I made a mistake in last update's notes. It's the chapter after this that's one of my favorites. So sorry! Thank you to MykEsprit for alpha reading and mcal for beta reading.
Early the next morning, before Theo could send a message through her bracelet, Hermione woke. She slid out of the bed, stepping into her shoes as she grabbed her robe from the hook in the corner of the room. Clearly, it had been too much to hope for that she would be able to sneak away without rousing Draco.
By the time she turned around, he was seated in the centre of the bed, his legs crossed as he yawned. Over the last week, they had grown comfortable with the other, so comfortable that Draco voiced aloud he didn't understand why her cheeks caught fire when he threw his shirt on the floor before they slept. Or maybe he did, and just let it go when she gave him another nonanswer. And for yet another morning, she'd found herself draped across his chest, fingers splayed against his scars. They seemed to be constantly gravitating toward one another, consistently meeting in the middle.
Hermione cleared her throat. "I need to get home before Theo realises I'm gone." Wind knocked against the window pane, drowning out her soft voice. "I'll see you before the sun sets."
Draco slid off the bed, padding toward her. He lifted her head by tucking a knuckle beneath her chin. From his smirk, he probably felt her swallow uneasily. "You'll be safe there?" He rumbled.
Well, she didn't truly know. There was no reason for Lucius to perceive her as anything more than a rebellious princess, but any number of things could go wrong in an attempt to drug him. "I don't think anything will happen, no."
"Not a reassuring answer," He traced her jawline, ending near her ear where he tucked her hair behind it. "Don't endanger yourself on my account. I've come this far without my memories. I could live without them."
"That's not fair."
He deserved to remember everything about his life. She was furious that it had been taken from him seemingly without a second thought.
Outside the window, the sun was breaking against the horizon. Hues of oranges and reds painted the sky. Hermione leaned into the palm cupping her cheek. "Stay out of trouble while I'm gone."
"The worst thing I could do is fuck up a spell."
She laughed. "Well, that can be dangerous, you know." Hermione stepped away from him, fastening her cloak around her neck. "See you soon." She murmured and vanished on the spot.
Thankful that her father was away on a trip, Hermione made her way from the entry hall to her bedroom with no one being the wiser. Once inside, she threw her cloak on the bed, letting her clothes fall to the floor in a pile, and took a long soak in the bath connected to her room.
She sunk below the hot water, sighing as she let her head rest against the edge of the tub. Already she had the urge to return to the safehouse. Her eyes fluttered shut as she wondered what Draco was doing right that moment. She imagined that he might have gone back to sleep, but sincerely doubted it. When it came to her leaving, especially since he knew she was up to no good, Hermione didn't think the wolf would have let him rest at all. Perhaps he'd already flipped open one of her textbooks, reading through the spells he'd already learned once.
She wondered frequently how long it would take for him to get to where he had once been. It was hope that kept her determination to retrieve his memories alive, hope that maybe if she managed to restore them, Draco would be able to remember exactly how to use magic. In her late night readings, while Draco sat beside her practicing charms, she knew it wouldn't be so simple.
If Draco had been Obliviated-and she was sure he had been, given all of the signs-the only way to reverse the effects would be for the original spell caster to do so. She dunked her head below the water as she was reminded that Lucius would never cooperate. That was if it had been him, which she strongly suspected.
Minutes ticked by as she wondered about Draco, about what her visit to Malfoy Manor would bring, until her bath water grew cold. As she wrapped a bathrobe around her, tying it in the front, Hermione dried her hair.
"Hermione," Theo knocked on the door twice. "Are you nearly done?"
"Yes." She called, gripping the edge of the counter. "Once I'm dressed, I'll be ready to leave. Are we due so soon?"
"No," his voice came through the wood. "I wanted to have breakfast before we left. There's something I want to tell you."
It didn't sound promising. "Be right down," Hermione replied, and waited to hear her bedroom door shut.
Theo sat at the far end of the table, his normal seat, and she took the place across from him. Smoothing her skirt down as the chair was pulled out for her, Hermione watched him. His hands curled into fists, and his jaw was clenched so tightly his teeth could crack. "Theo?"
"That will be all." He cleared his throat, speaking to the house elves. "Please clear the room, and let no one in."
Winky shot Hermione a panicked glance, but followed the rest of the elves from the room, immediately closing the doors behind them. Hermione watched her brother cast a silencing spell around them, warily eyeing their surroundings.
