The Just World Fallacy

by MissiAmphetamine

Sequel to "The Risk-Reward Ratio." The weight of the war begins to break both Hermione and Draco as they struggle to survive capture, betrayal, isolation, the consequences of their actions, and other perils and scars of war, with their lives and relationship intact. Nothing is ever easy, or even fair, but there's nothing they can do but keep fighting. Facebook: /theriskrewardratio

21. The Battle, 2: We Don't Have a Choice

Edited 10/15/15

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18. The Battle, Part Two: We Don't Have a Choice

We don't have a choice to stay

We'd rather die than do it your way

With our backs to the wall, the darkness will fall

We never quite thought we could lose it all

Ready, aim, fire, ready, aim, fire

An empire's fall in just one day

You close your eyes and the glory fades

[Ready! Aim! Fire! , Imagine Dragons]

---

Pain - flaring through mental fog and pushing back the peaceful oblivion of senselessness. Hermione's eyes snapped open and she sat up with a jerk that made her groan aloud as the movement sent more pain spiking through her skull. Her hand went shakily to her head and came away bloody. She stared at the crimson streaks on her palm in blank confusion for a moment, and then remembered what had happened. Her breath rushed in and she went rigid with tension as she looked around, trying to work out how long she had been knocked unconscious.

Hermione's head wound seemed to be bleeding as though it had only just been inflicted, and there were still tiny shards of glass like snowflakes settling down on her. Probably only a few seconds, then. A blurry, still half-dazed relief trickled though her, and then was shocked away again by the bone-jarring jolt of giant footsteps nearing her. Her head pounded as she scrabbled for her wand in the dirt and closed her hand around it, heels scraping on the dirt as she shoved herself back toward the sheltering plants and glasshouse wall behind her.

Where Draco was - and whether he was still alive, or lying dead and crumpled in the dark - she had no idea. Lupin and Tonks had been ahead of Hermione and Draco and she assumed - hoped - they'd gotten to safety. Her head swam and hurt and her thoughts were all muddled as she used the side of the glasshouse to pull herself up to her feet. She fell back against the glasshouse, choking and panting, head tipped up as she clutched her wand tight and found the giants with blurred vision.

Two of them left - one nudging at the giant she'd killed with its enormous foot as if it might be able to wake it, and the other stomping about and sniffing. The giant grew ever closer to her as it searched, huge feet smashing glass, wooden beams, and stone to smithereens. But it hadn't seen her yet. Hermione heaved in a quick, panicky breath and looked for an escape route. There was so much debris and rubble she didn't have a clear, easy path to run. She would have to pick her way through a minefield of broken glass and scattered bricks, broken beams and blocks of stones.

She had to find Draco. She had to get away from the giants. She had to find safety. Hermione bit her lip hard, squeezed her eyes shut, dragged in a deep breath. And then snapped her eyes open and ran without letting herself think about it. She went left, straight past the giants, heading toward the castle, toward the short stone passage that led into the fountain courtyard. The ground was jagged and uneven with debris beneath her boots as her feet pounded on the ground, her breath coming in little sharp sucks of air. She slipped and nearly fell as something slid when she drove her foot down, and pushed off desperately with the ball of her foot before she could fall, arms flailing for balance.

The giants had noticed her - at least one of them, anyway. She knew this because she could hear and feel it approaching behind her. There was no way she could look for Draco now she realised with a sick pang, hating the traitorous, logical thought. She had to get herself to safety first - regroup with Tonks and Remus and then go back out after him. She wasn't leaving him; no, she wasn't abandoning him but going for help. Hermione vaulted a huge wooden beam and landed unsteadily on her feet, swearing in her head as ground shock arced up her legs.

She made herself keep running, tears in her eyes making her vision glitter and fracture, her chest tight and burning from lack of air. Panic clawed over her as she wondered if Draco was really, truly dead and all of this was pointless now, but she ran anyway, away from the thundering footsteps gaining on her. Her boots scraped and crunched on the stones below her as she grew close enough to the castle to see the small arched passage that led through to the courtyard. Her hair flew out behind her as she hit a dead sprint, arms pumping and breath whooping in.

