Year Eight,
Autumn, London
The eighth anniversary of the Accord was celebrated with a lavish Ministry function attended by both sides, in fall of that year. It was held in the main Ministry banquet room and was the culmination of three months of careful planning. Relevant Ministry departments were invited to attend, as were all the key members of the Pureblood Alliance's Organisational Committee, of which Draco was a member.
Our feelers in the community suggested that the time was right for such an event. It had certainly been suggested before, but we wanted to give no reasons for dissenting factions to cause a ruckus.
This would be the first time both groups would be present in one location and to say it was a security nightmare was an understatement. Harry was full of complaints. Ron would have been, too, I imagine. I can't actually say for sure as he still found it difficult to speak to me after we ended our engagement.
It was with great relief that he did not inform his mother or other family members as to the true reasons for the split. The only other person who knew was Harry. I told Ron the truth. I felt that I owed him the full explanation.
And what was the full explanation?
"Sometimes life feels like it's running on rails," I said to him.
You are put on the tracks at a young age and off you go, heading towards what often feels like inevitability. There's scenery along the way and even stations that you can stop at, but your journey is a chaotic and urgent one. You don't have the luxury of stopping. There are forces beyond your control propelling you forward, giving you steam. There is no time to dawdle. At the end of the line is your destination; the fight you've been training for and building up to. That challenge was Voldemort. The trouble is that you're not really the same person you were at the start of the journey. What you thought you wanted at seventeen may not be what you need at twenty-seven. But you never had the time to explore what else you might have been inclined towards.
Like a lot of men, Ron is terrible when it comes to understanding metaphors, but I think he got this one. I would not dishonour our friendship, or what we had, by lying to him about my true feelings.
In hindsight, I wonder if I made the right choice. Perhaps I told him to gauge his reaction, to measure it for any signs that I was well and truly off my rocker. Maybe I had hoped that his disgust and incredulity would snap me out of what he referred to as my 'infatuation' with Draco.
But really, we both knew it wasn't infatuation. I would never end my engagement for that reason. There was plenty of disgust and diatribe, but Ron did not once mention our current circumstances. Instead, he clung to the past, as I knew he would. Our history with Draco provided context, yes, but it wasn't the sum of the situation.
Ron has a lot of pride, so I knew he wasn't about to propose a trial separation or a time-out. He ended it cleanly. It hurt, of course, but I felt more badly for him than I did for myself. Thank goodness, then, for Harry, who was able to counsel Ron. Now there is a man singled out for use and abuse by Fate. Fortunately, Harry seems to be genuinely besotted with Ginny and has successfully carved out his version of happiness.
Ultimately, it was fortuitous that Ginny did not attend the banquet. Draco arrived late, probably because he came with his mother as his date.
If there is a mystique surrounding Purebloods, it is because of people like Narcissa. In full, formal dress-or as Draco calls it, 'her peacock mode'-Narcissa is a sight to behold. Tall, regal and if possible, even haughtier than her son. She clung to his arm like a dowager queen being introduced to courtiers.
It is impossible not to feel frumpy next to such a creature. I often wonder what role Lucius Malfoy would have played in the proceedings had he survived the war. He and Narcissa had made a formidable pair. Perhaps Lucius would have been the PA's envoy, instead of his son. If so, I speculated as to whether the Accord would have survived its first birthday.
Across the hall, Ron stood beside Harry. Both were dressed in their Auror robes, not attending as guests, but as security. Although one had to learn to multi-task when one happened to be Harry Potter. The two had been discussing something seemingly urgent, but paused in their conversation to watch Draco's entrance.
Ron's gaze travelled across the hall to meet mine and I could see pain flash in his eyes briefly before he looked away. What could I do or say to make things better? Certainly no one could have predicted the course of events since the Accord.
The signal was subtle, but you learn to watch for these things when you spend enough time with Aurors. Something was amiss. Harry motioned to Dean, who then successfully caught Seamus' eye. Ron did the same with his brothers. In no time at all, every single Auror in the hall had filed out from the hall.
Their exit did not go unnoticed. Draco watched them over the rim of his glass as he sipped his drink. The entire room erupted into whispers. I felt the tiny hairs on the back of my head stand on end.
"Whatever is the matter, do you think?" Professor McGonagall asked me. She'd been talking about the progress of Hogwarts' new curriculum.
"I'm sure it's nothing," I reassured.
That old, familiar ball of apprehension that had been in hibernation for so long, condensed, and then dropped low in my belly. I hated it, but the feeling had saved my life on more than one occasion.
It seemed impossible that anyone could breach the Ministry's inner sanctum. The place ought to have been as safe as houses. But then we lived in a world where the impossible happened. Wizards cheated death and babies felled dark sorcerers. And houses had keys, given to a trusted few.
Three blasts occurred simultaneously from three different corners of the hall. Plaster and mortar dust billowed down, creating a thick, choking blanket punctured only by screams.
"Professor, quickly!" I said, grabbing my former teacher by the elbow. McGonagall was far from helpless, but she was frailer than she'd been during my schooling days. I pulled her behind the buffet table. There were already five other people crouched there. Within moments, there were just two, the other three having wisely Disapparated.
"Hermione! Where are you going?" McGonagall demanded, shooting out of our hiding spot with the agility of a meerkat. Perhaps not so frail after all.
"To see to Harry!" I wondered why she even had to ask.
Merlin, I had to get to Harry. Harry needed me. We needed to protect him.
But McGonagall would not release her wiry grip from around my wrist. "Miss Granger, in this instance I feel I should remind you that it is Mister Potter's job to protect this congregation!"
