, his voice rougher and less human as he said it. "I am not a house-elf."

"What about you, Griphook?"

"Similar reasons," said the higher voiced goblin. "Gringotts is no longer under the sole control of my race. I recognise no Wizarding master."

He added something under his breath in Gobbledegook, and Gornuk laughed.

"What's the joke?" asked Dean.

"He said," replied Dirk, "that there are things wizards don't recognise, either."

There was a short pause.

"I don't get it," said Dean.

"I had my small revenge before I left," said Griphook in English.

"Good man- goblin, I should say," amended Ted hastily. "Didn't manage to lock a Death Eater up in one of the old high-security vaults, I suppose?"

"If I had, the sword would not have helped him break out," replied Griphook. Gornuk laughed again and even Dirk gave a dry chuckle.

"Dean and I are still missing something here," said Ted.

"So is Severus Snape, though he does not know it," said Griphook, and the two goblins roared with malicious laughter. Inside the tent Johnny's breathing was shallow with excitement: He and Harry stared at each other, listening as hard as they could.

"Didn't you hear about that, Ted?" asked Dirk. "About the kids who tried to steal Gryffindor's sword out of Snape's office at Hogwarts?"

"Never heard a word," said Ted, "Not in the Prophet, was it?"

"Hardly," chortled Dirk. "Griphook here told me, he heard about it from Bill Weasley who works for the bank. One of the kids who tried to take the sword was Bill's younger sister."

"She and a couple of friends got into Snape's office and smashed open the glass case where he was apparently keeping the sword. Snape caught them as they were trying to smuggle it down the staircase."

"Ah, God bless 'em," said Ted. "What did they think, that they'd be able to use the sword on You-Know-Who? Or on Snape himself?"

"Well, whatever they thought they were going to do with it, Snape decided the sword wasn't safe where it was," said Dirk. "Couple of days later, once he'd got the say-so from You-Know-Who, I imagine, he sent it down to London to be kept in Gringotts instead."

The goblins started to laugh again.

"I'm still not seeing the joke," said Ted.

"It's a fake," rasped Griphook.

"The sword of Gryffindor!"

"Oh yes. It is a copy- an excellent copy, it is true- but it was Wizard-made. The original was forged centuries ago by goblins and had certain properties only goblin-made armor possesses. Wherever the genuine sword of Gryffindor is, it is not in a vault at Gringotts bank."

"I see," said Ted. "And I take it you didn't bother telling the Death Eaters this."

"I saw no reason to trouble them with the information," said Griphook smugly, and now Ted and Dean joined in Gornuk and Dirk's laughter.

"What happened to Ginny and all the others? The ones who tried to steal it?"

"Oh, they were punished, and cruelly," said Griphook indifferently.

"They're okay, though?" asked Ted quickly, "I mean, the Weasleys don't need any more of their kids injured, do they?"

"They suffered no serious injury, as far as I am aware," said Griphook.

"Lucky for them," said Ted. "With Snape's track record I suppose we should just be glad they're still alive."

"You believe that story, then, do you, Ted?" asked Dirk. "You believe Snape killed Dumbledore?

"Course I do," said Ted. "You're not going to sit there and tell me you think Potter had anything to do with it?"

"Hard to know what to believe these days," muttered Dirk. "I heard the Grindelwald boy was forced to become a Death Eater, and that psycho bitch, Bellatrix, helped him escape."

"I know Johnathan Grindelwald," said Dean. "He'd never willingly become a Death Eater. Same with Harry Potter, the real deal."

"Yeah, there's a lot would like to believe he's that, son," said Dirk, "me included. But where is he? Run for it, by the looks of things. You'd think if he knew anything we don't, or had anything special going for him, he'd be out there now fighting, rallying resistance, instead of hiding. And you know, the Prophet made a pretty good case against him-"

"The Prophet?" scoffed Ted. "You deserve to be lied to if you're still reading that much, Dirk. You want the facts, try the Quibbler."

There was a sudden explosion of choking and retching, plus a good deal of thumping, by the sound of it. Dirk had swallowed a fish bone. At last he sputtered, "The Quibbler? That lunatic rag of Xeno Lovegood's?"

