Chapter 21: Old Friends
Grindelverse
"Granger, I cannot and will not impersonate this version of myself," Draco said firmly, and with something he hoped was a version of his other self's unpalatable certainty, though the fact that he hoped it at all instead of implicitly knowing it was indicative enough to prove his point. "I don't know this world, I don't know his friends, and the only reason your other self got away with it for so long was because we were running for our lives and Potter is massively easy to fool—"
"Well, this Harry won't be," Hermione said, apparently (and rightfully) not bothering to dispute Draco's assertion about their universe's version of Harry Potter. "And you certainly can't fool his mother."
"Right, so—wait," Draco said, startled. "His mother?"
"But you can probably fool Tom Riddle," Hermione continued, opting to ponder under her breath rather than answer, "or maybe he'll be distracted by the Elder Wand, or—"
"Speaking of Tom Riddle," Draco groaned, abruptly remembering the cup floating around in her beaded bag, "that's the other thing I need to tell you about. Because I—unlike you," he tossed out irritably, "plan to be somewhat reasonable about my asinine plots, and will thus reveal them to you as they happen, rather than painfully and in retrospect."
Hermione gave him an irreverent look of impatience. "Fine. What is it?"
In response, Draco fumbled with the beaded bag in his hand. He dragged out the Hufflepuff cup and offered it to her, observing her slowly widening eyes as she registered what it was.
"If you really want to bring him back," he said, determining it was best to just come out with it, "then we'll have to do it here."
He wasn't sure what he'd expected her reaction to be, but he'd come to consider it most efficient to anticipate nothing and simply take things as they came. "That's quite a good idea, actually," Hermione said, eyeing the cup and absurdly bringing it to her ear to listen for a moment, as if it had been a seashell. "Particularly seeing as the information about how to use them seems to be broadly distributed. At least according to that Draco, anyway," she clarified, gaze falling down to the version of him that remained tied-up on the floor.
Draco wondered, not for the first time, what had happened between them. He suppressed a little surge of something objectionable at the idea she'd seen some version of him naked, perhaps even several times, and then forcefully attempted not to consider the possibility she might have liked what she saw.
Or, more intriguingly, what she'd touched.
He repelled the thought, shoving it brusquely aside.
"Well, you could wake him, if you thought he might be even marginally reasonable," Draco said, though personally, he had his doubts. "We'd need someone with his knowledge if we wanted to get away with this, anyway. Surely even a fragment of Tom Riddle's soul isn't a complete idiot."
Hermione paused for a moment.
Then blinked, apparently having a disconcerting revelation.
"Someone with his knowledge," Hermione agreed with a glance at floor-Draco, "but not necessarily him."
"What does that mean?" Draco demanded, but she was partly smiling to herself, having already stubbornly resolved to make his life difficult.
"Wait here," was the last thing she said before leaving a flustered Draco behind, returning a few minutes later.
"Okay, just to be clear," drawled a voice behind her as she re-entered the room, "when I said you had friends in the Underworld, I didn't technically mean you should abduct Hades."
Draco gaped a little at the lanky, dark-haired figure behind her, who in turn glanced at him with an extremely familiar look of disinterest.
"Oh, yes, you're right," this universe's Theo Nott remarked to Hermione. "I would've known immediately that wasn't him. Very unsettling, actually." He took a few long strides in, squinting at Draco's face. "There's some things missing. There should be a scar here from a quidditch mishap he had with Harry when we were younger," he said, flicking the side of Draco's temple, right near his hairline. "Draco makes a point to hide it."
After an uncomfortably long searching glance, Theo abruptly straightened. "Also, the expression isn't right. You look nervous," he informed Draco. "Do you spend a lot of time fearing for your life?"
"Astoundingly, yes," Draco replied irritably.
"Yeah," Theo confirmed with a shrug, turning back to Hermione. "This wouldn't have fooled me, and it certainly won't fool Harry. Also, I can't technically let you leave my best friend tied up and stunned on the floor," he added, folding his arms over his chest. "Just to be clear, this is what some might call a conflict of interest."
"I'm not going to leave him like that," Hermione sighed, shaking her head. "I just need your help getting a few answers, and then Malfoy and I can, you know. Leave you to it."
