Parvati had admired the way Lilah slipped, armed only with a wand, and an invisibility cloak, (which the griffins could see through anyway) into the cage into which the griffins had been herded. Now she knew how the griffins truly felt about humans, she knew Lilah was very brave. Lilah walked over to Parvati, who felt her hackles rise at the nearness of a human, and bound herself to the harness with a rope, tying the rope around her waist. She had the bottle of blood with her, and it made Parvati feel angry again, and hungry. She felt a mindless wish to eat until she was sated. Visions of rare steak danced in front of her eyes. She wished very much she had not thrown up earlier – she might have been less hungry.
Now, as Lilah maneuvered herself so that she was safely attached to the harness on one side of her, she paced edgily, occasionally throwing her head back, and letting out her griffin frustration in a screaming roar. A few times she swiped at her side where Lilah was, jerking her head away at the last minute with a huge amount of control.
When the Head Keeper let the roof off the cage, she soared up with the other griffins, heavily at first, because Lilah was a weight attached to her, but faster and faster. With the part of her that could still think, she was relieved to note that all her flight training as a bird had paid off. She was able to fly better than she thought, but she was still labouring a little as she caught sight of the arena and started to glide down.
Not only was Lilah dragging her down on one side but she also had to wave her arms and wand a lot, which made it more difficult still. Lilah had her hands full keeping the other griffins back. Parvati thought it seemed quite hard – they were probably going slightly slower than the griffins normally liked to fly, as she had an extra passenger slowing her down and they resented being kept behind her.
In spite of her griffinness getting in the way, at the smell and sound of the terrified meals running around below her, Parvati managed to remember what Lilah had said about angles and landing, so that she would keep Lilah hidden. She landed on the platform, ungracefully, and almost falling on her beak, but since the other griffins were just behind her, it looked as if she had been pushed.
One other griffin landed on the platform in front of her, and Parvati, forgetting for a moment that she was human, reared, her crest raised, and spread her wings menacingly. She let out a vicious hawking cry, and lurched forward, snaking her head, her beak open, to scare the other griffin away. She almost lost Lilah, who was just trying to free her arm from the harness so that she could dispose of the bottle of blood around Snape, and shoo the other griffin away. The other griffin reared too, and challenged her. Parvati hissed and snaked her head, and Lilah tried to send the other griffin off with a stinging charm, but was unable to aim successfully, as Parvati was weaving so much. The other griffin darted forward, and Parvati found herself in a battle royal.
The griffin in her won. She had been so frustrated and furious for hours now that it was glorious to unleash her temper. She totally forgot Lilah, who cut herself loose at the last minute, falling heavily, and tried to dodge behind the fighting griffins out of the sight of Voldemort.
Lilah got out her wand, but it was impossible to help Parvati much, as she was whirling like a dervish, mixed up with the other griffin. It was all Lilah could do to keep any of the other griffins taking Snape, whilst keeping herself under cover. It was some time before Parvati successfully chased off the other griffin and her head, front leg and chest had been badly bitten and scored. Blood dripped into one eye and she also had deep wounds in her flank. She knew she had an open wound in her shoulder.
Vaguely she registered the approval and cheers from the crowd. The other griffins were fighting for their meals, and the scene below was very messy. The two men with swords were still valiantly back-to-back, and one griffin lay dead beside them, but their case was hopeless, as they were now battling five griffins, and another had shown an interest.
Parvati felt victorious. She raised her head and gave a challenging cry into the charged air around her. It gave Lilah a chance to run up and link her arm through the harness. Parvati screamed her rage, and turned to savage this inopportune human. Lilah, scared beyond belief, was forced to use a shielding charm, before Parvait came to her senses.
Parvati screamed out her griffin rage, swinging her head, and giving herself time to regain control. She then approached Snape, stiff legged, part of her rather glad that no other griffins had carried him off while she was fighting, and the other part wishing to pounce on him and feed herself. She was so hungry, and she could smell blood!
Snape had been given a sword! Somehow, although beyond his strength, he managed to raise it, his face a sort of pallid white-green as he saw Parvati approaching.
She reared furiously once again, Lilah clinging on by her hands and nearly wrenching some feathers out. Parvati lashed her tail, and feinted. Snape swung the sword, and went with it, falling heavily to the ground. The crowd roared with laughter. Parvati forced herself to keep under control, and pounced, but he rolled quickly over, and off the ledge.
Parvati was forced to pounce once again, down from the rock and really knock him over this time. She held him down with her bloodied front leg, and screamed her triumph to the skies, lashing her tail angrily at the effort not to stab him with her claws.
