A/N: This story was written as a prize for one of my readers, bluefirefly5, who is always a wonderful reviewer, but recently wrote me a review that absolutely made my day. As I always do when someone makes my day, I offered her a reward. Normally I will allow said person to pick how a certain plot point in the story they reviewed (as long as they aren't reviewing after I have finished the story)plays out, but Futura Furtum is already plotted out to the end without any places that I could really leave up to chance without changing my story. Instead I offered her the prize of a one shot written about the pairing of her choice (from a list provided by me as there are certain pairings I couldn't do justice and others that I simply hate).
The original prompt for this one shot was : After the war, Lucius has to work on some kind of community project as rehabilitation, and Hermione is the one put in charge of him, and sparks fly?
This is what came from that.
I have taken some liberty with publication dates and the general timing of this story. It's just shy of a year after the war, but I am taking liberty with whether or not that is actually 1999 or what the publication dates of the books mentioned are. If that is a detail that will absolutely drive you insane you should probably turn away now
p.s. the song I used for inspiration while formulating and writing this story was Clarity by Zedd
"What would our world be like if we ceased to worry about 'right' and 'wrong,' or 'good' and 'evil,' and simply acted so as to maximize well-being, our own and that of others? Would we lose anything important?"
– Sam Harris-
They called her the brightest witch of her age, the female third of the golden trio, and a war heroine. The wizarding public had a very solid idea of who she was and what she stood for. So the lot of them was surprised, to say the least, when she did not enter into the Auror training program along-side Harry and Ron. There were a few that looked at her sideways, but they were all rested assured that if she were not to join the Department of Magical Law Enforcement then obviously she would be taking a teaching position at the illustrious Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. No one was more upset that Head Mistress McGonagall to discover that Hermione would not seek employment under her either. No one except perhaps the fair few who had stopped to truly listen to her in her fourth year when she lectured about house elves, could have predicted that her true passion lay in striving for equality for all. Even they would have been wrong in their assumption of where she would seek employment, as it was not the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures that held her contract of employment once it was signed. No, when she finally penned her famous name to the end of a magically binding contract it was as the head of a brand new department entitled the Department of Magical Cooperation and Equality which was somewhat dubiously placed amongst the other offices in the Department of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes.
As a brand new department, Hermione was not particularly surprised to find it was sparsely staffed. She did think however that she would have more than one person working under her. Being polite as always she did not comment on this, and bit her tongue to keep from asking if meek little Marietta Edgecombe was really cut out for fostering a sense of equality and perhaps a general idea of right and wrong in former Death Eaters who had been released from Azkaban. Hermione was self-aware enough to recognize that she also might hold a small grudge over the girl outing the D.A. and their location in fifth year, but if Marietta could forget that while she still bore faint scaring from the curse weaved into the parchment she had signed, then Hermione could let sleeping dogs lie as well. And there was something to be said about hard work and dedication of which Marietta had both, not to mention intelligence. She hadn't been sorted into Ravenclaw for nothing.
For the first few months their work had been very slow as all known Death Eaters (save for one) who had survived the war were still locked away in prison, and those involved with the losing side of the war who had not taken the mark upon their flesh were not required to enter into the mentoring program. Hermione and Marietta had still worked together to put on several functions that took wizards on educational yet entertaining jaunts out into the muggle world to encourage equality and acceptance. These were mostly attended by friends wishing to support them like Harry and as well as Cho Chang. Hermione considered it a feather in her cap however than one evening two months after the war had ended Narcissa Black, who was no longer married to Lucius Malfoy, attended an outing to the muggle opera hosted by Hermione, and she hardly even sneered. It was likely the woman was only doing it to cement her place in the new world order, but she had been present and had given some credence to the program for other purebloods. Already the guest roster for the night of fine dining in muggle London that Marietta would be hosting in a weeks' time had twice as many purebloods as any other event had so far. It was only Draco Malfoy and Astoria Greengrass, but it was an improvement.
Hermione was quite glad that work was starting to pick up a bit. She needed something to focus on other than the fact that she and Ron had finally decided to throw in the towel. It had been a struggle from the moment of the heated, and not at all thought out, kiss during that final battle. For that one moment the pair of them had been perfectly matched, but then when the adrenaline was gone the match had become just as ridiculous as it had been before the war had even begun. They were both too quick to temper for them not to find themselves in an argument, particularly when their beliefs were fundamentally different in so many different categories. They were working on becoming friends again, but their rather fantastic break up had made it abundantly clear that the only thing that had kept them together for this long was Harry Potter.
With things strained between her and the Weasley clan, and completely non-existent with Ron, Hermione's only real social interaction was with an awkwardly stretched Harry and of course Marietta at work. She spent more time getting lost in the library now than she did in her first year at Hogwarts when she had not yet made any friends. She yearned for a challenge to focus her mind, and as if the head of the MLE had heard her plea a purple missive flew into the room and landed on her desk. The plane unfolded itself into a flat sheet of paper once more and Savage's ridiculously oversized signature was the first thing she noticed on the bottom of the page.
With a quick perusal of the note she discovered that they would be getting their very first fulltime resident in the program. The first sentenced Death Eater was scheduled to be released from Azkaban, and as the head of the program he would immediately fall under her care and tutelage. She was excited to finally get started with the rehabilitation program, but she was filled with an emotion she didn't dare give voice to at the name on the paper before her. She certainly couldn't tell Marietta how intimidating the name Lucius Malfoy was. She couldn't say out loud that she was afraid of that man, and the thought of moving him into the halfway house that had been built specifically for this program was… was slightly terrifying if she was being honest with herself.
She considered herself a strong independent woman. She knew herself to be a woman who could handle just about anything life threw at her. Because of that she was the perfect candidate for this job. She didn't realize until just this moment that life might be able to throw her something she would trip over. She certainly hadn't realized just how much the terrifying persona of this man had skulked into the back of her mind and made her feel as if the sight of her own shadow would send her running. She was afraid, there was no denying it, but nobody needed know that.
Hermione took a deep breath and took out a manila folder from the bottom drawer of her desk and tapped her wand against it three times causing his name to be emblazoned across the top and then she slipped the purple missive inside the folder. She stood from her desk and took a moment to gather her wit, straightened her skirt that she never should have worn as it had a tendency to migrate around her waist when she wasn't paying attention, and she walked out of her office with her head held high.
The next day found Hermione standing in her power stance on the front porch of the halfway house. Her mother had instilled in her the belief that if one put forth the effort to convince another that they felt confident and self-assured; they would in turn begin to feel more confident and self-assured. One hand was perched on her hip to bolster that confidence, and the other was curled around the contract. Her chin was tilted up in an almost defiant angle, and any fear she might feel of the man that would soon be arriving was cleanly hidden away. She was ready.
Then there was a pop announcing apparition and in the blink of an eye there were two men standing before her at the end of the walk. Only, one of them seemed as if he may not be able to stand if it weren't for the man beside him. Dawlish was as imposing as ever in his black robes, but the man beside him was nearly unrecognizable. The man beside him was a waif that would blow away on the slight breeze if it weren't for the tight hold the auror delivering him had on his upper arm.
Lucius Malfoy's hair looked mangy and as if it were on the verge of turning into dreadlocks. His face was gaunt, grey, and almost terrifying with big deep set eyes that lacked the hardness of cold steel that had once been present. He had to have lost more than two stone, and something of himself appeared to have been left behind in Azkaban as well if his ambling shuffle beside Dawlish was any indication. Hermione's power stance dropped in a second and instead she found herself waiting with her free hand turned up beside her thigh as she resisted the urge to reach out to someone clearly in need with the lingering fear of a person who had already had the misfortune of being castigated for her efforts in the past.
"What… Savage?" she stammered. "I don't understand."
"You knew he was in Azkaban did you not?" was the man's tart reply as he neatly sidestepped her with his charge and entered the house.
Hermione could not reconcile the image before her with the horribly intimidating memory of Bellatrix Lestrange shortly after her release from Azkaban. Despite the fact that using the word release was incredibly generous. She had looked a bit insane, but nothing like the man that had just walked into the house ahead of her. She shook her head in dismay, turned on her heel, and followed the men inside.
"Are you ready to set the wards?" Savaged asked as soon as Hermione joined them in the foyer. "I'd like to release my own."
"Ah the changing of the guards," Lucius said, still managing to sound urbane despite the gravel in his voice. "Wonderful."
Hermione couldn't help but wonder if that was the first thing he had said out loud in a very long time.
"He speaks," Savage groused as he drew his wand, inadvertently answering Hermione's unspoken question.
Malfoy raised his chin defiantly in response, and stood quietly as Savage ran his wand over him releasing each ward that had been placed upon him as part of the new security measures of the wizarding prison. Becoming a guard at Azkaban was only allowed for the most powerful of wizards now, as each guard was assigned a block of prisoners to which they tied their wards. These wards were a creation from the bowels of the Department of Mysteries that completely suppressed the magic of another witch of wizard. For a powerful wizard it was a mild drain that increased with the number of people it was cast upon, but for the average wizard it could completely drain their magical reserve to cast it on anyone..
A milder spell would be used while they were housed in the halfway house. It would limit their magic to those that might be cast by a first or second year at Hogwarts, but it would allow for the beginning of a transition back into the wizarding world. These wards would be cast by Hermione for every released prisoner that crossed their threshold, as it would land Marietta in St. Mungos for magical reoperation to cast them. They'd practiced ahead of time, and limiting Hermione's magic had led to Marietta spending the weekend with healers rather than her family.