She veered toward the castle wall - the covered open corridor along the outside of the building. Maybe she could climb up into it through one of the glassless windows and get to the courtyard from there, out of the giant's reach. But the walls were just too high - her hand sticking up above her head as she ran, trailing along the building and not quite able to reach anything she could use to heave herself up with. She gave it up and kept going. Then the archway ahead lit up with a sudden bursting green glow that caught her eye, revealing Remus with Tonks beside him, her pink hair an eerie colour beneath the green streak of magic.

The Killing Curse Remus had cast streaked by above Hermione and just to her right, and then Tonks was screaming. "Run! Run, Hermione!" She was fucking running Hermione thought in a blur of panic, racing along beside the castle wall towards Remus and Tonks. She craned her head back behind and nearly fell, her steps faltering, but she got a glimpse of the towering giant swaying on its feet directly behind her - huge eyes dead and blank. Remus had hit it, and it was going to fall on her.

"Oh fuck," Hermione breathed on an inhale and pushed her body to run even faster, her legs feeling strangely numb and sore and her muscles filled with a deep burn. There was a boom behind her and the ground rippled and upheaved and she tripped and sprawled onto the paving stones, catching herself on her hands. The giant had fallen. She hadn't gotten killed. Oh thank Merlin. Thank fucking Merlin. Her palms stung and her calves were cramping, but she was alive. Adrenaline and relief pumped into her blood in equal amounts as she flipped herself, rolling onto her back…and then screaming.

The giant's corpse had only fallen to its knees, and now the upper body was falling toward Hermione. Fast. Her eyes strained wide with shock and she shoved herself frantically back with both hands and her feet, but it was too late. She was going to be crushed - she was going to die, she was going to… Something hit her then - not the giant but something else. Hermione choked on air as she was blown backwards by the shockwave of a repulso hitting her square in the chest. Her ribs made a funny crrrcking sound and pain swelled in her right side.

Hermione windmilled her arms and kicked her feet helplessly as she went flying back, landing on her arse on the cobbles hard enough that she felt her tailbone creak painfully. She hurt in all new places now, but at least she was intact and not squashed to bloody death. A shriek burst unbidden from her lips as the giant's fist thumped onto the ground just a few feet from her, and she clasped her wand to her chest and tried to breathe, staring at the huge creature that had nearly killed her. God that was so close. So fucking close.

A pale crimson-spattered face appeared in front of Hermione; coming from nowhere in the half-light and she stifled another scream. Draco looked like he was on the verge of either passing out or grabbing her and never letting her go again, mortal bloody terror for her safety written all over his face as he crouched in front of her, silver hand cupping her cheek. "Hermione. Are you all right?" She took a split second to just stare at him before she scrabbled up the brainpower needed to process his question. Blood trickling from his nose, a gash at his forehead, blood matting his hair, cheekbone swollen and bruised, lower lip split - god, he was the most beautiful thing she'd ever seen.

"Hermione? Fuck - fuck, are you all right? Can you - can you move? We have to move." Panic sizzled in his voice and Hermione wanted to fling herself at him and weep with relief that he was alive - and apparently not too badly injured - but she didn't do either of those things.

"I - I'm fine," she said instead, and let him drag her to her feet and propel her back into a run. Her legs just wanted to fall off and die, but she clutched at Draco's hand and made herself keep pace with him. He pulled ahead of her - longer legs, she thought disjointedly, it was easier for him - and his dragging grip on her hand felt like he was ripping her arm from its socket. Then they were skidding through the stone arch, nearly barrelling into Remus and Tonks and staggering to a halt just inside the courtyard.

"I've sent my patronus out," Tonks rattled out quickly as she hurried over to Hermione and Draco, her smile tight and reassuring as she eyed them both, clearly assessing their wounds. "We need backup to draw the last giant away, or -"

There was a graunching crash of sound and the three of them spun to stare past Remus at the giant hand reaching inside the short passageway and tearing away a huge chunk of stone as if it were cheese.

"Oh. That's not good," Tonks said, backing up a step towards the fountain in the centre of the courtyard. Then the giant straightened and in the shadows and dim light of torches and stars Hermione saw the giant lift its leg above the stone arch and bring its huge foot down. The short passage crumbled into a pile of rubble with a sound that drove into the core of Hermione's bones and rattled around inside her aching skull. So loud that she couldn't understand what Remus was yelling until he got closer.

