The spell hit Dolohov before he could block it and he toppled forwards across his comrade, both of them rigid as boards and unable to move an inch.

“Hermione,” Harry said at once, shaking her as the baby-headed Death Eater blundered out of sight again. “Hermione, wake up…”

“Whaddid he do to her?” said Neville, crawling out from under the desk to kneel at her other side, blood streaming from his rapidly swelling nose.

“I dunno…”

Neville groped for Hermione’s wrist.

“Dat’s a pulse, Harry, I’b sure id is.”

Such a powerful wave of relief swept through Harry that for a moment he felt light-headed.

“She’s alive?”

“Yeah, I dink so.”

There was a pause in which Harry listened hard for the sound of more footsteps, but all he could hear were the whimpers and blunderings of the baby-headed Death Eater in the next room.

“Neville, we’re not far from the exit,” Harry whispered, “we’re right next to that circular room… if we can just get you across it and find the right door before any more Death Eaters come, I’ll bet you can get Hermione up the corridor and into the lift… then you could find someone… raise the alarm…”

“And whad are you going do do?” said Neville, mopping his bleeding nose with his sleeve and frowning at Harry.

“I’ve got to find the others,” said Harry.

“Well, I’b going do find dem wid you,” said Neville firmly.

“But Hermione—”

“We’ll dake her wid us,” said Neville firmly. “I’ll carry her—you’re bedder at fighding dem dan I ab—”

He stood up and seized one of Hermione’s arms, glaring at Harry, who hesitated, then grabbed the other and helped hoist Hermione’s limp form over Neville’s shoulders.

“Wait,” said Harry, snatching up Hermione’s wand from the floor and shoving it into Neville’s hand, “you’d better take this.”

Neville kicked aside the broken fragments of his own wand as they walked slowly towards the door.

“My gran’s going do kill be,” said Neville thickly, blood spattering from his nose as he spoke, “dat was by dad’s old wand.”

Harry stuck his head out of the door and looked around cautiously. The baby-headed Death Eater was screaming and banging into things, toppling grandfather clocks and overturning desks, bawling and confused, while the glass-fronted cabinet that Harry now suspected had contained Time-Turners continued to fall, shatter and repair itself on the wall behind them.

“He’s never going to notice us,” he whispered. “C’mon… keep close behind me…”

They crept out of the office and back towards the door into the black hallway, which now seemed completely deserted. They walked a few steps forwards, Neville tottering slightly due to Hermione’s weight; the door of the Time Room swung shut behind them and the walls began to rotate once more. The recent blow on the back of Harry’s head seemed to have unsteadied him; he narrowed his eyes, swaying slightly, until the walls stopped moving again. With a sinking heart, Harry saw that Hermione’s fiery crosses had faded from the doors.

“So which way d’you reck—?”

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<== попередня сторінка	\|	наступна сторінка ==>
All three of them raised their wands again, but none of them struck: they were all gazing, open-mouthed, appalled, at what was happening to the man’s head.	\|	But before they could make a decision as to which way to try, a door to their right sprang open and three people fell out of it.

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