"Alright, my turn," Hermione said as she stepped forward and began to move her wand in wide arches over Malfoy. "You might feel slightly dizzy as I cast them, but I won't let you fall over. I imagine you feel a little jumbled inside right now after the sudden flare of your powers returning in full force. Some of that shaking should subside in a few minutes."
She was aware that she was rambling nervously, and she could sense that it annoyed both Malfoy and Savage, but she could not help herself. The light purple haze that was created by casting this spell began to hover over Malfoy's skin as she worked, and the simple pleasure of successfully wielding magic helped to soothe her a bit.
"In a few minutes that will dissipate," Hermione explained as she indicated the glow above his skin with her left hand while she continued to work her wand with the right. "When that happens you may feel sluggish for an hour or so… maybe a little longer with the release of one set of wards and the onset of another I'm not sure… I felt better about forty-five minutes after it was cast upon me."
"When exactly did you serve a sentence in Azkaban?" Malfoy grumbled. "And why exactly would they allow a convict to run the halfway house? Am I to serve as part of your own rehabilitation?"
"Shut your trap," Savage barked at him. "You know damn well Hermione Granger isn't going to cast an experimental spell on even the nastiest wizard out there without knowing exactly what will happen. She probably had the unspeakables cast it on her when she was learning how to use it in order to be able to explain everything to the likes of you. Her efforts are wasted on you."
"Enough boys," Hermione said quietly, trying to pretend she was gently chiding Harry and Ron like she had at school rather than trying to head off a fight between two powerful wizards.
They both fell quiet, so Hermione did as well. Easier not to explain that Savage had been inaccurate if it served to calm the brewing storm with Malfoy; better to focus on the magic. In a few more minutes the wards were firmly set and the haze had disappeared. What little fire had showing in her new resident's eyes with his outburst went out as the fatigue settled in.
"I'll show you to your room," Hermione explained as she tucked her wand away. "You might to lie down for a while, or maybe make use of the bath. I'll order us in some takeaway for your first meal outside of Azkaban while you rest a bit. Is there anything in particular you would like?"
"Completely wasted on you," Savage scoffed before he turned on his heal and headed for the exit. "Potter and Longbottom are on call to come to you if there are any issues here at the house."
Malfoy stood there, still not speaking, so Hermione listened to the sound of heavy boot falls as Savage made his way out of the house. The door swung open and shut, and then it was just quiet. Hermione turned her eyes on her charge, waiting for him to talk but when he remained silent she gestured for him to walk with her and lead him out of the room.
"I had a hard time picking something to eat when I had so many choices as well," she stammered on as she led him up the stairs. "After only wild mushrooms and whatever I could steal from a farm or just anything random… it was hard to choose. In the end Kinglsey took me to the Leaky and ordered for me. I had fish and chips. Would you like that?"
"Peasant food," he simpered, though it lacked the usual malice with how tired he was. "You may as well serve me the gruel for Azkaban."
She opted not to point out that he was being a surly git, and instead directed him into the bedroom he would be using for the time being. With a quick snap of his wrist the door closed in her face, and she released a shaky breath of air before she stepped away. Civility might be harder to manage than she thought, but she wasn't called Hermione Granger for nothing. She would overcome this situation like every other difficulty she had faced since learning that she was a witch, and that was just going to be that. Her lungs constricted as she fought the rising sadness at the thought of her life before learning about her magic. An image of maps of Australia sitting sprawled across her desk at home flash through her mind before she banished it ruthlessly.
"Perhaps something a bit less fit for a peasant," she said out loud to the closed door, and then she turned on her heal and went to place and went to grab her cloak.
Hermione quickly threw up restricting wards around the house to keep Malfoy in, and other's out, before she stepped out onto the porch. The halfway house was settled on the very edge of a muggle neighborhood, but it was well cloaked to keep any magic from being noticed. Because of this Hermione knew that no one would see her apparate away from the porch. Rather than picturing the Leaky Cauldron as she had intended to, she pictured the closest establishment she could think of that would give him food for a more refined pallet. The Hawksmoor was a muggle restaurant so it would fulfill her desire to broaden his horizons, but it was fine dining so it would also cater to his sensibilities. She appeared just around the corner from the entrance to the underground restaurant, and beat a quick path to their big black metal door. She walked inside and was immediately greeted by the hostess who had a beaming smile.
"How may I help you today Ma'am," the hostess asked as she reached for one of the black leather menus nestled onto the side of her marble podium.
"I'm here for express dining this evening," Hermione told her as she reached for the menu.
Hermione perused the menu trying to pick something to please her ill-tempered house mate, and eventually settled on something that she thought could please them bother.
"I'd like two orders of your sirloin dinner as well as some sticky toffee pudding," Hermione said with a smile as she handed back the menu.
"Might I recommend a nice vintage to go with your meal?" the young blonde woman asked as she replaced the menu to its home.
"Can I order wine with express dining?" Hermione asked surprised.
"By the bottle as it is leaving the premises, but yes you can," she nodded.
"Then by all means that sounds wonderful," Hermione smiled. "Could you recommend one of your merlots?"
"We have a wonderful Claret that pairs quite well with the sirloin," she said.
Hermione nodded, and produced her wallet. For the duration of the stay the Ministry would be footing the bill for Mr. Malfoy's rehabilitation, but tonight was a gift from Hermione. A gift that she would also be enjoying with him, so she would shell out for the wine because it would in fact be quite food with the steak she was sure of it. She paid for their meals and waited patiently in the foyer until it had been cooked, boxed up, and brought out to her. It certainly looked more sophisticated than fish and chips when packaged in sleek little boxes. It would do for a peace offering.
Hermione was certainly going to earn her keep trying to break through to Malfoy. He was belligerent and hard to work with, and Hermione could not foresee a date in the near future where she could say to the minister that her charge was ready to be released into the public once more. Each morning he groused when she would not share the Daily Prophet with him, and she reminded him that he had required reading to attend to before he would be allowed to touch the paper. Each afternoon he verbally castigated her as she made her way out the door to spend a few hours in her office at the ministry. Each evening he scorned the dinner she offered him and refused to eat with her in the dining room instead hiding away in his room. And each night Hermione spoke to him through the door that he was only lengthening his incarceration by being so stubborn before she returned to her flat and once again immersed herself in all of her Australian research with the undying belief that she would somehow find her parents.
Two weeks of being stubborn, that was what it took for Malfoy to cave and finally read all of the rules and regulations for the rehabilitation program. He looked properly embarrassed when he handed over the signed contract, and Hermione offered him a small smile when she handed over the morning paper.
"Was that so terribly hard," she asked him softly as she added milk to her tea.
He did not answer her from behind the paper.
"Tonight I am going to take you out on your first public outing," she went on, choosing not to explain that he was supposed to have gone on a different last week but he had not yet signed his name to the bottom of the rules. "We will be going to see a play at the Globe. You will of course need to wear muggle attire, so we will go to a department store first."
"We may as well transfigure something I already own," he said gruffly from behind his paper. "Unless of course requiring me to tolerate the blathering of a shop worker is part of my rehabilitation."
"A casual interaction with a muggle would be helpful," she said ruefully. "But as I also hate to shop I would be willing to concede the point. It will of course lead to some other interaction."
"Ah compromise," he sighed before folding the paper up and setting it to the side so he could return his focus to his breakfast. "There is no denying that my robes are of a higher quality than what would be found in a department store."
"Will you force my hand on this?" she sighed, abandoning her own cup of tea. "If you start drawing lines that place muggles in the category of inferior I will have to take you to the damn store in order to try and break down that barrier."
"You are quick to anger aren't you hellcat?" he laughed. "I was not indicating anything to do with muggles. My robes are tailor made, and lined with the softest of Chinese silks. You cannot find that quality in a department store no matter what world you reside in."
"That must make them difficult to wash," Hermione said, and it was clear that she was just trying to make peace.
"I've not ever had to worry about that," he said as he turned his attention back to his breakfast. "The Malfoy house elves however have never had trouble with them."
Hermione bit her tongue, and he face turned red. He watched her school her immediate reaction to the mention of house elves, and he in turned stifled the urge to laugh. He felt she was terribly predictable when it came to her feelings about the house elves, and he couldn't help but think about Draco and how often he had complained about that particular reaction from her. Draco had however given him the impression that she was unable to control herself when it came to the little buggers. Perhaps control came with age.
"I will not allow you to call a house elf here," she said once she had calmed. "I would be willing to concede the point and allow you to send your clothing to your manor to be cleaned."
"Is there anyone living at the manor currently?" he asked, and she was surprised to hear genuine curiosity in his voice.
"My understanding is that Draco stays there when he is in the country," Hermione told him quietly, only then realizing he had no idea what was going on in his son's life. "He is however in Italy more often than not. Narcissa lives at Black Manor now."
"What is Draco doing in Italy," he pressed his eyes a bit harder after the mention of Narcissa.
"He is pursuing a potion's mastery actually," she told him with a soft smile. "He lives where he is doing his apprenticeship most of the time, but he comes back as often as he can manage to spend time with Astoria Greengrass."
"So the marriage contract still stands after everything?" Lucius said with a quirked brow. "I admit I expected that to fall through considering the events of the war."
"I did not realize they were already betrothed," Hermione said, her eyes lighting up with curiosity. "Is that common amongst purebloods?"
