Yay! Lovely lovely reviews, it' actually makes me so happy that you all are enjoying this. Keep it up, I love hearing from you! Here's your next chapter to spur you on!
Draco Malfoy entered Saint Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries feeling worse than he'd ever done in his whole life. It was a pain so unbearable so was completely at a loss as to what to do with himself. In one hand he held a wilting bouquet of giant daisies, in the other a small bag.
Hilda Hetherings looked up as the boy approached her desk. She looked deep into the lost blue eyes as they seemed to stare straight through her in shock. She smiled at him sympathetically as he stood before her, trying to catch his voice, a bustling and noisy line beginning to form behind him. "I think it's fifth floor you need, I'm guessing your recovering from some paralytic charm gone wrong". she pointed to the lift but he shook his head profusely.
"No." He dropped the flowers onto the desk, the bag onto the floor and leant desperately towards her. "My girlfriend's been hurt. I don't know what's the matter with her but I need to see her." She flinched a little as a menacing look flew across the increasingly cold eyes, the blue turning to grey.
Hilda gave herself a little shake and sat up a little straighter. "Can you tell me this girl's name?"
Draco stood back up, picking the bag up off the floor. "Hermione Granger."
"Ah, the girl Albus Dumbledore bought in earlier today." She smiled, a painfully wide smile that made Draco grimace. "Third floor."
"Thank you." Draco retrieved his flowers from the desk and half walked, half ran towards the lift.
Inside was a variety of painfully afflicted looking people, including a man who appeared to have a broom sticking out of his head, and a boy who's ear seemed to be whistling. Draco crammed himself inside, for once not caring about the people with whom he was being forced to touch, so long as this lift took him to Hermione.
The lift played depressingly cheerful music overhead as they moved painfully slowly upwards.
Thy finally reached the third floor and a female voice, similar to the one who lived in the ministry of magic lifts, spoke. "Level three: Magical viruses and charm related injuries. Fatal wounds and…"
"Bloody hell" Draco cried, sprinting out of the lift and down the whitewashed corridor. "You gotta help me." He grabbed the arm of a passing healer who spun around shocked. "Can you tell me," Draco tried to catch his breath. "Where Hermione Granger is."
A sympathetic expression crossed the healer's face. He told Draco to follow him, and led him further up the corridor, the a door marked "Fatal Wounds." "Oh no."
The healer pushed the door open slowly to reveal a grim scene. "Professor Dumbledore's there with her now." He whispered to Draco, holding open the door as Draco took in the sight before him.
Beds ran the length of the long hall. Each bed divided by a semi-transparent screen. Draco slowly moved up the ward, realising that every occupant of a bed was unconscious. He passed several families, huddled around a patient. Some were crying, wiping their faces on handkerchiefs, but others, and these were the one's Draco found most upsetting, were sat chatting away to their friend or relative, seemingly unaware they were receiving no replies.
He reached Hermione at last and gave a sharp intake of breath as he looked down at her. To one side of her was a screen, like that around every other bed, but on the other there was no screen, and another bed lay beyond it, on which lay Harry Potter.
"What happened here." He breathed. Hermione's face was ghostly white, marred only by cuts across her cheeks, and one across her blackened eye that shone scarlet. His eyes drifted further down her body, taking in the cuts all down her arms, the veins showing blue through the skin. A particularly deep wound glistened wet and bloody down her calf.
Draco sank into a seat positioned by her bed. "We have yet to find out." Professor Dumbledore appeared at Draco's side, holding a steaming mug. "Forgive me for leaving her, Draco."
He was unable to answer. Dumbledore sat in the seat beside Draco's. "I found them in this state late last night." He sipped from the mug. "The healer's were up all night working on them. Mr Potter over there," Dumbledore gestured over to the perfectly still black haired boy on the other side of the cubicle. "we know has been hit repeatedly with various minor curses, as well as the cruciatus curse. However, Miss Granger…" He trailed off, not able to find words that would do anything to console the man beside him.
"It's my fault." Draco found it difficult to get the words out. "It's my fault she's here." He felt tears forming in his eyes but blinked them back ferociously.
"Dear boy, it was nobody's fault - "
"It was. She asked me to go with her. She said. She said what if she got into trouble, but I still said no." Draco gulped back the lump forming rapidly in his throat. "I said no, just because it was Potter's place, just because I couldn't be bothered to face Potter." His head fell into his hands and he couldn't stop the tears bursting from him.
Dumbledore sipped again from his mug of tea. "I doubt it would have made much difference if you'd been there. There'd just be another patient the poor healers would have to concentrate on. In practise it's better you weren't there."
"I could have stopped her."
"Miss Granger is a very determined, brave but above all, stubborn woman. I highly doubt you'd have been able to stop her."