"Theo?" She repeated.
"Father's mask is gone." He said bluntly, sipping his pumpkin juice. "I was in his personal study this morning looking over legislation that he left me to read. While looking for a quill, I realised there was something missing from the bottom right drawer of his desk."
She sat frozen in her seat, staring at her older brother with wide eyes. "That doesn't-it doesn't mean-Theo?"
He blinked, sighing to himself as he pushed his plate away from him. "I think you should prepare yourself for the worst now, Hermione." He pushed a folded piece of parchment across the table. "There's a portkey inside of it. I want you to promise me that at the first sign of trouble, you'll use it."
"Where would it take me?" The lights flickered above them as he shook his head. "You don't know?"
Theo's nod was barely there. "It's safer if I don't know where you are, but I promise you'll be safe."
She unfolded the parchment, taking a long look at the skeleton key tucked away inside of it. It was heavy in her hand, traces of magic running through it. "Where did you get this?"
"Doesn't matter."
"Of course it matters. What aren't you telling me? First, you give me this bracelet for my protection. Now you're telling me Father's mask has vanished and I'm to run at the first sign of danger? I won't do it."
His eyes flashed. "Don't argue with me, Hermione."
"Then tell me the truth!"
His fist slammed against the top of the table. "Why don't we just exchange secrets then? What about that? You're keeping several of them now, and you've enlisted Harry's help to do so. I have no idea where you are at night, but I know you haven't slept here in a week." He gritted his teeth. "Where are you staying?"
The weight of her own lies threatened to break the floor below her, dragging her with them. It was on the tip of her tongue: Draco is alive. You were right. I can take you to him. Please forgive me. Hermione shook her head. "I already told you I was with someone, Theo. You know as well as I that father is an impossible man to please."
"I know that you're a shite liar, and you always have been."
She grimaced.
"If this was about love, you'd have stormed up to him and told him that you would make the decisions. Yet you haven't, so don't think me daft." He vanished his breakfast. "It's one of two things as I see it."
Hermione didn't ask how he saw it, too fearful he might hit it right on the head in one guess.
"Either you're meeting with someone who isn't a Pureblood, or you're keeping a secret that could bring the world down on your head."
I'm so sorry. Hermione schooled her features, leaning back in her chair. "I can't tell you anything. I'm so sorry."
Theo ran a hand down his face, groaning. "Eat your breakfast. We'll be leaving soon. Even if you plan to chuck that over the castle wall the first chance you get, at least pretend to pocket it for my sake of mind." He left her with that, his footfalls heavy against the floors as he flung the door open.
Staring at the food before her, Hermione had already lost her appetite.
Hermione visited her lab in the dungeons before meeting Theo at the Floo. He said nothing as they stepped into the Floo together, reaching for a handful of powder, and calling out, "Malfoy Manor!"
They were whisked away in plumes of green smoke, the ground changing below her footing as they landed in the connected fireplace. Theo stepped out first, turning and offering his hand. "You always trip over the ledge," he muttered. "Can't have you embarrassing me."
She nodded, knowing that any other day she would have laughed at his statement. Hermione's lips curved into a polite smile as a servant took her cloak, leaving her arms cold to the draft manor. She hadn't set foot inside of the estate since Narcissa Malfoy hosted a memorial service for her son. Following that, neither she nor Theo had any desire to return.
"Your Majesty," Narcissa greeted, dropping to curtsey.
Hermione wore a mask of faux politeness. "Narcissa, it's lovely to see you. You're looking well."
Considering how the woman had looked the last time, gaunt and frail, it was the truth.
Narcissa slipped an arm through Hermione's, guiding her to the drawing room. "The elves have just prepared tea." Before Hermione could say anything else, she was pulled away from Theo.
Hermione shot a dark look toward Theo, mouthing, "Hurry up, would you?"
She sat through the news that she would have been interested in, had she grown up to be a gossiping socialite. Hermione smiled when necessary from behind her tea cup, managing a laugh when Narcissa told a joke even when they weren't funny, and pretended that she wasn't there for any other reason than to keep Narcissa company.
So far, she'd learned that Pansy Parkinson was engaged to Blaise Zabini. Narcissa thought the swift engagement and wedding that was slated for the next month was due to an accidental pregnancy, but Hermione was to not breathe a word of it.