"We have to retreat - get into Hogwarts proper - the old stones are warded - might hold better," Remus was calling in short gasping clusters of a few words at a time, and Tonks and Hermione both nodded agreement. She went to run right after Tonks and Remus, but Draco wasn't moving. He just stared up at the giant as it pummelled the stone archway into the courtyard to powder and roared with fury.

"Come on!" Hermione screamed at Draco, tugging at his bracer, and he licked his lips and looked to her with grey eyes that looked frantic and wild.

"Fuck it," he mumbled almost to himself. "Go, Hermione. I'll be right behind you."

"No, I'm not leaving you!" Flashes of him using himself as giant bait flickered in Hermione's head, and she shook it sharply and winced at the pain the movement produced. "What are you going to do?"

The giant smashed its way through the last of the stone arch and stood to its full height again on the rubble, huge eyes swivelling and rolling down to rest on Hermione and Draco. She gulped and froze on the spot, feeling like a bug ready to be squashed under the giant's dark glare. She wondered if it was angry over the deaths of its comrades, and looking for revenge. "This," Draco said, the word slurred from his bruised mouth as he raised his wand. "Now run for fucks sake, Hermione. Avada Kedavra!"

The beginning of the Killing Curse had barely left his lips when Hermione realised what he was doing and did as he had told her - she ran, trusting that Draco would be able to get himself out of the way in time. The giant toppled as Draco's spell hit - it was hard to miss a target that size - and Hermione only narrowly avoided being crushed for the third time tonight. Her nerves were utterly shredded just from that. Hermione landed hard, and only Tonks' quick shielding spell protected Hermione, her, and Remus from the falling chunks of stone that skittered and bounced along the ground.

Thick, choking dust billowed in the air and Hermione struggled to her hands and knees and squinted through it desperately, searching for any sign of Draco in the dusty dark. She could see the giant not three metres away, its head having demolished the fountain, but Draco was nowhere to be seen. Hermione's heartbeat picked up, her breathing caught. Tonks and Remus were quiet behind her as Hermione went up on her knees looking around with narrowed eyes, fists balled up with tension as she refused to believe anything had happened to him.

The sound of boots scraping on stone. Rasping breathing coming closer. A hacking cough. And then something hard hit Hermione and nearly knocked her down again, smelling of sweat, blood, and the lingering reek of the Inferi. Draco had fallen to his knees in front of her, hauling her against him with desperate strength and holding her so tightly she could barely breathe, her possibly cracked ribs protesting. Hermione ignored the pain. His hands buried themselves in her hair and his face pressed into her neck, his skin sticky and wet on hers with coagulating blood and sweat.

"Fuck, fuck, Hermione - I thought - I can't - fuck -" she heard him gasp into her neck as if he was choking the words past tears, and then it was just incoherent babbling that she couldn't make any sense of. Hermione stayed frozen for a brief moment - shocked to see Draco reacting this way - and then her arms came up tight around his waist. She clung to the solidity of him as he petted her and choked his muddled words of relief and fear into her skin, shaking like a leaf. His heart thumped rabbit-quick in his chest, and she shuddered in a breath. Giants. They had killed giants. She thought perhaps she was in shock.

"That - that," Tonks said with a hysterical edge of laughter to her voice. "That was why Remus said not to kill the giants near the castle. You nearly brought half the damn thing down!" Hermione looked up over Draco's shoulder and saw Tonks laughing and trembling, leaning into Remus who stood very still, his eyes glued to his wife. His hands came up to Tonks face and Hermione watched as his mouth closed tenderly over the pink-haired witch's, cutting off her teary laughter. Hermione averted her eyes, a blush stealing over her cheeks. It was only a chaste kiss, but somehow it was far too intimate to watch.

She pressed her own kiss against the top of Draco's head, heedless of the blood that had matted sticky in his white-blonde hair. As if that broke a spell he drew back from her and let out a whoosh of breath that seemed to steady him. The shaking that had rippled through him was all but gone now, and if he had been crying she couldn't see any trace of tears on his cheeks. He shifted back a bit and his hands went to his belt, pulling out a vial of potion.

"We'd better -" Draco began roughly, clearing his throat as his voice cracked slightly. "We'd better do what we can to sort out our injuries before we head any further into the castle."