"Well, that's not helpful either. Draco doesn't have much experience with being dumped," Theo remarked idly. "Or any experience, actually. Just a hunch," he mused, "but I have my doubts he'll care for the sensation."
"What are you saying?" Hermione asked, frowning. "You think he'd come after me?"
"Uh, yes," Draco pointed out before Theo could reply, rolling his eyes at the naivety of her disbelief. "If he was willing to kidnap you, Granger, somehow I suspect seeking vengeance is perfectly in character."
"That's also the least of your problems," Theo told her. "I mean, I don't know if you've noticed, but the world's a mess. You can't just scamper off into it."
"All the worlds are a mess," Draco grumbled under his breath, and Theo glanced warily at him. "What? They are," he insisted, and Theo shrugged his acknowledgement before turning back to Hermione.
"What made you do this?" he asked her.
"Narcissa Malfoy," Hermione said flatly. "She's working with Lily to some degree. And possibly Tom. And I just…" She trailed off. "I needed someone I could trust."
Theo turned a skeptical glance to Draco, then back to Hermione.
"Interesting choice," he commented tonelessly, and she sighed.
"Look, I just need you to help us with the horcrux," she said. "You know how to use it, don't you?"
"Well, theoretically, yes," Theo said. "Though I'm not sure I have all the required materials for a full resurrection."
"What do you need?" Hermione asked.
"A living person you're comfortable with killing," Theo replied in an uncomfortably cheery tone, and Draco sighed heavily, wondering now if it wouldn't be worth it to simply join the other Draco on the floor.
"Well, that's problematic," Hermione remarked in a new and terrible understatement. "Are you sure?"
"Yes," Theo confirmed. "You know the basic principles, don't you? Magic can't create corporeality," he said, which Draco had to grudgingly acknowledge was probably an accurate assessment. "The only thing that can sustain one human life is another. Certainly to sustain a body."
"What if we don't need him to have a body?" Hermione posed thoughtfully. "All we really need is a seance of sorts."
"Sure, only he's not a ghost, Granger," Draco cut in, shaking his head. "He's going to try to manipulate you into giving him what he wants."
Theo nodded his agreement. "If you want the truth, you have to give him a reason to tell you," he advised. "Otherwise, I doubt you can trust anything he says."
"Hm." Hermione frowned, a familiar expression filling the space between her brows as she considered something new and idiotic. "Well," she said slowly, turning her attention to Theo, "how do you kill a monster?"
Theo registered the remark with a blink.
"Are you sure?" he asked, and Draco balked.
"Sure about what?" he demanded, glancing between them. "What are you talking about?"
"We could do it now," Hermione suggested to Theo, ignoring Draco entirely. It seemed to be a skill she'd picked up during her time in this universe. "Once we have answers, we'll leave."
"Assuming you get answers," Theo said. "And assuming nothing catastrophic occurs."
"It won't," Hermione said, fixing him with a solemn glance. "I can trust you, can't I?"
"Hello?" Draco asked, waving a hand between them. "Is anyone going to explain to me what's going on, or am I just going to have to continue shouting?"
"You can trust me all you like, but that doesn't make this any less dangerous," Theo told her. "There's not a lot I can do if something goes wrong."
"OKAY," Draco erupted firmly, "THIS IS GETTING RIDICULOUS—"
"You are definitely not Draco," Theo interrupted with a scrutinizing glance at him, and then shrugged. "I kind of like it, though. Refreshing," he said approvingly. "You're quite a spectacular mess."
"Could you not—"
"You kill a monster," Hermione interrupted with an impatient sigh, "by letting it believe you're nothing. I'm suggesting I permit the horcrux to believe it can possess me," she explained curtly, "and then stop it before it does."
"How?" Draco demanded.
She shrugged. "That's on you to figure out," she told him. "Just don't let me die, Malfoy. That seems relatively within your skillset, doesn't it? You managed to keep me from death by torture last time we saw each other," she pointed out, and he grimaced.
"You," he said brusquely, "have gotten really entitled, do you know that?"
She gave him half a smile.
"I know you won't let me die," she said again, "and I also know I can trick him."
