Chapter Fourteen

Sorry for the sudden break, something cropped up in my life and I wasn't able to write. But I'm back. *phew*

Sooo, some people have had complaints about Chapter Twelve being quite unrealistic in terms of what happened to Harry (his inability to defend himself), and I throw my apologies all around for that! I just need him in a vulnerable position for his and Tom's relationship to advance, and I swear to you that this is not a story where he becomes submissive and defenceless and changes Tom's ways just by becoming his little boyfriend or whatnot.

Word on the Hogwarts grapevine was that Harry Delacour and Elijah Jenkins had been childhood best friends, but it had ended when Jenkins had been discovered nursing an obsessive crush on Hermione Delacour. In a fit of possessiveness, Harry had cut all ties he had with Elijah, and great bitterness built up between the two as the years passed. Then, upon the Delacours' arrival at Hogwarts, the former best friends quickly became enemies. It was said that last night, the two met and duelled to the death to gain Hermione's affection.

At least, that was what Ignatius and Phyllis was listening to, coming from the mouths of a gaggle of third year Gryffindor girls who were nattering together in the outside courtyard.

"Elijah's second was Axel, you know, Axel Renshaw," one of the girls whispered to her group of friends. "And apparently Delacour's was Tom Riddle."

"Elijah and Axel can't have stood a chance against those two!" another said.

"Go on, Beatrice, what happened next?"

"Well," Beatrice said, puffing up, "I heard from Peter that Axel withdrew from the duel, so Elijah became desperate and used the Cruciatus Curse on Delacour!"

"No…"

"Most certainly. And then there was the most unexpected turn of events – Delacour broke free from the curse, and killed Elijah!"

"No!"

"Are you certain? I mean, the Killing Curse…"

"Oh, Elsie, Delacour's a Slytherin, what would you expect? Besides, it would explain why Elijah has just vanished, Axel too… haven't you noticed that the professors are being very tight-lipped about the whole matter?"

"Oh, that is enough," Ignatius hissed to Phyllis, who tailed him as he stormed over to break up the gathering.

"Go forth and defend Harry's honour," she toasted, raising a hand in salute, dropping back to watch the show. Oh, Ignatius planned to.

"Never have I heard a more brainless theory in my life!" he shouted once he was towering over the group of third years. Intimidation was key when it came to handling a bunch of pesky little girls.

"Excuse me?" the one called Beatrice asked, twirling a lock of hair calmly around her finger.

"There are many things entirely wrong with what you're saying," Ignatius snapped. "Firstly, why would Harry and Elijah 'duel to gain Hermione's affection'? Harry and Hermione are cousins, isn't incest illegal anyway? Secondly, Riddle would never second Harry in a duel, just as Harry would never ask him to. As a friend of the person in question, I can vouch for the fact that those two are mortal enemies. And thirdly, the most important thing of all, Harry is not capable of the Killing Curse! I know him, he wouldn't hurt a Bowtruckle even if it begged him to!" A frown crossed his face momentarily – he hoped so, anyway.

"Listen," said Beatrice, crossing her arms and stepping forward, flanked by her girlfriends – the obvious ringleader of the gang. "You may claim to know Delacour, but I happen to know Elijah. He wouldn't just disappear unless some… some terrible fate befell him."

"Perhaps some terrible fate befell Harry, and Elijah was the one to cause it. That would be a fairly good reason to disappear as well." Ignatius mirrored Beatrice's defensive stance, to far greater effect in his most humble opinion. "You said that you heard that Elijah used the Cruciatus on Harry. Have you ever considered that it ended there?"

"I thought that you said it was a brainless theory," Beatrice countered innocently, and her group of friends tittered. Ignatius saw Phyllis gasping comically through his peripheral vision, and scowled.

"Have you ever considered it, though?" he pressed, refusing to back down. Beatrice's expression went flat, and she looked away.

"It's not right," she said softly. "Elijah was so kind to me all the time. When I was in first-year, he was always helping me with homework and answering my questions about this world. I mean, I'm Muggle-born, I didn't know anything, and other people always laughed at me when I asked things like 'who's the Minister of Magic', or 'do werewolves really exist'. I don't even believe that he's capable of casting the Cruciatus. Elijah is a good guy."

Ignatius exchanged a glance with Phyllis, who shrugged. Finally, he let out a puff of air, gazing skyward as he dragged a hand through his hair.