They were in the courtyard right at the very edge of it, up against one stone wall. There was an archway beside them that led into one of the corridors - lined with classrooms, and from the sound of it barren of any people. The fighting must not have reached this far yet then, Hermione thought, as she nodded at Draco and began unhooking her own healing supplies from her belt. Remus and Tonks settled to the ground in silent agreement with Draco, and the next five minutes were spent tending each others' wounds - of which there were far too many.

And then they set off down the corridor at a brisk walk, heading for the Great Hall with their wands raised and ready. Hermione wondered what they would be facing next and trepidation hung heavy on her. Although, she thought with a small smile as she limped along, there couldn't be much that was worse than Inferi and giants and they'd survived them.

And then she thought of Oliver, and the two badly burned men and their Auror guard whom they had left behind, who hadn't survived. Who had died in seconds, their lives snuffed out in the blink of an eye, and Hermione felt guilty and sick. She hadn't even thought of them until now. She thought that perhaps she should have wept for them, should be crying now over the loss of them, but her eyes were painfully dry despite the grief that lay thick and heavy in her throat.

Hermione's mind turned to Ron and the others in his group of fighters, and she balled her hands into tight fists and hoped to Merlin they had survived. She didn't want to face a world that didn't have Ron in it, but she knew - knew with utter desperate certainty - that Ron had survived. He couldn't have died. He couldn't. Tension tied her aching muscles in knots as she refused to contemplate the possibility that he had been killed. She didn't want anyone else to die tonight, which was stupid because this was war and in war people died.

But if Hermione had to choose, she would choose for those she loved the most to survive. She was choked with sadness for Oliver and anyone else who had died, but she was glad it hadn't been Draco, or Ron. Bile rose in the back of her mouth sour and nauseating as she admitted that fact to herself, feeling ashamed because no person's life should be worth any more than anyone else's. She was not noble and brave, she was selfish and terrified, and the rest of the world could burn to ash and she could survive it, but losing Draco, Harry, or Ron? It didn't bear thinking about.

Hermione tried to focus on the battle, pushing morbid thoughts aside with an effort. Her feet trod the ground in a steady, limping rhythm; her eyes pinned on Draco walking just ahead of her, his gait stiff as his injuries pained him. He should be lying on a hospital bed being treated right now instead of limping into battle with burn cream slathered roughly on his arm. His back was like one enormous bruise, the gash on his forehead went right down to the bone, and he seemed to be having trouble breathing. Hermione was so afraid for him - fuck, she was afraid for all of them. But there was nothing she could do. She kept walking.

---

They hurried down the corridor past abandoned classrooms, the thud of their boot soles echoing in the emptiness, the sound of distant screams creeping in at the edges of the hearing. Draco determinedly ignored the pain of his aching body and forced himself to keep going, his heart a staccato drumbeat against bruised ribs. They had survived the giants - just barely - but there was still an entire army to fight.

Draco winced at the flaring hurt in his back as he twisted to look behind him and make sure Hermione was still keeping pace. She gave him a tiny smile and he fell back next to her, his eyes skimming over her body. The bites at her throat were now joined by a plethora of other wounds that made him furious and frightened at once. He had nearly lost her tonight. Too many fucking moments when he had nearly lost her, and it terrified him beyond all reason.

Hermione limped a little as she walked and that little weary smile had quickly shifted back into a grimace, but she held her head high and her eyes were brave. Her left hand was seemingly unconsciously cradled against her abdomen and for a moment Draco let himself think about the baby. The baby. What if the physical trauma she went through tonight caused her to lose it? His lips compressed and his jaw tightened, his throat went clogged with emotion as a visceral fear closed around him.

He wanted to be a father. Shit, he wanted it, and that scared him as much as anything because what if he turned out just like his father? What if having Draco Malfoy as a father ruined his child's life? What if his child grew up to hate him? Grew up ostracised by the bulk of wizarding society? Shit, he didn't fucking care - he wanted desperately to hold a little human that was himself and Hermione all mixed up together. Since he'd begun spending time with Teddy Lupin the idea had become more and more appealing. And when Teddy morphed to mirror Draco's colouring, a funny feeling rose up in him and he couldn't drag his eyes away from the child.