"It's not so lunatic these days," said Ted. "You want to give it a look, Xeno is printing all the stuff the Prophet's ignoring, not a single mention of Crumple-Horned Snorkacks in the last issue. How long they'll let him get with it, mind, I don't know. But Xeno says, front page of every issue, that any wizard who's against You-Know-Who ought to make helping Harry Potter and Johnathan Grindelwald their number-one priority."

"Hard to help two boys who's vanished off the face of the earth," said Dirk.

"Listen, the fact that they haven't caught them yet's one hell of an achievement," said Ted. "I'd take tips from them gladly; it's what we're trying to do, stay free, isn't it?"

"Yeah, well, you've got a point there," said Dirk heavily. "With the whole of the Ministry and all their informers looking for them, I'd have expected them to be caught by now. Mind, who's to say they haven't already caught and killed them without publicising it?"

"Ah, don't say that, Dirk," murmured Ted.

There was a long pause filled with more clattering of knives and forks. When they spoke again it was to discuss whether they ought to sleep on the back or retreat back up the wooded slope. Deciding the trees would give better cover, they extinguished their fire, then clambered back up the incline, their voices fading away.

Johnny, Harry, Ron, and Hermione reeled in the Extendable Ears.

"Ginny- the sword-" said Harry in shock.

"I know!" said Hermione.

She lunged for the tiny beaded bag, this time sinking her arm in it right up to the armpit.

"Here... we... are..." she said between gritted teeth, and she pulled at something that was evidently in the depths of the bag. Slowly the edge of an ornate picture frame came into sight. Johnny hurried to help her. As they lifted the empty portrait of Phineas Nigellus free of Hermione's bag, she kept her wand pointing at it, ready to cast a spell at any moment.

"If somebody swapped the real sword for the fake while it was in Dumbledore's office," she panted, as they propped the painting against the side of the tent, "Phineas Nigellus would have seen it happen, he hangs right beside the case!"

"Unless he was asleep," said Harry, but he still held his breath as Hermione knelt down in front of the empty canvas, her wand directed at its center, cleared her throat, then said:

"Er- Phineas? Phineas Nigellus?"

Nothing happened.

"Phineas Nigellus?" said Hermione again. "Professor Black? Please could we talk to you? Please?"

"'Please' always helps," said a cold, snide voice, and Phineas Nigellus slid into his portrait. At one, Hermione cried:

"Obscura!"

A black blindfold appeared over Phineas Nigellus's clever, dark eyes, causing him to bump into the frame and shriek with pain.

"What- how dare- what are you-?"

"I'm very sorry, Professor Black," said Hermione, "but it's a necessary precaution!"

"Remove this foul addition at once! Remove it, I say! You are ruining a great work of art! Where am I? What is going on?"

"Never mind where we are," said Harry, and Phineas Nigellus froze, abandoning his attempts to peel off the painted blindfold.

"Can that possible be the voice of the elusive Mr. Potter?"

"Maybe," said Harry, knowing that this would keep Phineas Nigellus's interest. "We've got a couple of questions to ask you- about the sword of Gryffindor."

"Ah," said Phineas Nigellus, now turning his head this way and that in an effort to catch sight of Harry, "Yes. That silly girl acted most unwisely there-"

"Shut up about my sister," said Ron roughly, Phineas Nigellus raised supercilious eyebrows.

"Who else is here?" he asked, turning his head from side to side. "Your tone displeases me! The girl and her friends were foolhardily in the extreme. Thieving from the headmaster."

"They weren't thieving," said Johnny. "That sword isn't Snape's."

"It belongs to Professor Snape's school," said Phineas Nigellus. "Exactly what claim did the Weasley girl have upon it? She deserved her punishment, as did the idiot Longbottom and the Lovegood oddity!"

"Neville is not an idiot and Luna is not an oddity!" said Hermione.

"Where am I?" repeated Phineas Nigellus, starting to wrestle with the blindfold again. "Where have you brought me? Why have you removed me from the house of my forebears?"

