A growing, dizzying web

()()()

I was such an idiot about the whole business that I am genuinely surprised not a soul caught on (save for Potter, maybe, but on the whole my youth was an effective mask behind which I could feign innocence). But the months of work were not in vain. A singing canary, fluttering ephemerally, alive, was the emblem of my success.

In their homes, in their hideaways, in their dens, the Death Eaters began to prepare.

()()()

"What's wrong with you two?"

Hermione leveled a glare in Harry's direction that told him with its simmering ferocity to shut it. Malfoy was expressionless as he read the Prophet. Harry lifted his eyebrows at her and gave a little shrug, obviously resigning himself to silence. She continued upstairs to her room, her legs heavy as they fought the steps and her footfalls seemingly thunderous.

They hadn't spoken a word since their confrontation, and while silence was not excessively unusual between them this was different. Rigidity radiated between them and dissociated them, tangible like the surface tension of water. She'd caught him staring (glowering) at her more than once, and he had held her gaze for no insignificant amount of time on each occasion. She felt trapped, caged by the gray condescension and antipathy she saw in his eyes, rendered immobile by his despised attention until he broke the contact (it felt physical, she was so affected by it) with a sneer.

Her guilt didn't help the situation. She secretly, in that hidden place she didn't like to acknowledge but was becoming more and more familiar to her, felt that perhaps that last cut about sixth year had been just a bit cruel.

His non-presence became such a bane to her that she often found herself spending those ubiquitous hours of insomnia studying just to keep her mind off the whole business. It felt good to open up an old book and smell the pages, that lovely scent of paper and ink that was so intrinsic to her.

But focus eluded her. She found herself staring at the candescent wick of a lit candle one night as she sat at the kitchen table some time between the hours of four and five in the morning. An open book lay before her, the shadows across the yellowing pages flickering in rhythm with the flame. Transfixed, she ran her fingertip up the candle's length, up until the wax turned soft and down to the candleholder. She drew her hand back sharply upon touching, accidentally, the molten wax quite close to the flame, smiling slightly once the mild pain subsided to see her fingerprint copied exactly in the little wax cap she flicked from her fingertip. She released the iron constraints she held on her thoughts, slowly like the painful relaxation of a sore muscle, and allowed her mind to wander. To wander over the past six months, over the holidays that hadn't truly been holidays at all, over the friends she could never see, over the lonely human density of the house, over her parents, over her faults and lacks and failures. She imagined herself just two short years ago, hopeful and brimming with ideals and faith. Distractedly she held her index finger to the hot wax again, nearly touching the wick, and it wasn't until she felt the fine hair on her knuckles singe and the skin around her nail and beyond blister that she pulled her hand away, gasping. Her heart pounding in her chest, she waited the excruciating seconds for the wax to congeal before running to the sink and attempting to remove it from her finger. The blisters tore just as a whimper tore from her lips, and clear lymph, not quite blood but close enough that her stomach churned, dripped from her fingernail before she stuck her hand under the running water.

Her breath came in rasps and hisses, fast through her teeth. Her vision shook and she felt a sudden, strange headache at the back of her neck. She'd never done anything like that before and the ease with which she hurt herself terrified her.

She didn't notice his presence until he moved behind her. The rustle of his clothes made her start and she let out an instinctive sound as she jerked her head towards him. She saw him staring at her through the riot of her hair.

They watched one another, her eyes inexplicably locked into his, which she saw as only hollow, glinting shadows against the pallor of his face. His expression was completely neutral (the mouth straight and tight, the skin of his forehead and cheeks marble) and she felt like dying from the shame of it. Finally he turned like nothing had happened (like he'd seen nothing) and walked out.

Hermione sat there for an unknowable time, staring blankly ahead, before she carefully picked up the candleholder and threw it hard across the room. It disintegrated into ceramic shards upon colliding with the opposite wall, and, enjoying the satisfaction of this, she did the same with the plate and empty glass that sat next to her. The crash these collisions made sent a different kind of satisfaction through her, less potent but nonetheless effective. She left the mess there and no one mentioned it in the morning.

Some time later (Weeks? Days? Months? Time was becoming something transient that she paid little mind.) a loud crash wrenched Hermione unpleasantly from her dream, and she jerked under the bedclothes as the disagreeable sensation of resurfacing hit her like a freight train. She forgot the dream in an instant, in the half second between lucid slumber and full wakefulness, but she knew it had been lovely and likely sexual given the feel of her body, both loose and taut all at once. She gave herself a resolute shake and groaned as the sound of drunken laughter filtered in from under the door of her room. She burrowed under covers and pillows but could not seem to stop concentrating on the noises from downstairs. Her mind wouldn't stop whirling about and she knew sleep would be impossible.