Draco knew Hermione would be a brilliant mother, the best mother, but he was still afraid he would fail as a father. There was nothing he could do about it though, so privately he had accepted - no, embraced - the idea of a child. Not that he expressed that openly, not even to Hermione, really. The possibility that his future could still lie in Azkaban stopped him from showing his excitement too openly. Just in case. Keeping the depth of his feelings secret somehow felt like a meagre protection against the vulnerability produced by wanting something so badly, when it could be ripped away from him at any moment.

But yeah, Draco wanted a person that was made up of him and Hermione - the best of both of them - and the way she winced and her fingers rubbed over her abdomen right now frightened him. "Are you all right? Is…the baby…?" he asked very quietly and she glanced up at him and smiled, the corners of her eyes crinkling and her blood-smeared face lighting up. It was both grotesque, and beautiful. She patted her abdomen tenderly.

"I'm fine - we're both fine. I just pulled a muscle."

"Good," Draco said on a short, relieved sigh, and then admitted the rest like it was a crime, a secret, his eyes flicking to hers and holding them for a second. "I was worried."

"I know," she told him, the corner of her mouth tipping up and her tired eyes sparkling for a moment, and Draco knew she was thinking of the way he'd reacted after the last giant had fallen. His cheeks flushed hot and he hunched his shoulders a little and didn't reply immediately. He didn't like that he'd lost it like that in the middle of a battle situation, but he had been so convinced they had been going to die and so fucking amazed they were still alive that he'd… Well all right, he'd had a fucking moment - and he'd rather just forget about it, Draco thought, his cheeks still traitorously hot.

"I have good fucking reason to be worried, Hermione," he said more sharply than he should have, and she bit her lip and looked away. "You shouldn't even be here." He said it low, so that Lupin and Nymphadora couldn't hear, but Hermione heard fine and her expression shifted to frustrated anger immediately.

"Yes I should," she snapped back, equally quiet but no less vehement for it. "And I am, so there's no point in arguing about it now, of all fucking times, Draco."

He didn't answer her, guilt twinging at taking out his fear on her, because that was what he was doing after all. Draco wanted nothing more than to get Hermione out of here - he would drag her to safety by the fucking hair if he had to. The urge to take her away washed over him, fed by the fear that pumped icy in his veins. She was bloodied and bruised, the person that he lived for, carrying his child, and he wanted her safe and he wouldn't fucking apologise for that. They passed through the bottom of the tower the headmaster's office was atop of and along the walkway, heading for the entry hall where the sounds of fighting were coming from.

Draco's fingers twitched around his wand as he fought the urge to argue with Hermione and hopelessly, pointlessly try to persuade her to go. But he forced himself to keep walking with her toward danger, because she wouldn't leave and he couldn't make her. Running away was not a choice he could make - the only choice left to them now was fight or die. And then as if his thoughts had triggered it, as they went right down the corridor that led to the entry hall, the world boiled into chaos.

Madness filled the wide stone corridor they had cautiously entered as a flood of Voldemort's people spilled down it from the entry hall, and while Draco yanked Hermione back out onto the walkway in time, Nymphadora and Lupin were lost in the crush. Voldemort had brought in the next wave of fighters it seemed - Fenrir's people, and all the hanger-ons that weren't good enough to be Death Eaters but made good expendable soldiers for Voldemort's army.

"Remus! Tonks!" Hermione screamed for them as Draco pulled her to relative shelter on the walkway, slamming her back harder than he meant to against the wall at one side of the doorway. "Remus! Tonks… Oh god…"

"Stay here! You can't go after them, you know that," Draco snapped at her, his hand pressing into her shoulder to keep her pinned against the wall. She sobbed dryly once, and he caught her gaze and held it grimly until she nodded agreement, tears standing in her eyes and shoulders slumping.

"Good." He squeezed her shoulder quickly and dashed across the open doorway, flattening himself to the other side and sticking his head out to see what was happening. There was a fierce clashing of fighting happening just down the corridor from the walkway, and he couldn't see Lupin or Nymphadora but he did see what he thought was Lavender Brown's body. She lay on the ground, limbs splayed at awkward angles as one of the werewolves tore at her body with blunt, human teeth. Fuck. He felt sick, and when Hermione began to peek around the corner he waved her back with a sharp, angry gesture. She didn't need to see that.

