Voldemort was talking. Casting a complex spell with his wand and words. The Horcrux-McGonagall smiled an empty, dejected, hollow smile. She looked so beaten, she was almost welcoming the inevitable. And Voldemort obliged. His wand shot out a beam of thin light. It hit McGonagall in the throat and began to slice. It was jagged, rough and the smoky blood shooting from the severing cut was astonishing. The cry which issued forth from McGonagall's mouth was the sort of pained, terrified shriek that Hermione would never have thought her once-favourite teacher was capable of emitting. She was too strong for such a thing. Hermione flung her hands to her ears to block the sound, but the putrid sickness bubbling in her belly was harder to quell.