Hermione's gaze strayed, an impolite thing to do when she should have been giving her full attention, but her blood ran cold as she saw the portrait on the wall. Draco's likeness stared down at her from over the mantle, his eyes gray, but the pigment wasn't the right colour at all. One eye was lighter than the other. Her throat threatened to close as she remembered the only reason she'd come at all.
"Do you think of him often?" Narcissa asked quietly. "He and Theo were always inseparable, but you went along with them more often than not."
It was easy to forget that Draco had been her friend once upon a time as well when he didn't remember it. Before Hogwarts, before meeting Ron and Harry, Draco and Theo had been the only Purebloods she could stand.
"It's a terrible thing." Hermione replied. She watched the woman, carefully gauging her reaction. Would Narcissa have been able to leave her only son for dead? Hermione wasn't sure. "Theo misses him more with each passing day."
Narcissa choked. "As do I. I wish I had been there."
Hermione looked to her, reaching across and squeezing the woman's hand. "You would have died had you been there. If Lucius couldn't…" Tears stung her eyes, and Hermione quickly wiped her face. "It isn't your fault."
The blonde clasped Hermione's hand in her own with a teary smile. "You're much too kind to me, Your Majesty."
As she shifted, the vial of Veritaserum pressed into the side of her dress. Hermione nodded. "May I use the loo?"
Narcissa ushered her off, and Hermione took the opportunity to hurry up the staircase, and make her way down the hallway. She wasn't sure where Lucius would be, or how she would catch him outside of his meeting with her brother.
"-rubbish law," Theo's voice echoed down the corridor, and Hermione pressed herself into the nearest room.
As the door sealed behind her, Hermione recognised the Malfoy library, a broad expanse of a room that she'd spent a large chunk of her childhood. Hermione strode across the room, busying herself in case anyone walked in. As it were, there was a fresh cup of tea on the desk, and someone could return at any moment.
She was right. Moments later, as Theo's footsteps trailed down the corridor, growing fainter and fainter, the door opened. "Your Majesty," Lucius called, closing the door softly behind him. "I knew Narcissa's gossip would bore you eventually."
She feigned a sheepish look. "You know I've always loved this library." Not turning her back to him, Hermione reached his desk in two strides. "I actually had a few questions if you wouldn't mind sitting with me?"
Lucius waved his hand, taking a seat on one of the leather couches.
She glanced at the tea service. "Might I pour you a cup of tea?" Hermione asked politely.
"That would be kind of you, Your Majesty."
Most Veritaserum had a particular taste to it, but she'd been experimenting with a batch to go undetected. Carefully, she pulled the vial from the inside of her dress before dumping the contents into his cup. Hermione crossed the room. handing the cup to him, her fingers brushing his before sitting down.
Lucius took a long drink of the tea, laying his cane across the table in front of him. "What questions did you have?"
Hermione fidgeted with her wand, conspicuously looking to the cane that housed his own. "Is Draco alive?"
His eyes widened. "Yes." Lucius' hand flew to his mouth as he shot forward for his cane.
"Incarcerous!" Hermione cast quickly, watching as ropes appeared, tying him to the sofa. "You're a real bastard, aren't you?" She cast a silencing spell before locking the door. "Does your wife know you left Draco to die by choice? Does she know that you Obliviated your own son so he couldn't find his way home?"
"She doesn't know." He glared at her.
She clutched her wand close to her chest. If he were to get free of the ropes, Hermione wasn't entirely sure what she would do. Stun him, probably, but it might not get her far. "How could you leave him? He's your son!"
"A werewolf has no place in my family. If the gods had been looking kindly on him, he would be dead now."
Her heart hammered in her chest. "Did you extract the memory?"
"Yes."
"Where is the pensieve?"
He clenched his jaw. "In my private study, you vile little bitch."
"Are there other memories of him inside of the pensieve?"
"There are memories of Draco in Narcissa's."
"Where is it?"
"Our bedroom, west wing, last room on the right."
Hermione nodded. "He's alive, you know. And you won't remember this, but I swear I'll make you pay for what you've done." Muttering a "Stupefy," Hermione stunned him before Obliviating him herself, and rendering him unconscious.
Barely catching her breath, she released him from the bindings and fled from the library.
Hermione extracted the memories from both pensieves without fail. No one was on the top floor as she flitted from the private study into the last bedroom on the right. Carefully storing the memories, wispy little things, in a necklace around her neck, Hermione made her way down two flights of stairs.