She looked anyway. Of course she fucking did; she was Hermione fucking Granger, what did he expect? Draco ground his teeth together hard, the graunching sound reverberating in his skull as she gasped and flinched back as though she'd been struck. And then Hermione hurled a curse at the werewolf in human form that tore at her dead friend's body, and drew the enemy's attention to them. A stunner flew at him and he ducked and sent a hex back, a small part of his mind acutely aware of Hermione. She stayed in the meagre cover of the doorway, popping out every few heartbeats to fling hexes and curses at the fighters in the corridor.

More of Voldemort's fighters came down the corridor, drawn by the fighting, and Draco flattened himself back against the wall just as a disembowelling curse passed through the air where he'd been standing. He sucked in a huge breath, adrenaline pulsing through him with a rush that made his vision sharpen and his muscles buzz with energy. Near-death experiences tended to make him alert like that. There were nearly ten fighters swarming in the corridor and Draco and Hermione could only really keep them at bay, with a barrage of hastily thrown spells designed to rend and tear through flesh.

He heard Hermione choke on her retches and make a sick sound like a wounded animal as Draco hit one of Voldemort's people with a spell that stripped the skin from her body. He hadn't meant to use something so gruesome, but after his time under the Imperius, the darker spells were familiar to him, tripping onto the tip of his tongue. And they worked so he wasn't going to apologise for using them. Besides, Draco had met some of the enemy fighters before - familiar faces that he took great pleasure in cutting down. They were Voldemort's expendable underlings, who fought each other over the remains of prisoners and other luxuries that the Death Eaters had grown weary of.

Draco was happy to kill them. He had seen what they'd done.

They fought and hexed and cursed, but in the end there were too many of the enemy and Draco knew that if they stayed and fought they would die. He bounced twice on the balls of his feet, sucked in a breath, and then dashed across the bridge to Hermione's side. Hexes flew through the air, one thwipping just over his head, a slashing hex leaving a light slice across his upper arm as it skimmed him. He fumbled at a pouch hooked on his belt as Hermione - stark white beneath the blood on her face - covered them both, her breath coming in ragged pants. "Shit, shit, shit," she was saying with each panicked breath, and her eyes were so wide he could see the whites all around.

"What are you doing?" she gasped at him as she threw up a shield to block a hex and then slashed her wand to send her own hex whizzing back. The man she was duelling fell in a disjointed crumple, twitching and spasming on the floor as blood leaked from his nose, mouth, eyes and ears. She let out a guttural growl - a sound that was both triumphant and sickened - and risked shooting Draco a furious, frightened look just as he pulled his hand out of the pouch. "Draco? What -?"

Peruvian instant darkness powder puffed out as Draco flicked his fingers, and the world around them went pitch black. "Run," he breathed in Hermione's ear, his fingers curling around her elbow, and then he was dragging her blindly back down the walkway, retreating. Light came back to the world as they got to the tower at the end of the bridge, Draco slamming the solid wooden door shut and barring it with Hermione's help. "Quick," he ordered and she ran with him as hexes began to thud against the oak door, down the corridor at their right, toward the east wing.

"Upstairs?" she gasped, panting as they reached an intersection. "Or head for - for the Great Hall?" The route to the Hall lay to their right and Draco nodded - it was as good a destination as any. The plan had been for it to be heavily defended, and if they reached it they might get the chance to take a breather in relative safety. Perhaps; who knew - the plan might have gone to utter shit at this point.

He pulled her right, jogging down the corridor with his breath huffing out at each painful step and Hermione biting back whimpers. And then someone stepped out of the darkness with a grin like a slash cut into his face. Draco's breath strangled in his chest, his heart seemed to stop as the world blurred and froze, and as if from far away he heard Hermione make a little cry of pain as his fingers crushed hers in a vice.

Rostan. Standing there and smiling at Draco as if the sick fuck could see inside his head, could see the memories surging up in Draco's mind. He felt hot and sick, his stomach cramping and the memory of helplessness surging over him. A flashback; bits of memory resurfacing and swirling through his head, degradation replayed in a split second and Draco went back there. Back to the pain and the humiliation, the torture and the - the - the… His breath wrenched in on a half-sob.

