Title: The Year Without Harry
Fandom: Harry Potter
Warnings: Uh, language, and potion abuse
Setting: Alternate reality as of the end of OotP where Harry, instead of Sirius, fell into the Veil in the Department of Mysteries
Summary: Hermione unexpectedly encounters a former-classmate-turned -Death-Eater in Knockturn Alley on Christmas Eve, and the resulting conversation plants a seed of hope in her mind for the wizarding world
Author's Note: Never written a Harry Potter fic before, but couldn't get this scene out of my head, so I decided to just go with it!
"It's the second archway on your left, first door on the right."
Hermione drew her breath in quickly at the quiet voice just behind her ear, and spun around, her booted feet crunching in the light snow. She had thought she was alone. "What?" she demanded, before she was even facing the source of the voice. It was familiar, but only vaguely, and belonged to a hooded, black-cloaked figure only a few inches taller than herself.
"Hermione Granger, wandering about Knockturn Alley on Christmas Eve, certainly not shopping for a last minute gift for Potty or the Weasel," – Oh. Under her robes, her hand gripped her wand tightly – "so it must be a book on Dark Magic she's after," he went on in that Wiltshire drawl of his, something she hadn't heard since… since… "one that the Hogwarts library doesn't have, even in the Restricted Section."
"Sod off, Malfoy!" she said, irritation verging on hysteria in her voice, and shoved past him. She had to be back on Platform 9 ¾ in less than an hour; the Weasely clan was expecting her on the last train of the evening and sending someone, Arthur or Bill or Molly, to pick her up, and she couldn't make it through the holidays without a fresh supply of ingredients. "At least I'm not a bloody Hogwarts dropout," she added over her shoulder, feeling her voice rise and struggling to keep it under control.
"A Hogwarts education is nothing to be proud of," he said, a sneer, though she couldn't see it on his hooded face, was evident in his voice. "That school went to shite the moment that dundering old fool took over –"
She felt a hand grasp her wrist, the one that held her wand, mid-air, and they both hurriedly ducked into a corner. The last thing Hermione wanted to do was call attention to herself by getting into an altercation in Knockturn Alley. She wasn't even supposed to be there, she was supposed to be on the Hogwarts Express.
"I'd watch out if I were you, Granger, there are Death Eaters about," he hissed, the hand that held her wrist forcing it, and her wand, down into the space between them and out of sight of any passer-bys. The tiny flakes of snow blowing through the air clung to her hair and eyebrows, and she snatched her hand away.
"How do I know you aren't one of those Death Eaters?" she snapped. She put her wand back in her robes and backed away, closer to the sidewalk, not wanting to risk trapping herself in a corner with someone she strongly suspected was working directly for the Dark Lord.
"Because I haven't kidnapped you and tortured you into telling me where your side is hiding Harry Potter," he said levelly.
Harry Potter. The name slammed into her consciousness, and she opened her mouth to say something, but no words would come out.
He took a step closer to her, and she could see the glint of his eyes under the shadow of his hood. "After you get your book, floo out of here. Don't go into Muggle London, and don't hang around here any longer than you have to."
"I'm not here for a book," she said, her voice very faint, "and I'm not hiding Harry, Harry's dead. I saw him die. In the Ministry."
A snort came from beneath the hood. "You saw wrong. Potter is very much alive."
Her heart began to pound, and her breath caught in her throat. "You're a liar," she whispered.
"I am not. He's alive."
"Harry died," she repeated slowly. "in the Department of Mysteries. I was there, don't be so cruel!" She wanted to storm away from him, fling him away from her with her wand, inconspicuous-be-damned, but she felt her feet rooted to the ground. It wasn't a spell. It was the sad, pathetic hope that she and everyone else were holding out that somehow, somehow, the Boy Who Lived had lived again.
"He didn't," Malfoy said quietly.
"But how do you know?" she demanded, her voice rising up with emotion, and he grabbed her arms again, pulling her back into the shadows and hissing a frustrated shhhhh in her direction.
"I'd hardly mistake it," he said flatly, and then, visibly expelling the air from his lungs, he pushed back his hood and gestured towards the right side of his face. "Potter did this."
Raw, angry looking scars climbed up from his jawline, distorting the corner of his mouth, pulling the flesh of his cheek, stretching his eyelid downward and cutting into his eyebrow even up into his hairline, raised spider-webs of shiny pink and stark white. She stared.
"Floo out of here, Granger," he whispered again. "Don't stick around, and don't go through Muggle London."
She tore her eyes away from his scarred face, looking instead at the bricks behind his head. "Why should I believe anything you say? What do you even care?"