"Look, you're only what, thirteen? I'm seventeen, Elijah's sixteen. I've known Elijah much longer than you– please let me finish!" Ignatius tacked on hastily when he saw Beatrice opening her mouth. "I'm not going to lie and say we were friends, but we've been team mates on the Quidditch team for a while, and I know that he's always been prone to rages. I'm not trying to say that Elijah's an evil villain, that he deserves to disappear, or anything like that. I'm trying to say… we've all got alter egos, but I think that his may be darker than Harry's, and at the end of the day…"

"Fuck you!" Beatrice wheeled around and flounced away, her girl gang hovering protectively around her, shooting Ignatius hostile stares as they did. Ignatius shook his head. He could have handled that better, he supposed.

"I didn't know that thirteen-year-old girls exercised such vocabulary," he murmured to Phyllis when she came to stand beside him.

"Maybe you should have left them be," she said. "People tend to defend friends to great extent."

"But that's exactly why I did it." Ignatius started across the courtyard for his next class. "Do you think that Madam Pomfrey will let us in to speak to Harry before dinner, finally?"

"I hope so," said Phyllis. "I can't wait to tell him that you argued with a third-year. Truly well done, Prewett."

"Oh, shut up." Ignatius bumped her shoulder playfully, then caught sight of a familiar trim figure with a head of unruly brown hair dashing past. "Look, there's the cousin, I should ask her how he's doing…"

Taking a deep breath, he called out.

"Hermione!"

Hermione paused in her path at the shout, feeling completely frazzled and out of it. Today was a bad day – after a terrible few hours' worth of sleep, she had spent the entire morning in Transfiguration, where her performance had been less than exemplary when demonstrating some of the more advanced principles of Conjuration through wand-work. Dumbledore had been entirely sympathetic – when operating on a system which was both sleep-deprived and recovering from shock, he said that this was to be expected. It still didn't hinder her frustration, especially with her peers whispering behind their hands about her, and Riddle performing up to his usual standard. It was as if he was purposefully trying to spite her.

To continue a perfect day, over the lunch hour rush she had been subject to yet more curious stares and probing questions which she did not plan on answering. Rowan and Quincy were doing their best to be supportive, but Rowan was being too clingy to alleviate any stress, and Quincy was simply too scatterbrained. As much as Hermione appreciated them, she managed to break away from them in order to run up to the Hospital Wing and check in with Madam Pomfrey for any changes in Harry. Other than a further increase in brain activity, he showed no sign of waking. He simply sat there, glassy-eyed. But the slight improvement was enough for Hermione to plough on to her next class, where she was headed now – Arithmancy. Professor Gwin was not lax when it came to punishment, and Hermione was certain that she would be tardy if she didn't get a move on.

But she couldn't well just ignore Harry's Gryffindor friends, two of whom were approaching her now. Doing her best to not look impatient in her already drained state, she wracked her brain for names. The tall redhead with the sweet brown eyes was Ignatius Prewett, and the freckled brunette was… ah…

"Ignatius," said Hermione, brushing hair out of her face and doing her best to compose herself, "and Phyllis, right? How are you?"

"Decent," said Phyllis, at the same moment Ignatius said, "Pissed. The tales that some people are spinning about Harry and Elijah is ridiculous."

Ah, yes. Hermione had heard many of these tales chasing her down the hallways all day. One had involved a battle in the Forbidden Forest with the centaurs, another had involved an Apparition to an art gallery in Jamaica (which wasn't even possible in Hogwarts Castle, honestly), and another had involved the reopening of the Chamber of Secrets, with a smiling lizard involved somehow.

Surely people had better things to do than craft such stories.

"What materialised from the rumour mill this time?" asked Hermione wearily.

"That Harry killed Elijah," Phyllis offered with a quirked eyebrow, and Hermione scowled – she should have anticipated that Harry would be villainised at some point.

"That's what I thought!" Ignatius agreed, reading Hermione's expression, then added hesitantly, "But… the thing is, nobody knows what really happened. Other than the people who were there, the professors, and you. Could you possibly…?"

Blowing out a heavy breath, Hermione tugged her bag strap over her shoulder more securely and met his eye flatly.

"It's not in my place to tell you what happened," she said. "If he wants to, Harry will be the one to."

"So he's awake–?"

"No." Hermione averted her gaze and fidgeted with the cuffs of her blazer. "It could be a little while until he wakes up. His mind and body are recuperating from the trauma, and until he's ready, he won't be emerging from this coma. We can only hope that that will be sooner rather than later."