"Never mind that! How did Snape punish Ginny, Neville, and Luna?" asked Harry urgently.

"Professor Snape sent them into the Forbidden Forest, to do some work for the oaf, Hagrid."

"Hagrid's not an oaf!" said Hermione shrilly.

"And Snape might've though that was a punishment," said Johnny, "but Ginny, Neville, and Luna probably had a good laugh with Hagrid. The Forbidden Forest... they've faced plenty worse than the Forbidden Forest, big deal!"

"What we really wanted to know, Professor Black, is whether anyone else has, um, taken out the sword at all? Maybe it's been taken away for cleaning- or something!"

Phineas Nigellus paused again in his struggles to free his eyes and sniggered.

"Muggle-born," he said, "Goblin-made armor does not require cleaning, simple girl. Goblin's silver repels mundane dirt, imbibing only that which strengthens it."

"Don't call my fiancé simple," said Johnny.

"I grow weary of contradiction," said Phineas Nigellus. "perhaps it is time for me to return to the headmaster's office.?"

Still blindfolded, he began groping the side of his frame, trying to feel his way out of his picture and back into the one at Hogwarts. Johnny had a sudden inspiration.

"Dumbledore! Can't you bring us Dumbledore?"

"I beg your pardon?" asked Phineas Nigellus.

"Professor Dumbledore's portrait- couldn't you bring him along, here, into yours?"

Phineas Nigellus turned his face in the direction of Johnny's voice.

"Evidently it is not only Muggle-borns who are ignorant, Grindelwald. The portraits of Hogwarts may commune with each other, but they cannot travel outside of the castle except to visit a painting of themselves elsewhere. Dumbledore cannot come here with me, and after the treatment I have received at your hands, I can assure you that I will not be making a return visit!"

Slightly crestfallen, Johnny watched Phineas redouble his attempts to leave his frame.

"Professor Black," said Hermione, "couldn't you just tell us, please, when was the last time the sword was taken out of its case? Before Ginny took it out, I mean?"

Phineas snorted impatiently.

"I believe that the last time I saw the sword of Gryffindor leave its case was when Professor Dumbledore used it to break open a ring."

Hermione whipped around to look at Harry and Johnny. None of them dared say more in front of Phineas Nigellus, who had at least managed to locate the exit.

"Well, good night to you," he said a little waspishly, and he began to move out of sight again. Only the edge of his hat brim remained in view when Harry gave a sudden shout.

"Wait! Have you told Snape you saw this?"

Phineas Nigellus stuck his blindfolded head back into the picture.

"Professor Snape has more important things on his mind that the many eccentricities of Albus Dumbledore. Goodbye, Potter!"

And with that, he vanished completely, leaving behind him nothing but his murky backdrop.

"Guys!" Hermione cried.

"I know!" Harry and Johnny shouted in unison. Unable to contain himself, Johnny punched the air; it was more than he had dared to hope for. He strode up and down the tent, feeling that he could have run a mile; he didn't even feel hungry anymore. Hermione was squashing Phineas Nigellus's back into the beaded bag; when she had fastened the clasp she threw the bag aside and raised a shining face to them.

"The sword can destroy Horcruxes! Goblin-made blades imbibe only that which strengthens them- Guys, that sword's impregnated with basilisk venom!"

"And Dumbledore didn't give it to me because he still needed it, he wanted to use it on the locket-"

"-and he must have realised they wouldn't let you have it if he put it in his will-" said Johnny, excitement on his face.

"-so he made a copy-" said Hermione, squeezing Johnny's arm.

"-and put a fake in the glass case-" said Harry.

"-and he left the real one- where?"

They gazed at east other. Johnny felt that the answer was dangling invisibly in the air above them, tantalisingly close.

"Think!" whispered Hermione. "Think! Where would he have left it?"

"Not at Hogwarts," said Harry, resuming his pacing.

"Somewhere in Hogsmeade?" suggested Hermione.

"The Shrieking Shack?" said Johnny. "Nobody ever goes in there."

"But Snape knows how to get in, wouldn't that be a bit risky?"

"Dumbledore trusted Snape," Johnny pointed out.

