ANGEL OF A DEVIL
Chapter 10: If I've Killed One Man, I've Killed Two
DISCLAIMER: I don't own Harry Potter or Draco Malfoy or Hermione Granger or Ronald Weasley or Ginny Weasley or Hogwarts or … well, you get the point. Don't you?
A/N – I think this is one of my fave chapters so far, and it's the longest one too! Hope you like it. Sorry it took me a bit longer to update but uni's been forcing me to write EVIL essays!
"What?" Hermione blurted out, suddenly agitated.
"I didn't say anything," Malfoy raised a perfectly shaped eyebrow, looking at her curiously.
"You just said 'join the club'," she replied, hoping that she was right and he had said it. The other possibility she was considering couldn't be true, it just couldn't be.
He was looking at her even more strangely now – almost appraisingly yet wary at the same time.
"Granger, I didn't say a word," he paused, something moving behind his eyes, "I guess that between your natural talent for the magic and the amplification of the ring, it's no wonder they want you. You'd be very useful."
"What do you mean, the 'amplification' of my ring?" Her eyes narrowed but never left his face as she processed his implications.
"Merlin Granger, for a supposed genius you're acting a lot like a blonde airhead!" His tone was irritated, but with an undercurrent of amusement. He was enjoying knowing something she didn't, and was enjoying torturing her with it even more.
"I didn't say a word, but I can't deny thinking it."
With one last glance at the waning moon he turned and made his way back down the staircase, leaving Hermione to her own thoughts.
So I read his mind? Cool. She caught herself a second later, No! Not cool! I can't go round hearing other people's thoughts, I don't want to hear other peoples thoughts. Not only is that a gross invasion of privacy, but what if I hear something I really don't want to?
Hermione returned to the common room several hours later, exhausted after watching the sun rising from her vantage point on the tower.
She meandered her way through the various chairs, footrests, sofas, desks and other pieces of furniture lying around, not noticing that three of the couches she passed were occupied with slumbering figures.
She was almost at the stairs leading to the girls dormitory when her foot caught on a table leg and she went flying, knocking the towering pile of books off the table and landing on her backside on the floor with an almighty racket.
"Ow," she moaned, lying back on the floor, not bothering to pick herself up, not having the energy to do it.
A green-eyed face loomed over her, followed by a face framed with fiery hair, which was also followed by another, softer faced red haired person.
"Morning Hermione," Ginny smiled as Harry reached down a hand to help her up.
She hesitated for a second, looking from his hand to his eyes but she could read no more in them now than she had been able to on the path the day before. Slowly she reached up her own arm and grasped his hand, allowing herself to be pulled to a standing position.
For several long heartbeats no one said a word. Finally Hermione mentally shook herself and resigned herself to doing something she hadn't been looking forward to but knew had to be done.
"Harry, I am so sorry about what I said! I know it's just a word and it doesn't mean much but I am sorry, I was just angry and I wanted to hurt you, I didn't mean it, you know I didn't."
"I know," Harry stopped her ramblings with two little words.
She looked at him in shock as he continued, "it hurt, I'm not going to pretend that it didn't but you did have a point, we don't listen to you enough and I'm sorry. We both are," he gestured to Ron, who nodded at her and gave a small smile, "so we're not going to bug you anymore, I'm just going to say that if you do want to talk to us we'll listen."
Harry and Ron had decided not to tell her what they'd seen, fearing what she would say if she'd found out they had followed her. Ginny had been in the common room when they had returned from the tower (she had muttered something about a nightmare involving her wedding to Snape) and had listened to their explanations and the argument they had regarding what Malfoy could possibly be blackmailing Hermione with and why she was taking it.
Ginny had laughed herself silly when Ron had told her his theory of Hermione being Voldemort's daughter, it was such a stupid idea; Hermione Granger – smarter than most Ravenclaws, more loyal than the Hufflepuffs, with an incredibly strong resolve for sticking to the rules. There was no way she could be the heir.
And so they had veto-ed that idea and spent the early hours of the morning brainstorming for what they could do to help Hermione, who was obviously under a tremendous amount of stress if the way she'd blown up at Harry was any indication, not that they could blame her – being blackmailed by Malfoy could hardly constitute as heaps of fun. Being as nice as possible to her seemed to be the best plan they could come up with.
When Harry had finished his acceptance of her apology, Hermione's eyes filled with tears and she reached out to pull him into a huge hug, feeling better than she had in a long time. After a second he wrapped his arms around her back.
She pulled away with a sob and reached for Ron who didn't hesitate at all in his reciprocation. She held him for longer than she had held Harry, for the first time she gave in to her tears, feeling that here, in this moment, with the two guys she'd been best friends with for so long and the girl who had become almost her sister, she could get through this.
She was Hermione Granger, nothing could change that. And they loved her for it.
The tearful – on Hermione's part anyway – affair had been cut short by the descent from the bedrooms of hungry students. Though it was Sunday, many pupils still woke early in order to eat, the boys mainly.