"I don't," he snapped. "I just… can't stomach it, seeing another one of my schoolmates captured and cursed." He still held her arm, and began marching her down the narrow back alley, about to turn under the second archway, when she dug her heels into the ground and spun around.
"I need the apothecary," she said firmly. "Not the bookstore." She had delayed too long, she'd never get to Platform 9 ¾ on time if she didn't make a speedy purchase of her supplies. His eyes widened, in surprise, or suspicion, or both, and he pointed to another archway that somehow hadn't been there a moment before. She nodded in terse thanks, walking hurriedly away, and turned once to look behind her.
He was mouthing the words "Floo back," before he reached behind his head, pulling his hood up once more, and then into his cloak, withdrawing a sinister-looking mask and turning away.
The encounter with Malfoy left her even more anxious than she had been at the start of her illicit trip to Knockturn Alley.
Don't go out alone.
Don't wander away from the protection of Hogwarts; England isn't safe anymore.
Bad things can happen to young girls in dark corners.
Don't talk to anyone on the train; someone will be waiting for you on the platform to apparate you straight home.
But she couldn't let the Weasleys know how badly she needed her supplies. If Mrs. Weasely knew how much she had risked just to get her ingredients, surely she'd pack her right off to St. Mungo's.
Intellectually, Hermione understood that addiction was a sickness, and the Mrs. Weasely loved her like her own daughter and wanted only to help, but she couldn't go to St. Mungo's, she simply couldn't, they were in the middle of a war, the Order needed her, she was top of her class at Hogwarts, she was a prefect, her fellow students counted on her, needed her, and she needed, desperately, to be needed. Ever since she'd lost Harry, who relied so much on the love and support of his friends –
Could she evem trust the words of Draco Malfoy? When Harry fell into the Veil, when she saw him fall into the Veil and Sirius shouted "James, no!" – but no one survived the Veil. Not as a ghost, not as a spirit, not as anything. She'd never see Harry, ever, ever again, and without Harry Potter, the wizarding world was without hope.
"Eye of newt," she said calmly to the apothecary, laying the necessary galleons on the worn table. "Heart of palm, dragonfly wings, just an eighth will do, and hackleskank venom, as much as you've got. And," she whispered the last ingredient, "essence of Valerie."
The apothecary eyed her, seeing a bushy-haired, fresh-faced teenager, and shook his head. Kids these days. Falling into the life younger and younger. What was it to him, though, but more and more business?
There was a riotous noise outside the door, and he stopped, mid-scoop, leaving the powdered newts' eyes in a heap on the scale.
Hermione turned just in time to see black-clad figures marching past, wearing frighteningly familiar masks and holding their wands out in front of them, tips glowing. Death Eaters!
The apothecary grabbed the galleons Hermione had set down and bolted into the back room of the shop. Just as the shop windows shattered inwards, she saw the green flash of floo powder. Not caring for the flying shards, Hermione opened her charmed bag and swept half the potions stores into it before dashing after him, snatching up the floo powder from its canister and barely inside the fireplace before she shouted "The Burrow!" and felt the disorienting whoosh of floo travel.
Her ears rang and her face felt the chill air as she felt herself rushed through the floo network, able, for the first time, to look briefly into the floos she passed by. Why was the floo moving her so slowly? This had never happened before. How was she going to explain to the Weaselys why she wasn't at Platform 9 ¾? No matter what explanation she used, Ron, if no one else (since Harry was not there) could always tell when she was lying. And what about whoever had gone to meet her at King's Cross?
And what about whatever Malfoy had been hinting would happen in Muggle London?
The floo deposited her, finally, with a jerk, and so, despite the unusually slow travel, Hermione found herself stumbling out of the floo, coughing up soot and feeling the flames scorch at the backs of her legs.
"'Mione!" Ron shouted, and there was a crash beside him. He had dropped the mug he was holding and it shattered on the floor. "Fred, George, 'Mione's here!" His face was white as a sheet, his freckles standing out in stark contrast, and he ran towards her, nearly knocking her over with the force of the collision. "Oh, Merlin, 'Mione," he said, arms wrapped tight around her and head pressed into her hair. "We thought we'd lost you too, I thought you were gone…"
"Ronald!" she said sharply, trying to push him away. "You're covered in soot, and now that makes both of us!"
Two nearly simultaneous apparition pops sounded behind them, and then two nearly identical voices shouted "Hermione!"
She busied herself brushing the soot from her robes, then gave up and pulled them off, shaking them out and folding them over her arms. "What's all this?" she asked. "Why would you think I was dead?"