Lilah sprinkled blood around from the bottle, under cover of Parvati’s legs, staining Parvati’s resolution even more as she did so and then twisted her arm and leg through the harness, so that she was once again lying under Parvati’s wing. She had no time to secure herself.
Parvati leaned forward carefully and grasped Snape in her talons, forcing a couple of them through the cloth of his cloak to give her added hold. Snape smelled delicious, and Parvati had to force herself not to take a bite, as she felt saliva pool in her mouth. She felt the weight of both her passengers, and rearing up on her hind legs, made a lumbering start into the air.
For a heart straining second she could not get airborne, and almost fell. If she had been taking off from the platform, she would have had less trouble, but as it was, she had drawn attention to herself. A gasp ran around the crowd.
Parvati made a supreme effort – she wanted to turn, and spiral upwards slowly, which would have been the natural thing to do, but she couldn’t without exposing Lilah to Voldemort’s eyes.
The jerk had loosened Lilah’s leg, and she swung from Parvati’s harness by one arm, but there was no time to lose. Hoping that Lilah would be able to hang on, she flapped frantically. Her anger as a griffin helped her here, as her heart felt as if it was bursting, and her wings strained painfully. Her spine felt as if it were going to crack with the effort of lifting the weights. She breathed in painful bursts through her open beak, searing her throat. At the last minute, she managed to throw her front legs up and lift Snape, but her hind legs rapped painfully on the roof over the top stands, as she nearly didn’t clear the arena.
Lilah nearly fell, but struggling, (which unbalanced Parvati even more) managed to get a leg through the harness. Quite a few people were standing watching now, and one of the other griffins had been attracted, noticing her clumsy flight. He started after her, determined to wrestle her dinner away from her. Lilah held off as long as she could before repulsing him, but they were still in sight, when the other griffin suddenly turned and went back to the ground.
Voldemort was standing himself now, looking after Parvati piercingly, and suddenly, he took out his wand. A flash of green streaked toward her.
****************
Draco saw Parvati land, and immediately knew what the trouble was. He knew Lilah was weighing her down too much. His heart in his mouth, he watched her hiss at the other griffin, and then get into what looked like a savage and deadly fight. The crowd loved it. They had not seen a real fight between griffins before, just scuffles, and so this was extra, unexpected entertainment.
Parvati was moving clumsily, not weaving and snaking as much as the other griffin, but Draco knew that was because she was trying to protect Lilah. Why in Merlin’s name was Lilah not driving the griffin off? Draco sat in agony, and watched, as Parvati was bitten and bloodied, while he was not able to help her. She was covered in blood when it was over.
He leaned forward, tense, as he saw her feint at Snape, looking very savage and not at all like his Parvati. He watched Snape roll off the platform, and groaned. Everything was going wrong.
He knew this would make it harder for her to take off, and her injuries would have made it harder still. His heart in his mouth, he saw her pounce onto Snape, seemingly tearing at him with her beak, and then heard the crowd react as she nearly didn’t make lift off. He saw the tremendous effort she made, and heard the hard thud, as her hindquarters hit the roof.
Voldemort had noticed, and stood staring after her, his already narrow eyes narrowed further. Suddenly, he raised his wand, and murmured a curse. Draco didn’t even think. His own wand was out, and he had shot off his own spell. Breathlessly he watched, unaware that people had turned to watch him. The last thing he saw before amazing pain seemed to wrench him asunder was the curses collide in midair, and start to break up, like a good display of Filibusters.
****************
Parvati saw the curse, and the firework display behind her, and put all her effort into speed. Lilah gave her a few moments of difficulty, as she moved onto Parvati’s back, interfering with her wing, but once she was there, it was much easier. Fright made it easier still.
Parvati could see brooms lifting off behind her, and she shot forward into cloud cover, as fast as she could. Lilah performed a shielding charm which would help prevent them from being found, and then lay forward on Parvati’s neck to let her become as streamlined as possible. Parvati flew on, her wings, ribs and back aching, and her breath still coming in gasps, pushing herself as fast as she could possibly go until she reckoned they had gone about five miles or more, and they were well over where she judged the wooded copse to be where Ron had set up the reconnaissance post. She also smelled water.
She shot out from the cloud cover, glad that she was black and that Lilah was invisible. A Death Eater could be seen silhouetted against a cloud, but before he could give the alarm, Lilah had him in the body bind. Parvati tried not to watch as he plummeted down toward the forest helplessly, toward his death.
Parvati herself floated on wings as soft as powder, down through the trees, and then to the ground, where she deposited Snape as quietly and gently as she could. Lilah slipped from the harness, cutting the rope that had tied her with her knife. Parvati stood, her whole body aching, her breath coming in pants, slicked in sweat, her legs splayed, the injured one off the ground, too tired even to transform.
