Disclaimer: I don't own HP or the characters, though I sincerely wish I did. This is M for mature themes and should not be viewed by anyone under the age of eighteen, or the easily offended.

Part Two: Aftermath

Hermione awoke with a splitting headache. She rolled off her bed ungracefully and began the humiliating crawl to the bathroom. She thanked Merlin she was alone and no one was around to witness her undignified Sunday morning.

She began to run herself a bath and stared at herself in the mirror. Her makeup was smudged, her hair was wild and she had an angry bruise forming on her upper thigh – probably from the bar stool Harry had to drag her from.

Exhaling loudly, she resolved that she would lay off the fire whiskey in the future. She also resolved that she should probably start dating again – lest she start spending every Saturday night alone in wizard dive bars.

Her brain felt foggy and some of her more unpleasant memories were swirling unusually close to the surface. Why on Earth after all these years was she thinking of Draco Malfoy?

She did her best to push the memories back into the vault in her mind where they lived.

"No more of this Hermione," she said to her reflection. "No more of this."

Draco had thought about what he saw all night. Still no closer to a resolution about how he felt. Still undecided about whether or not to violate her memory further.

He had everything he needed in the vial to sort through her memories for any juicy thing he wanted.

Briefly, Draco dabbled with looking into her lusty memories (the image of her skirt hitching over Potter's shoulder clear in his mind). But the idea of coming face to face with Ron Weasley's naked arse put a quick halt to that.

He thought about the numerous Ministry of Magic parties he had bumped into her at. She seemed her usual disgusted but mostly disinterested self. There was nothing to suggest she had ever threatened his life or tortured his father.

But then again, as the Golden Trio's Princess, her attention was monopolised by most of the key players in the Ministry and wizarding world, so even if he wanted to, he had never got to say more than a few words to her.

When she saw him, did she think of that day? Was she sorry, or guilty? On some level, he needed to know.

He decided to leave her memories for a while and speak to his father instead. He and his father were not particularly close these days, mostly because Draco had never quite forgiven his parents for essentially signing him up to be a Death Eater at birth.

Although the Malfoys' allegiance to Voldemort clearly faltered during the war, it is hardly as though they went and fought for the other side. They were just out for themselves – it was the Malfoy way.

Though, now a grown man, Draco was no longer sure the 'Malfoy Way' was the best way, or the one he wanted to live by.

He apparated to the Manor that morning to seek out his father.

Lucius had spent several years in Azkaban for his involvement with the Dark Lord, but had been released as he was no longer considered a security risk, especially given his wife and son were now considered reformed.

"Draco," greeted the older Malfoy with little warmth in his voice. "What a pleasant surprise."

"Father. I need to talk to you about the day Potter and his friends escaped the Manor," he spluttered.

"What ever for?" his father asked, his eyes narrow with suspicion.

"What happened in the grounds?" asked Draco, looking intensely into his father's eyes.

"Ah, is this about the Mudblood girl?" replied the blonde wizard coolly.

Draco winced at the use of the term Mudblood but he let it slide. This did not go unnoticed by Lucius, who smirked in response. He did enjoy pushing Draco's buttons.

"Yes father, it is about her."

"How do you know?" asked the older Malfoy.

"I saw it. In a pensive. Don't ask me how, but I did." He replied. There was a long pause before his father opened his mouth to reply.

"Impressive, wasn't she?" replied Lucius, his eyes dancing.

"Impressive?" replied a shocked Draco, "That is what you have to say about that?"

"Yes Draco, that is what I have to say about that."

Draco had been pacing around by the pensive for what felt like an eternity. He was conflicted. His father seemed captivated by Granger's curse and Lucius Malfoy was not one to praise a muggle-born or anyone else for that matter.

That meant her curse was every bit as unyielding as it looked in the memory. Power and cruelty, were the only things that impressed his father, even to this day.

He felt sick for being so enthralled by it. By being so wrong about her. He was usually an excellent judge of character, always in control and rarely wrong about anyone. He could assess a person and have them wrapped around his finger in minutes. Find their preferences, dig at their weaknesses. Reading people was essential to being a master manipulator.

Again he wondered, how did he get Granger wrong?