"Not enough to tell him that he had swapped the swords," said Hermione.

"Yeah, you're right!" said Harry, and they felt even more cheered at the thought that Dumbledore had had some reservations, however faint, about Snape's trustworthiness. "So, would he have hidden the sword well away from Hogsmeade, then? What d'you reckon, Ron? Ron?"

Harry looked around. For one bewildered moment he thought that Ron had left the tent, then realised that Ron was lying in the shadow of a bunk, looking stony.

"Oh, remembered me, have you?" he said.

"What?"

Ron snorted as he stared up at the underside of the upper bunk.

"You three carry on. Don't let me spoil your fun."

Perplexed, Johnny looked to Harry and Hermione for help, but she shook her head, apparently as nonplussed as he was.

"What's the problem?" asked Johnny.

"Problem? There's no problem," said Ron, still refusing to look at them. "Not according to you, anyways."

There were several plunks on the canvas over their heads. It had started to rain.

"Well, you've obviously got a problem," said Harry. "Spit it out, will you?"

Ron swung his long legs off the bed and sat up. He looked mean, unlike himself.

"All right, I'll spit it out. Don't expect me to skip up and down the tent because there's some other damn thing we've got to find. Just add it to the list of stuff you and Johnny don't know."

"We don't know?" repeated Harry. "We don't know?"

Plunk, plunk, plunk. The rain was falling harder and heavier; it pattered on the leaf-strewn bank all around them and into the river chattering through the dark.

"It's not like I'm not having the time of my life here," said Ron, "you know, with my arm mangled and nothing to eat and freezing my backside off every night. I just hoped, you know, after we'd been running round a few weeks, we'd have achieved something."

"Ron," Hermione said, but in such a quiet voice that Ron could pretend not to have heard it over the loud rain that beating on the tent.

"We thought you knew what you'd signed up for," said Johnny, butting into the conversation.

"Yeah, I thought I did too."

"So what part of it isn't living up to your expectations?" asked Harry.. "Did you think we'd be staying in five-star hotels? Finding a Horcrux every other day? Did you think you'd be back to Mummy by Christmas?"

"I thought you knew what you were doing!" shouted Ron, standing up, and his words Harry and Johnny like scalding knives. "I thought Dumbledore had told you both what to do, I thought you had a real plan!"

"Ron!" said Hermione, this time clearly audible over the rain thundering on the tent roof, but again, he ignored her.

"Well, sorry to let you down," said Johnny, his voice quite calm even though he felt hollow, inadequate. "Harry and I've been straight with you from the start. We told you everything Dumbledore told us. And in the case you haven't noticed, we've found one Horcrux-"

"Yeah, and we're about as near getting rid of it as we are to finding the rest of them- nowhere fucking near in other words."

"Take off the locket, Ron," Hermione said, her voice unusually high. "Please take it off. You wouldn't be talking like this if you hadn't been wearing it all day."

"Yeah, he would," said Harry, who didn't want excuses made for Ron anymore. "D'you think I haven't noticed you whispering behind our backs? D'you think we didn't guess you were thinking this stuff?"

"That's right, I'm disappointed, I thought you had a bit more to go on than some bullshit!"

The rain was pounding the tent, tears were pouring down Hermione's face, and the excitement of a few minutes before had vanished as if it had never been, a short-lived firework that had flared and died, leaving everything dark, wet, and cold. The sword of Gryffindor was hidden they knew not where, and their were three teenagers in a tent whose only achievement wasn't yet, to be dead.

"So why are you still here?" Johnny asked Ron coldly, raising his eyebrows. "Go home then."

"Yeah, maybe I will!" shouted Ron, and he took several steps toward Harry, who didn't back away. "Didn't you hear what they said about my sister? But you don't give a rat's fart, do you, it's only the Forbidden Forest, Harry I've-Faced-Worse Potter doesn't care what happened to her in there- well, I do, all right, giant spiders and mental stuff-"

"I was only saying- she was with the others, they were with Hagrid-"

"Yeah, I get it, you don't care! And what about the rest of my family, 'the Weasleys don't need another kid injured,' did you hear that?"