Lilah threw back the hood of the invisibility cloak, and ran to check Snape. He had relapsed into unconsciousness, which was probably just as well. Lilah looked over at Parvati, and said, “Where are we?” Then she noticed Parvati’s condition for the first time.
“Water. You need water!” She looked around her, listening intently. Over the sounds of Parvati’s laboured breathing, she heard water. It was coming from not so far away. She pulled at Parvati’s head. “You need to transform, and get some water. There is water down the hill. I can’t get you there - you are too large.”
Parvati nodded, and made a supreme effort to transform. Her robes stuck to her, and she could feel her plait, thick and heavy and wet with sweat against her blood and sweat stained neck. Her shoulder and face ached and stung with the long wounds and there were tears all the way down the front of her robes, that were soaked with blood.
She felt very peculiar, and she lurched down to where Lilah had pointed. She drank until she could drink no more, and then made her way unsteadily back to Lilah, who was waiting with Snape. Parvati held out her scarf, which she had soaked in the river, and collapsed on the ground beside Snape. Lilah wrung the scarf out over Snape’s face.
She looked over at Parvati. “You should have told us it was going to be that difficult to fly.”
Parvati, who was still feeling a bit griffinish, with weepy tired Parvati mixed in, snarled. “We didn’t have much choice, did we? And I did it. I thought we would be able to take off from the rock, but Snape didn’t really cooperate did he? And you were supposed to keep the other griffins away from me. It is kind of difficult to fly your best with a long gash in your shoulder by your wing when you can’t fly in a circle to gain height.”
Lilah said nothing. She got out her wand, and started tending to Snape’s different wounds, while Parvati watched. She could see the Death Eaters occasionally, as they circled above, but she did not really notice them. She was crying inside. Why had it turned out so badly? Why had they come at all? Draco was probably dead.
At last Parvati got to her feet again. She was stiff and sore as she could ever be, but it was probably better to keep moving.
“If you can get Snape up, I can manage a stag for a while. I know where we are going, and the Death Eaters see me, all they will see is a forest animal. They won’t notice Snape from this height. You will have to walk beside to keep him on my back, and use your invisibility cloak, or at least put the hood on – your hair is very visible.” She licked a tear off her nose as she spoke.
Lilah nodded, taking off her cloak, and turning it around so that the black side was visible. She put it back on. Parvati transformed, and Lilah, with a great deal of effort, managed to get Snape onto Parvati’s back. Parvati could only bend her already unsteady legs so far, and Snape, though he had lost a lot of weight, was still heavy, and Lilah’s shoulder ached from when she had been thrown to the ground as Parvati started her fight.
It was only a short distance to food and lodging, but Parvati was already wondering if any owl they sent out would be intercepted. If only it were possible to Apparate to Hogwarts! Lilah could Apparate to Grimauld Place though, and get Professor Lupin to help. (Here she caught her foot in a branch, and nearly fell. Snape lurched on her back, but did not awaken.)
It was only a mile further, but Parvati was spent, so the short distance took them a while to achieve. Snape lay across Parvati’s back the whole time unmoving. Parvati began to wonder if he was dead.
The wards on Ron’s reconnaissance post were still intact, and she spoke the password. It was warm inside, and lighted. There was food in packages in a charmed cooler, and wood for the smokeless fire along the shelves.
A soft bed stood in one corner, and another by the stove. An owl sat on a perch in a homely kind of way, chuntering softly as they entered.
Parvati and Lilah rolled Snape into the bed by the stove. He smelled indescribable, so Lilah started to clean him up a little.
Parvati fetched a small amount of hot water in a bowl from the tiny bathroom, and began to sponge his face. She knew Lilah wasn’t speaking to her, because of Draco. But it had not been her fault. She hadn’t meant to call attention to herself. She had tried as hard as she could, but she hadn’t been quite able to remain anonymous in the end. Tears dripped down her nose, in a tired fashion, and she did not bother to wipe them away.
She did not see what else they could have done. She had needed Lilah there with her, to help with the other griffins. She knew well enough that they would have torn her to pieces as a stranger, if Lilah had not been there. Nor would she have been able to pick up Snape – one of the other griffins would have got to him first. And she had done everything she could not to think like a griffin.
And Lilah may be hurting, but so was she. She missed Draco like a raw ache. She knew what the firework display had meant. Draco would be lucky if he were still alive.
The worst of it was that until Lilah had Apparated, there was nothing she could do about it. Neither she nor Draco knew how to Apparate themselves. She also needed to eat, and sleep, or she was not going to be much use to anyone. She refused to believe that there was no point in going back.