She didn't particularly care that all she wore besides underwear was a not-very-long t-shirt and threw open her door without further thought. The noises came louder once she left the asylum of her bedroom, and she descended the stairs towards their source.

"'Mione, come join us!" Ron cheered jovially upon seeing her, holding a bottle of firewhiskey aloft. The men of the house were dispersed about the living room, obviously enjoying themselves immensely if she was to judge by the smell of alcohol and the sight of smiles. Neville and Seamus were there as well, and she frowned a bit to see the latter swaying, bleary-eyed, in his seat.

"Do you lot know what time it is?"

"You're not wearing pants, Hermione."

"That's because I was sleeping."

"Best not provoke her, boys." This came from Malfoy, whose eyes flamed across her like always, and she stiffened. "You never know what she'll do."

No one else seemed to notice the strangeness of this, but she felt a paralysis in her spine and looked at him sharply. His intoxication was not so pronounced as in the others, but that drawl was back and it contrasted incessantly with the frozen look in his eyes. She let out a harsh breath through her teeth; they were clenched so hard she felt the ache in her jaw. The boys watched them for a moment, drunkenly perplexed, before returning to their previous conversation.

She and Malfoy continued to stare at one another. She felt something in her crack.

"Can I speak with you for a moment, Malfoy?" It came out like grit, squeezed between the wall of her cheeks and teeth.

He gave a short nod and rose, steady on his feet, to follow her into the hall. Once they were in the dark she whirled on him. "Can we set something straight about the other night? That was an accident. I don't know what you assumed, but it was an accident."

"I don't believe you."

"What?" Hermione gaped at him; he returned her gaze coolly. His serenity was infuriating. She watched his pale face in the dark as he took a breath and opened his mouth, tongue pressed against his teeth as if he were going to speak, before closing it again. "What, Malfoy?"

"You cooked your finger, Granger. Now, I don't know about you, but where I'm from that's generally not a sign of terrific mental fitness."

"I did not cook myself, you git. I just wasn't paying attention." Her vision was beginning to waver at the edges, to twist and contort she was so upset.

He seemed to bristle, obviously frustrated with her behind the veneer of the cool, expressionless set of his face. "How can you—" He took a breath and stopped himself, eyes going northward in what appeared to be an unconscious plea for her sanity. Hermione crossed her arms in a huff.

"Don't pity me, Malfoy. That's the last thing I want." It came out slightly more shrill than she had intended.

"Well someone's got to, don't they? Apparently you've lost the better half of your mind."

"I most certainly have not, you—"

"Merlin, Granger, just because you pick a fight does not mean I'm going to let this slide. I know we don't like each other, but we do live together and that means a certain amount of cordiality is necessitated. Thus if I see you intentionally injure yourself it becomes my responsibility to make sure you're not absolutely raving and likely to smother us in our sleep. So shut up and tell me what's wrong or I'll tell the wonder twins over there what I saw."

"I don't understand what you think you know, Malfoy. No one else thinks anything is wrong, and they live in this house too." She said this accusingly, staring at him hard.

He hesitated—this obviously bothered him, but he appeared to settle on a familiar superiority to protect himself (from what, she wondered?). "I think I'm just a mite more observant than the two wunderkinds in the next room."

"You are not more observant than Harry, you ass, and stop avoiding the question—"

"Potter? That's rich—"

"Will you just ANSWER, PLEASE?" Her voice, initially a stark shriek in the dark, dropped off severely as she screeched last word, her temper and mindfulness of those in the next room battling against one another.

She hated that she could just barely see the glint of his eyes in the darkness as he looked at her. "It's that, Granger. I know you've always had a bit of a temper, but this is just ridiculous." He paused, taking a deep breath and shaking his head. He raised a hand, rubbing his fingers over his mouth as he watched her. She watched the arc of white his movement made through the gloom, her breath coming fast. "You're so fucking angry." He took a step closer, as if involuntarily. "It's like I can sense the heat of it from here."

"I'm not—"

She stopped suddenly, shutting her mouth with an audible click of her teeth. Because she could feel it.