"His mind and body are recuperating in a coma state?" Phyllis sounded horrified. "So what those girls were saying is true…"

"The Cruciatus was used." Ignatius's face was pale, and he wetted his lips. "Does that mean–"

"I have class, I should be going," Hermione cut in firmly, turning and leaving the courtyard as swiftly as she could without running. As soon as she was out of sight, concealed beyond the first doorway that she found, she pressed her back to a wall and sucked in a deep, steadying breath.

Stay strong, she told herself. Stay strong. Making it her mantra, she stepped away from the wall, straightened the tie at her throat, and returned to the battlefield.

Once it became evident that Madam Pomfrey would continue to deny everybody except Hermione entrance into the Hospital Wing for visits to Harry, the number of classroom 'accidents' skyrocketed drastically. Soon there were queues of students waiting for admittance. It didn't take long for the matron to suspect the deception going on behind her back, and finally had Harry moved into private quarters in the Hospital Wing, out of the sight of prying eyes.

As for Hermione, her declining condition did not improve, and she suspected that it would not until Harry awoke. Worry and guilt gnawed at her constantly, shadowing after her wherever she walked, whether it be to class or the library or the Great Hall. When she slept, it hung over her head like a heavy cloud, raining on her restless dreams. Because she should have been there for Harry. They were meant to be each other's pillar of support in this frail time, and she had failed to be so.

Perhaps she was being ridiculous, for believing that she could have prevented this whole incident from every happening. But her subconscious told her that either way, Ron, Ginny, Remus, and Neville and Luna and Mr. and Mrs. Weasley and even Sirius (if he had been alive) would be disappointed in her. Harry had always been there for the rest of them, and she couldn't even repay the favour.

And so the guilt continued onwards, holding her heart hostage and sucking the marrow out of her bones.

As the days merged into weeks and Harry showed no sign of waking, even despite his supposed "full brain recovery" as quoted by Madam Pomfrey, the professors began asking after him during class time.

Whenever Hermione reported the news to them (that is to say the lack of news), Flitwick would shake his head sadly, Merrythought would mumble about a "waste of talent", Beery, the Herbology professor, would pat Hermione's shoulder, and Dumbledore merely looked thoughtful. He was always looking thoughtful nowadays, as if he knew something that nobody else did. But then again, he probably did.

"Still nothing?" Ignatius asked for about the fifth time that day, leaning back in his chair to address Hermione – during the time that Harry was absent, the two of them had spoken more than they had the previous month combined.

"No, Ignatius," Hermione said through gritted teeth, concentrating on the Occamy eggshell that she was grinding up. "Please stop asking me, I'll tell you if there is any development whatsoever."

She understood that he and Harry were good friends, but the persistent probing of the Gryffindor was beginning to grate on her nerves after this long. Even Greengrass and Parkinson had taken to tagging along after Hermione every day, attempting to extract every droplet of information from her that they could. Then there was Rowan, acting the guard dog more than ever, and Trelawney, predicting Harry's untimely death with more morbid creativity each day. Trying to maintain a mask of composure to the public while dealing with these people was becoming overwhelming.

Ignatius stared into Hermione's face, as though he was seeing her for the first time, and said, "Blimey, are you feeling alright?"

"What?" Hermione snapped back in a manner most unlike herself, wiping hair off her damp brow with her forearm.

"You don't look well," Ignatius remarked matter-of-factly. "Are you sick?"

"Honestly, Ignatius, don't be rude!" said Bridget Bones, his fellow Gryffindor, grabbing Ignatius's arm and yanking him back to their table, all the while shooting Hermione an apologetic glance.

Hermione ceased work, placing her pestle on the table ruminatively. So someone had finally noticed her pale complexion, the dark shadows around her eyes, the exhaustion in the lines of her face. She had done her best to conceal it, but apparently it was beginning to show through…

"Miss Delacour," said Slughorn, wandering over. Gone was his booming voice when he approached her, the jovial expression on his face, replaced by pure sobriety. "How is Felix faring? And more importantly, how is our Harry? It has been over two weeks, surely he has woken by now?"

"No, sir," said Hermione grimly, and surreptitiously passed a glance over to where Riddle was working. "He hasn't."

"Poppy seemed so sure when she said that he would…" Slughorn trailed off, frowning.

"He could," Hermione said, staring down at her workbench. "Madam Pomfrey says that he has made full recovery, and could have woken up at least a week ago. But he hasn't, it's as though his subconscious is hiding from something. It's as though his subconscious… doesn't want to wake up."

"With Grindelwald on the move," said Slughorn gravely, "not many people would."