"How?" Draco pressed. An endless refrain, it seemed. "How can you be so sure?"
"He's not Tom Riddle," Theo clarified for the both of them. "Not really. Horcruxes split your soul, yes, but not in half each time. It's just a sliver of what he was, operating within the constraints of metal," he said in the same dry voice Draco was so accustomed to being used to point out the obvious. "She'll have a few minutes to talk to him while he drains her of most of her energy, and then we just have to destroy the object keeping the soul-shard alive."
"We?" Draco echoed, dismayed.
"We," Theo confirmed. "The more human the horcrux becomes, the harder it'll be to fend off. One of us can distract the shard while the other destroys its host."
"But I—" Draco glanced at Hermione, who was thoughtfully waiting for his response. "Are you sure?" he asked with painful hesitation. "Are you very sure about this? Because if something happens to you, I—"
He broke off, and she lifted a brow.
"Fucking Potter would never forgive me," Draco said, withering a little, and the corners of her mouth quirked slightly, pleased.
"He really wouldn't," she agreed, wavering somewhere between amused and unsurprised. "Better take care to do it right, then, don't you think?"
Draco sighed. "This universe did something very strange to you," he commented gruffly, and again, she shrugged.
"You don't really know me that well," she reminded him, and as she said it, it struck him as entirely true. They'd been inadvisably convinced to trust each other despite having nothing but rivalry and academic performance to go on, and now their relationship seemed to amount to repeatedly saving each other's lives.
Still, he wasn't planning to let her down. He owed a debt to every version of her.
"Well," he sighed. "I guess we should just do this, then."
The roles were fairly straightforward. Hermione would be the one to ask questions; Draco, concealed under the invisibility cloak, would be the one to destroy the horcrux before it took too much from her; Theo would be the distraction factor, or at the very least, the only other visible person in the room.
That, and the person to sort out how the horcrux even worked.
"What do I do?" Hermione asked him, eyeing the cup. It sent an eerie chill through her to hold it, and her skin crawled in waves of discomfort. "Is there an incantation, or…"
"Well, it's not a lamp," Theo said. "You certainly don't rub it and make three wishes."
"Unhelpful," came Draco's incorporeal voice. He hadn't been particularly thrilled with any of the events taking place; unsurprising, in Hermione's view. In fairness to him, he was currently under the cloak with the unconscious version of himself, which even Hermione had to assume was an unnerving task.
"Maybe we have to activate it somehow," Hermione said nervously, frowning a little. How had Harry opened the locket? Parseltongue, she recalled from being told the story by Harry and Ron, but the diary hadn't required anything. He'd just had to use it. "Maybe I have to drink from it," she said uncomfortably, and Theo shrugged.
"As good an idea as any," he said, and slid open one of the desk drawers, pulling out a bottle of Ogden's. "Here," he said, holding it out, and Hermione lifted the cup with a growing sense of anxiety, letting Theo pour a little liquid inside it before removing a normal glass for himself.
"Cheers," he offered, clinking his glass against her cup, and she grimaced.
She'd never been a fan of alcohol (and her entire being opposed whisky consumption from this particular receptacle) but she managed to nearly drain the cup, swiping excess liquid from her lips as it burned its way down her throat. "Nothing," she managed when she could speak, and Theo poured a little more.
"Try again," he said. Another clink. Another round of salutation.
She made the mistake of inhaling before she drank this time, the spice of the whisky burning oppressively at her eyes and nose. She coughed, suffering the sting of a misbehaved swallow, and shook her head.
"Nothing," she said.
Nothing? asked a voice in her head, and she froze.
"Hello?" she said.
Theo frowned.
Hello, said something hazy.
"More," Hermione said urgently, holding the cup out, and Theo shook his head with unease but consented to pour, letting a thin trail of whisky collect in a pool at the base of the cup. "Thanks," she said, and downed it. Her head was spinning already, just slightly. She'd never been one for drinking and something this potent was surely going to affect her with immediacy, but still. She'd already started. Why chance switching to something less effective?
"Can you hear me?" she coughed up, half-choking.
Yes.
"Where are you?" she asked.
Wrong question.
She weighed the answer. "What do you need?"
Have a little more.