She felt the dampened, latent, ubiquitous rage seething through the cords and surfaces of her body, curling like a writhing serpent through her intestines and under her skin. It had once been an entirely foreign sensation but now seemed such a part of her that would not have noticed it had she not heard the words from his mouth. Anger resided like a staggering tenant in her limbs, in her aortas and veins, and it made her different and disarming. Her lips opened and shut as she stared helplessly at his face, expressionless as it was and void of pity. The scorch of her fury rose up from somewhere in her gut, past her lungs, constricting them as it went, coming to rest behind her retinas.

"Granger…"

She felt her tears in a visceral kind of way, not really registering them until she sensed the tickle of them down her cheeks. She turned away from him with the sound of an animal and pressed her hands over her mouth and forehead against the wall. She shut her eyes tight, trying to suppress her embarrassment. But it wouldn't stop.

She sensed him immobile at her right. She couldn't see him watching her but she could feel it burning a crack in the side of her face. The tears stung the dark smudges under her eyes. A horrifying sound, very soft but high like a child, emerged, muffled, from her lips. He took another seemingly involuntary step towards her.

"D-Don't touch me." Her voice cracked and she made to shrink from him without actually moving.

"I wasn't going to."

"Go away, please."

"No."

"WHY NOT?"

He didn't answer but stood watch, a twisted sentinel, as she slid down the wall into a huddle on the ground. The strange sound stopped and she heard, somehow, incongruous laughter from the other end of the house. He sat down next to her and she sent him a vile glare through the glaze of wet, but he wasn't looking at her and stared straight ahead at the opposite wall.

After a time she calmed, her cheeks became sticky with salt and the taste of crying dissipated from her mouth. She felt suddenly an extraordinary fatigue and, almost without realizing it, lowered herself to the ground so that she lay on her side, the top of her head only barely touching the side of his hip. She felt the warmth of that scant contact through her hair and down into her body below. Her spine relaxed from the heat of it and her lungs loosened so that breathing became something on which she didn't have to concentrate to get right.

She thought that maybe their breath synchronized as they sat there, but she was probably imagining it. She drew her knees up to her chest and her hands up to her chin, a protective ball with the stabilizing energies of the wall at her back and him above.

"I guess we've each had our own little special breakdown now, right?" It came out with a bubbly, snot-soaked giggle and her body convulsed with it. He remained silent and she had nearly resolved to drag herself to her feet when she felt him rest his hand on the back of her head. It was not a caress, it resisted tenderness, but it was like a steadying, warming force against her and she took a deep, shuddering breath upon sensing it. She couldn't look up at him, afraid of testing, of breaking the instant, but stared instead straight ahead as he had. The pressure of his fingertips teetered on the edge of comforting and unnerving and something else, and she felt it increase until suddenly it was gone and so was he. She watched and heard his footsteps down the hall and exhaled sharply as he disappeared around the corner. The ground felt hard against her temple and she stayed there for a while, exhaustion and confusion preventing movement.

()()()

In the instant my life began just we two existed. I remember that I stared at the headmaster, I watched his eyes and heard his voice—so calm, despite the obvious pain the Dark Lord's potion had caused him.

Draco… you are not a killer.

It was a second, maybe two, between the moment my mind seemed to open like the petals of a flower and when I lowered my wand. I think the span of a year, of a lifetime, could fit in that second; my destiny was presented to me and I determined, unknowingly, my future and myself.

I saw the bifurcations my life would take and had taken, the paths my choices would forge like they existed in temporal and corporeal space, unfurling like a sapling before my vision. I saw the alternate realities, the alternate times, my decisions made; had I chosen to befriend Harry Potter, had I ever really talked to my father, had I refused Voldemort's request, I would be one of the different people I now saw, the separate and distinct boys that seemed to blink back at me with my eyes at the end of the wraithlike forks of the sapling. I created (or was shown) alternate worlds in which I existed, both the same and opposite. I understood that there was no uniform and absolute time, but an infinite series of times, a growing, dizzying web of divergent, convergent and parallel times that approach one another, fork, are snipped off, and contain all possibilities. In most of those times I do not exist; in some, you exist but I do not; in the one in which I now stared at the man I was meant to kill, the disfavoring hand of chance had led me to the astronomy tower on the night the Dark Mark floated like a specter over its heights. In some times I am an error, a ghost.*

The juncture of this choice, of this instant lay before me, spread out between Albus Dumbledore and my own indecision.

()()()

*Fragments taken from "The Garden of Forking Paths" by Borges

A/N: Early Xmas present, I guess. I'm on winter break, so maybe lots more!