"Obviously," he sneered. "Draco and Astoria have been promised to one another since they were toddlers."
"I had always imagined that marriage contracts were loveless," Hermione admitted as she picked up her tea cup again. "But an idiot could see that those two love each other. They aren't over demonstrative by any means, but you could see it in their eyes for sure."
"When would you have occasion to witness my son with his fiancé?" he questioned his brow inching up toward his hair line.
"Draco and Astoria attended one of the events put on by my employee," Hermione said, somehow nervous about giving this man Marietta's name. "I did as well, and I can't help but people watch."
"It is uncommon for a Gryffindor to view a Slytherin with anything other than scorn," he pointed out, inadvertently pulling Hermione in with the way his eyes bore into hers.
"The Department of Magical Cooperation and Equality is about breaking down barriers," Hermione told him. "Including the ones that are built into us in school. I have to admit. I really think they ought to abolish the house system at Hogwarts because it's part of the problem not part of a solution."
"You are a radical aren't you?" he sneered as he pushed his chair back from the table and stood to leave. "You will tear our world apart if you do not learn how to decipher a good idea from a bad one."
"Well you would know all about bad idea wouldn't you Malfoy," Hermione spat before she regained control of her temper. "That is why we are working together. Now that you have signed the paper work I can give you your first assignment.'
With a flick of her wrist Hermione summoned her staid beaded bag from the foyer and immediately began to dig inside. When her hand emerged she was holding a novel. The man standing across the table smirked at the predictability of it, but did not refuse when she tried to hand it to him. He took the book in hand, read the back cover and then turned an amused gaze back on her, a smile that frozen in place as his eyes locked on her forearm. Hermione felt her heart slam against her ribs in her chest when she realized that he was staring at the scar on her arm. She snapped her shirt sleeves down with a wicked flick of her wand and folded her arms across her chest before turning a defiant gaze on him. He seemed to shake himself free of whatever he'd been thinking and the smile appeared on his face once more.
"A muggle novel," he laughed. "And one about their second great war at that. Am I to assume you expect me to draw parallels between the trails of the main character and the trails of yourself?"
"No," Hermione said cuttingly. "This has nothing to do with me Malfoy. I can't force you to take anything away from that book, but I can hope that it might make you think about the price of bigotry."
"Ahh yes," he sighed as he swept away from the table and toward the stairs. "The Know It All intends to sway me with books. I should have seen that coming."
It had only taken him a day to finish the book, but he did not want to encourage the little chit, so he put on a wonderful act to suggest that he was still reading the damnable book for two more days whenever Hermione was in the house. He didn't want to admit that he had finished the book, because he was certain he would then be required to discuss the damn thing. How could he express the fact that he hated the book at the same time that he loved it? It was brilliantly written from the point of view of death, but it was so aggravatingly honest about what war was that it forced him to think of the part he had played.
He knew exactly why she had made him read the book, and that just enraged him further. How dare she try to throw his past in his face as if having read this book could have enabled him to stop the rise of a megalomaniac or kept him from dragging his son down into the mud with him? Who was she to try and tell him how he should have behaved? It was not her place!
He had hoped that waiting a few days to tell her had finished it would allow him the time to bring his temper into check, but he had no such luck Three days after handing the book to him Hermione gave up what had apparently been and act and spent all of breakfast staring at him with her arms crossed over her chest, tapping a foot in irritation under the table. She persisted with the frankly annoying behavior all through his cup of tea, English muffin, and hard-boiled egg. Lucius did his best to pretend he didn't notice it and continued to read the morning paper as if nothing was happening. She at least had the decency to remain silent until I set the paper aside and met her gaze.
"You do of course understand that you have zero chance of returning to your ancestral home if you refuse to comply with my program?" she bit out with a frustrated sneer. "You've been remanded into my custody, and the ministry is perfectly fine leaving you here if I don't give a recommendation on your behalf. If you continue to pretend you're reading that book rather than actually doing it you are going to stay in this bloody house until you die."
"Don't work yourself into a tizzy," he drawled at her.
"Read the damn book Malfoy," she argued, slapping her hand down on the table. "I realize you obviously still hate muggles, but it's actually a pretty good book."
"How I may or may not feel about muggles is not a topic I have any intention of discussing with you this morning," he sighed at her as he leaned back in his seat and crossed his arms over his chest. "If it will please your majesty however the book was not completely repellent."
"It is exactly what we are—" she started to yell at him before her ears caught up with her mind. "Wait, you've already finished the book?"
"Clearly," he sneered. "I finished it the first day you gave it but I had no interest in discussing it with you."
"Why not?" she asked him, uncrossing her arms from her chest and folding them on the table in front of her as she leaned forward in interest.
"I have no interest in having a happy little chat about that irritating piece of literature," he shouted a very slight tint of pink taking up residence in his cheeks. "I'm sure you'd love to beat your opinion on the great muggle war into me, and having some long winded discussion about the comparisons you'd like me to draw between what happened in the 1940's and what has been happening in the last several years."
"The book made you mad then?" she asked carefully.
"Yes it did, you irritating little chit," he snipped. "And you damn well knew it would. Mission accomplished."
"I admit I wanted you to think about what happened to Max because of his heritage, but I did not set out to hurt your feelings or make you exceedingly angry," she said, offering her hands up in supplication. "It was obviously very upsetting to you, so I won't force a discussion upon you. If you give me my book back I will give you your next reading assignment."
Lucius pulled up short. She wasn't going to force her ideology on him? She was not going to poke and prod him until he was forced into admitting that Max accurate representation of the average muggleborn who had to hide from the muggle registration committees just over a year ago. She was not at all what he expected her to be, and nothing like the pushy little know it all his son had described and he himself had opportunity to witness on a few occasions.
"Excuse me," he said pushing his chair out from the table and quickly sweeping out of the room.
He was gone only a moment before he returned with the book and set it unceremoniously on the table beside her. He folded his arms over his chest and leaned over her in his most intimidating stance while he waited. She pretended to be unphased, but he did not miss the small tremor that rocked through her before she tapped her wand on top of her book and caused it to vanish. He assumed she had sent it zipping back to her home, and was not surprised to see her twirling her wand artfully in an obvious summoning ritual. In the blink of an eye there was another book sitting on the table before her. This one was much smaller than the last one, and that caused a tiny smile to quirk the left side of his mouth. Perhaps she was giving up on this tactic already.
"Since you finished The Book Thief in just one day," she said as she picked up the little book and offered it to him with a smile. "I'll expect you to have this one done by the time I come back this evening."
"You don't intend to hover over me like a nanny this afternoon?" he sneered.
"I trust you can keep yourself occupied with Night," she shrugged. "And I need to spend the afternoon in the office."
"Wonderful," he said sweeping away with the book in hand. "It will be nice to have a little silence here."
Hermione held back a scoff as she watched him walk away. She hadn't been noisy yet! There was a petulant part of her that wanted to stay and spend the day showing him what a racquet she could make, but she squashed it down into the same hole she frequently pushed the urge to hit Draco Malfoy during school. Instead she stood from the table and calmly walked out onto the porch so she could apparate into work.
He was sitting looking somewhat dejectedly staring out the front window when she returned that evening. She was somewhat glad that she had brought takeaway from the Leaky Cauldron this evening, as he did not seem particularly fond of her cooking and she wasn't sure he knew how to cook himself. For a moment she wondered why she cared if dinner would cheer him or not, but she shook her head to dismiss the thought as pointless and went into the dining room to begin plating the food he was sure to describe as peasant food.
She nearly jumped out her skin when he shuffled up behind her and grabbed the empty brown paper bag off of the table. He tossed the novel she had given him down on the table beside her and proceeded toward the kitchen presumable to throw the bag full of empty containers away. She sat down in front of her plate of fish and chips and waited for him to return. He did so within moments, his face an emotionless mask as he slid sinuously into the chair across from her.
"What quote did you relate to most in that book?" he asked her when he was finally settled.
"That's a difficult question," she said, stalling as her brain raced for an answer.
He watched her closely as her eyes tracked in the empty space, and he wondered if this little girl that had so often bested his son in school had an eidetic memory. She looked as if she were actually rereading the book within her mind. He imagined that would make obtaining the highest test scores in school quite easy, and for some reason that only made him want to proceed with his admittedly vicious mental attack more. He felt as if that was what she had perpetrated against him today, and he wished to give her a taste of her own medicine.
"His cold eyes stared at me. At last, he said wearily: ' have more faith in Hitler than in anyone else. He alone has kept his promises, all his promises, to the Jewish people.'" She said finally, looking up to meet his gaze that almost completely hide his shock. "If I had to pick one line that I identified with most it would probably be that one. It is very similar to how I felt many times when I was confronted again and again with corruption amongst those who were supposed to be the good guys."
The room was quite for a moment, and Hermione wondered if something large was hanging in the balance of his response or not. She wondered if perhaps she should not have been quite so honest. She wondered why she hadn't just lied to him, honestly what did it matter how she had taken the book. This wasn't about her. She hoped that none of that showed on her admittedly animated face while she stared at him waiting for his response.
"That surprises me," he said finally, plucking at a nonexistent bit of lint on his shirt sleeve. "I was rather certain it would be something along the lines of 'An SS came towards us wielding a club. He commanded: "Men to the left! Women to the right!" Eight words spoken quietly, indifferently, without emotion. Eight simple, short words. Yet that was the moment when I left my mother.' I found myself wondering what was the last thing you heard before you left your own mother."