Draco blinked back the last of his tears, wiping his eyes as inconspicuously as he could on the sleeve of his robes. He stood and dropped the pathetic daisies into a glass vase beside her bed, and used his wand to fill it with water. "I bought some of her things." He told Dumbledore, indicating the bag sat next to his now vacant chair.
Dumbledore's voice dropped to a soft but steady whisper. "Draco, Hermione isn't going to be waking up too soon."
"Oh right, of course." Draco said, a little hysterically. He waved his wand at it distractedly and it vanished.
"Sit down, Mr Malfoy." Dumbledore pointed to the chair beside him, and Draco flopped down into it. His eyes were wide, and staring.
"It's all my fault."
"It is not, Draco!" Dumbedore's patience wavered. "I assure you. Nothing you could have done would have prevented this from happening." Draco didn't reply, just stared straight forward. "I must return to Hogwarts." Dumbledore got to his feet and bid Draco goodbye as he left the ward.
Draco moved closer to Hermione. He ran his fingers shakily through her soft brown hair, and ignored the tear that ran smooth down his face. "I'm so sorry." He told her, leaning over her and kissing her almost pale blue face. "I'm so, so sorry."
He tried best he could to lace his shaking fingers through her deathly still ones, trying unconsciously to put some of his warmth into them. "I love you." He told her, realising it himself for the first time.
There was no news of an improvement in Hermione's condition. Draco sat beside her still seemingly lifeless body a week later, her hand in his. The same healer who had first shown Draco where to find Hermione appeared at his side. He put a hand tentatively upon Draco shoulder. He jumped and turned to him.
"I'm sorry, I just came to explain to you what is going on." Draco kissed Hermione's forehead and sat down in one of the chairs he now saw as a second home. The healer sat beside him. "I'm afraid we're still at a loss as to what's wrong with her. We've tried everything that would not hurt her but we fear it's some sort of new jinx or curse."
Draco let out a deep breath, not knowing what to say or even think. "We don't think she's going to die, I can tell you that much." His deep breath turned a sigh of heavy relief.
"You're sure?"
"No, I'm sorry to say I'm far from sure." Draco's eyes widened. "But her condition is stable, and though it may not look it, she's fighting amazingly well."
"Figures, she's always been a fighter." Draco smiled his first smile in a week.
"Well we just have to hope she keeps it up." The healer left, leaving Draco alone with Hermione once more.
Draco leant back over her, resuming his normal position, hand wrapped around hers, hand stroking her increasingly straw like hair. "Hear that?" He asked her softly. "You just got to keep fighting and it'll all be ok."
He walked over to Potter's bed, where the boy was lying still, just like Hermione. His face, however, so unlike hers, was normal colour, his breathing obvious, and his cuts healing. He was just asleep. "You too, Potter." Draco told him gruffly, no longer able to look at Harry's face. "I may not like you very much, but god knows we need you."
Harry stirred a little in his sleep, a frown creasing his face. "Yeah, I hate you too." Draco said casually, turning slowly back to Hermione.
"I'm so sorry." He told her, smoothing her curls away from her face. He'd told her every single day since he'd first been to see her, but he still felt no less guilty. He looked at his watch. "I've got to go." He leant forward and kissed her silently. "I'll be back tomorrow."
He started to move away and then turned back, as he'd done everyday. "I love you."
"Morning, Heather!" Draco called over to the receptionist cheerfully as he strode through the hospital foyer. She waved at him merrily.
He chatted away to people in the lift, some looking at him gloomily, others humouring him answering, equally as cheerfully. "This is me!" He told them all happily, scrambling out of the lift at the third floor. The people who had been surrounding him felt their faces fall in sympathy and sudden understanding as the woman's voice informed them all what could be found on this floor.
The long "Fatal Wounds" ward was as silent as ever. Draco waltzed down it until he reached Harry and Hermione's cubicle. "Morning Potter." He waggled his fingers patronisingly at Harry who pulled a fake smile across his face in reply.
"Malfoy." Harry watched curiously as Draco carried out the ritual he'd been doing the past two weeks. He rid the vase by Hermione's bed of it's still semi-fresh flowers and evaporated the water using his wand. He dropped a new bouquet into the vase, bouquets of which had become increasingly more beautiful as the days had passed, and filled the vase with fresh water. He then pulled his chair over to Hermione's bedside and sat himself down, by which time the cheery visage had completely gone.
"Morning, my love." Draco whispered. He brushed the hair out of her face. It killed Harry to admit it, but Malfoy took amazing care of his best friend, and it seemed completely genuine. "Hope you're doing ok today." He ran a finger along a vein her arm, worrying about how faint the colour was.
"It's ok." Harry called over, spotted the frowning and concerned expression on Draco's face as he peered at Hermione's wrists. "It's a treatment they're trying on her. They're washing out her blood to see if there's something in there keeping her like this." Draco stared at Harry as if he were mad.
"Are they crazy?" He yelled. "They'll kill her!"