There was a great flurry of motion from the doorway when a little Hufflepuff, presumably a first-year, burst in, scanning over the individuals of the classroom with wild eyes, before landing on Hermione and scurrying over to her.

"Excuse me, sir," he said to Slughorn, before thrusting a note out to Hermione. "Madam Pomfrey asked that I give this to you immediately."

Hermione stared at the note, frozen. Could it be…?

"Well, read it then, Miss Delacour!" Slughorn said.

The other students were watching curiously now – Hermione could feel a certain pair, from over in the Slytherin section, burning into her face dangerously. Refusing to look at any of them, she took the note and unfolded it with shaking fingers.

Your cousin is awake. – Madam Pomfrey

Covering her mouth with a hand, Hermione looked at Slughorn, unable to stop grinning daftly.

"Might I…?" she began, and he laughed loudly, having read the note over her shoulder, a spark returned to his eyes.

"Well, of course you must!" he shouted. "Go now, your potion will be dealt with."

Nodding her head, Hermione rushed out of the classroom blindly, thinking all the while, Harry's awake, Harry's awake, Harry's awake.

They were going to be alright.

The world was hazy. Bright and white and fuzzy, and he wondered if this was what it was like to be born into the world for the first time.

"Mr. Delacour!" a woman's voice said. "Mr. Delacour, are you with me?"

He blinked, trying to source the voice. Where was he? Who was speaking? Who was Mr. Delacour?

He wasn't sure how long he tried to get a feel for his surroundings in this too bright world, when finally somebody whispered, "Harry?"

Harry. Yes, Harry… that was his name, wasn't it? And that voice… he knew it, but it sounded different, there was a strange lilt to it. But it was her voice, nonetheless.

"'Mione?" he mumbled, and she whispered, "Oh, thank Merlin and Morgana."

"Huh?" Harry was still as dazed as could be, as if he had just taken a strong Confundus Charm, or else quite a beating, but everything was slowly sliding back into focus, and he could now see the blurry shape of Hermione, leaning over his prone form. He heard her make a noise which sounded suspiciously like a sniffle, before saying briskly, "Here are your glasses, I expect that you'll be wanting them back."

A cold, familiar weight slid onto his face, and suddenly Harry was back in touch with everything – the echoey wooden rafters overhead; the windows thrown open, welcoming in a dancing breeze; the cool, crisp sheets which were tucked around his body; Hermione, retreating to the chair by the bedside table, her hair falling across her face to form a veil.

Harry sat upright, pressing a palm to his forehead as blood rushed to his head.

"Where am I?" he croaked, and Hermione whipped out her wand, pointing it at him.

"I nearly forgot," she said, and before Harry could dodge the oncoming spell, she had shot one at him, and Harry let out a shout of outrage as it tingled up his throat.

"What the bloody hell are you doing?" he cried, grabbing at his neck as something inside it twanged.

"Shh!" Hermione hissed, casting a glance over at the doorway as if Snape might sweep into the room like an overgrown bat. "Don't fuss."

Harry snapped, "Hang on, why have you got a French accent?" right before, "Why do I have a French accent?" and finally, "Oh. So this wasn't a dream."

"No," said Hermione, giving a pained laugh and staring down at the ground. "It most certainly isn't."

"Bloody hell," Harry rasped, lying back down so that he could stare at the ceiling. He cleared his throat, and tried again with a little more success. "Bloody hell. What… what happened?"

"You don't remember?" Hermione sat up a little straighter, but still did not look at him directly.

"Well…" he frowned, dredging through his muggy memories. "I think I was doing work in the common room, then I got a note from Ignatius… but it wasn't Ignatius, it was these two Gryffindors… there was J-Josie? James? Argh, their names, why can't I remember their names?"

"Jenkins and Renshaw," Hermione offered quietly, and Harry laid a shaky forearm over his nose, letting out a muffled exhale.

"That's right," he murmured. "Jenkins and Renshaw. Jenkins told Renshaw to use the Cruciatus on me, and Renshaw panicked. His Cruciatus barely tickled, so Jenkins took over and Renshaw ran, I think. The details are so hazy, I hardly remember what happened. Where are they now?"

"No one but the professors know," said Hermione, standing and gazing out the open window. A breeze kissed her face, lifting wisps of her hair so that they waved like miniature banners. "The very next day, the two of them vanished. Neither of them are of age, so Azkaban is out of the question, besides, it turns out that Unforgivables are not as unforgivable as they are in our time. But I suspect that Jenkins is visiting a mental institution, he's quite unstable."

