“Well done, Ha—”
But the Death Eater Hermione had just struck dumb made a sudden slashing movement with his wand; a streak of what looked like purple flame passed right across Hermione’s chest. She gave a tiny “Oh!” as though of surprise and crumpled on to the floor, where she lay motionless.
“HERMIONE!”
Harry fell to his knees beside her as Neville crawled rapidly towards her from under the desk, his wand held up in front of him. The Death Eater kicked out hard at Neville’s head as he emerged—his foot broke Neville’s wand in two and connected with his face. Neville gave a howl of pain and recoiled, clutching his mouth and nose. Harry twisted around, his own wand held high, and saw that the Death Eater had ripped off his mask and was pointing his wand directly at Harry, who recognised the long, pale, twisted face from the Daily Prophet: Antonin Dolohov, the wizard who had murdered the Prewetts.
Dolohov grinned. With his free hand, he pointed from the prophecy still clutched in Harry’s hand, to himself, then at Hermione. Though he could no longer speak, his meaning could not have been clearer. Give me the prophecy, or you get the same as her…
“Like you won’t kill us all anyway, the moment I hand it over!” said Harry.
A whine of panic inside his head was preventing him thinking properly: he had one hand on Hermione’s shoulder, which was still warm, yet did not dare look at her properly. Don’t let her be dead, don’t let her be dead, it’s my fault if she’s dead…
“Whaddever you do, Harry,” said Neville fiercely from under the desk, lowering his hands to show a clearly broken nose and blood pouring down his mouth and chin, “don’d gib it to him!”
Then there was a crash outside the door and Dolohov looked over his shoulder—the baby-headed Death Eater had appeared in the doorway, his head bawling, his great fists still flailing uncontrollably at everything around him. Harry seized his chance:
“PETRIFICUS TOTALUS!”
The spell hit Dolohov before he could block it and he toppled forwards across his comrade, both of them rigid as boards and unable to move an inch.
“Hermione,” Harry said at once, shaking her as the baby-headed Death Eater blundered out of sight again. “Hermione, wake up…”
“Whaddid he do to her?” said Neville, crawling out from under the desk to kneel at her other side, blood streaming from his rapidly swelling nose.
“I dunno…”
Neville groped for Hermione’s wrist.
“Dat’s a pulse, Harry, I’b sure id is.”
Such a powerful wave of relief swept through Harry that for a moment he felt light-headed.
“She’s alive?”
“Yeah, I dink so.”
There was a pause in which Harry listened hard for the sound of more footsteps, but all he could hear were the whimpers and blunderings of the baby-headed Death Eater in the next room.
“Neville, we’re not far from the exit,” Harry whispered, “we’re right next to that circular room… if we can just get you across it and find the right door before any more Death Eaters come, I’ll bet you can get Hermione up the corridor and into the lift… then you could find someone… raise the alarm…”
“And whad are you going do do?” said Neville, mopping his bleeding nose with his sleeve and frowning at Harry.
“I’ve got to find the others,” said Harry.
“Well, I’b going do find dem wid you,” said Neville firmly.
“But Hermione—”
“We’ll dake her wid us,” said Neville firmly. “I’ll carry her—you’re bedder at fighding dem dan I ab—”
He stood up and seized one of Hermione’s arms, glaring at Harry, who hesitated, then grabbed the other and helped hoist Hermione’s limp form over Neville’s shoulders.
“Wait,” said Harry, snatching up Hermione’s wand from the floor and shoving it into Neville’s hand, “you’d better take this.”
Neville kicked aside the broken fragments of his own wand as they walked slowly towards the door.
“My gran’s going do kill be,” said Neville thickly, blood spattering from his nose as he spoke, “dat was by dad’s old wand.”
Harry stuck his head out of the door and looked around cautiously. The baby-headed Death Eater was screaming and banging into things, toppling grandfather clocks and overturning desks, bawling and confused, while the glass-fronted cabinet that Harry now suspected had contained Time-Turners continued to fall, shatter and repair itself on the wall behind them.
“He’s never going to notice us,” he whispered. “C’mon… keep close behind me…”
They crept out of the office and back towards the door into the black hallway, which now seemed completely deserted. They walked a few steps forwards, Neville tottering slightly due to Hermione’s weight; the door of the Time Room swung shut behind them and the walls began to rotate once more. The recent blow on the back of Harry’s head seemed to have unsteadied him; he narrowed his eyes, swaying slightly, until the walls stopped moving again. With a sinking heart, Harry saw that Hermione’s fiery crosses had faded from the doors.
“So which way d’you reck—?”
But before they could make a decision as to which way to try, a door to their right sprang open and three people fell out of it.
“Ron!” croaked Harry, dashing towards them. “Ginny—are you all—?”
“Harry,” said Ron, giggling weakly, lurching forwards, seizing the front of Harry’s robes and gazing at him with unfocused eyes, “there you are… ha ha ha… you look funny, Harry… you’re all messed up…”
Ron’s face was very white and something dark was trickling from the corner of his mouth. Next moment his knees had given way, but he still clutched the front of Harry’s robes, so that Harry was pulled into a kind of bow.
“Ginny?” Harry said fearfully. “What happened?”
But Ginny shook her head and slid down the wall into a sitting position, panting and holding her ankle.
“I think her ankle’s broken, I heard something crack,” whispered Luna, who was bending over her and who alone seemed to be unhurt. “Four of them chased us into a dark room full of planets; it was a very odd place, some of the time we were just floating in the dark—”
“Harry, we saw Uranus up close!” said Ron, still giggling feebly. “Get it, Harry? We saw Uranus—ha ha ha—”
A bubble of blood grew at the corner of Ron’s mouth and burst.
“—anyway, one of them grabbed Ginny’s foot, I used the Reductor Curse and blew up Pluto in his face, but…”
Luna gestured hopelessly at Ginny, who was breathing in a very shallow way, her eyes still closed.
“And what about Ron?” said Harry fearfully, as Ron continued to giggle, still hanging off the front of Harry’s robes.
“I don’t know what they hit him with,” said Luna sadly, “but he’s gone a bit funny, I could hardly get him along at all.”
“Harry,” said Ron, pulling Harry’s ear down to his mouth and still giggling weakly, “you know who this girl is, Harry? She’s Loony… Loony Lovegood… ha ha ha”
“We’ve got to get out of here,” said Harry firmly. “Luna, can you help Ginny?”
“Yes,” said Luna, sticking her wand behind her ear for safekeeping, then putting an arm around Ginny’s waist and pulling her up.
“It’s only my ankle, I can do it myself!” said Ginny impatiently, but next moment she had collapsed sideways and grabbed Luna for support. Harry pulled Ron’s arm over his shoulder just as, so many months ago, he had pulled Dudley’s. He looked around: they had a one in twelve chance of getting the exit right first time—
He heaved Ron towards a door; they were within a few feet of it when another door across the hall burst open and three Death Eaters sped in, led by Bellatrix Lestrange.