Finally he gave in, uttering his father's name before dropping more liquid silver into the pensive.

All at once he was back in the grounds of Malfoy Manor as she retreated from his battered father. She was following the sound of Potter's voice.

He saw the concern in Weasley's eyes as he embraced her. "I thought I lost you 'Mione," he whispered. "Never," she replied with a tenderness he found shocking given what she had been doing to his father moments before.

Their lips grazed, making Malfoy flinch.

"Are there any other's back there?" interrupted Potter.

"I stupefied two of them," she replied in an even tone.

"Anyone we know?" asked Ron.

"No," she lied, without falter.

The world seemed to swivel as he was taken to another place in her memory.

She was sitting in a sterile office he recognized as being the therapists office all of the students caught up in the war had been sent to at the order of the Hogwarts Headmaster.

A mild mannered balding therapist was looking at Hermione with an unreadable expression. "Well Miss Granger, the question is this, do you regret using the unforgiveable curses? Focus on Mr Malfoy."

Draco caught his breath… curses… curses plural. What else was he missing? What else did she do, and to whom?

He refocused on the task at hand and fixated on the situation unfolding.

"No," she answered, her tone was honest.

"Why?" asked the therapist.

"Because they deserved it. They were racist vile human beings who saw me as nothing more than garbage to be disposed of. It may have been Bellatrix who…" her voice wavered as she spoke, "who tortured me, but all of the Malfoy's were there. They enjoyed it. They believed it was okay. I was entertainment to them. My pain was entertainment. Like a game of bloody wizards chess. Well FUCK that." Her voice grew in volume.

"Lucius deserved what I did to him in the forest. It was probably the only justice I will ever really get. I regret nothing."

The familiar swirling feeling returned and he realized he was moving to another place in her memory.

This time he found himself watching her reading the newspaper in an apartment that clearly belonged to her and Weasley. She slammed her fist on the table and cried out in frustration.

"They let Lucius out of Azkaban. It's not fair. They all get to move on with their lives after what they have done. Our friends and family are still dead. I've still got MUDBLOOD scarred onto my arm," she ranted.

Ron rested his hand on hers comfortingly. "We can't let them take more from us by being angry. That just gives them power. Power they don't deserve." He said wisely.

"I don't deserve you," she replied tenderly. Their lips met softly and then with increasing passion. Draco was transfixed.

Her memory swirled yet again and he was standing in their bedroom. Ron was asleep and Hermione was rising from the bed. She was wearing only Ron's T-shirt and was clearly disheveled from lovemaking. She looked beautiful, noted Draco.

She walked into the bathroom and he followed. There she was staring into the mirror for some time.

"The Malfoy's don't matter," she repeated, over and over. Eventually she nodded, seemingly satisfied by her affirmation.

Draco emerged from the pensive reeling. "The Malfoys' don't matter!" he snorted to himself.

Hermione's brain itched and she began to feel surer and surer that something untoward had happened to her at the bar. She resolved to look into it.

That night she took home a number of large text books from the Ministry to begin to try and establish why her brain felt like it had been in a blender and why she had been plagued by old memories, long buried, all day long.

At about midnight she found the answer in an old spell book. She spent most of the remainder of the night brewing potions and practicing the kind of old magic needed to establish whose finger prints were all over the magic that had been fumbling around her mind.

On Tuesday morning Draco Malfoy walked into his office in the Dark Arts department of the Ministry of Magic. His receptionist was beside herself. "What's wrong Daphne?" asked Draco, pretending to be concerned for his admittedly attractive but insufferably thick receptionist.

"Someone has locked themselves in the office and charmed the door so only you can enter. I have no idea how they got in here or what they want. Should I get an Auror?" she asked, panicked.

Draco figured it was Zabini, pissed about Saturday night and wanting to mess with him. He told his receptionist to go fetch him some coffee and not to worry before he opened the door.

On entry he felt a freezing gust of wind as the door swing shut and bolted behind him.

Sitting behind his desk was none other than Hermione Granger, wand in hand.

"Give me one good reason I should not hex you and Zabini into oblivion?," she said in a way that was somehow sweet and threatening at the same time.

Oh Gods.