Make Me.

Book 4 - Chapter 10

"It hurts to move," Ellie said quietly.

Remus was hovering over her, the pair of them hand in hand, Ellie sitting in the armchair she had cuddled up in last night with her father. He was trying to get her up and on her feet. Mr. Weasley was bustling around, waking the others up. Everyone was on an even schedule with Ellie, getting only a few hours sleep that night.

"I know it does," Remus said softly. He pulled Ellie up to her feet gently. His thumb on his left had was sticking straight up in the air, trying to avoid the big, swollen bruise on her knuckles.

"I think they've cracked my ribs back up," Ellie mumbled, face scrunched up in pain. The pain after an injury always seemed to get the better of her, rather than when it was freshly given. "Or they've pummeled my kidney. My back - urgh"

"I know, here -" He helped Ellie across the tent to a glass of water and a couple of loose pills from his pocket. "I've already got your bag, okay? We're going back to the Weasley's and you can lay back down."

Mr. Weasley used magic to pack up the tents and they left the campsite as quickly as possible. Ellie was hobbling between Remus and Fred, both of them supporting the bulk of her weight. Every step Ellie took felt like a newly shattered rib exploded in her side. As they passed Mr. Roberts at the door of his cottage, he had a strange, dazed look about him, and he waved them off with a vague, "Merry Christmas."

"He'll be all right," said Mr. Weasley quietly as they marched off onto the moor. "Sometimes, when a person's memory's modified, it makes him a bit disoriented for a while. . . and that was a big thing they had to make him forget."

They heard urgent voices as they approached the spot where the Portkeys lay, and when they reached it, they found a great number of witches and wizards gathered around Basil, the keeper of the Portkeys, all clamoring to get away from the campsite as quickly as possible. Mr. Weasley had a hurried discussion with Basil; they joined the queue, and were able to take an old rubber tire back to Stoatshead Hill before the sun had really risen. Ellie released a hot wave of sick into the grass from the pain in her ribs when her feet were lifted off the ground and they harshly touched down again, body slamming against everyone else's. They walked back through Ottery St. Catchpole and up the damp lane toward the Burrow in the dawn light, talking very little because they were so exhausted, some of them thinking longingly of breakfast, Ellie not induced, Fred's stomach, definitely included. As they rounded a corner and the Burrow came into view, a cry echoed along the lane.

"Oh thank goodness, thank goodness!"

Mrs. Weasley, who had evidently been waiting for them in the front yard, came running toward them, still wearing her bedroom slippers, her face pale and strained, a rolled-up copy of the Daily Prophet clutched in her hand.

"Arthur - I've been so worried - so worried -"

She flung her arms around Mr. Weasley's neck, and the Daily Prophet fell out of her limp hand onto the ground. Looking down, Ellie saw the headline: SCENES OF TERROR AT THE QUIDDITCH WORLD CUP, complete with a twinkling black-and-white photograph of the Dark Mark over the treetops.

"You're all right," Mrs. Weasley muttered distractedly, releasing Mr. Weasley and staring around at them all with red eyes, "You're alive. . . Oh boys. . ."

And to everybody's surprise, she sized Fred and George and pulled them both into such a tight hug that their heads banged together. Ellie felt the weight of her body sink back halfway into her own control as Fred dropped her arm.

"Ouch! Mum - you're strangling us -"

"I shouted at you before you left!" Mrs. Weasley said, starting to sob. "It's all I've been thinking about! What if You-Know-Who had got you, and the last thing I ever said to you was that you didn't get enough O.W.L.s? Oh Fred. . . George. . . "