Hermione could feel the ways her eyes widened at that statement, and she was ashamed to admit that they burned for a moment with tears that wanted to fall before she could regain control of herself. It took only a moment to stamp down that painful reaction, and a second more for the rage to boil up under her skin.
"You haven't a clue what you are talking about Lucius Malfoy," she spat.
"Don't I?" he said, looking up from his sleeve to pin her with his steely gaze. "I know that you predicted the threat against your parents and swept them away before we could strike. I know that you erased their memories and shipped them off to an undisclosed location. I know that you sat upon the couch for an hour crying after their car pulled away from the driveway for the last time. What I don't know, and my morbid curiosity after reading this novel drives me to ask, is what was the last thing said before your mother ceased to be your mother within her own mind."
Hermione's hand slammed down on the table in frustration before she pushed back her chair and stood to her full height, which was of course not very intimidating, but the way her anger burned in her eyes and her curly mess of hair seemed to spark with magical energy was enough to give him pause. He could practically see the wheels turn and then lock into place with her mind at the realization that someone had been watching her house, and had seen her do what she had done.
"No, don't want to answer that one?" he said calmly, as if he were completely unaffected by her display despite the fact that he was and felt she deserved to feel as unsettled as he had today. "Why not then instead answer me what the first thing was that your mother heard when she became your mother again? Did you tell her that you loved her, or that you missed her? Or was your first sentence to her after returning her memories an apology for the atrocious crime that you committed against her while you were gallivanting about saying that we death eaters were violating others?"
"Oh I'll be sure to tell you when I know," she spat, but they both knew that was a lie. "It's none of your damn business."
"You haven't returned their memories?" he asked, cutting right through to what she had actually said a second ago without meaning to. "That is a bit cruel don't you think?"
"I cannot return their memories because I cannot find them," she said quietly, as if there were no air in her lungs before her face hardened with anger once more. "Which quote do you identify with most then Malfoy. I don't suppose it was 'They are committing the greatest indignity human beings can inflict on one another: telling people who have suffered excruciating pain and loss that their pain and loss were illusions.' was it?"
"You'll have to get up a little earlier in the morning if you want to have a successful verbal spar with a Slytherin my dear," he said indication for her to take her seat again as if this were his home and she were his guest. "I realize that was meant only to wound me, but I am feeling somewhat generous at the moment I will actually answer your question if you take your seat."
Good, he thought. Let her think I am taking control of the conversation to belittle her. Do not allow her to realize that you regret what you just did. Lucius Malfoy does not regret bringing pain to someone who deserves it. He couldn't help but remind himself that even if this girl really deserve pain, which he was not so sure of anymore, she'd already had her fair share. Unbidden an image of her writhing on his drawing room floor came to mind and then he pictured that damnable scar on her arm. She begrudgingly took her seat and motioned for him to go on.
"It was pitch dark. I could hear only the violin, and it was as though Juliek's soul were the bow. He was playing his life. The whole of his life was gliding on the strings-his last hopes, his charred past, his extinguished future. He played as he would never play again...When I awoke, in the daylight, I could see Juliek, opposite me, slumped over, dead. Near him lay his violin, smashed, trampled, a strange overwhelming little corpse." He said quietly, his somber tone as well as the words he was saying drawing her in until she was leaning with her elbows on the table completely focused on him. "You look surprised. A death eater cannot know how to play the violin?"
"I wasn't responding to the idea of you playing the violin," she said quietly. "Thought admittedly I would not have pictured you as a man who spared much thought for music. I was just thinking about what it meant that out of all that is in that book, that is the line that sticks with you the most. Do you think you relate more to Elie or Juliek in that piece. I could see either I suppose. You could be forced to witness Severus Snape offering his final concerto masterpiece, having in fact been the one to send him off to die. Or you could be the man who put every bit of his soul out there, only to have it striped away from you like your family and your freedom. It is for you to decide who you should be compared to, not me."
"I do not wish to speak on this any longer," he said quietly as he pushed away from the table and turned his back on her to walk out of the room.
He was no longer in the dining room when he spoke again, but Hermione heard him clearly anyway.
"I had identified with Juliek, thinking of my own fall from grace as a type of death long before I lost my wife and son," he admitted. "You are however quite accurate in relating Severus to Juliek instead. I did a very terrible thing in the moment that I knowingly sent him to slaughter."
Hermione sat quietly in the silence that reigned after that statement. A tiny piece of her fear of the man drifted away as she realized that Lucius Malfoy was human. Here she was working for equality and yet she had made the same error so many bigots before her had made and thought of the man as something less than human. She had thought of him in shade, and that allowed her to continue fearing and hating him.
She realized that she had a lot to think about as she picked up the book off the table. She replaced it with the next book she wished for him to read, The Kite Runner, and then she left the house once more. She thought he might like to step away from the holocaust for a moment, but she didn't want to disturb him to explain any of that. They could both use a little space this evening.
Hermione knew without entering the halfway house that her book suggestion had not been well received. She apparated onto the front walk and before she could even step forward she saw what had once been her fairly new copy of The Kite Runner. She'd only just read it a few weeks ago, and had given it to Lucius because of the interesting perspective it gave from the other side of a group of people who were not viewed as the most loving society. She had hoped to have a conversation about paternalism and how that had influences their society and had made avoiding the war damn near impossible.
She had not expected to find a book that had been partially torn in half with pages missing and burned. How had he even managed to burn it, he wasn't allowed a wand and his magic was still restricted. Hermione knelt down beside the ruined book to take a closer look and saw that one curved burn mark still existed on the edge.
"You pressed it to the stove top?" she mused looking up at the door in confusion.
There of course was no answer as she was alone outside. Hermione took a moment to mourn the loss of perfectly good book, and then she vanished it with a flick of the wand. Then she took a deep calming breath and proceeded into the house and whatever reaction she was about to get from the surprisingly temperamental Slytherin inside.
"Mr. Malfoy?" she called out tentatively when she had closed the door.
Silence was her answer. She proceeded further into the house looking from room to room unable to find him immediately. He was not in the living room or the dining room. He wasn't in the kitchen either but there was evidence of his fit of temper with ashes from the book littering the floor as well as a discarded glass and spilled water that indicated how he had put out the fire he started.
Hermione took a moment to vanish his mess before she turned on her heel and marched resolutely toward the stairs. She did not bother to call out for her charge again, he was likely pretending not to hear her anyway. She pushed his bedroom door open carefully, peaking inside but seeing immediately that he was not there either. A worry began to spring up in her that somehow he had managed to get out of the house despite all of the warding, but the strange tightness that had taken up residence in her lungs died away when she came flush with the bathroom door. There he was sitting on the edge of the bathtub holding his hand awkwardly into a sink full of water.
"What are you doing?" Hermione asked him as she stepped into the room.
"Go away," he groused at her with no fight in his voice. "I have no interested in speaking with you."
Hermione had not expected resignation from him, so the lack of fiery temper left her floundering as to what to do. She had expected the rage that had lead him to destroy her book to still be present, but this man did not look as if he had the energy to stand up from the ledge of the tub and walk out of the room, let alone rage at her.
"What happened to your hand?" she asked carefully as she stepped closer.
It was not lost on her that he recoiled away from her before he regained control of whatever that reaction was and his face went blank. It took effort not to put her hands up in a show that she would not hurt him, but she seemed to know instinctively that would only make the situation worse very quickly.
"It seems I am able to wield fire as a weapon when I am in possession of a wand." He sighed and then he pulled his hand out of the water to show her.
"Merlin," Hermione gasped when she saw how badly his hand had been burned. "Did you pick the book up when it was still burning?"
"I was holding it against the stove," he snapped at her. " My hand was on the book when it caught fire you insolent witch."
"Hush," she said without any real malice in her voice as she turned her wand on him.
She cast a cooling charm to relieve some of his pain and then she pulled open the medicine cabinet and dug through the many healing potions that were present until she found the paste meant for healing burns. Marietta had laughed when she had included that, asking her just how she thought anyone would need it, and while Hermione hadn't predicted this situation in particular she felt vindicated in having included it in their first aid kit.
"Do you mean to tell me I've been sitting by a burn cream this entire damn time?" he sighed in resignation.
"You couldn't have known to check behind the mirror," Hermione shrugged as she gingerly took his injured hand in hers happy to see a lack of reaction to her touching him. "It's a muggle practice."
He did flinch just a bit at that, but he said nothing. Hermione focused on gently applying the cream to his hand. The bathroom was somewhat uncomfortably silent around them, but Hermione tried to pretend she was comfortable. She was very aware of the detachment that was present in her charge that hadn't been before tonight.
"I take it you did not like the book," she said softly.
"No, I did not." He said his voice controlled, but his anger present in the way her jerked his hand away and stood up.
"Do you want to tell me what was so unlikable about it that you decided to set it on fire?" she asked just as calmly, taking a step back to allow him a bit of space.
"It's irrelevant," he said, some of that weird sense of distraction appearing in his voice once more. "I'm done with your books."
"No. I'm afraid you are not," Hermione said simply, quickly screwing the cap back onto the jar before she crossed her arms over her chest. "We will continue on with the books until you are able to see why I am even having you read these books."
"You act as if I am lost and cannot see that you are trying to lead me down the path of equality and acceptance," he said burning her with his gaze when he finally looked at her, and pinning her into place with a renewed surge of old fear when I stood up from the edge of the tub. "You act as if I know nothing, but it is you Hermione who cannot see the forest through the trees."
