Soul of Ice

45. The Beginning of the End

It had been an inauspicious day when Harry arrived - or as much as it could be. Starting with Neville, more and more students had begun hiding out in the Room of Requirement when staying in the Carrows' reach became too dangerous but they couldn't bear to leave the castle in such a state. While the Room provided many incredible things, including a secret passage to the Hog's Head, it couldn't produce consumables such as food, water, medicine and potions. Therefore, while Aberforth Dumbledore provided food from the Hog's Head, Abbie brewed healing potions by the cauldronful in the dungeons (a blind eye turned by Professor Slughorn) and snuck them in to help those who needed it. And as those in hiding decided the best use of their time was to practise duelling, she was needed as a healer fairly often.

That night, she was healing some particularly nasty damage to Seamus Finnigan's face when it all began.

"Ariana," said Neville, greeting the portrait of Dumbledore's sister as she appeared in her frame. Abbie looked up with curiosity - Ariana rarely appeared without reason. "What's going on?"

"Harry Potter is here."

An enormous cheer erupted from the gathered group, and immediately people began jumping up from where they had been sitting, or lying, and as Neville left with Ariana, the room was abuzz with whispered theories.

Abbie knew her instructions. She had to find Snape as soon as possible, but she couldn't leave straight away - first, she needed to know that Harry really was there, and what he was there to do.

But when Neville returned with Harry, Ron and Hermione in tow - and after the gathered students had calmed down - Harry was being annoyingly cagey with his task. He even seemed surprised that everyone wanted to help, as if that weren't what they had all been waiting for all year.

"Okay," Harry conceded. "There's something we need to find. Something - something that'll help us overthrow You-Know-Who. It's here at Hogwarts, but we don't know where. It might have belonged to Ravenclaw."

Ravenclaw? If it were an item linked to Voldemort, surely it would be something of Slytherin's they were after?

Then again, they already had Slytherin's Locket - destroyed, hopefully, once they had hold of the Sword of Gryffindor. Perhaps Voldemort had chosen his Horcruxes to be items related to the founders. But he wouldn't have stored something in Hogwarts, surely, right under Albus Dumbledore's nose?

Abbie noticed Harry closing his eyes and wincing for the second time, as if his scar were hurting him. That only happened when he was having visions, or Voldemort was near. Either way, it wasn't good, and she knew she had to get to Snape quickly.

She was just trying to think of an excuse to slip out when Harry turned to her.

"Abbie. Can you keep Snape distracted?"

She smiled. He had no idea she had been helping the students, how could he? All he had was the news - as far as he knew, she had reconciled with Snape, became Head Girl and was engaged to Draco. Yet, Harry wasn't hesitating to trust her.

"Of course," she said, grateful for both Harry's trust and the opportunity to do exactly what she had been intending to do.

When she arrived in Snape's office, he was pacing back and forth, agitated.

"What's going on?" he demanded of her by way of greeting.

"He's here."

Snape stopped pacing. He exchanged a long look with Dumbledore's portrait, then turned to Abbie.

"His plans?"

"He's being cagey. Something involving Ravenclaw. What do you know?"

"The Dark Lord contacted me tonight. He informed me Potter would be along shortly and would likely be investigating Ravenclaw Tower. Alecto is there now, waiting for him. If she can capture him, she will bring him here to me. Then... the truth."