She held the cup out to Theo again and he narrowed his eyes, but poured. This time, before she could bring it to her lips, a little of the liquid in the cup's basin dropped, drained of some of its contents.
She shivered, then downed the rest.
"Interesting," said a voice, and Hermione whipped around, but there was no one in the room. Theo eased closer to her, looking equally discomfited, which she assumed meant he could now hear it, too. "Have more."
Theo frowned. "Maybe I should—"
Hermione shook her head. "Just pour," she said, her voice a little raspy now from the alcohol that lined her throat. "A couple more should do it."
He gave her a look that suggested it was a bad idea, but it wasn't as if she could stop now. She certainly couldn't share, as that would be to chance making Theo just as susceptible to Tom Riddle's clutches. Who would save her then?
Draco, she remembered, and breathed a little easier.
Then she shook herself of the sensation, recalling that shard of him or not, Tom Riddle would likely have no problem reading the facets of her mind. Better to clear it of anything vulnerable—like, say, evidence of the invisible person in the room.
Theo poured more into the cup and she watched it drop again, something hazy beginning to form beside her. She took a sip, waiting, and another inch or so disappeared. She was starting to see the shape of something; shoulders, she imagined. The line of a neck. A little blurry shift of movements.
Abruptly, it hit her: she was sharing a glass of whisky with Tom Riddle.
She swallowed hard and drained the cup, holding it out for Theo, and he emptied the bottle. This time, a sense of solidity manifested around the cup, lightly brushing Hermione's fingers. She jolted, the cup about to drop in mid-air, but precisely as she stumbled, blinking back an unsteady shift in equilibrium, a hand closed around it.
A slim forearm, with long, slender fingers. A watch. A neatly folded cuff. A white shirt, the sleeve of which led up to a narrow chest and a long torso. A linear chin, sharpened cheekbones. A set of intently-focused blue eyes.
"Who are you?" asked Tom Riddle neutrally, taking a sip from the Hufflepuff cup, and Hermione opened her mouth to answer.
Then she stumbled, Theo's arm coming around her waist to loft her upright.
"Hermione," she managed to mumble, and Tom nodded approvingly, his gaze flicking gradually over her.
"I see," he said, emptying the cup of its contents and discarding it over his shoulder only to warp slightly, like a badly conjured projection. "Ah," he determined, shifting quickly to watch himself come in and out of view. "You're not quite giving me everything."
It was giving her a headache not to. Hermione rubbed at her temple, leaning steadily against Theo.
"That's not the deal," she said, and Tom smiled. He looked to be somewhere in his twenties, though she noted he had a slightly starved look to him. The older version of Tom Riddle she'd previously met was certainly on the thinner side, but at this point in his life, he must not have been eating well. She remembered he was an orphan; she wondered if he'd had stomach problems. Likely he wouldn't have eaten well as a child, which would have affected his development later in life. For a moment, she almost felt sorry for him.
Almost.
She watched Tom's eyes narrow in response, translating her silence.
"You know who I am," he noted.
"Yes," she confirmed. "Though I'd like to know more."
"I'm sure you would," Tom replied. He definitely wasn't entirely present; she realized now what Harry had meant about the time Tom had nearly been brought to life in the Chamber of Secrets. He was more corporeal than a ghost, but not entirely there. Most significantly, Hermione couldn't feel any pulses of magic around him. He had the sensation of being magic, but not the usual solidity of being able to alter it.
His gaze searched her, probably for a wand.
"I want an agreement," she told him, dragging his attention back to her. "If you want more from me, then I want something, too."
"I can already take just fine," Tom said, gesturing to himself.
"No," she said, shaking her head. "I gave you that." And she had, somehow. She could feel the warps of magic she didn't quite understand. One of these days, she thought, she'd manage to learn not everything was the elegance of conjugated Latin or the waving of a wand. Some things were just a primitively simple matter of give and take. "If you want more, you'll have to work with me, Tom."
He flinched at the use of his name. This was a prouder, haughtier version of him; I get that, she wanted to say. Youth is stupid.
He stared at her, concentrating, and she felt something like a tap on her shoulder, which she brusquely shoved away. He shook himself, frustrated.