Hermione's breathe caught in her chest and she froze in place. Some part of her that she didn't dare let anyone know about was absolutely terrified of this man. Particularly in the moment with him so much larger than her and both of them standing so close in such a small bathroom. She stayed frozen in place waiting for the shoe to drop, but he simple swept out of the room. She gasped in a lungful of air before following after him.
"Enlighten me then," she said as she followed him into his bedroom. "What is it that I am missing?"
"You are the brightest witch of your age are you not?" he spat from where he stood glaring moodily out of the window.
Hermione was suddenly struck by how aristocratic he looked doing that. With the sun glinting off his silvery blonde hair and half of his face hidden in profile… well he was almost beautiful. She might appreciate the image more if he were a better person, or at least less terrifying.
"Obviously something in the subject matter of that book resonated with you," she mused as she perched on the bottom corner of his bed. "The problem with trying to deduce what exactly it is that upset you is that I don't know how much of the book you've read. There are different pieces, in different sections of the book, that could illicit your anger. Well anyone's anger really."
"Think long and hard about if you want to continue down this road," he bit out, turning further away from her so she could only stair at the back of his head and his tensed shoulders.
"Where did you stop reading?" Hermione asked, refusing to be intimidated away from this potential break through.
"I read up through chapter seven," he said, looking back over his shoulder and pinning her with a haunted gaze. "That was enough. I am done with your foolish little reading assignments. I will not barter what is left of my sanity for the chance I might get to leave this damn house one day."
"Oh," Hermione said softly as it started to fall into place for her. "When this tore through your memories like it so clearly did were you Amir or Hassan? Or were you perhaps Assef?"
"Don't you dare!" he shouted at her, moving so quickly she almost missed it. "Don't you dare lump me in with the likes of him."
In just the blink of an eye he had gone from staring out of the window stoically to pinning Hermione to the doorframe with a head pressed angrily against the wall on either side of her head. She could feel his breath panting out of him in quick bursts against her face, and her own heart was about to beat of her chest with fear. More than that though it felt like it might break despite the fact that she had never cared for this man.
"Hassan then," she whispered and he flinched, punching his hand into the wall beside her before he backed away from her. "Who did that to you Lucius?"
It seemed to only hurt him further that she had finally broken down and used his first name. She wasn't sure if his behavior changed drastically, or if it was the sudden knowledge that she had that made him change from a caged tiger to a defeated animal that had no fight left to offer.
"I bet you want to read so much into that don't you?" he whispered as he returned to the window. "You expect me to tell you a story about how some dirty muggle man pinned me to the ground and stole my virtue like that poor boy in your nasty little book. You want that to be the reason I became what I am? So what does your little mind make of the fact that it was a friend? What story do you spin for my life when you discover that I was eleven, had just started at Hogwarts, and it was a fellow Slytherin, a young man who I counted a friend and had spent years as playmates with before I came to school? Does it change your mind about me to know that I followed that boy into the ranks of the death eaters?"
"Is that supposed to take away from your injury?" she asked him softly, not daring to move from her spot against the door. "That it was your friend? I think that is worse. I cannot ever really justify the pain you inflicted on others, that was still wrong, but I can see how you might have felt the need to perpetuate against others what had been done to you."
"For the love of Merlin," he groaned, fisting the gauzy white curtain in his hand and refusing to look at her. "I already told you I have never raped anyone."
"No, you didn't," Hermione agreed, taking him at his word there. "But you hurt people. You violated people. You stole virtues of your own. You may not have pinned a twelve year old boy down in an alley while he was trying to collect a kite, but you know that in some ways you are just as guilty as Assef and his gang. But Lucius, I hope you also understand that you are just as innocent as Hassan in other ways."
The room was silent after that. She didn't dare push him further, and he didn't seem able to speak any longer. Hermione watched him drown in the emotions that he did not seem to be able to hide on his face at the moment and she just waited. All she could offer in a moment like that was to be present, even if he didn't want her there.
They stood in silence as the sun slowly set outside. Neither moved from their spots. Hermione grew steadily stiffer by not moving a muscle, but she suspected that Lucius was in more pain. That thought alone motivated her to remain still for longer. She did not speak to him until it was nearly pitch black in the bedroom. Lucius was hidden from her view by the darkness of the night.
"We can take a break from the books for a while," she said softly. "I think it's time I took you out amongst muggles anyway. I'll tell you more about it in the morning."
"You can't drop a bombshell like that," he said in a quiet and hoarse voice. "You can't do that and then just leave. What is it you have planned?"
"I think tomorrow Marietta and I will take you to an art museum on the west side," Hermione told him. "She wanted to check it out for an upcoming even anyway, and you aren't allowed to go out with just one chaperone this early in the program."
"I wish you would just let me return to Malfoy Manor," he sighed tiredly. "You all seem to think I need to be here to keep from repeating past behaviors. You don't seem to understand that being a prisoner to the Dark Lord in my own home already enforced that change in me. I just want to go home."
"No one has been in Malfoy Manor in a long time," Hermione told him carefully. "Narcissa has returned to the Black estates, and Draco and Astoria have purchased a brand new home in London that he is living in alone until the wedding."
"Do you think you could get my son to come to the art museum?" Lucius asked, so quietly his voice was nearly non-existent. "I know he wants nothing to do with me, but if he were to meet with your assistant perhaps. I could see him at the very least."
"I will see what I can do Lucius," Hermione promised, unashamed of the soft spot she had for him this evening. "But you have to be on your best behavior."
All he offered to that was a light air laugh. When silence fell again Hermione knew it was time for her to go home for the evening.
Lucius was not someone to be around when Hermione was unable to get Draco to make an appearance in the art museum. Oh he tried to look like an upstanding citizen viewing great art despite the fact that it was created by muggles. He tried valiantly, but a screen that had hidden him from view of Hermione had been taken away the night before, and she was beginning to see him. It was hazy like the sunrise streaking through the trees of a sleepy forest, but she was beginning to know him. Knowing him let her see that he was hurt. He missed his child, and perhaps more than missing him he was desperate to see him now that he was free of the tyrant that had nearly destroyed their family.
Hermione could see that he didn't need his ex-wife. He didn't need his sprawling home or his money. He didn't need anything except for his son. The one thing he really needed right now, the unconditional love a child offers their parent, was the one thing that was not forth coming. Hermione hoped that somewhere in his heart Draco still loved his father, but that part was so far buried right now that even if he understood the way he would wound his father by refusing to see him he didn't care. Hermione thought it was likely that Draco wanted him to hurt the way that he had during the war. It surprised her to find herself siding with Lucius rather than Draco.
Two weeks passed in an eerie silence after their trip to the art museum. Lucius simply didn't talk to her. They ate breakfast without speaking. She watched him read the books she was bringing to him once more, but they did not talk about them. She wasn't going to force him to, and he clearly didn't want to break his silence. He remained quiet when Hermione took him to a dinner that was attended by Harry, Ginny, Neville, Kingsley, and Blaise Zambini at a muggle outdoor café. At least the silence had been broken by others, but still Lucius did not talk.
Hermione brought him the foods she had slowly discovered he loved in hopes of eliciting a vocal response from him but he did not talk. She made messes in the house in an attempt to anger him, but he just alternated between leaving them and cleaning up behind her without ever making a sound. Hermione was at her breaking point with him, and started to send daily owls to his son.
She literally begged Draco to come to the halfway house in letter after letter, drowning under the continued silence. She struggled and struggled, and it wasn't until they were going on a third week of silence that she thought of the solution. She made a floo call to the home of the Greengrass's and she plead her case to Astoria. She begged her to think of what this rift would do to Draco down the road if she could not care for how Lucius suffered now. She laid all of her shame aside and she actually begged for the man in her care, but she was unable to read any chance in Astoria's face. Ultimately she ended the floo call assuming that once again she would spend and evening watching Lucius slowly and silently recede within his mind. She wondered if his depression would cause him to harm himself, and she had to admit that the thought of him doing that upset her greatly. She had to admit that she had begun to care for the man that she had once been terrified of.
Two days after her desperate floo call there came the sound of someone knocking on the front door while she stood awkwardly against the wall in the living room watching Lucius pretend to read the newspaper. She knew he wasn't actually reading it as he had been staring at the same spot on the page for over an hour, but she let him pretend. The sound of the door made her heart leap into her chest though. She wondered, as she hurried to answer it, if Lucius was filled with as much hope as she was. Did he pray that it was Draco behind the door like she did? Would she be nearly as heartbroken as him if it wasn't? Hermione tentatively opened the front door, telling herself inside she would not frown if it was Marietta who was knocking, but she was unable to stop the beaming smile that overtook her face when she saw that it was Draco standing awkwardly on the front porch.
"Well Granger if I had known you would look at me like I single handedly made the sun rise," Draco drawled as he adjusted the sleeves of his robes with a flick of his wrists and then folded his arms imperiously over his chest. "I would have shown up a lot sooner."
"Thank you Draco," Hermione murmured, uncaring of how sycophantic she might sound. "Thank you for coming. Your father is in the living room."
Astoria looped her hand through the small gap between Draco's body and his elbow, and to the casual viewer it would look like she was simply allowing her husband to guide her to their destination. Hermione could see however that Astoria was close to dragging Draco into the house with her. She knew for certain then that Draco had no interest in being here, but she hoped Astoria forcing him to come would turn out to be worth it. She followed at a casual distance after the couple as they made their way into the living room so she could keep an eye on everything.
