Chapter 11 – Severed

Hi everyone =) Thank you for all your comments on the last chapter - you really made me smile, and reading them made my day. So, we're on exactly 100 reviews which I thought was a nice number to update on - but I have some news. Could you read the AN at the bottom of this chapter? Thank you... and enjoy xx

She was running, running, her feet pounding in time with her heart.

Thump.

Thump.

Thump.

And she was breathing, but only just; the pain was almost too intense to bear. Still, she ran.

"But you're not physically injured."

She turned, screaming out into the darkness.

"Who's there?"

"I am."

She knew that voice, and it was coming closer. So she stumbled away, and started running again.

"You're not actually hurt."

"I am!" she screamed, trying to sob.

"I am." The voice echoed. "I am hurt. I'm dead. It hurts being dead."

"No!"

"You killed me."

"I'm sorry!"

"I love you."

"Don't!" she begged, tears streaming down her face as she stumbled forward.

"I love you. Come back to me."

"I can't!"

"You can't." the voice agreed. "But you need to choose."

And suddenly, she was in a room. And two objects were in front of her.

"What can you see?"

"I see…a knife."

"What else?"

"I see…Harry. A knife, and a picture of Harry."

"YOU LIE!"

She was thrown to the floor by some sort of force and she cried out at the fresh pain she felt wash over her.

"I'm sorry!"

"What else do you see?"

"I see Malfoy! I see Malfoy!"

"Which Malfoy?"

"Draco." She whispered.

"And now you must choose."

"No."

"You aren't letting go. But you can balance on the edge of the cliff for only so long, before you fall, or are pulled to safety. So choose. Will you fall? Or will you move on?"

She reached forward and –

Hermione sat up with a start, gasping for breath, and drenched in sweat. She winced: her throat was raw from screaming. And then, the dream came back to her.

"You must choose." She whispered.

And she stood up, moving over to the mirror, and grabbing a picture of Ron off the wall.

"I choose to let go."

She tore it in half.

ooooo

"Malfoy!" Hermione pounded on his bedroom door. "Get up! Malfoy!"

She waited for a few seconds, before she kicked the door hard, relishing the sound it sent resonating through the house.

"I'm coming!" she heard him shout, before he added: "Bloody witch."

"I heard that!"

He opened the door, dressed in only his boxers with his hair sticking up at the oddest angles. She looked away, embarrassed.

"For the love of Merlin woman, it's about six-thirty in the morning!"

"Yes." She nodded. "I needed you to unlock the door."

"You're a bloody witch! Use your wand!"

She cocked an eyebrow, trying to cover up the fact that she actually hadn't thought of doing that. "And what would you have done if I'd barged into your room, uninvited?"

"Killed you." He said, without hesitation.

"Precisely. And I'm quite happy with my life the way it is – our current predicament aside."

"I'm close to killing you now." He glared at her.

"I'm the one with the wand."

"Then use it!" and he tried to slam the door, but she put her foot between the frame. "I wouldn't do that if I were you." She warned, and slowly, he opened the door again.

"What. Is. It?"

"I'm letting go?"

He slapped his palm to his forehead. "Thank you, Merlin, for leaving me alone with this mentally unstable woman who has finally completely lost it. You – "

He was cut off, as she grabbed his arm, pulling him out of the room and down the hallway.

"Granger."

"Yes?"

"Granger!"

"I'm listening!"

"I'm in my underwear."

ooooo

"Sweet Merlin." Draco ran his hand through his hair, looking around the room, where Hermione had already started pulling pictures off the wall. A pile of shredded photographs was beginning to build up – the entire scene resembled…well, there was only one way to describe it. Chaos.

"Granger?"

"Yes?" She'd attacked the walls again.

"You remember how we were talking about the fact that you have a wand?"

"Mmhmm."

"USE IT!"

She turned to face him. "You don't seem to understand that I need to do this properly. You were right - "

He smirked, and she glared at him.

"You were right about the fact that this is all wrong."

"So you're going to rip up every single picture you have with Weasley?"

"No." she shook her head. "But I don't need to cover the walls with him. I'm not letting myself move on."

"Granger. Why should I care?"