"Hey, calm down." Harry sat up a little straighter on his pillows in alarm at Draco's raised voice. A hush fell across the already quiet ward. "It's working."
"It is?"
"Yeah, she moved this morning." Draco's face was suddenly lit by a smile. He felt tears well up in his eyes, but fought hard to keep them back. There was no way he'd be crying in front of Potter, no matter what circumstances it was under.
"She did?" Harry nodded and turned back to the book he'd been pouring over. "That's so good to hear." Draco whispered to Hermione. "You're getting better."
He stroked her still ghostly face. "I don't know what you've done to me, Granger. I never cared about anything before, and now I don't ever want to leave you." He took her hand and bought it up to his lips, kissing her fingers softly.
There was warmth in the fingers that had not been there the day before, and it made Draco smile. "Ah, Mr Malfoy, good to see you again." Draco got to his feet as Dumbledore extended his hand in greeting. "I'm not kissing your hands, Sir." Draco informed him, grinning.
Dumbledore chuckled lightly. "No, that's quite alright, you can save that for her. I hear she's doing splendidly." Draco nodded delightedly.
"Potter says she moved this morning, and she's getting warmer." Dumbledore walked around the bed and took Hermione's other hand in his.
"She is, indeed." He placed Hermione's hand carefully back onto the bed before moving to see Harry.
Draco laughed as he looked down at Hermione. "Hear that, even he thinks you're getting better. I'm going to go and talk to him and Potter, but I'll be back in a minute ok?" He kissed her cheek and went to Harry's bedside.
"Wow, all these visitors, you'd think I was famous or something." Draco rolled his eyes at Potter's lame joke. "How long do you think it'll be before she wakes up, Professor?" Harry asked.
Dumbledore pondered. "I'm really not the one to ask, but to be honest I believe I could give as good an estimate as anybody." He glanced over at Hermione. "I'd say maybe a few more days, but I could be wrong." Harry seemed satisfied by the answer completely.
"Professor, could I ask you something?" Draco looked at the old man, feeling like a school boy again.
"You may."
"How did you find Hermione and Potter so quickly? I mean, as I far as I can gather they were alone in a deserted house, bar their attacker of course. And come to that, do you," he looked to Harry. "know who attacked you?"
"So many questions." Dumbledore looked to him thoughtfully. "Well, my answer is simple. As you know, Grimmauld Place is headquarters to the Order, I check on it, and Harry every week, luckily I came by the evening the two were attacked. I believe I may have just missed their attacker."
"Great timing." Draco muttered darkly.
"Indeed." Dumbledore's mouth twitched.
Harry sat up off his pillows. "To be honest, Malfoy, I don't remember much of the evening at all. I remember a lot of pain, and seeing Hermione fall, but the rest is sort of blurry."
"Whoever attacked them has to have known where headquarters' are found. He, or she, could not have just come to look for it because it is obviously unplotable."
"Then who - "
"Who ever it was is either a member of the order, or was told by a member of the Order where to find headquarters." As Dumbledore said this, Harry turned to stare at Draco.
"Keep your evil eyes to yourself, Potter. I don't even know where headquarters is myself yet. Can't exactly go telling some nutter about it, not that I would if I knew." He shrugged.
The three men stood in silence, each pondering who the attacker could have been. The obvious answer was Voldemort, but had been years since he'd last been heard of, and it wasn't his style.
"A deatheater?" Harry suggested.
"It's starting to look likely, but who?" Dumbledore turned to them both. "I'm afraid I'll have to get back to the two of you. I must return to the castle." And he left."
United in their thoughts, Draco and Harry could have appeared to be almost friends. "Most of the death eaters are in hiding, or dead. They had no way of telling I'd be unable to remember them, it would be suicide." Harry said.
"Well they're crazy, the lot of them, believe me, I'd know. Who knows what they're thinking." Draco looked over at Hermione and sighed.
"She'll be ok, Malfoy, I'm watching over her all the time." Harry assured him.
"I just wish she'd wake up so I can tell her how sorry I am."
Harry couldn't think of what to say, so stayed quiet. He watched as Draco went back over to Hermione and kissed her lightly. He watched as he whispered, the same three words to her as he had done everyday. "I love you." And as Harry watched, he could have sworn that as Draco turned to leave, Hermione's eyes flickered open.
So, last day of the holidays! I have no idea if anyone has the same holidays as me, but think of me tomorrow, having to get up early when no one else in my family does (my sis and brother have a teacher training day) and having to go to school where I will be shouted at because I haven't doe much homework. I don't know if I'll get a chance to update tomorrow. I'll possibly try when my party ends so it'll be about 11 (I'm off for a meal with 13 of my friends, wish you could all come). So it'll be late my time by the amazing thing is it may not be your time, I don't know! So review, make me in a good enough mood to stare out the teachers and I'll try my hardest to update tomorrow!
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