After the hugs Hermione had apologised to Harry and Ron about her mood swings. Ginny, who had spent the week caught up in settling into her sixth year hadn't seen much of Hermione was filled in on everything.
It wasn't until the common room was almost full that the subject of why she'd been acting strangely came up. She took a deep breath and prepared to tell them what she'd been keeping, but before she could say a word Harry grinned and gave her a 'you'll never believe this' look.
"Ron had a very interesting theory on you're behaviour," he gave the blushing redhead a playful punch on the arm.
"Shut it Harry! It was a valid point, we're all paranoid after all."
Hermione shot a questioning look between the two boys, one of whom was grinning widely and the other who was looking distinctly uncomfortable.
"I just happened to mention…in passing…that there was a possibility that you were Voldemort's heir."
She only had a chance to take a sharp breath, before he continued, "I know it was a stupid thing to say, there is no way you'd be his daughter, I mean, you're too…nice. So don't worry, I'm not accusing you of anything, I don't know why I even thought it anyway, you'd think living with Ginny would clue me in to the fact that sometimes girls get moody because of…" he paused and blushed even more furiously than before, "…well because of other, girl things."
"Don't worry, Hermione, I told him he was being an idiot," cut in Harry, "I've met your mum, I don't think she'd go anywhere near Voldemort, besides I know she's a muggle, so that totally rules you out anyway, seeing as he hates all muggles."
A weak smile was all that Hermione could manage, but she didn't have a chance to say anything before Andrew Kirke and Jack Sloper interrupted, to get Harry's urgent opinion on some new Quidditch move they were having trouble with.
Ginny and Ron being part of the team too, they joined in the discussion, leaving Hermione to mull things over.
Ok, so I didn't tell them about Voldemort being my father, but that doesn't really matter, does it? I'm still Hermione, they don't really need to know who my dad is to know who I am. Just be happy! You've got your friends back, Harry doesn't hate you, and you managed to have a whole conversation with Malfoy without threatening, maiming or hexing him.
Twenty minutes later Hermione found herself being dragged from the common room by all of the seven members of the Gryffindor Quidditch team. The discussion had turned in to an argument over tactics and impossible moves, which had turned into a full-blown team effort and requests for explanations of certain things, leading to offers of a demonstration, which had in turn led to an impromptu practice.
Hermione had been too busy thinking, mentally listing her homework for the upcoming week (something which always relaxed her), to be able to come up with a believable excuse to get out of 'coming along and offering Harry her moral support in his argument with those two jumped up idiot beaters'. In Ginny's words anyway. Hermione preferred to think of it as sitting out in the cold watching seven students fly around on sticks throwing spheres at each other in different ways when they should be inside studying.
By this time Hermione had been awake for around 24 hours, during which time she'd been subjected to the Cruciatus curse twice, had had a major falling out with one of her best friends, made up with said best friend, found out she could read minds – well, Draco's mind anyway – been told that Draco was being made to spy on her, and had cried. A lot. So she was extremely tired, possibly more exhausted than she could ever remember being.
All she wanted to do was go back into the castle, take a shower and crawl into her nice warm bed and sleep for a week. Her eyes kept closing and her head kept nodding, only to be roused from her doze every couple of minutes when a Bludger went rushing past her or one of the players called out to her to watch them execute a move and see if anything was wrong with it. How could Harry, Ron and Ginny be so awake and energetic? They couldn't have had much more sleep than she'd had.
Eventually she couldn't stand it anymore and was just about to shout to Harry, who was closest, that they were all doing really well but she was going inside, when a large group of people appeared in the middle of the Quidditch pitch.
It looked as though the whole of Slytherin house had come to congregate, led by none other than Draco Malfoy himself. Surprisingly, although Hermione wasn't happy about the Slytherins in general being there, she just couldn't muster up the hatred she usually felt towards Malfoy. Shrugging it off as nothing more than sleep deprivation and the experience of having an actual conversation with him that hadn't included the words 'mudblood' or 'ferret', she watched as he shouted up towards where Harry was flying.
Never taking her eyes off the argument Harry and Draco had started, Hermione started to descend from the stands she was sitting in and made her way onto the pitch.
"…Doesn't matter how much practice you get, you're still going to lose to us," Harry was hovering slightly above the pitch, shouting at the blonde who stood clutching his broomstick in front of the group of green-clad crowd.
"You're full of yourself Potter, if you're that confident then get lost and let us practice, you've been out here all morning, don't you have mudbloods to go and protect or something?"
Harry swooped down to land in front of him just as Hermione appeared by his side.
"Harry, don't. He's not worth it," she grabbed his arm as he started walking towards Draco with a livid look on his face.
"Stay out of it Granger," Draco sneered at her, although she could see in his face that he was less comfortable being insulting towards her than he was towards Harry, "you wouldn't want me to let anything slip would you?"
She shot him a venomous look before stepping between he and Harry, who looked even angrier if it was possible, "ok, I have an idea, how about we release the Snitch, Harry and Malfoy go after it and whoever catches it, their team gets to practice?"
It took a lot of glaring, shouting and insults between the two Quidditch teams, not to mention the other Slytherins who had come out to witness an altercation between the two famous enemies, before she got them to agree to her plan.