"Fine," he said, which she determined with a tiny sense of victory was a sign she'd successfully prevented him from draining her of anything further. "What do you want?"
"Answers." Her mouth was dry. She was incredibly thirsty, but she didn't have much time. Theo's hand was tight around her elbow, nudging her to get on with it. "Where did you go in 1947?"
"Ah, what a question." Tom glanced around. "Where are we?"
"Focus." But she was the one struggling to focus. She had no doubt he was still trying to take from her, though she couldn't identify where or how. She just felt edges of him prodding at the lines of her, tapping at all the places she couldn't see or explain. "1947. What did you do? What did you find?"
His lips quirked up in a smile. "You've found it too, haven't you?"
She swallowed. Again. Her throat was uncomfortably dry. "Found what?"
"The world. The other world."
She blinked, dizzied. "You can travel between worlds."
The words slurred slightly, her voice as fuzzily inaccessible as her thoughts.
"Of course I can. I defied death, didn't I? I have no limitations." He glanced around the room again. "Have I met Narcissa yet?"
"What?" She could feel Theo shifting his grip on her. She must have been leaning more heavily against him. "Narcissa Malfoy?"
"Narcissa Black. Is she born yet?" Tom asked, tilting his head. "No, I think not."
"I—" Her throat was so dry. It was nearly all she could think about. That, and repeatedly keeping Tom's magic at arm's length, clumsily now. She was like a tired boxer, aiming jabs that barely landed. Time was limited. "How do you know her if she's not born?"
"I keep myself informed," he said drily. "Are you a friend of hers?"
Without hesitation, Hermione mumbled, "Yes."
"Liar." Tom's lips curled triumphantly in a smile. "Narcissa doesn't have friends."
"1947," Hermione said again. This time, when something reached for her, she didn't react fast enough. It curled around her like a vine, a thin tentacle of something taking root. She shifted, but it held fast. "You traveled to another universe. You—" She blinked. He was getting more solid. She, by contrast, felt she was sinking into the floor. "You killed the other version of yourself," she guessed. "Why?"
He shrugged. "Why not? He was nothing." He pivoted, admiring the office. "I'm there, aren't I? Good." He eyed his watch. "I expect it must be time, then."
"Time for…" She swallowed hard. "Time for what?"
"Are you familiar with history, Hermione?" She managed a nod. "Colonization," he said crisply, and if she could have summoned even the capacity for reflex, she might have shuddered. "Right of conquest. Imagine not only conquering death, but conquering worlds. I cannot die. I cannot be stopped." He spared her a laughing glance of feigned sympathy. "You look tired. Perhaps you should rest?"
"Where did you go?" she forced out. "The real you. The original version."
"Ah, but you know the answer already, don't you?" Tom asked. "You've met me. I can tell."
In the moment, she had the absurd thought of not Tom Riddle himself, but his teacup. Its exact dimensions, its precise design, the delicate painted pattern and the way it had risen to his smugly curled-up lips. It floated into her mind without permission and Tom reached forward, stopping just before he touched her forehead. Just before he might have brushed his fingertips between her eyes.
"Don't," Theo warned, and Tom shifted his clever smile to him.
"I'll take care of you in a minute," Tom said, before glancing back at Hermione. "I'm almost done with her."
Then he withdrew his hand, curling it briefly around something small, something she could tell was delicate even before she saw it, and then Tom offered it out to her with the same deliberation he might have handed her a baby bird.
A porcelain teacup rested in the unfurled expanse of his palm.
Hermione blinked, stunned.
"Draco," she whispered.
Then she collapsed to the ground, limbs numbed to bonelessness as she fell.
The mention of his mother had startled Draco immensely. What exactly had been her involvement with Voldemort? Or with Tom Riddle, who seemed to be worse? Suddenly, the Dark Lord seemed cartoonish in retrospect. What a stupid villain, Draco thought, all claws and red eyes and inhumanity grown from blood and bone, when the version right in front of him was clearly much more dangerous. He was draining Hermione of everything, growing more solid by the second, and the moment he'd conjured something in his hand—without a wand, without transfiguration, just pure inexplicable conjuring, as if he had control of time and space itself—Draco was certain the experiment would have to end.
