Disclaimer: I do not own anything except the plot. The characters belong to J. K. Rowling, and 'The Hanging Tree' belongs to Suzanne Collins and the Hunger Games series.
Trigger warning: Indirect references to suicide. Torture.
AN: Thank you Rachael for beta-ing this story. You are a life saver!
This is pretty dark and intense, not something that's usually my style, but the idea of The Hanging Tree in a world ruled by Voldemort where Draco doesn't like being who he's forced to be really intrigued me. So I thought I'll try my hand at writing it. I hope my attempt wasn't a complete disaster. Let me know what you think?
The Hanging Tree
Are you, are you,
Coming to the tree?
Wear a necklace of hope,
Side by side with me
Strange things did happen here,
No stranger would it be,
If we met at midnight,
In the hanging tree.
- The Hanging Tree, Mockingjay (Suzanne Collins)
-O-
Voldemort had won, that was all there was to it. Despite Narcissa Malfoy's blatant lie to the Dark Lords face, Harry Potter – the prophesised saviour of the wizarding world – was dead. Suffice it to say, she was dead too. No treachery to the Dark Lord could ever live to see the day, at least most of the time.
The Order of the Phoenix was now just an organisation of war criminals hiding out and still holding on to the hope of bringing the Dark Lord down, the new ruler of this darker world.
The tree still stood though, tall and proud, unaffected by the hopelessness and fear that hung around it. Draco often stood and stared at the tree from afar; admiring the solace it held for the lost souls out there. 'The Hanging Tree,' they called it. Two nooses hung from one of the sturdier branches, looking ever so inviting.
Draco's thoughts shifted to the metaphorical noose that had been tightening around his neck ever since he had taken the Dark Mark in his sixth year at Hogwarts. And that again led to the vicious cycle of perverse fantasies that often revolved around the nooses on the tree and the freedom they could provide from this hopelessness.
But then there was her, a faint light in a world of darkness, but a light nonetheless.
"The mudblood," ah yes. Her. Draco recoiled from the slur, but the voice it came from seemed to enjoy the word with a sadistic pleasure. "You failed to kill her again, Draco," the man stated. Though being called a man didn't suit him much, he resembled a snake more than he resembled a man. His slit like red eyes narrowed in barely concealed anger.
Draco turned to face Voldemort, though he kept his gaze averted. "The Order members, my Lord…the rebels, they were shielding her," he barely managed to not stammer out his response, a lie. Draco could not kill her, the girl he loved, the only one who kept him alive at this point. He thanked every deity, magical or muggle, that his Aunt Bella had trained him in Occlumency, which was helping him keep his façade of a loyal servant. Though he suspected his face still might give away his true loyalties.
"Ah but yes, those very powerful Order members," the Dark Lord mocked. "Tell me, Draco, are those inferior beings with stolen magic really stronger than you?"
Draco kept his eyes trained on the ground, hating every second of his own cowardice. He often wished he was strong enough to reject these new pureblood ideals and join the rebels instead. But by staying here at least he was keeping Hermione safe, as much as he could. Voldemort cleared his throat, urging him to speak.
"I was outnumbered," he said. "There was just me and there were a lot of them." There wasn't. It was just Hermione and Draco, all defences down.
Voldemort regarded him with a suspicious gaze, trying to get inside his brain, then pointed his wand at him and said, "perhaps you need a little more motivation to follow your masters orders to the desired conclusion, boy. Crucio!"
Draco's knees buckled under him as he fell to the floor in excruciating pain. He felt like he was being poked with red hot iron all over, no longer aware of anything but the pain; feeling like his body would burst from it. Voldemort exacted the torture on him for several minutes, or was it hours, he didn't know. Enough to cause pain his victim would never forget, that it kept his body shaking and aching for days, but not enough to kill.
As the pain dulled and Voldemort walked away, Draco lay motionless on the floor and thought of the tree.
-O-
Draco looked over at Hermione, her face solemn and resigned. He knew she was hurting too, possibly much more than he was. He best friend, Harry Potter, was dead. Ron Weasley was on the run, probably dead too. Her parents lived a happy life far away on another continent, unaware of who she was, unaware that they even had a daughter.
He wondered how they had ended up in a world so cruel, worse than their worst childhood nightmares. The war truly had given them the worst lives possible.
His thoughts wandered off to how they had found each other in the midst of all this darkness. The night of the final battle, when Harry Potter had died a second and final time in the same night. The night Vincent Crabbe had died in the fiendfyre. She had approached him, despite her own grief. She had spoken to him as a person and not as a boy who had bullied her all her life, not even as a Death Eater responsible for the death of the Headmaster. She spoke to him of the 'hope she saw in him,' as she put it. She thanked him for not recognising Harry at the Manor, for not being the one to kill Dumbledore; she had consoled him about Crabbe's death. And he had done nothing but sat quietly, soaking in the warmth her presence provided. He didn't flinch in disgust or repulsion when she placed a comforting hand on his arm. He didn't speak for a week after that; Crabbe and the fiendfyre, his mother and the green light of the Killing Curse always at the forefront of his mind's eye.
Ten days later he sent her a letter with his majestic eagle owl. And that's how they began, owl post back and forth and secret meetings with far too much time in between. They comforted each other. He confessed to her how much he hated being a pawn on Voldemort's game of chess. They didn't tiptoe around the war. Instead they dived head on into each other's wounds and bitter realities.
Their love was quiet, alive in the shadows, away from prying eyes and torturous wands.
Draco realised that Hermione was watching him as he stared straight ahead. His hand was shaking, a tell-tale sign of a recent bout of the Cruciatus Curse. He tried to still the movement, but to no avail.
She placed a hand on top of his shaking one. "He did this," she said, less as a question and more as a statement. She was always quick to figure it out whenever Draco fell victim to the torture curse.
"We could run away, you know," she said. They had had this conversation too many times before.
"And where would we go?" he urged. "You are the most wanted witch in the magical world, and I'm a Malfoy. Not the easiest lot to hide."
They looked at each other for a moment and then she averted her gaze and quietly mumbled, "We could go to the tree." It was so quiet that he wouldn't have heard it had he not been expecting it. They had said this same sentence too many times before too, though he had been the one to suggest it the first time. It was the day Narcissa had been killed, it was also the day they had admitted out loud that Ron might be dead too.
Hermione had wanted to stay then, she had wanted to fight. Draco knew there was nothing left to fight for, they were outnumbered. Most of the wizarding world had surrendered to Voldemort, he had won and that was all there was to it.
Draco pulled her close, resting his cheek on the top of her head. She sighed. They could go to the tree, they toyed with the idea often enough, tossing it back and forth between them. It had become a sort of morbid game for them.
After a few minutes of sitting quietly, Draco stood and pulled Hermione to her feet. He took her hand in his, walking closer to the tree they had only ever observed from afar. For the first time ever since he had fixated on the tree, they were close enough to touch it.
Hermione reached her free hand out and traced along one of the nooses, pulling on it lightly. Draco just watched her, and a few seconds later she met his eyes. Her expression was of uncertainty, glimmering with a bit of hope; he suspected it mirrored his own. He cupped her face in his hands and kissed her lightly. "You pulled me out of the darkness that I was destined for ever since I was born in the Malfoy family. You showed me that I did not have to be a heartless killer or a slave like my father, that I did not have to mirror everything he did. You, Hermione, taught me how to be human. Yes we lost the war and the world is not a better place, and yes we still have to hide, but you have given me something that keeps me from dragging myself out to this tree."
Hermione traced her thumb across his cheek, and kissed him.
-The End.-