500 days of War
This is not a love story. This is a story about love.
"Avada Kedavra"
The battleground seemed to freeze as the flash of green lit up the sky. Wands dropped and eyes turned, as thousands of people collectively held their breath. Hermione span, eyes searching for her best friend amongst the throngs of cloaked figures before the green flash dissipated, leaving behind a silence so thick that Hermione could hardly breathe.
"Mosmordre"
Hermione could not believe the sight in front of her. He looked so small, crumpled on the ground, his messy black hair sticky with blood, his green eyes blank.
"Harry, NOOOOOOO," Ginny wailed, breaking the silence and snapping the battlefield out of its shocked gaze. The order stormed towards the throngs of masked, jeering death eaters with little concern for their own safety. However, throngs of dementors began to swarm from beyond the castle, causing many of the light to collapse in despair, as Voldemort ordered his followers away from the battlefield, presumably to some celebration of some sorts.
Hermione was yet to move, frozen, eyes still staring at the crumpled, lifeless figure of her best friend. However, at the sound of Voldemort's voice she sprinted towards the figures disappearing into the darkness of the forest. She ignored the cries that followed her, needing to hurt them, needing to kill them like they had hurt and killed him.
Soon she was stumbling through the forest, spinning towards any snapping twig, wand thrusting menacingly towards the source of the sound. However, after ten minutes of spending more time trip ping over roots than jogging, the truth that the Death Eaters had all left began to creep up on her.
Her logical mindS had known they would be gone before she began running towards the forest. But for once Hermione would not, could not listen to her logical mind. Because her logical mind was telling her that her best friend, the wizarding world's saviour, Harry James Potter, was dead.
A muffled sob from deeper in the forest startled her from her thoughts, and she immediately re-drew her wand and began creeping towards the source. Soon she found herself in a clearing, the stars shining from above illuminating a black robed figure in hunched by a small brook. While a small corner of her mind wondered why a Death Eater was crying on this night, a night she came later to know as the beginning of the end, she cursed the figure without even thinking.
He didn't even flinch when his wand flew from beside his side, and soon he was trussed up to oak behind him, his silver mask glinting in the light from the stars under a blindfold. Hermione held her wand at his throat (she could tell the gender by the adam's apple bobbing nervously beneath her wand), the desire to hurtmaimKILL searing through her veins like a poisonous salvation. How long she stood like that she didn't know, hand shaking, a small line of red, red blood flowing from underneath the tip of her wand. Apart from the rise and fall of his chest, her captive made no move to escape.
The image of Harry crumpled on the ground flashed before her eyes, erasing the small hesitation that had held her fury. She waved her wand once, vanishing the blindfold and mask, wanting to see the pain she was about to inflict upon this evil human.
Grey eyes and brown eyes met and for the second time that night, time froze. Hermione's eyes were blank, cold orbs, burning into the red-rimmed eyes of Draco Malfoy.
"Hermione," he gasped. As she took in his dishevelled appearance, his tear streaked face a flash of surprise showed in her eyes. Her hand did not falter.
"Do it," he gasped, the pressure of her wand against his throat clearly painful. "Kill me, that's what you're here for Granger, isn't it? Well what are you waiting for?"
There was no mocking in his eyes. No fear. Just despair.
"Hermione,"
At the second mention of her name her wand twitched withdrawing slightly before she dug it into his skin with renewed vigour, his blood flowing readily now.
"Don't," she choked, her throat constricted, "call me that, you bastard!"
Her voice grew stronger, fuelled by her anger.
"I'm surprised you would lower yourself to utter the name of a mudblood bastard," she spat at him.
"Well hopefully I won't have to do so every again, now that golden boy is gone it can't be too long before you and the rest of your kind follow him," Malfoy retorted.
Hermione snarled, "Avarda-" she spat out before she saw a brief flash of relief cross his face.
She drew back her wand in hesitation and a broken sob left the man in front of her.
"No, Granger, Hermione, please," he moaned like a wounded animal, "kill me...KILL ME!"
Hermione backed away, eyes wide with terror and another emotion that Draco could not place.
With a wave of her wand his binding's vanished, and with another crack she disapparated, leaving Draco Malfoy to collapse, broken and sobbing alone in the forbidden forest.
And so ended day one.