I'd been about to dismiss that notion, but then the truth of what she was telling me set in.
Why, yes. We were not seventeen and this was not the fight it had once been. Harry was a highly-trained, combat-ready Auror with a team to support him. It was remarkable how my old programming was so strong. There was a new development at the entrance, which proved once again how difficult it is to rid oneself of old assumptions.
To my dumbfounded amazement, I recognised some of the interlopers. Two were Citizen Committee members. One was a spokesperson of the main lobby group that opposed the Accord. They were, in essence, us. This was not an attack from the PA. It was a case of Citizens attacking our own event.
Draco.
In sharp contrast to my old, well-honed fear for Harry's safety. This fear was new and raw. True enough, I saw other PA members go down, either killed or hopefully merely Stunned by the attackers.
An elderly woman wearing an impressive turban with a PA badge pinned onto it was on her hands and knees, crawling away from an assailant who was nearly upon her. Without pausing in my run, I hit the man with Impedimenta as I sprinted towards the corner of the hall where I had last seen Draco. I nearly tripped over someone's fallen handbag along the way.
I could hear Harry bellowing orders at his team. It seemed that the Aurors had engaged with the terrorists and were on the offensive.
"Harry!" I screamed, thinking it was pointless. He couldn't hear me. "Harry!"
A spell caught me full in the face. For a moment, I thought I'd had it. I was on the floor with my hands clamped over my ears to try and block out the deafening ringing noise. But then I realised that the ringing was coming from inside my own head. I couldn't see a bloody thing. Every time I opened my eyes, it felt like they were on fire. I could make out occasional bright flashes of light, but was entirely unable to discern shapes.
Someone tripped over me, kicking me painfully in the shoulder.
"Hermione!" I heard Harry's distant bellow. "Where are you?"
I opened my mouth to call back, but was waylaid by someone picking me up. When I opened my mouth to shout again, a hand was clamped over it. Panicked, I bit down. The hand was snatched back.
"I cannot believe you just bit me," said a dry voice in my ear.
Draco! Oh good Lord, I was so happy to see him. Or 'feel' him, rather. I turned in his arms and hugged him, ecstatic that he was unharmed.
"You! I was just trying to find you!"
"Some attempt," he chastised. "You were running in completely the wrong direction, calling completely the wrong name."
His utter calmness in the face of calamity beggared belief. I could not understand him. I felt his fingers push my hair from my face to inspect my eyes.
"I saw you take that hit."
"It stings," I hissed, swatting at his hands. I didn't know what I would do if I was permanently blinded. Dear God, it would be the end of me.
"Be still and let me look," he ordered.
He looked, much more gently than I would have given him credit for. The absence of my eyesight served to amplify my other senses. I tried to sort out the confusing input of smells and sounds. I could hear glass crunching under panicked feet. I could smell the sweet apricot liqueur on Draco's breath that he'd been drinking moments earlier.
"Where's your mum?" I asked.
"She Disapparated for the Manor at the first hint of trouble."
Draco left for a moment. I had to swallow down a wave of panic, thinking he had abandoned me to join his mother, but he was back within moments. "Tip your head back and blink for me."
I did as he asked and sputtered when he poured what had to be a pitcher of cold water over my face, complete with ice cubes and two slices of lemon. It completely soaked the front of my modest, eggplant-coloured formal robes. The stinging over my face and eyes immediately lessened and for that, I was grateful.
"You're not singed, so it's not a burning hex of any kind. I think it must have been a Blinder, but at half strength."
I was so relieved I started to weep. Not that he could tell, given how wet my face was. "Blinders. I am woefully unfamiliar with them. How long do they last?"
"Two days at maximum, for a full spell. Provided I get you out of here safely, your vision should be back by tomorrow."
"Me?" I was incredulous. "It's my people attacking your people. You're the one that needs to get out of here!"
"Granger," he drawled. "Considering that right now Potter is exchanging enthusiastic wand-fire with these lunatic fringe-dwellers, I think it's safe to say that we're both targets. Potter's men are gaining the upper hand. The enemy is being pushed to the eastern corner of the hall, which is us, I'm afraid. Ergo, we leave. Now."
"What about-"
"Anyone with any common sense would have bloody left by now!"
There was an almighty bang. Draco cursed and quickly dragged us under what I assumed was the buffet table again. I thought my left foot might be in the pâté I had sampled earlier in the night.
The smoke and dust in the air increased. "What the hell was that?" I asked, putting my sleeve over my mouth to keep the dust at bay.
"Dean Thomas just fired off a rather impressive Reducto."
"He's awfully good at those," I felt wretched. I hated being useless when the people I cared about needed me.
Draco read my mind. "In your condition, you'd only get in their way." He reached for my hand, which I snatched back.
"We seem to be making a habit of this," I muttered, gripping my wand harder.
"Stop getting into trouble and I'll stop having to step in."
"You're not stepping in!" I retorted. "I'm getting out of this on my own, thank you very much!"
"That would sound all the more convincing if you weren't talking to an upturned chair. I'm over here."
Oh.
His wrist closed around my wand hand. "Where were you planning on going? Home may not be safe."
"I have wards upon wards."
"As many as there would have been in operation here tonight?" he barked. I could tell he was losing his patience. I was delaying him, I realised.
He had a point. If the terrorists had managed to breach Ministry security, they may very well have the capacity to meddle with my not inconsiderable home defences. I utilised the same protection spells as the Aurors. It was a perk of having Harry Potter for a friend.
"Bugger," I admitted. "You have an alternate destination in mind?"