Chaos Rising |BOOK 2| Harry Potter x PJO |Alexandra Marine|

HARRY POTTER

My head began to spin. I closed my eyes and tried to think, but all that I could think of was my seventeenth birthday, before all of this mess had started- I had received gifts, a watch from the Weasleys, a new razor.... a dagger.

A dagger, I realized.

"Hermione!" I called. "Get me that dagger Annabeth gave!"

"What?"

"My birthday gift! No time, Hermione!"

Hermione stared at me blankly for a minute before finally reaching for her bag hurriedly and scattering things on the floor, searching for a plain golden dagger.

My frustration grew, and I held out my wand, "Accio dagger!"

The bag expanded in size and a second later, it spewed out a golden dagger at my face, slowing down only a couple of centimeters away from me, just so I could catch it.

I took the dagger hurriedly and clashed it against the chains. "Please work," I muttered.

Mrs. Cattermole gasped as the dagger cut through the chains like they were butter, and I was surprised at my own strength for a minute- or perhaps the sharpness of the dagger was to be praised. Whatever it was, Mrs. Cattermole was freed, and she looked just as frightened as ever before.

"I don't understand," she whispered.

"You're going to leave here with us," I said, pulling her to her feet. "Go home, grab your children, and get out, get out of the country if you've got to. Disguise yourselves and run. You've seen how it is, you won't get anything like a fair hearing here."

"Harry," said Hermione, "how are we going to get out of here with all those dementors outside the door?"

"Patronuses," I said, pointing my wand at my own: The stag slowed and walked, still gleaming brightly, toward the door. "As many as we can muster; do yours, Hermione."

"Expec — Expecto patronum," said Hermione. Nothing happened.

"It's the only spell she ever has trouble with," I told a completely bemused Mrs. Cattermole. "Bit unfortunate, really.... Come on, Hermione..."

"Expecto patronum!"

A silver otter burst from the end of Hermione's wand and swam gracefully through the air to join the stag.

"C'mon," I said, and I led Hermione and Mrs. Cattermole to the door.

When the Patronuses glided out of the dungeon there were cries of shock from the people waiting outside. I looked around; the dementors were falling back on both sides of us , melding into the darkness, scattering before the silver creatures.

"It's been decided that you should all go home and go into hiding with your families," I told the waiting Muggle-borns, who were dazzled by the light of the Patronuses and still cowering slightly. "Go abroad if you can. Just get well away from the Ministry. That's the — er — new official position. Now, if you'll just follow the Patronuses, you'll be able to leave from the Atrium."

We managed to get up the stone steps without being intercepted, but as we approached the lifts I started to have misgivings. If we emerged into the Atrium with a silver stag, an otter soaring alongside it, and twenty or so people, half of them accused Muggle-borns, I could not help feeling that we would attract unwanted attention. The lift clanged to a halt in front of us.

"Reg!" screamed Mrs. Cattermole, and she threw herself into Ron's arms. "Runcorn let me out, he attacked Umbridge and Yaxley, and he's told all of us to leave the country, I think we'd better do it, Reg, I really do, let's hurry home and fetch the children and — why are you so wet?"

"Water," muttered Ron, disengaging himself. "Harry, they know there are intruders inside the Ministry, something about a hole in Umbridge's office door, I reckon we've got five minutes if that —"

Hermione's Patronus vanished with a pop as she turned to me, horror-struck.

"Harry, if we're trapped here — !"

"We won't be if we move fast," I said. I addressed the silent group behind us, who were all gawping at me.

"Who's got wands?"

About half of them raised their hands.

"Okay, all of you who haven't got wands need to attach yourself to somebody who has. We'll need to be fast before they stop us. Come on."

We managed to cram ourselves into two lifts. It was year five all over again, and I felt like we were going to the department of Mysteries.

My Patronus stood sentinel before the golden grilles as they shut and the lifts began to rise.

"Level eight," said the witch's cool voice, "Atrium."

I knew at once that they were in trouble. The Atrium was full of people moving from fireplace to fireplace, sealing them off.

"Harry!" squeaked Hermione. "What are we going to — ?"

"STOP!" I thundered, and the powerful voice of Runcorn echoed through the Atrium: The wizards sealing the fireplaces froze. "Follow me," I whispered to the group of terrified Muggle-borns, who moved forward in a huddle, shepherded by Ron and Hermione.

"What's up, Albert?" said the same balding wizard who had followed me out of the fireplace earlier. He looked nervous.

"This lot need to leave before you seal the exits," I said with all the authority I could muster.

The group of wizards in front of me looked at one another.

"We've been told to seal all exits and not let anyone —"

"Are you contradicting me?" I blustered. "Would you like me to have your family tree examined, like I had Dirk Cresswell's?"

"Sorry!" gasped the balding wizard, backing away. "I didn't mean nothing, Albert, but I thought.. I thought they were in for questioning and..."

"Their blood is pure," I said, and Runcorn's deep voice echoed impressively through the hall. "Purer than many of yours, I daresay. Off you go," I said to the Muggle-borns, who scurried forward into the fireplaces and began to vanish in pairs. The Ministry wizards hung back, some looking confused, others scared and resentful. Then:

"Mary!"

Mrs. Cattermole looked over her shoulder. The real Reg Cattermole, no longer vomiting but pale and wan, had just come running out of a lift.

"R-Reg?"

She looked from her husband to Ron, who swore loudly.

The balding wizard gaped, his head turning ludicrously from one Reg Cattermole to the other.

"Hey — what's going on? What is this?"

"Seal the exit! SEAL IT!" Yaxley had burst out of another lift and was running toward the group beside the fireplaces, into which all of the Muggle-borns but Mrs. Cattermole had now vanished. As the balding wizard lifted his wand, I raised an enormous fist and punched him, sending him flying through the air.

"He's been helping Muggle-borns escape, Yaxley!" I shouted.

The balding wizard's colleagues set up an uproar, under cover of which Ron grabbed Mrs. Cattermole, pulled her into the still-open fireplace, and disappeared. Confused, Yaxley looked from me to the punched wizard, while the real Reg Cattermole screamed, "My wife! Who was that with my wife? What's going on?"

I saw Yaxley's head turn, saw an inkling of the truth dawn in that brutish face.

"Come on!" I shouted at Hermione; I seized her hand and we jumped into the fireplace together as Yaxley's curse sailed over my head. We spun for a few seconds before shooting up out of a toilet into a cubicle. I flung open the door; Ron was standing there beside the sinks, still wrestling with Mrs. Cattermole.

"Reg, I don't understand —"

"Let go, I'm not your husband, you've got to go home!"

There was a noise in the cubicle behind; I looked around; Yaxley had just appeared.

"LET'S GO!" I yelled. I seized Hermione by the hand and Ron by the arm and turned on the spot.

Darkness engulfed us, along with the sensation of compressing bands, but something was wrong...