"Hm." Harry did not move his arm away from his face, and closed his eyes as if he could shutter himself from the events of the world. "Hermione, I feel so… pathetic. Useless. Weak. How can I be expected to defeat Voldemort when I can't even defend myself against a pair of teenagers?"

Hermione had no reply ready, and so Harry continued, "I expect that you were the one who rescued me, then?"

"No." She gave a bitter little chuckle. "It wasn't me, or Ignatius, or even Greengrass or Parkinson. Tom Riddle rescued you, Harry."

"Tom… Riddle?" Harry's eyes shot back open, then narrowed thoughtfully. "The very same Tom Riddle who seems to be out for my blood?"

"Exactly," said Hermione, and Harry could tell that her eyes were blazing, even if he couldn't see them. "Exactly. One might have thought that Riddle would have been perfectly happy to leave you to the mercy of Jenkins, he could have easily ignored Nott's warning."

Warning? It appeared that Harry was currently in debt to more than one Slytherin.

"But Riddle saved you," Hermione persisted, holding onto the window frame with whitened knuckles, "and he brought you here and watched over you. Nothing about that makes sense. He's unpredictable, and that's concerning."

"He brought me here?" Harry asked. "And watched over me? Wait, where is here?"

"A private room in the infirmary," Hermione said dismissively. "People kept trying to sneak in here to catch a glimpse of you, so Madam Pomfrey had you moved. Everybody thinks that you're a brain-dead vegetable now."

"Excellent, just excellent." Harry sighed, and it was the sigh of a much older wizard than he. "I… I feel weary. Right down to my bones. When can we return home?"

Silence met this remark, and Harry's entire being paused, before he slowly pushed himself upright and faced Hermione's back as she continued to stare out over the Hogwarts grounds.

"Hermione." He repeated in a ghostly whisper, "When can we return home?"

At first it seemed that she would ignore him a second time, before finally she turned her head, and he saw her face clearly for the first time. She looked like Death's sister. Chalky-pale skin, black circles ringing her tired, bloodshot eyes, her cheekbones as sharp as knives. Delicate, sickly, frightening. The glance that she gave him was a haunted one.

"I don't think we ever will," she said, and Harry's heart bypassed his stomach, dropping into his shoes.

"What," he said eloquently.

"The night that you…" Hermione gestured to him, her voice cracking. "That was when Dumbledore told me."

When Harry spoke next, it was in the whisper of a small child. "Never?"

"I've been so scared, Harry," began Hermione softly, and started to pace the room, wringing her hands all the while. "You've been gone for eighteen days, eighteen, and I've barely been able to sleep or eat, it's been on my mind constantly. What if Harry dies like this? Because for a while, it seemed like you weren't planning on waking up. And I can't blame you. Who would want to come back to a world where we're lost in another time and can't go back? Or worse, a world where we can go back, back to a war that you're meant to sacrifice yourself for?"

Her mad pacing slowed, and she grabbed at her head wildly, clutching it between shaky hands. Harry had never before seen this side of her, and he reached out for her.

"But selfishly," she continued, tears rolling down her cheeks, "I couldn't accept that you might want to stay away from all of this, permanently. I didn't want to be alone with all this, Harry, I don't want to be alone… but every morning, when I ran over here, believing that you would be awake, you never were. It terrified me, how real this all was, is, and you're like a brother to me, you're my best friend, I… I don't know what I would have done if–"

Harry managed to hook Hermione in weakly, cradling her in his arms and stroking her hair. She stiffened, as if she had not been expecting such a kindness.

"I'm sorry," he whispered, his voice muffled by her hair.

"Why are you sorry?" Hermione mumbled into his shoulder. "Aren't I acting like a child, shouldn't I be apologising, for being so selfish and then crying about it?"

"I'm sorry," Harry repeated, as gently as a moonbeam, "for taking so long. To return back to you." Her arms around him now, Hermione began sobbing.

"You're not alone," he said, rhythmically smoothing down her thick hair and welcoming the tears which were threatening to well in his own eyes. "This may be a nightmare, but it's our nightmare, and as long as we've got each other, we'll be okay. And it's perfectly alright to cry, 'Mione. It doesn't mean you're weak. It just means that you've been strong for too long."

They held each other, lamenting for all that they had lost in the mellow warmth of sunshine, for a long time.

Okay, a pretty short, mushy chapter. I'm sure you'll forgive me one day, but I thought that I'd best get something posted before I'm slaughtered in my sleep. So just think of this as an interlude, before we knuckle down again! So again, SORRY SORRY SORRY.