Lucius rose swiftly from where he was sitting, the newspaper falling to the ground giving away his stoic face as the act that it was. Lucius's face betrayed nothing, but somehow Hermione still knew he was hurt by the way that Draco stiffened at the sight of him moving.
"Hello Draco," Lucius said formally with a slight nod. "And Astoria."
"Hello Mr. Malfoy," Astoria said diplomatically when a few awkward seconds of silence indicated that Draco had no intention of speaking.
"You both look well," Lucius pushed on, despite the cold look in his son's eyes. "Are you settling in nicely here in London?"
"I don't know who has been telling you about where I live now," Draco spat. "But I have no interest in discussing my home with you. I have no interest in discussing anything with a scurrilous bastard like you."
"Draco," Astoria cut across him with a soft yet powerful whisper. "This is your father."
"No, this man is no father of mine," Draco spat. "This is a man who besmirched my family name and destroyed my childhood by bartering me off to a megalomaniac. You know I only came here today for you. I want nothing to do with him."
"Oh Draco," Astoria said, her eyes flashing to Hermione with concern mingling with confusion easy to see there. "Perhaps we should just go."
"I think that might be best," Hermione agreed quietly, her eyes locked on Lucius he was visibly shaken by what his son had said.
"We will not be back," Draco spat over his shoulder as he drug his fiancé out of the house behind him.
"Wait," Lucius croaked his voice rough and unrecognizable.
Draco was unaffected and he disappeared with his wife to be in tow, but Hermione felt as if she had been lanced through the heart. She became afraid again for the first time in weeks, but this time she was not afraid of what the wizard she was staring at might do to her. She was afraid of what he would do to himself. He had seemed on the edge of suicidal before, and to be rebuked by the one person he had needed, the one person he cared about in this world, she wasn't sure he could take it.
She started to step toward him when she saw something dark and painful light up in his eyes, but her steps faltered despite her best efforts. She watched in an almost detached fascination as breath sawed rapidly in an out of his chest as he grew more agitated, but she began to grow very weak. She tried to reach out her hand toward him, to do what she wasn't quite sure, but her arm had become so heavy that she found herself completely unable to lift it.
"Lucius?" she whispered as the world spun around her at a strange angle.
He did not respond to her, his whole body was trembling as his breathing grew steadily more erratic and he did not seem to be connecting with the world around him. Lucius did not react, nor did he seem to really notice, when Hermione slumped to the ground unconscious. He did not react when every bit of glass in the room shattered from the outburst of uncontrolled magic that exploded so forcefully out of him that it momentarily jerked his chest up toward the ceiling before it returned to its rapid rise and fall.
Every window, lamp, mirror in the room shattered spraying the room with their shimmering debris. Both Lucius and Hermione sustained injuries, the little shards of glass cutting small red lines on the bits of exposed skin, but neither reacted to it. Hermione lay on the ground, still lost to the world, covered in a fine dusted layer of broken glass, a slow and gentle rise of her back the only indication to the world that she was still alive. Lucius, despite his lack of reaction to the explosion he had caused, folded in on himself grasping at his ears as a shrill alarm began to reverberate off the walls in the living room.
There was a beat of confused chaos and then with three cracks in rapid succession aurors appeared in the living room amongst the madness. Savage, Proudfoot, and Dawlish stood in dueling stances with wands drawn and zeroed in on Lucius. The threat in question, did not appear to be a threat at all as he curled into a ball on the floor and to their immense surprise began to sob.
Dawlish cancelled the alarm that had been triggered by the wards detecting that Hermione Granger had been incapacitated and in the absence of the trilling sound, the pained sobs issuing from the parolee seemed all the more pained. Proudfoot ran a series of rapid diagnostics and quickly deduced that uncontrolled magic was still seeping rapidly out of Lucius Malfoy and without further thought cast a stunner on the man. A ringing silence fell when the wails were cut off and the three men stared in shock at the scene around them. The wards had been placed on the house to protect Hermione or Marietta in the off chance that one of their charges got ahold of one of their wands and became hostile, but none of their training had prepared them for, nor seemed to really consider, the possibility of something happening that would so upset the parolee that he or she would lose control of their magic and injure their host or themselves without even meaning to. It was unprecedented.
The situation at hand made it abundantly clear that Hermione and Marietta could not be the ones to hold the wards controlling the felons magic, as another situation like this could happen in the future. Something had upset the parolee so much that he had completely drained Hermione's magical reserves as her body naturally tried to contain his magical outburst. Proudfoot quickly took charge of the situation dispensing Savage to take Lucius Malfoy to St. Mungos and Dawlish to take Hermione in for medical care just as quickly while he dealt with the damage that had been wrought on the house. They would have to wait until later to determine what had even caused such an outburst and try to determine if Lucius Malfoy had in fact violated any of the terms of his release.
Hermione woke slowly, groggy with sleep the clung to her like a wet blanket, and her eyes were slow to bring the world around her into focus. Her mind did not seem to be firing on all cylinders but she gradually became aware of the fact that she seemed to be lying in a hospital bed and she felt more tired than she had ever felt in her life. She felt more drained even than she had in the singularly most poignant moment of true tiredness of her life when she had been draped indelicately in Ronald Weasley's arms on the beach in front of shell cottage just after escaping from Malfoy Manor.
With that jarring thought her mind lurched back to the present with some semblance of speed and she remembered the look of pain so deep it mirrored mental illness that had been present on Lucius's face before she had lost consciousness. It felt like trying to wade through honey, but eventually she was able to piece together the truth of the matter for herself. He had been so upset by the interaction with his son that he had lost control of his magic. In doing so he had been able to push beyond the limiting wards she had placed on his person and actually tap into that magical power which rapidly drained her own magic trying to contain it.
She thought maybe she should feel angry or betrayed, but honestly all she felt was guilty. She felt guilty that she had made him read the book that had sent him spiraling into this soul crippling grief. She felt even worse that she had tried to fulfill his request to see his son without first trying to determine if Draco could show his father a simple kindness. She wasn't quite sure when she had begun to side with Lucius, or when she had begun to think of him by his first name for that matter, but it seemed she would be unable to go back now. He had become a human, and an injured one at that, she could not stop herself from trying to help him now. He was desperately in need of a champion in his corner, and despite how she should probably still hate him she found that she was willing to be that person for him.
Her musings broke off at the sound of the door opening, and for the first time she looked beyond the crisply folded standard issue white hospital blanket that was pulled up to her chin. She noted that her surroundings were sterile, as was expected in a hospital, and their dullness caused the healers green robes to seem even more vibrant than they truly were. The man in black robes beside her certainly added in the illusion. Hermione met the gaze of that man and was surprised to see genuine concern on the usually annoyed face of Savage.
"It's good to see you awake," he said gruffly, standing back to allow the healer to step forward and begin casting diagnostic charms. "You fell asleep at a damn inconvenient time."
"You know me Savage," Hermione said in a gruff voice followed by an airy laugh. "I live to make your life difficult."
"Sure you do," he said with a short chortle of his own. "Do you know what happened?"
"Lucius had a burst of accidental magic," Hermione sighed. "Obviously a strong one considering just how quickly it put me on the ground. Unless of course we over estimated my magical fortitude. Perhaps I was successful before because I was casting against Marietta."
"I might be willing to play into your self-deprecation if you hadn't also cast against me," he said with a quirked brow. "I think this comes down less to how strong of a wizard Malfoy is and more to how intense of an emotion he had to have been feeling. To be quite frank he's luck you had wards place on him, else he might had seriously harmed or perhaps even killed himself."
"Is that even possible?" Hermione mused.
"If the emotion behind the loss of magical control is intense enough," the healer answered distractedly still running her wand over Hermione and casting a serious of spells that neither witch or wizard seemed to recognize. "Based on the explosion Mr. Malfoy caused when his power was being tempered I am wont to believe that his loss of control would have killed you both if he had been at full strength. Thank Merlin for small miracles that he was bound by your wards."
"Wards that you will not be placing again," Savage said as he crossed his arms over his chest. "A gathering of pertinent Wizengamot determined that Malfoy was not responsible for his actions and did not need to be returned to Azkaban, but it was heavily debated whether or not it was safe to return him to the halfway house. In the end it was decided to allow it so long as the wards are retained under the control of the Auror department. They have already been put back into place, and I am once again Malfoy's keeper."
"I'm sorry," Hermione said quietly, tucking her chin to her chest in a strikingly childlike show of guilt. "I know you aren't fond of the drain."
"Don't worry about it," he shrugged. "The transitional wards are much less of a burden, and soon enough those will be lowered to allow him to transition back into society again. I'd rather have the added strain if it comes with the peace of mind that I'm not sending you off to the gallows with each parolee that crosses your threshold."
"It's not as if each one of them will want my head on a pike," Hermione argued. "Besides if one of them was actually going to try and move against me, don't you think it would have been Lucius? He has the biggest grudge to hold against me, and his attack was completely on accident."
"I still don't like it," he grumbled. "I don't much like anything about this program to be quite honest. I'd like to see the lot of them locked up for good or cart out of English wizarding society, but alas it simply isn't in the cards."
