Running AIAOY 7

Chapter 12

"You're sure this one is hers?"  Ron asked as Hermione held a hair up into the light.  It was dark and clearly came from a curly head, but that could also apply to Rebecca and not just Bellatrix.  "How can you know?"

"I'm positive."  Hermione looked him over.  Ron had a beard on from the Beard-Berry, and his hair had been lightened to a brown-blond colour with a Colour-Comb.  He had assumed to role of a foreign Death Eater, to flank 'Bellatrix' as she went to visit her vault.  On her other side was another new Death Eater, one with similar lightened hair and other disguise methods.  Rebecca squirmed uncomfortably in the outfit they had put her in.  

"You don't have to do it, you know."  Rebecca spoke quietly, turning her back to Ron and Harry.  "I can do it and you can be...whoever this is supposed to be."

"I can do it."  Hermione steeled herself and dropped the hair into the potion.  She had been certain the hair was Bellatrix's, but now she was doubting herself slightly.  Worst case, this would be the second time in her life she had transformed into a Potter.

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Ron scratched at his face, grunting in discomfort.  Facial hair did not amaze him as it had when it first sprouted for the disguise.  "This is horrible."

"It's part of being a man."  Fred said, puffing his chest out and showing off the stubble he had begun to accumulate.

Harry looked up cheekily.  "Is it really part of 'being a man' if you're keeping it for a girl?"

Fred narrowed his eyes at Harry.  "Yes."  George sniggered and grabbed Cedric's hand, swinging it between them as they walked into the kitchen.  Fred scowled.  "Don't know what you're laughing about.  You've shaved, what--twice?  Ever?"

Cedric pulled George into a hug and rolled his eyes at Fred over his shoulder.  "C'mon," Cedric murmured.  "You know he's only worried because they're leaving."

"I know, but he's such an arse about it."

Fred leaned against the counter beside them.  "I'm sorry, George."  Fred hadn't meant for it to come out, not really.

"I'll have you know I have, in fact, shaved more than twice!"  George retorted and stuck his tongue out at Fred.  He and Cedric moved away from Fred, George still not letting the barb go.

Harry grabbed Fred's shoulder and looked up at him.  "Remember that nothing's stopped us yet, okay?"  Harry glanced over his shoulder where Sirius and Remus were speaking with Arthur and Molly.  "Don't let anything ruin this time you're with them."

"You're right."  Fred saw Harry in a new light, a more mature light.

"Naturally."

The light of maturity dimmed.

Footsteps echoed outside the room, a copy of Bellatrix Lestrange walking in with Rebecca's Death Eater disguise beside her.

Fred stood, surrounded by the family that he would be moving with to another safe house.  He grabbed Rebecca's hands tightly.  "All's well that ends well."

"Aren't we supposed to say that at, you know, the end?"  Rebecca asked.  She grinned up at him and Fred could see exactly how it would have looked had the face not been disguised.

"Figured I'd beat you to it."

Griphook stepped forward, reaching his hand up for them to join with his.  Rebecca spoke strongly, "Everything will end well, we'll be together soon enough.  All of us."