He'd already taken the cloak with him and crept around to the cup, trying to move towards it without garnering Tom Riddle's attention It had been discarded behind the upsettingly large desk, and Draco aimed his wand just as Hermione dropped to the floor, whispering his name.
In the same moment, Tom spun.
"Who else is here?" Tom demanded, and his hand shot out to close around Theo's neck. He took hold of Theo gruffly and turned him to face the unconscious Draco, who had (by necessity) been left uncovered on the floor. "Who is that?"
Theo struggled to answer, Tom's nails digging into his throat, and Draco hastily aimed the Elder Wand at the cup.
"Confringo," he said firmly, and the wand, apparently quite enamored with blasting things to shards by now, happily complied.
Tom Riddle let out a horrible yell as the cup burst into slivers and fragments, Theo falling to his knees as the floor beneath them quaked. Draco stumbled, a piece of the golden cup embedding itself near his eye, and crawled over to Hermione. She was lying still at the feet of what had only just been a man but was now something of a disintegrating image, pieces of him falling like ash on a gust of conjured wind. Draco curled around her, keeping her from the disintegrating rubble, but just as quickly, Tom was gone.
The cup itself was gone, scorched floorboards left in its place.
In the lull of shock that followed, nobody moved. But in the subsequent moment, as if regaining their breath in the same instant, Theo struggled to rear up on his knees as Draco pressed his fingers to Hermione's neck, checking her pulse.
"She's alive," Draco exhaled with relief, "but she's not—"
"Shut up immediately," Theo said, rising to his feet and dragging Draco (who clung to a limply unconscious Hermione) by the collar to shove him into the corner by his unconscious self, throwing the cloak over all three of them. "Don't move, don't speak, do you understand me? Just don't—"
The door burst open and Theo rapidly wheeled backwards, positioning himself to lean casually against the desk.
"Yes?" he asked innocently.
"Nott, is that a joke?" asked someone who looked astonishingly like Harry Potter. "Did you kill someone?"
"James, we discussed this, didn't we?" Theo said in the irreverent tone Draco was so intimately familiar with. "You said not to make a habit of it, I said you really shouldn't be so limiting, you seemed to disagree—"
"Theodore, I am exhausted," said the person Draco was piecing together must have been James Potter, who was presently wearing a t-shirt and underwear and looked very much as if he'd been sleeplessly wandering the house (Draco knew the attire for such activities quite well). "If you have plans to continue destroying property at these hours, I'd really appreciate it if you could at least keep it down."
"James, as I keep telling you, I can't plan my spontaneous property dama-"
"What's going on?" asked a sleepy voice that Draco was alarmed to find belonged to Ron Weasley, his feet shuffling against the floor. "I thought I heard screams."
"Are you sure that wasn't you?" Theo asked him.
"To be honest, there's no ruling it out," Ron said morosely, and then another figure burst in, shoving Ron aside and glancing briefly at James with confusion before making his way to Theo.
"Why are you all here?" demanded a very different (but still obnoxious) version of Harry Potter, who—unlike the others—was formally dressed in a pair of slacks and a collared shirt, his attention drifting suspiciously to the others in the room.
"Why are you here?" barked James, whose identity Draco was now rather uncertain of. Was he Harry's father? They were practically identical minus minor signs of aging, but in Draco's experience, this was not how fathers spoke to their sons. "I specifically told your dad to keep you from doing anything stupid."
"Oh please, like he could stop me," Harry said, delivering Draco to a bewildering moment of both confusion and agreement as he attempted and failed to follow the exchange. "Can I have some privacy, please? I need to talk to Theo—"
"Fine, but keep him from any further destruction," James advised, "and be respectful of the time, would you? HE'S WAKING THE WHOLE HOUSE."
"Noted," Harry said gruffly, and then James reached out to grab Ron blindly by the shoulder, hauling him from the room and shutting the door behind him. In his absence, Theo gave Draco a firmly silencing glance, turning attentively toward Harry once the others had gone.
"Listen," Harry said, sounding anxious, and in Draco's arms, Hermione stirred. Her eyes snapped open, panic clearly eminent, and he, with a painstakingly apologetic glance, quickly closed a hand over her mouth, silently shaking his head in warning. She nodded, relaxing just enough to breathe unsteadily into the curled expanse of his palm.