Ron's blue eyes were bloodshot, she noticed belatedly. "The six o'clock Hogwarts Express was attacked," he said breathlessly. "Any Muggle-borns on board were executed. Mum, Dad, and Bill are at Headquarters right now. I thought you – how did you – 'Mione, if you weren't on the train, where were you?" He stared at her as if she would disappear if he looked away.
Fred was crouched down at the foot of the floo. "And what do you need so much hackleskank venom for? What are you –"
"- doing, brewing potions over the holidays? Trying to get ahead for next term?"
Identical faces looked at her quizzically. She snatched the jars away from the twins and shoved them into her bottomless bag as quickly as she could, turning back to Ron defensively.
"'Mione," he muttered, knowing full well that she wasn't trying to get ahead on her potions homework. "You can't keep – "
"Merlin, Hermione, what happened to you? You're –"
"- Covered in blood, are you all right?"
She looked down at herself, bringing a hand to the front of her jumper. Indeed, it came away damp with fresh blood.
"Is that your blood?" Ron asked, mouth agape.
Still staring at what was obviously more than a minor scratch, she said shakily, "I'm fine; it's nothing."
"It's not nothing, it's everywhere, look at yourself!" Ron said, his voice rising in panic.
She found a chair pushed under her; suddenly she was sitting and felt the wave of a diagnostic spell rush over her. Who -?
Fred stood over her, wand out, while Ron and George continued to stare at her in disbelief. "She'll survive," Fred concluded, his voice forcibly light. "Go on then, Hermione, get cleaned up and then let us heal you."
"I'm fine," she repeated, staring from freckled face to freckled face.
"Come on," Ron said grimly. "Your brains are addled from blood loss."
"My brains are fine!" she exclaimed. "Don't you dare insult me! I am the smartest witch in our school –"
"Then act like it!" Ron roared at her suddenly, dragging her up out of the chair and up the winding stairs to the Weasely's tiny bathroom.
By the time he shut the door behind him, she was sobbing into his shoulder, pressing more of her blood into his clothes.
"Don't cry," he mumbled awkwardly. "Whatever happened, you're safe now…" he patted her hair gently, then pulled his hand away when he realized there were tiny shards of glass in it. "'Mione, you've got glass in your hair." He didn't add what happened, although he badly wanted to.
"I know," she hiccoughed. "A window broke – Death Eaters –"
"Death Eaters?" he echoed. Then he looked down at her blood continuing to soak through his clothes, and said, "Come on, off with this shirt."
"Oh Ron," she said, batting her eyes through her tears, "how romantic of you."
"I'm going to pretend you didn't say that," he muttered, sitting her down on the toilet seat and pulling the ruined jumper over her head. There was glass embedded in her abdomen and chest. He touched a piece very lightly, watching her carefully for any reaction. "This hurt?" he asked, concerned.
"I told you I was fine," she whispered, but her face was slowly losing color.
"Damnit, I'm being bloody serious, if you tell me it doesn't hurt, I'm pulling the glass out right now!" he said, his temper slowly escalating. The only reason she wasn't feeling any pain was because of the potions – the same potions she had promised him she gave up weeks ago. When she didn't respond, he carefully removed the larger shards, setting them carefully on the sink, and reached in the bathroom cabinet for a roll of bandages. "Mum can heal you when she gets back," he murmured, "if you don't want Fred and George casting spells on you topless. Specially if it doesn't hurt."
She shrugged.
He wound the gauze around her tight enough to staunch the flow of blood – that bra was ruined too, there was blood all over it, and she seemed to notice it just as he did, because she reached around her back and unclasped it, letting it fall to the floor. Ron knelt on the tile floor in front of her and looked into her potion-bright eyes. "You're going to feel like shite when it wears off," he said tiredly, and she nodded.
"I know. I've only got a few drops left, and even if I start brewing tonight, I don't have enough to last me until the new batch is ready," she said, her voice very quiet. She hated herself like this, hated what she'd become, hated what she was doing to Ron.
He sighed, sitting back on his heels, hesitated for a moment, and then reached into his pocket, withdrawing a blue-violet phial. His heart ached at the way her eyes lit up when she saw it.
"Oh Ron!"
"It's not because I think this is okay," he said sternly. "It's because I don't want you to ruin Christmas for my whole family."
She broke into fresh sobs even as she tried to hold them back, and he leaned into her, wrapping his arms around her again and holding her tightly.
"Oi!" came a voice outside the door, accompanied by insistent pounding. "Enough playing doctor in there!"