Escape ↣ Harmione

Chapter Fifty-Seven

Chapter 57 - Harry and Hermione

Waiting was hard, the morning of the battle at McGonagall Lodge was filled with tense anticipation. Harry knew everyone was in the same boat, that they needed something to happen so they could fix on it, aim for it, deal with it. Waiting around was awful. It made you feel tired while you did nothing. It stretched your nerves taut with no release in sight.

Breakfast had been a quiet, tense affair. Himself, Hermione, Helen, John, Fred, George, Percy, and Audrey had sat around Minerva's dining table as a parade of elves bustled food in for them. They hadn't been able to do it justice, but everyone had tried eating a little from as many dishes as they could so not to disappoint the elves. Harry had been unaware that Minerva had that many elves in the house. His interactions had been limited to Dobby and Folly, but as they entered the room, Audrey had politely asked each one for its name and thanked it for bringing in whatever dish it had been carrying. Helen, John, Harry and Hermione had all offered their thanks while the pureblood wizards looked on in quiet amusement. It highlighted again the differences in cultures they had. When Percy had tried to explain to Audrey that house elves were supposed to serve, and knowing their names and offering thanks were completely unnecessary, she'd simply turned and chide him that manners cost nothing.

It was true, Harry thought. If he had to go and kill a megalomaniac to allow the wizarding society to live in peace, then he probably shouldn't feel above offering a house elf the same thanks he'd offer staff in a restaurant or shop.

Once breakfast had finished Hermione transformed to go looking for a suitable patch of sunshine to lounge in. Her stress levels, she claimed, were much more manageable as a cat. They had forgotten about Audrey, who watched Hermione disappear from the other side of the table and had politely asked where she'd gone off to. The realisation Hermione could at will change from a person to a cat sparked a conversation that Audrey, Percy, Helen, and John took to the library, and it looked to be a long one. Harry mumbled his apologies and made his escape to the work room.

The door opened behind him, and Fred and George came through.

"You don't mind, do you, Harry?" George asked.

"Only I'm very sure the school books were about to come out and honestly, we've not missed being in the classroom," Fred added with an exaggerated shudder.

Harry grinned at them. "Nope, feel free to make yourselves at home." He moved over to the shelves, pondering if he should start brewing something just to keep himself occupied, but there seemed no point. Their potions had been packed off to Grimmauld Place to be put into the bags they were sending out with those that Kingsley had assigned to duties away from the Burrow. The rest and the bulk of them were packed ready into a trunk with an undetectable extending charm on it to go to the Burrow when they received the signal from Kingsley. That thought made Harry reflectively pat his pocket making sure the mirror was still there. It was.

He turned back to the table and picked up the pouches they had filled with shield rings. They'd given a third of their stash to Ginny and Neville to hand out, the other third had been handed over to Fred and George to hand out to their volunteers, and Kingsley had asked that all the rest be brought to the Burrow to be given out before people went out to fight. They'd not told Kingsley about the glamour rings. He and Hermione would have theirs, and the DA would be wearing them to hide the fact they were students. But they had decided that the shields would be more important than a disguise and had poured their efforts into making those instead. They'd had a few glamour rings left over which they'd given to Helen and John thinking that if any Hogwarts student made it to the Burrow for aid and had lost theirs, they could be provided with another.

The pouch of shield rings wasn't as full as he would like it to be. The stripped-down version that absorbed the magic that hit and absorbed a small amount from the wearer without using the transfer of kinetic energy to keep it powered were a lot simpler to make. Consequently, however, they wouldn't last as long. They'd stand up to a good hammering still, but they only had maybe four hours' life instead of the infinite life. Four hours under constant barrage seemed unlikely, and they had assured themselves that anyone wearing one would likely be covered for the duration of the battle unless they were supremely unlucky. Or hit with an Unforgivable. They still hadn't been tested against them, and they had cautioned everyone that they couldn't be relied upon under such circumstances. It had felt like he'd been letting them down telling them that, although he'd been assured that no one expected them to hold up against those spells.