"Yeah, I-"

"Not bothered what it meant, though?"

"Ron!" said Hermione, forcing her way between them. "I don't think it means anything new has happened, anything we don't know about; think, Ron, Bill's already scared, plenty of people must have seen that George has lost an ear by now, and you're supposed to be on your deathbed with spattergroit, I'm sure that's all he meant-"

"Oh, you're sure, are you? Right then, well, I won't bother myself about them. It's all right for you, isn't it, with your parents safely out of the way-"

"And what about my mother?" Johnny asked, his eyes flashing red.

"No one gives a rats arse about your mother," Ron snarled. Johnny was about to pounce, but Hermione pulled him back. "She'll end up like Har-"

"My parents are dead!" Harry bellowed.

"And mine could be going the same way!" yelled Ron.

"Then GO!" roared Harry. "Go back to them, pretend you're got over your spattergroit and Mummy'll be able to feed you up and-"

Ron made a sudden movement: Harry reacted, but before either wand was clear of its owner's pocket, Hermione had raised her own.

"Prestego!" she cried, and an invisible shield expanded between her, Johnny and Harry on the one side and Ron on the other; all of them were forced backward a few steps by the strength of the spell, and Johnny and Harry glared at Ron from the other side of the transparent barrier as though they were seeing him clearly for the first time.

"Leave the Horcrux," Harry said.

Ron wrenched the chain from over his head and cast the locket into a nearby chair. He turned to Hermione.

"What are you doing?"

"What do you mean?"

"Are you staying, or what?"

"I..." She looked anguished. "Yes- yes, I'm staying. I can't leave my fiancé, the father of my child."

"Brightest Witch of Our Age," Ron scoffed shaking his head. "Got herself knocked up like a one galleon whore."

"You mother-!" Johnny yelled, anger flushing through him as Harry held him back. "LEAVE! BEFORE I TEAR OFF YOUR HEAD AND SEND IT TO YOUR MOTHER IN A PRETTY PINK BOX!" Johnny threatened at the top of his lungs, feeling extremely tired all of a sudden.

"Ron, no- please- come back, come back!"

She was impeded by her own Shield Charm; by the time she had removed it he had already stormed into the night. Johnny and Harry stood quite still and silent, listening to her sobbing and calling Ron's name amongst the trees.

After a few minutes she returned, her sopping hair plastered to her face.

"He's g-g-gone! Disapparated!"

She threw herself into a chair, curled up, and started to cry.

Harry picked up the Horcrux, and placed it around his own neck.

"I'll go on watch," Harry muttered, sending a nod at Johnny who was sat on the kitchen table, clutching his head in his hands. It was silent in the tent, the on,y sound being Hermione's tears and the soft thudding of rain.

"Come on," said Johnny, sending a small smile Hermione's way as the song came on the radio. Hermione took Johnny's outstretched hand, a smile appeared on Hermione's face as the two began to slow dance with Hermione's small baby bump in between them.

A/n: Start the song!

Love Songs by Maggie Lindemann

"I'll take away the hurt
Tell me all your fears
And if you're feelin' scared, I'll be here
You don't have to be tough with me
I'll protect you from it all
I could be your safety net, if you'd let me
'Cause when you're happy, I'm home."

Hermione giggled slightly as Johnny twirled her, pulling a funny face as he kissed her nose.

"Smiling feels different with you
Crying feels better with you
If love is a game, then I'm willin' to play
'Cause somethin' was missin' 'til you
Somethin' was missin' 'til you."

"I'll be there through your flaws
Catch you if you fall
And if you call for me, I'll be there
I just wanna make you feel loved
I'll carry the weight for you
You deserve everything life can bring
'Cause nothing compares to you."

"Smiling feels different with you
Crying feels better with you
If love is a game, then I'm willin' to play
'Cause nothin' is missin' with you
Nothin' is missin' with you."

Johnny dipped Hermione once more, and pulled her in for a passionate kiss.

"I love you," Johnny told her, before dropping to his knees in front of the small baby bump. "And I love you too, Princess," he placed to kiss to the bump.

"And we love you, darling."