Only to be stopped dead in her tracks by a familiar voice. Hermione pressed her back to the wall, listening to the conversation on the other side.
"Your father asked you to relay a message, boy?" It was a man's voice, gruff, agitated, and familiar. Hermione wasn't sure she'd ever heard it in her life however. "Out with it then."
"My father asked I inform you that he's prepared to fulfill his debt to the Dark Lord." Theo said smoothly.
She nearly barrelled into the room before she could stop herself. Dark Lord? Debt? She'd known Theo was keeping his own secrets, but she hadn't pressed the issue when she had her own.
Clearly, neither of them had come to Malfoy Manor for social calls.
Bile rose in her throat as she peeked through the crack along the hinge of the door. She recognised the man, but then there was the woman standing just behind him. They should have been in Azkaban, sealed away for the heinous crimes, but she knew as well as anyone else that the Lestranges had escaped.
She stumbled away from the room, her legs nearly buckling as she couldn't escape fast enough.
The Apparition point outside of Malfoy Manor was in the middle of the garden, and considering she couldn't use the Floo since she'd have to shout the name of the safehouse, Hermione had complimented Narcissa on the garden she maintained, and excused herself for a short walk to clear her head. Behind the tallest hedge, she took a deep breath, and Disapparated.
She landed in the living room, her legs immediately giving out from under her as she crashed to the floor. Draco was at her side in an instant, his hand steadying her at the small of her back as he helped her sit upright. "I'm alright." She voiced, lifting her head to look at him.
His brows were drawn together, and he didn't appear to believe her. "What happened?"
Hermione hiccuped as tears slipped down her face. "My father is a Death Eater." She whispered, her voice cracking. "There were Death Eaters inside of the manor, and I was just steps away from them. Theo was talking to them about a debt my father owes the Dark Lord."
He rubbed circles in her back. "Were you seen?"
She shook her head. "No, I got Lucius alone. The Lestranges were with Theo. Bloody hell, I have no idea if Theo is a Death Eater." He wouldn't, she told herself, but he'd been there talking with Death Eaters on their father's account...
"Hey," Draco sat in front of her, taking her hands into his own. "Take a deep breath before you hyperventilate."
She hung her head, her hair slipping from the pins in her hair. "Merlin, I've been so naive." Hermione allowed him to draw her into his arms, to wrap her up securely against him. "I got the memories of your attack, of the Obliviation." She whispered the words into his skin, slipping her arms around his waist.
"Thank you."
"I took several of your mother's memories as well. I thought you'd like to see your childhood." Hermione laid her head on his shoulder. "There's no way to fully restore them, not without Lucius."
Draco shook his head. "Stay away from him. Stay away from Malfoy Manor if you can. It's not safe."
She stiffened. "I could protect myself."
He laughed a low laugh next to her ear. "I believe you, but I worried what might happen to you when I couldn't reach you."
If she pulled on what he was mentioning, the string would unravel and she would be led to the question regarding werewolf mates. "I would come back."
Draco swallowed, lifting her with him as he stood. "I would hope so. Or else I'll tear anyone apart who prevented it." Following her stare, he grimaced. "That sounded possessive. I didn't mean-I just meant that if anyone ever hurt you, I would-"
Hermione placed her hand over his mouth. "I feel the same way about you, but with less tearing and more wandwork."
The bed was soft below her as he laid her on her side, and she pulled the necklace from her neck. "There's a pensieve that I bought yesterday in the living room. You can view these memories." Hermione pressed them into his palm. "I'm not sure if you're inviting me to stay the night because I'm upset, but I can go home if you prefer."
He gripped the vials tightly, and they likely cut into his palm. "Stay?" Draco asked quietly. "I'll watch these while you sleep."
She gave a sleepy smile before rolling onto her side. "Goodnight, Draco."
His fingers brushed her hair as he murmured a goodnight. She burrowed into the pillow, inhaling the scent of him as she imagined fingers running down her back as she drifted.
Yay, more plot! I'm so ready to get to the war, you just have no idea.
Next Chapter Snippet: Hermione tucked hair behind her ear. "I don't know. I always believed you thought of me as a sister."
He choked, levelling a stare at her, slowly reaching up to cup her cheek. His thumb swiped across her bottom lip, causing them to part in surprise. "Oh, Hermione, I definitely don't think of you as a sister. The things I think—they're not acceptable for a sister."