She looked up, her mind made up. “Lilah – you need to Apparate or Floo to Grimauld Place, and see Professor Lupin. He can come and help you. I have to go back. I will catch some sleep and eat and set off as soon as you have Snape out of here. He needs a healer.”
Lilah sighed heavily, and leaned forward to take Parvati’s hand.
“Do you think you are the only one who wants to go back? Parvati, you had better face it, Draco is not alive. He let off a curse to foil Voldemort while surrounded by several thousand Death Eaters. He won’t be alive now. I’m sorry if I have seemed quiet. It wasn’t your fault; you tried your best. I wasn’t blaming you when I said you should have told us how difficult it was going to be. Neither Draco nor I thought how hard it was going to be for you. I was just worried about you when I saw how completely exhausted you were. I just can’t even feel any more. With Peter gone, and then Draco…” Her voice trailed away.
Parvati was more stubborn, but did not say anything. Let Lilah say what she would, Parvati was going back. There was silence, and then Lilah said wearily.
“You need to take a shower and let me tend to your cuts. I think most of them are superficial from what I see, but that one on your shoulder and the one over your eye are really nasty.
Professor Snape is no worse than he was, in fact he is clean now, and sleep will heal him, so I don’t think waiting until tomorrow and having a good night’s sleep is going to ruin anything. I can’t Apparate right now; I would splinch myself.
I am going to try to feed Snape some of this soup. He looks emaciated. Why don’t you go and have your shower? I will send the owl to Dumbledore meanwhile.”
The hot water did a lot for Parvati’s aches and pains, even though it stung at first. Parvati stood under the water for a long while, letting her tears flow freely. She could not believe Draco was dead. Was that because she felt something inside her, or was it because she was hoping too much?
Parvati was not as gifted as Padma, but she truly wanted to believe that what she felt was not wishful thinking. Draco was alive there somewhere. She knew it. She had to go back. As soon as Lilah and Professor Snape were gone, she would go back.
Once she had showered and washed her hair, which had been stiff with sweat, she wrapped herself in a towel, and went out to let Lilah clean her up as much as possible. Lilah was rather horrified at the amount of wounds she had sustained, and very worried about the one on her shoulder, and the one crossing her beautiful face, but assured Parvati that she would not have deep scars over her breasts as she had feared, although she would certainly carry some on her hips and thighs.
She used a cleaning charm on Parvati’s clothes for her, and helped her put them on. Then Lilah went for her shower, while before she forgot Parvati sat down and wrote out down everything she had heard from the owls at Voldemort’s stronghold. She folded the paper up, and curled it around Lilah’s wand. Then she transformed. She was not going to sleep on the floor, Lilah had every right to a bed as well as her, and she could sleep comfortably anywhere. She became a cat, and leapt up to sleep on Snape’s legs, curled up warm and snug on the soft down quilt. At least that way, they could both sleep - she would wake at once if he stirred.
Lilah did not sleep long, and was up before Parvati. Parvati was woken by the smell of eggs cooking, and woke up with a start. Lilah had scrambled eggs, fragrant Earl Grey tea, and slices of hot buttered toast ready for her. She was reading the directions for Apparating to Grimmauld Place, which she had found in the cutlery drawer as she ate a slice of bacon and stirred the eggs.
As Parvati watched, she opened the oven, and took out a pan of nicely browned sausages. The aroma was magnificent. Snape woke with a jump, and Parvati, suddenly realizing where she was, leapt off his legs in horror and onto the floor, transforming as she did so. Oh, but she was STIFF! She started yowling in cat form, and ended up making a most peculiar sound as a human, as she landed on all fours. Snape stared, disbelieving.
Lilah moved over to him, and propped up the pillows under him. Snape moaned himself, as his stiff muscles complained, and then looked around.
“This must be another Death Eater trick,” he said acidly in a hoarse voice, taking note of the pillows, and soft duvet. Parvati thought he sounded strong for someone who looked emaciated, had dry cracked lips, and had been in a swoon for a long time.
Lilah ladled out some plates of food. “When we have finished, I am going to Apparate, and go to Grimmauld Place,” she told him. “I would just do a Portkey and take you with me, but I want to make sure that it is still a safe place. There have been a lot of Death Eater attacks recently.” Snape stared at her as if she were a ghost.
“You must be a Malfoy,” he drawled painfully. His eyes widened slowly, “And Parvati Patil?” He closed his eyes. “I am in a nightmare,” he said quite firmly. “This is not Voldemort – he doesn’t have a sense of humour this sick and twisted.”