"I need your help with something," Harry was saying.
"Understandable," Theo said. "Did you have a particular position in mind?"
"Not that," Harry sighed, wearily shaking his head as Draco glanced questioningly at Hermione, who gave a resigned shrug in response. "I… I need you to keep something between us."
"Well, I keep quite a lot of things between us," Theo said, reaching out to loop his finger around Harry's belt. "So you might say I'm well rehearsed for this mysterious request."
"Theo, can you—" Harry exhaled, rubbing his temple. "Can you not?"
Immediately, Theo softened. From afar, Draco marveled.
"What is it?" Theo murmured, and Harry scrubbed tiredly at his eyes. Now that Draco was looking closer, he could see that Harry, too, had been doing some late-night house-wandering, even if he was considerably better dressed.
"I want to find Lily." Harry was chewing the inside of his cheek. "I know that's crazy, I know we have no reason to trust her, but…"
He trailed off, bending his head, and in response, Theo pulled him closer, cupping a hand around the back of his neck.
"I don't think she'd hurt me," Harry said, his voice muffled into Theo's shoulder. "I know Draco's going to disagree—I know he's going to tell me this is fucking stupid, and it is—but I started this thing because I thought my mother had been killed. I thought my father—" He swallowed hard. "I wanted Grindelwald brought down because he took my family from me. But now they're here, somewhere, even if they're flawed, and…"
He trailed off again, and Theo waited.
"I don't need to rule the world," Harry gradually exhaled, his fingers tightening in Theo's shirt as Hermione's expression abruptly filled with gladness, her hand rising to curl with relief around Draco's wrist. "Theo, I just want my family."
Theo paused for a moment, considering this.
Then, his voice so quiet Draco strained to hear him, Theo said, "I know, Harry."
Draco blinked as Harry leaned back and pulled Theo flush against him, kissing him firmly, roughly, and Theo responded with his hands tight around Harry's jaw, his thumb scraping over Harry's cheekbone. Draco glanced down at Hermione, stunned, and she gave a small shrug; sort of a yeah, I know, I was surprised, too that left him both speechless and, after a few moment's escalation, extremely unsure what to do about their unexpected voyeurism.
Eventually, once Harry's hands tugged insistently at Theo's trousers, Theo seemed to recall there were other people in the room and pulled away, half-laughing.
"I have a bed, you know," Theo said. "Granted, I know we don't use it very often but a little exploration is good for a relationship—"
"I don't know how to find her," Harry croaked, as Draco registered he'd gone back to talking about his mother. "Will you help me?"
To that, Theo chuckled.
"Ah, Lord Black." Theo slid a finger under Harry's chin, shaking his head fondly. "Harry Potter." A light kiss. "Whoever the fuck you are, whatever the hell you want to call yourself—Henry, I'm on your side."
"Even if it means we keep it from Draco?" Harry asked, and added hastily, "For now. Just for now."
"Well, I suspect Draco is otherwise occupied," Theo said, as Draco glanced questioningly at the one currently unconscious beside him. "Shouldn't be a problem. Though, I imagine more people than simply the two of us are looking for Lily Evans right now."
"That's true." Harry bent his head ruefully. "I could try to contact her, maybe?"
"But someone could be expecting you to do that," Theo pointed out. "That someone being Tom Riddle, I imagine."
Harry made a face. "You really think he's dangerous?"
"Yes." Theo's expression was grim. "Certainly to your mother, if any of what she's said is true, which some of it must be. But what if we sent someone else after her?" he mused neutrally. "Someone we could trust?"
"Well, sure, but who can we trust?" Harry asked.
"Depends. Do you," Theo began, and coughed slightly. "Do you trust me?"
"Never," Harry said, a wry smile twitching at his lips. "Your ideas are always the worst."
What irony, Draco thought, and yet, what incontrovertible truth.
"Well," Theo said, clearing his throat, and then stepping in Draco's direction to make his heart flag unsteadily in his chest, "prepare yourself for another truly terrible one."
