For The Greater Good (A Draco Malfoy Story)

Escaping

        It felt like an hour had passed by the time Harry, Ron and Hermione came for me but it was probably about ten minutes. They had already changed back into themselves too. Most of the muggleborns gasped when they saw Harry. Oh yeah, "Undesirable No. 1."

Hermione patted her pocket. "We got it," she said.

"Well, thank Merlin for that. Be a ruddy shame if we came all this way for nothing. Speaking of which, we've got another thing to try to smuggle out of here," I nodded my head towards the people congregating behind me. "Muggleborns and half-bloods."

"How are we going to get them out of here?" Ron squeaked.

"We'll manage," Hermione said firmly. The thought that Hermione could have been one of these people suddenly hit me and I felt my resolve strengthen further. I turned towards the crowd and spoke up.

"Alright, you lot need to be quiet and when we give the signal, run the hell out of here. Take your families, friends and leave the country. It's not safe for any of you here."

More then half of the muggleborns nodded and stood alert. This was their chance, they weren't going to ruin it. Or at least I hoped they wouldn't. I turned to Harry and Hermione and they quickly led us out of the room and to the lifts. We loaded them inside and sent them up right after each other. When the last of them were in the elevator, the trio and I stepped inside along with them.

"Oh, by the way," Harry turned towards me and handed me my wand. "Found this with one of the guards."

"Why thank you, Harry m'boy."

Just as we were getting situated, the temperature in the hall dropped drastically. Our breath came out in white puffs and shivers started to wrack through the few muggleborns behind me. And as black cloaked figures began to fly towards us with their skeletal hands outstretched, I heard Harry curse under his breath. They kept coming and coming but our lift wouldn't budge.

"Expecto Patronum!" I shouted and a silver eagle flew from my wand into the dementor and blocked it from us while the lift doors closed. We flew back and upwards, much to our relief and waited as the doors opened to the atrium a second later. We quickly got out and hung our heads down so no one would look at our faces and recognize us. I looked up quickly and saw that all the muggleborns were running into the fireplaces and disappearing. The muggleborns that we were with ran to them and my friends and I followed quickly. Everyone looked at them, wondering should they stop them. No you bloody well shouldn't, I screamed in my head.

Finally, one man shouted,"Oi! Stop those mudbloods! They're escaping! And they're helping!" He pointed at us with fervor. Harry turned and punched the man straight in the face and yelled at the man.

"How dare you? This man is framing me! He is the one who let them escape!" his voice deepened. Before anyone could do or say anything, Yaxley came out of one of the lifts and stared at us with fire dancing in his eyes.

"POTTER!" he bellowed.

"Run, you nitwits!" I pulled Harry and we began to sprint towards the fireplaces. Yaxley was throwing spells left and right and I started to shoot some without even turning my back, much to his aggravation and shock. Ron was the one who was far behind us but when he finally caught up, we apparated. We spun on the spot and the world tilted off its axis but I knew something was wrong. I caught a glimpse of Grimmauld Place before we apparated again and landed in some forest.

I groaned as I got up from the dry ground and looked around. We were in a forest but it didn't look like the Forbidden Forest at Hogwarts. It was different. The trees were thin and tall, with thousands of dry leaves covering the ground like a blanket. A pained groan broke me from my thoughts.

"Merlin's beard, he got splinched?" I knelt down next to Hermione as she tried to calm Ron down. Tears gathered in her eyes every time she looked at her bloody hands. His whole left arm had been mangled. Flesh and muscle was torn off until the bone was clearly visible. The blood drained from his face drastically as more of it leaked from his wound. I looked up at Hermione. "Did you bring anything we could heal him with?" I asked urgently. She nodded and looked around.

"I-I have a bottle of Essence of Dittany in my bag. Harry! Harry, my bag is next to you!" she shouted frantically to where Harry stood a few feet away from us. He crouched down and began to look through the expansive bag but god, it was taking forever.

"Bloody hell, Harry, by the time you bring the damn thing!" I frowned, then an image flashed through my mind. An image of me holding Draco's torn hand then seeing it perfectly healed. I looked at Ron with interest. Could I do that? But how? I looked back at Harry who was still fumbling for the Dittany and made my decision. I placed my hand on Ron's arm and closed my eyes, concentrating on the wound itself and imagining the muscle reforming, the skin stitching back together. How did it work for Draco? All I was thinking about when I held his hand was how I wished I could take away all that bad energy, all that hurt and pain and see him at his best. I wanted to see him happy, strong and ready to take on the world. I wanted him to fight and let me help him. I wanted him to be whole.

"Rose," Hermione breathed. I opened my eyes, and was met with no wound, no bloody mess that was there before. Ron's arm was smooth and whole as it once was but he was still as pale as a sheet. Hermione studied me briefly with her brown eyes unblinking and wide. To be honest, it was making me a bit uncomfortable. I cleared my throat.

"I'll go put the enchantments up and set up the tent."