Fascinated, Parvati noticed that Lilah seemed to be able to deal with Snape. Perhaps it was because he had never had to suffer one of his potion lessons. She sat down on his bed with a huge cup of tea.
“Nor does Voldemort's humour include tea,” she told him. "Can you drink it, or do you need help?” It turned out that Snape needed help. His arms wouldn’t obey him very well. His eyes looked black, fierce and loathing over the rim of the cup, but he let Lilah help him. He needed the tea.
Parvati was glad Lilah was there – Snape, even in his weakened condition, scared her. As soon as he had drunk a cup of tea, he went to sleep again, for which Parvati was profoundly thankful.
Parvati was still eating when Lilah Apparated, leaving Parvati in charge.
She appeared back again quite soon.
Professor Lupin, who appeared with her, looked grim and had her in a half-Nelson with his wand at her throat. (Lilah must have been one of the last people he was expecting at Grimmauld Place).
His face cleared somewhat when he saw Snape, and he let go of Lilah with a mumbled apology, looking in a worried way over at Parvati’s wounded face. “I am going to make a Portkey,” he said. “It is the easiest way to travel. We can all go back together, and then we need to get you back to Hogwarts and Madam Pomfrey young lady.”
Parvati said nothing, as she was sure that if she did, Professor Lupin would forbid her to go back to Voldemort’s stronghold to find Draco. Padma would have known what she was going to do, but Padma was not there.
Professor Lupin still watched Lilah warily, as if he still thought it might be a trap, but he performed a simple spell on Snape’s bed, and asked everyone to take hold. Parvati moved over, pretended to hold a corner of the duvet and watched everyone else vanish with the bed as Lupin hit it with his wand, as if they had never been there. Quickly, before anyone could return, she wrenched opened the door of the hut, and shut it behind her.
She transformed quickly into a wolf, and in lope that grew easier as her tired muscles relaxed, disappeared quickly into the forest. One advantage of being able to transform was that animals could bear pain far more stoically than Parvati herself could!
*********************
“Where is Parvati?” asked Lupin blankly. He and Lilah stood alone, with Snape lying in bed between them. Lilah swore, and then turned to Lupin.
“There is no use even trying to find Parvati. She did this deliberately. She will have transformed, and will be somewhere else completely, and since Snape gave her a blocking draught she will be completely untraceable, unless one of us is brilliant enough to make a counter potion. And even then it will take too long to prepare. She has gone to see what happened to Draco, but it is useless. There is very no chance that he is alive. She will just make things worse for herself.” She saw Lupin’s confused expression.
“She is an Animagus. Do you remember reading the Daily Prophet about nine, ten years ago?” She saw a look of astonished comprehension on Lupin’s face and carried on, “and she is very much in love with my brother. It sticks out all over her. He interfered with a curse of Voldemort’s just before we left. There is no chance for him, but she can’t accept that.”
Lupin nodded. “Well, I guess there is nothing we can do, except check back at the post regularly. If she is an unregistered Animagus who can transform into practically any animal, she should be all right unless she does something silly. Now, first things first, let us get Snape into a comfortable bed, and then I will find a healer from somewhere, even if I have to kidnap one.”
As they bathed Snape properly (which he would have very much hated if he had known about it, but luckily had passed out again) and dressed his wounds, Lilah filled Lupin in on what had happened at the castle, and what Parvati had heard, which made him blench.
Here, she surprised herself by bursting into hot tears. Everything had just been too much to bear, and now that she was safe, she couldn’t hold back any longer.
Gingerly, Lupin patted her on the back, and finding that seemed comforting, followed it up with a fatherly hug. She clung to him for a while like a child, crying until she was exhausted, and then he led her down to get a cup of tea. Here she gave him the parchment she had found wrapped around her wand that morning, and he immediately flooed over to give it to Dumbledore, and request that a healer be brought back with him.
Tonks arrived while he was gone, and was surprised to see Lilah, whom she had known in Auror training. She had also known Peter, and it was a huge comfort to Lilah to tell somebody who would care, what had happened. Tonks was shocked. They had, of course, known of Lucius Malfoy’s escape, but Martin had successfully covered up what had happened at the Malfoy mansion. Narcissa was supposedly still under Auror protection, so the news was very distressing. Tonks went off immediately to see what the situation was there.
Lilah stayed with Snape, until Lupin arrived, with a rather young healer, who had not expected to be given any responsibility for a while, and was very diffident. He approved of what had been done so far, however, although he had better working potions for human consumption with him. Lilah assisted him as he went to work, and soon Snape began to breathe more as if he was asleep, and some of his colour returned.