Hermione winced a little as the cloak was pulled from over them, Draco's hand still lightly cupping her mouth. She'd wrapped her fingers around his wrist, comforted by the feel of his pulse. They'd done it. They'd brought Tom Riddle back and gotten answers without being killed.
Sure, it had been close, but she wasn't dead, so it was really the end result that mattered.
"What," Harry began, staring between her and the two Dracos, and then frowned. "How," he attempted, and then faltered again.
"Sorry," Hermione murmured, and struggled to sit up, Draco backing away from her slightly to permit it. "It's just, um. I actually had a bit of an encounter with your mother. And then I, uh—"
"You knew about this?" Harry asked, pivoting to Theo, who gave a single guilty nod. "What did my mother say?" he demanded from Hermione, who winced.
"She's hiding the Elder Wand from Tom Riddle," she said, and then added quickly, "who I'm pretty sure is the original Tom from my universe. He is dangerous," she said. "Really, he is, and Draco is, um." She glanced at his unconscious face, his restrained hands. "Well—"
Harry gave her a weary glance. "You stunned my best friend?"
"I… it wasn't on purpose!" she insisted.
"You accidentally stunned him?" he pressed doubtfully.
"Well, no—"
"Look," the conscious-Draco interrupted, "I think we can all agree he's a bit of a massive dick. Right?"
Harry rounded on him. "Obviously I don't have to ask who you are."
"No," Draco loftily agreed, "so let's not."
Hermione grimaced. "Look—"
"They can help us," Theo pointed out, nudging Harry. "Nobody's looking for them—certainly not for her, anyway. That's why we hired her in the first place. The first one, I mean," he explained to Hermione, who nodded. "She could go places we couldn't, and that's what we need, isn't it? We need someone who can find Lily without attracting attention."
Harry frowned. "But Draco's unconscious."
"Well, true," Theo said. "But that's probably best, don't you think? Temporarily."
"But he's our best friend," Harry pointed out.
"Yes," Theo agreed, "but also, he's going to want to kill your mother when he finds her."
"True," Harry sighed, and glanced at conscious-Draco. "How'd you get here?"
"Portkey," Draco said, and Hermione internally flooded with relief. She wasn't sure she wanted to discuss the Hallows yet. "Granger figured out how to contact me with the resurrection stone and I came here to help her."
"Where's the portkey now?" Harry asked.
"Safe," said Draco, and Harry frowned, noting the avoidance.
"The point is," Hermione interrupted, drawing Harry's attention back to her, "Theo's right. Malfoy and I can find Lily. Then we can all figure out some way to get rid of Tom Riddle, and we'll go right back to my universe. Your Draco won't even have to know what happened."
"What are you planning to do with him until then?" Harry demanded, and the Draco beside her looked at her curiously, obviously having wondered the same thing.
"We'll have to take him with us, I suppose," she said, and Draco balked. "I mean, his mother knows he went after me."
Harry frowned. "I can't just let you cart him around like this. And if you think you can Imperius him—"
"No, no," Hermione said hastily, glancing at Draco. "We'll, um…" She trailed off, then brightened, an idea occurring to her. "We'll get someone to watch him."
"Who?" Harry demanded, and behind them, the door opened.
"Oh, hi," said Ron, sticking his head into the room. "I was just wondering, is there any chance you have any herbal…" He trailed off, eyes widening as he spotted the two Dracos on the floor. "Tea," he finished, and immediately, Theo's expression went worryingly radiant with delight.
"How about we make that tea and a job?" Theo asked Ron. "Are you any good at chaperoning?"
"Uh oh," said Ron, and Hermione pointedly arched a brow at Harry.
"So, here's my offer," she said, rising to her feet and dusting herself off. "We find your mother, work together to solve this Tom Riddle mess, and then Malfoy and I leave and we don't come back. Deal?"
Behind her, Draco said nothing, most likely too unsurprised by anything at this point to wonder what he'd gotten himself into. Harry, meanwhile, considered her proffered hand a moment, glancing at the Draco on the floor with conflict before returning his attention to her expectant glance.
"Deal," he eventually agreed, meeting his hand with hers.
a/n: Thanks to aurorarsinistra for literally endless alpha reading. You are a gentleman and a scholar.