Of course, her subtle threats towards Malfoy when everyone else was preoccupied with their shouting matches hadn't hurt. It was surprising how someone's attitude could change when you told them you could find out their most embarrassing thoughts and spread them all over the school.
When the furore had died down and the only two people in the air were Harry and Malfoy, staring at each other menacingly, Hermione released the Snitch and watched it zoom up into the air, lost almost immediately to her vision.
Oh God, I hope they don't end up killing each other or something, she mentally groaned, as they each started flying, Harry taking up his usual position high above the pitch where he could see everything, whereas Malfoy flew here and there, keeping an eye on Harry in case he spotted anything.
Several minutes passed, the crowd now sitting in the stands watching the two seekers and watching for the Snitch themselves. Insults and encouragement were shouted in turn, when suddenly Harry went into a dive.
The speed at which he was hurtling towards the earth was terrifying to Hermione, the shouts were becoming louder and louder as Malfoy fell in behind Harry and was urging his broomstick to catch him up, but Hermione could barely hear anything past the blood rushing in her own ears.
At the last possible second before he hit the ground, Harry pulled up, a smug look on his face as he retreated slightly and looked behind him to see Malfoy's fate.
Malfoy had seen him suddenly change direction in time to notice that he was extremely close to the ground. He didn't have a chance to pull up, but he did have a chance to slow down slightly, meaning that when he hit the ground, the crunch was only slightly sickening.
A brief second of confusion passed over the crowd when they took their eyes off Malfoy and his broken nose to realize that Harry's hands were empty.
The Wronski Feint.
The Gryffindors in the audience roared their approval, while Harry just smirked at Malfoy, who glared back with such hatred that Hermione could almost feel it. She didn't need to be able to read his mind to know what that look meant. He was going to make Harry pay.
Before he could do anything, something gold whipped past him and headed upwards. He immediately angled his broomstick upwards and followed it, gaining on it before Harry even realised what was happening.
The shouts from both sides resumed with increased vigour when Harry followed Malfoy, gaining on him with every second until they were so close that they could have reached out and touched.
They had been steadily climbing up, so far that it was difficult, even with the raised stands, for the people left down below to see them.
This has got to end. Hermione wasn't shouting along with the rest of the crowd, she was wringing her hands in fear, Draco's going to try something, I just know it. He won't let that broken nose pass without a fight. They'll end up killing each other.
It was true that by the looks of things, this had turned from a simple playing for the pitch to a grudge match between two enemies, if the look on Malfoy's face had been any indication.
Her anxious worryings were cut short as the red figure in the sky pulled ahead of the green one, only to swerve suddenly, as though the tail of his broomstick had been hit with some force. There was a brief moment where it seemed Harry would regain his bearings and pull ahead of Malfoy once more but the green figure shifted slightly and suddenly Harry was falling.
From several hundred feet in the air, Harry was now dropping through nothingness with an astonishing speed.
Screams filled the stands as the audience watched helplessly.
He's going to die! I've got to do something, oh my god. Spells, spells, spells…what do I know that will help?
Ron was shouting at Hermione to do something, but she'd never been any good at thinking under pressure, she'd gotten better since the time in first year with the Philosopher's Stone but it still wasn't her best feature.
Her eyes followed Harry as he hurtled ever closer to the ground and her mind was blank, no spells came to her, no charms she could use, all she could do was watch her friend fall to his death.
I knew that snake was going to try something! This is all my fault, if I hadn't suggested they play for the pitch…Oh, I need to do something!
Her jumbled, panicked thoughts were racing at an incredible rate until, almost without realising it, Hermione raised her right hand, palm facing outwards towards Harry. Nobody was watching her, all eyes were on him.
It was the first time she'd actually attempted to use the power of the ring willingly, she could only hope that it would respond to her and do something, anything, to save Harry.
She could feel power building up, rushing through her, all of her magical energy and more focusing in her outstretched hand. The world filled with white noise and a breeze unfelt by anyone else shifted her hair, which was almost crackling as the magic surrounding her lifted it.
Pins and needles pricked at her hand until eventually, with no more thought than it took to move a muscle or blink, she released the energy and felt more than saw the magic flowing out of her, to snatch Sloper's broomstick out of his hand and send it tearing out onto the pitch.
A sigh of relief escaped her as it drew below Harry.
A sigh that turned to a scream when the broomstick shifted, undulating and changing, until it became a giant snake, almost as large as the Basilisk.
Before she had a chance to do anything more, the snake opened wide its huge jaws and Harry fell screaming into the depths of its mouth.
A/N – About Draco and Hermione – I'm just warning you now so that I don't get flamed by people who hate them being anything more than enemies, there WILL be a bit of civil friendship between them but as for romance, well I'm just going to have to see how the story works out.
BTW, Does anyone actually read my A/N's? I know some people hate them so just let me know what you think of them, cos I can stop writing them if no-one reads them. Of course, if you don't read it then you wouldn't know that I'm asking you if you read it or not…