She crossed her arms. "Because I'll hex you into the next century if you don't help me."

"But why do you need my help?"

"I'm not going to get through all this," she waved her arms about, "by myself. So get started!"

"While I'm half naked?"

"The sooner the better."

"Well you certainly aren't complaining." He muttered, resignedly starting to pull pictures off the wall. He suddenly felt a sharp jab between the shoulder blades.

"I heard that. I'll hex you if you keep talking back."

"You're like Professor-bloody-McGonagall."

ooooo

Hermione looked up at the sound of an owl tapping its beak against the window.

"It's Potter's." Draco said, without looking up.

"How do you know?"

"Because I have a brain. He obviously doesn't because if it's too unsafe to tell anyone about our location, it's bloody suicidal to send owls back and forth."

She opened her mouth to retort, but realised that what he'd said actually made sense. Well done, Harry.

She quickly opened the window and grabbed the letter.

Hermione,

I'm with the Weasleys…yesterday was…worse than we thought it'd be. I'll spare you the details – but everyone here sends you their love. They think you're in Australia or something, on an errand for Luna – and we all know not to mess with Luna when she's got her mind set on something. Hope that you're alright…and hopefully you've got Malfoy under control. I need to stay here…some documents need to be authorised, or something like that, but I promise I'll check on you as soon as possible. Sorry, Hermione: I warned you, but I still feel awful.

Thinking of you,

Harry.

She folded the letter up, and turned around to find Draco staring at a picture in his hands.

"What's up Malfoy?"

"I'm not tearing this up."

"Why not?" she walked over to him, and peered of his shoulder at the photograph. It was taken sometime soon after the war, and she was thrown over Ron's back in some sort of piggy-back style as he ran down a hill, laughing. And then she reached over to kiss him on the cheek, but he turned his head to face her, and they ended up bumping noses.

She choked back tears.

"Why not?" she repeated. "You've torn all the other pictures so far."

"But you can't just ruin them all."

"I'm keeping a few! It's just, this is too much. It's wrong. I'll still have some in my drawer."

"Granger." He turned around, and she almost gasped at the intensity of his unwavering gaze on her. Never mind the fact that he was wearing pretty much nothing, his expression was so serious – it literally took her breath away."

"Granger." He said, again. "If I had photographs of my mother, I would value them like gold. Fine, I wouldn't cover my walls with her, but I would still keep pictures of her. That's fine."

"But I am keeping pictures of him!"

"This is different. This," he stabbed the photo with his finger, "is real. The ones you keep will all be formal, and fake – you need to remember him properly. Like this."

"Since when do you care?"

He hesitated, and seconds passed with the pair simply staring at each other.

"Since now."

And then he kissed her.

Hopefully you liked this one - and if you're thinking "what the *"&$%?!" then I've done my job =P

Okay. Now for the "important news". There's no good way to say this, but - I'm putting Carousel on hiatus. Guys, I am so, so sorry. I can only imagine how frustrating this is for you...and it's probably completely out of the blue from your point of view, really. And I guess this chapter's a pretty evil place to stop. But I don't think I have a choice. At the moment, I'm not really enjoying writing the story, and I can tell that the standard of the chapters has really gone down. There's no point in me writing and posting trash just for the heck of it - I'd rather give you guys some decent stuff which I've actually enjoyed writing to read. I have planned ahead, and I know where this story's going...I just need a break. I'm not sure how long it'll take - maybe only days, maybe months. But I can assure you that I WILL definitely resume writing this, so please don't be too distressed. What can I say? I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I have changed the summary of the story to show that it's on hiatus...if you have any questions, or simply want to understand more about what the hell's going on, please feel free to PM me. Guys, again, I'm so sorry. I hope I haven't disappointed too many of you...if I could have it any other way, I would.

On a more positive note - while I am on a break from Carousel, I'm currently working on another fic: Paper Butterflies. There's a tiny bit of information on my profile, and I'll be posting in a while, so keep an eye out for it? I'm very excited about this one, and who knows? Maybe after writing it for a bit, I can come back to Carousel with a new perspective.

Thank you all for being so understanding. (At least I hope you will be. Understanding, I mean.)

Love you all,

Tris xx