"Those that are beyond seeing the error of their ways, truly, won't be released Savage, you know that," Hermione sighed, sitting up at the indication of the healer, noticing as she did so that she wasn't feeling quite so tired anymore. "Lucius underwent several rounds of interrogation under veritaserum before his release. He may not be the next candidate for minister of magic, but he isn't the death eater that was locked away at the end of the war anymore either."
"Whatever you say," he groused. "If you want to deal with him, you just go right ahead. I don't want anything to do with any of these scum bags."
"Scum bags or not," the healer interjected with a quirked brow that indicated she did not approve of Savage's term of endearment in the slightest. "Hermione is ready for release, and I am clearing her to return to work if she so wishes. Mr. Malfoy may be remanded into her custody but I should like to hear that he remained on bed rest for the next several days. I will supply you with a serious of potions that will keep him sedated and nourished for the next 72 hours while his body recuperates from the damage it wrought upon itself."
"How am I to administer the potions to him if you are keeping him sedated?" Hermione asked, genuinely concerned.
"They won't actually force him to sleep unless he is tired enough to do so," she explained as she summoned a small wooden box that emitted a clinking sound indicating it was filled with potions bottles. "He will remain very calm and docile, but he will be able to sit up and take the potions at your indication. He will be lethargic enough that walking will be out of the question so you will need to cast cleansing and ah… relief charms on him over the next few days to keep him comfortable."
Hermione knew exactly what the healer was indicating but she could tell by the quizzical look on his face that Savage wasn't quite sure. She just shook her head and instead shifted out from under the blankets so she could place her feet firmly on the ground. She pushed herself up, embarrassed to sway a bit to the left when she was fully standing on her feet. She quickly schooled her response and tried to ignore the tingly feel in her legs and general woozy feeling in her head.
"It will take another day for you to feel one hundred percent again Ms. Granger," the healer explained. "Try to take it easy, and get lots of fluids in the meantime."
With that she handed the box of potions over to Hermione and she swept out of the room. Save quickly stepped forward to take the potions from her and offer her his arm to help steady her. He shook his head as if he couldn't help but disagree with what he was about to say.
"I suppose you'd like to be apparated to the halfway house rather than your own flat?" he asked.
"Yes," she agreed. "I think tonight I will actually stay in the house, so I can take it easy but also keep an eye on Lucius. I'm assuming he is also being sent home today?"
"My understanding was that he was being released right now as well," Savage nodded. "I believe Dawlish will be delivering him to the house at any moment. He will probably still be out cold when you get there though, so you may as well have a bit of a lie in."
Hermione had done just that, not waking until the next morning. When she noticed that the early morning sun was streaming through the window she immediately hopped out of bed and hurried across the hall to check in on Lucius. He was lying in bed awake staring listlessly up at the ceiling. He did not appear to be thinking about anything at all, his eyes slightly glassy as he looked into middle space.
"Good morning Lucius," Hermione said
She wasn't surprised when she didn't get a response. She just went to the bedside table and opened the wooden box full of potions and took the first little glass bottle out and pulled the cork.
"Alright, time for a potion Lucius," she said as she perched on the edge of the bed and slid her hand under his head. "Aright, tilt up a little bit for me. There you go. Swallow it all now. Good job."
She felt as if she was coaxing a small child into taking their medicine, but it was successful so she couldn't really complain. Lucius seemed to sag into the mattress after the potion was administered. Hermione sat beside him watching his eyes begin to flutter until they slowly drifted shut. Not that she would admit it to anyone, but she sat there just watching him sleep for a long time. He looked quiet peaceful with his face smoothed of any anger or worry and the sun shining softly off his aquiline features.
"I know you're upset," Hermione said quietly, watching his closed eyes. "It's okay to be upset. What happened was painful and unexpected, but you can't let it destroy you like this. You've got to pick yourself back up."
She was shocked when his heavy lids pulled back and she was staring into grey eyes that we surprisingly clear for someone who was supposed to have just woken up. She offered him a shaky smile but he showed no visible reaction to it. Instead he shocked her by dragging his lethargic arm up from under the blankets and grabbing her hand from where it lay limp against the coverlet.
"How do you pick yourself up after everything is gone?" he asked her in a raspy barely there voice. "When you wake up in the morning and you realize that your family is gone and you aren't likely to ever get them back, how do you even get out of bed?"
Hermione was initially shocked by the question, and she wondered if he was trying to be hurtful to her. For a second she was angry, but then she realized that he meant no harm with the question. He truly needed to answer to such a question because of what had happened to him, and he looked to her for the answer because he knew that she was dealing with a vaguely similar situation.
"I think part of it is just letting that pain drift away," she said after a long while. "You invest your time with other people you care about like friends, or a significant other… if you have them, and you hope. You hope that one day you will have your family again."
"It's the hope that may very well kill me," he whispered. "To hope for something I cannot get back… even if Draco were to forgive me I still cannot retrieve the family I have destroyed. Narcissa is gone forever. It's strange, because I don't think it's Narcissa that I miss specifically, but a wife. I miss having a partner, and that was something I lost long before I went to Azkaban."
"That's something you can pursue in the future," Hermione told him delicately. "Obviously right now is not the opportune time, since you can't really go out anywhere. You can't take a potential suitor on a date just yet, but you could in the future if that's something you want. Or you can foster new friendships, or healthier friendships from the ones you already have. You can build a new family for yourself. That's what I've done for myself in a way. I built a family around myself to help me through while I cannot find my parents."
"I just want my son," she said petulantly before he slowly turned his head away from her to stare at the opposite wall. "And you'd be lying if you said you wouldn't trade your substitute family of Potter and the Weasley's to be with your mother and father."
"Hush," Hermione sighed.
With that she left Lucius alone in the bedroom and then she did something she had not done since Lucius had been released from Azkaban. She flood called Marietta and asked her to cover for her so she could take a bit of personal time. She reassured her that Lucius was heavily warded and almost equally sedated, and that Marietta should not expect any trouble from him so long as she kept up on the potion regiment and gave him some space. As soon as Marietta was settled in at the house, so returned to her flat with plans to not emerge for at least twenty-four hours, if not forty-eight. She needed a nice long bubble bath, plenty of sleep, and to spend some more time scrying for her parents in Australia.
In the end Hermione had sent an official notice of temporary leave of absence to both Marietta and the head of the Department of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes. As was protocol when missing more than three days of work she filed the appropriate paperwork and due to her stellar performance so far in congruence with her recent hospitalization she was almost immediately approved.
She was away for just over a week. She took that time to gather the wits that had been scattered by the change in dynamic between her and Lucius, and to chase down the most recent lead on her parents. She'd been at such a loss trying to find them as they had not ever arrived at the destination she had originally sent them too. More than once since the end of the world she'd had the terrifying thought that perhaps they had been killed before they could get there, but while scrying she finally stumbled upon a relatively new dental practice in Sydney Australia that was owned by a married couple.
She'd taken the first portkey that she could into Australia to investigate further, but had quickly found that the older couple that owned the practice while carrying the last name Wilkins were not in fact her parents. Her stomach had turned at the thought of how close she had been, it had seemed like the perfect fit. She tried to cut off all of her tumultuous emotions at least long enough to get home, but she had cried all over the old rain boot that had served as her portkey home.
The rest of her leave of absences was spent curled up under her duvet once again morning the loss of her parents as vividly as if she had just received word of their deaths. It felt like every bit of hope that had once existed in her heart of finding them had died on this particular trip and she could not bring herself to get out of bed for several days. She conjured glasses of water to get her by at first, but when her hunger became powerful enough to overpower her grief she finally drug her body from the bed. Once she was up and eating, it only made sense to clean herself up and return to work.
Forty-five minutes later found her freshly showered, her hair pulled back in an elegant twist, a well pressed set of robes in place, and an unreadable look on her face as she walked up the walk to the halfway house. It was early afternoon, so there were no lights on in the house, but even still she could see in the front window as if it were illuminated to draw her in. Marietta was sitting nervously in the bay seat before the window watch while Lucius paced back and forth, with a book in hand, clearly agitated about something, looking as if he were interrogating Marietta.
Hermione resisted the urge to stand on the porch and watch whatever was happening unfold. Instead she picked up her pace and quickly, yet quietly, passed through the front door and hurried toward the living room. She knew the moment that Lucius heard her heels clicking along the hardwood floor because he stopped speaking altogether. Hermione was gifted with one brief image of Lucius with his back ramrod straight staring in something akin to shock and the open doorway of the living room, but then he transitioned into the unreadable aristocratic man she was used to and she stepped into the room.
"Would it have been terribly difficult for you to simply tell me she was on her way here?" Lucius asked in an acidic voice as he offered a haughty glare to Marietta.
"Like I've been telling you all day Mr. Malfoy," Marietta sighed in exasperation. "Hermione has been on leave from work."
"It's alright Marietta," Hermione said as she stepped further into the room. "I really ought to have sent word ahead that I was planning to return today. I imagine it's been a very long week for you. Why don't you go ahead and call it an early day?"
"Thank you," Marietta said, hopping up from where she was seated and sheepishly heading for the door. "I'll see you in the office sometime tomorrow."
Hermione nodded to her, and then stood patiently waiting for Lucius to speak to her. The pair of them listened to the quiet sounds of Marietta leaving the house. Hermione watched Lucius, waiting for him to tell her why it was he had been demanding her presence but he refrained from looking at her. Instead he was staring out the front window, likely watching Marietta walk away. Hermione was wondering what exactly she should expect from him. Would he yell? Would he try to apologize for his inadvertent attack on her? Somehow she doubted the latter.
She waited, with surprising patience for how curious she was, for him to turn back from the window to look at her. She did not speak, she did not fidget, she simply waited. When he finally did turn, she was surprised to see a fire burning in his eyes. The unreadable features in his face melted away and there seemed to be concern or something she wasn't quite sure how to read lighting up his face. Hermione felt her knees lock into place when he started moving swiftly forward. Something within her shook loose and rattled around somewhere between panic and relief when he came within a few inches of her.
"I made your assistant drag me to a muggle book store so I could find a book for you," he said, the book clattering to the floor as he put his hands on either side of her face and came even closer. "It's an apology, or a surrender, or something else. I don't know. I don't know anything about anything anymore. All I know is that while you've been away all I could think about was doing this."
And just like that he closed the last bit of distance between them and he crashed his lips to hers. Hermione sighed against his lips and he tightened his hands in her hair to tilt her head back and further open her up to him. Hermione melted into the kiss, and Lucius pressed his every advantage tucking her body tightly against his as her ran his tongue along the seam of her lips seeking entrance. Despite her shock at what was happening she couldn't help but give in. She opened her mouth and allowed him to deepen the kiss.
Hermione went weak in the knees as Lucius absolutely possessed her with that kiss, and just when she thought she was going to end up on the floor he backed her up across the room and pressed her back against the living room wall as he further plundered her mouth. Hermione was embarrassed by the moan that broke free of her throat but that nervous feeling was quickly replaced by arousal when Lucius growled and released her mouth and instead began to trail his lips down her throat in a fiery trail.
"What are we doing?" Hermione panted in question even as her hands came up to fisted in his long blonde hair.
"Does it matter?" he whispered against her neck as he began to brush his hands along her sides, gently brushing the undersides of her breast in a delicious way. "I need you Hermione. I don't know what you've done to me while I've been here, but it became abundantly clear to me after you left me here alone that I just need you. I don't need my magic, I don't need my friends and family, I don't need to be free of this stupid house, I just need you."
"You don't know what you're saying," she sighed, trying not to react to his hands massaging more fully now and his hips grinding against her. "You are only thinking this way because you are under house arrest. You are confused."
"No," he said, stepping back and leaving her feeling bereft and breathing hard as her body threatened to fold in on itself. "I am not confused. For the first time in decades I have clarity. I have put so much time and energy into pursuing power, and things that are aesthetically beautiful, and money. I had to hit rock bottom to realize what an idiot I've been. And then somehow, here in this house, I hit rock bottom again and I realized that I have still been pursuing things that I don't need. I will always need my son, and I can hope that someday he might be willing to speak to me again, but for now what I need is someone who can help me move forward. I need someone who lights me up with a passion for life that I haven't had since I was in school. I need you. I want you."
"Lucius," Hermione said in a shaky voice, her body betraying her desire to keep things professional as she found herself reaching out of him. "We shouldn't do this. This is a serious breach in professional conduct."
"I don't care," he growled as he snatched her hand out of the air in between them and quick as a flash pinned her arm above her head with his fingers laced through hers.
Her pressed every inch of his body against hers as he once again began to kiss her, and this time Hermione completely surrendered. She clutched at his shoulders with her free hand, and moaned without restraint into his mouth when his free hand trailed under the hem of her robes and began to move up her thigh.
"Oh God," she said shakily when he released her lips again in order to trail his tongue along her ear, tearing her mental focus between that incredible sensation and the quivering he was causing in her legs as he massaged higher and higher on her thigh.
"Will you let me have you Hermione?" he panted huskily into her ear, letting his hand brush against everything between them.
"Yes," Hermione said after of beat of silence broken only by their labored breathing.
That one word was all it took to release him from the last of his restraint it seemed. He released her arm from above her head so that he had full use of both of her hands. He pushed her legs apart with his thigh and pushed her robes up so they rested above her lips leaving her simple white knickers exposed to his eyes. He smiled at those before he grabbed her right hand and placed it atop her knickers just above the seat that was rapidly becoming sodden.
"Vanish them," he ordered in a husky voice before he began to kiss her neck again. "Show yourself to me."
Hermione shook with lust, trying to focus past the sensation of his lips and the way his words made molten pleasure pool in her gut in order to cast a wandless spell. She was not successful on the first attempt. Instead she released a shaky groan of pleasure as he bucked against her hip making her very aware of his erection.
"I'm waiting," he whispered against her collarbone.
"I can't focus," Hermione whined thrusting her hips up against his hips, trying to make him feel even a portion of what he was feeling. "You make it so hard to think."
"Let's focus then," he said huskily as he put his larger hand over hers where it rested on her knickers. "Make them go away Hermione."
He pulled back just enough so that he was not touching her anywhere except for where his hand lay on top of hers. His eyes locked on hers staring at her with so much lust in them that it felt as if his fingers had dipped down to brush her aching clit, but the jolt of pleasure was purely mental. While staring into his eyes she focused on baring herself to him, and she felt the ripple of magic and then cool air when she was no longer covered by her knickers.
Lucius's eyes wandered down to her exposed lady parts, and she felt another ripple of pleasure roll through her just from the hungry look on his face. She already felt a sigh working its way out of her, but then he drug the pair of their hands down and directed her own finger down to slide between her wet folds with ease and power. He guided her with his own fingers, but it was her fingers that tore a breathy shriek from her throat as it ran along her engorged clit.
"That's right," he told her as he moved his hand off of hers and instead held onto her hips while he watched her fuck her hand. "Just like that Hermione."
She could only moan in response as she began to wantonly thrust her hips up to meet her strokes. She felt as if a fire had been set inside her and it was spreading throughout her body setting every single nerve ending aflame with pleasure. She had never felt so naughty or so aroused in her life. She didn't think she could take much more, and then Lucius began to unbutton the front of her robes, kissing each inch of flesh as it was exposed and she thought she may very well expire from pleasure.
"Lucius," she groaned when he pushed her robes to the side, pulled down the cup of her bra, and took her nipple into his hot mouth. "Yes. God Yes."
He laved at her with sinful precision and it seem in the blink of an eye she went from teetering on the edge of something unprecedented to a writhing screaming mess that was only still on it's feet because of how his body was positioned against her. She broke apart in the most powerful orgasm she had ever had and Lucius continued to suckle at her breast while she thrashed in near blinding pleasure. It was a pleasure she had never before been able to bring to herself, and yet Lucius had coaxed her into doing it right her in the living room standing against the wall.
When she had come down somewhat he released her breast. She felt almost bereft for a moment, but then he took her limp hand from where it was resting against her thigh and he brought it to his lips. She felt her inner muscles tighten and flutter when he sucked her wet fingers into his mouth, and she thought she might climax again right there when he began to swirl his tongue around her fingers removing all the sticky traces of what she had done.
"Yes taste divine," he whispered huskily when he released her fingers. "I'd like to try that at the source next time, but for now I cannot wait any longer."
Hermione couldn't agree more, and she nodded fervently to let him know that. She reached out and began to unfasten his trousers with shaking hands. Despite the way her body was still trembling from orgasm she managed to quickly open his trousers and pull both them and his pants down in one swift jerk. She did not hesitate to take his heated and harden flesh in hand and she was gratified by the almost pained groan that came from him when she pumped her hand over him.
Lucius thrust twice against her palm before he pulled back and took himself in his left hand before grabbing her leg with his right and positioning her so one foot was planted on the ground and the other was wrapped around his waited opening her up to him. He stared into her eyes as he rubbed the head of his erection against her still sensitive clit. When her eyes rolled back and she began to moan in pleasure against he leaned forward to capture her mouth against, and then with one quick snap of the hips he entered her. He swallowed her near scream of pleasure at the sensation of being filled so fully, and then their tongues began to duel with one another as he thrust slowly in and out of her tight channel.
Soon enough neither of them were getting enough air and they had to break apart if only to focus on the way their hips were coming together. The only sound that could be heard in the house was their shallow panting and the sound of their hips hitting together as they began to move faster. Soon enough the sound of Hermione keening in pleasure joined the mix, but even without it he would have known she was close again. She was tightening on him like a vice and her whole body began to shake. Lucius thought he might break apart before he could get here there with how wonderful she felt, but he managed to hold on a second longer and that was all it took.
He gripped her hips tightly as she exploded around him. He growled her name against her throat and then he began to thrust erratically against her chasing his own release. His vision went white as his pleasure shot up his spine and then he erupted into her. He held her closed to his body, refusing to be parted from where he was nestled so perfectly inside her, and he sunk down onto the ground.
They shifted about until they were sprawled on the ground with Hermione lying on top of him, and they just lay their enjoying the come down. She continued to flutter around him and he occasionally pushed her hips down against him to let her further ride his softening cock while she was still flying high. The world around them could go to hell for all he cared, nothing but the feel of this woman on top of and around him matter. He wasn't sure what to think when he felt her body begin to shake around him. He thought at first she was crying, but when he finally heard her tinkling laugh he found himself very confused.
"Lucius Malfoy," she laughed. "You fuck me within an inch of unconsciousness and then you lay me down so my face is inches away from the cover of The Picture of Dorian Gray. You are a strange man indeed."
"Oh," he breathed before he began to laugh as well. "Yes, well that is the book I got for you, but I clearly forgot I even had it in my hand earlier."
"Perhaps later we can talk about what that purchase means," she told him before she began to kiss along his neck. "For now however, I believe turnabout is fair play."