Rostan's hand was a vice on Draco's shoulder as he hung from the chains, nearly insensible with the agony of the torture of the last few hours. The bastard's fingernails dug into a deep gash on his shoulder blade, and his breath was hot on Draco's forehead as the taller man looked down at him like he was a piece of meat. An animal. A traitor. A fucktoy. Draco slumped there limply, body a mass of torn, bruised flesh, the manacles digging into his wrists and cutting off circulation to his hands.

Rostan shifted his hand from the wound on his prisoner's shoulder blade and buried it in Draco's hair, jerking his head back and exposing his throat, and Draco groaned at the relief. The absence of direct pain was so good he could've cried. The Death Eater's mouth trailed along his neck like a lover's kiss, open-mouthed, wet and hot and raising goosebumps in its wake. Shamefully blissful to feel a gentle touch after all the torture, and in the haze of pain Draco hated himself for accepting it. Rostan's voice in Draco's ear was dark and cruelly amused; Rostan loved this part.

"Beg. Beg me to stop hurting you." His tongue flicked out and curled over Draco's earlobe, and Draco shivered and jerked in the chains and said nothing. He wanted to scream but his throat was raw from it. He wanted to run but he was chained. He wanted to kill them all, to hurt them until it was them screaming and begging, but that wasn't how it went. Draco knew how it would all play out. Tears slipped down his cheeks as he pressed his lips together, shaking and broken but refusing to beg, and Rostan laughed and let Draco's head drop back down.

"You'll beg in the end, traitor. You always do."

Barely a second had passed when Draco broke out of his frozen horror. "Run!" he barked at Hermione again and wrenching at her hand, and they turned and ran down the corridor, legs burning and Draco wanted to be sick. They sped down to the very end, far outpacing the man who walked after them at a leisurely pace, as if he knew Draco couldn't escape. But Draco didn't want to escape. He wanted this, he wanted to face Rostan down and tear him apart piece by fucking piece. To pay the bastard back.

"Are you ready to beg, now? Ready to beg me to fuck you? To beg me to use you? You want to; I know you do, Malfoy. I know you. Inside and out."

"Fuck -" Draco hacked a cough that made his body scream with hurt, scream for mercy. "Fuck…you! Go to…fucking hell."

"We both know who's going to be fucking who, at the end of all this," Rostan said with a sly, disgusting smile, his fingers coming down Draco's cheek in a mockery of a caress. His nails gouged strips from Draco's cheek and he moaned and tried to roll his head away. "You fucking filthy whore." Draco flinched and a whimper of horror slipped from his bloodied lips. "You always beg for it in the end. Don't you, Malfoy?"

Draco skidded to a stop outside the classroom at the end of the corridor and flung the door open, shoving Hermione inside and taking a step in himself; just out of the line of fire. He had to keep Hermione safe. He couldn't afford to be distracted by her, by his fear for her safety. The bastard would use her against Draco; distract him, fuck with his head, make him even more afraid for her than he already was. Besides, Draco wanted to do this alone. He had to do it alone. He had been waiting for this for what felt like a very long time, and he was going to fucking enjoy it.

"Please, stop," he choked through blood and snot, feeling sick sicksicksick and he just wanted it to stop. Please just stop. Just stop hurting him. Please just stop Ican'ttakeitanymore. I'lldoanything youwantjustpleasestophurtingme. Draco kept those words choked down inside him somehow, whimpering at the effort it took to hold them in. He wanted to beg for it. His blood dripped on the ground pat-pat-pat from the slices the whip had cut into his back, and Rostan's hand smoothed his tears away, rough but gentle at once.

"I'll stop whenever you want. Whore. You just have to say the words." He somehow spoke so gently in that harsh, contemptuous voice and Draco wanted to say the words, he did. He did. He almost believed the mockery of kindness that Rostan mixed in with the agony. But even mired in pain and blood and the dizziness of shock Draco's urge to give in disgusted him. Sickened him. He loathed himself. He wouldn't say the words. He managed a tiny shake of his head - no - and then the pain came again, and he screamed.

Draco's breath came in short, panicked jerks and yet he was utterly focused now that the initial shock had passed. Hatred surged through him, a physical force that made him burn with a frenetic heat that made his hands shake. And that was good. Hatred overpowered the fear he felt and the cowering, cowardly shame that also rose up in him, like bile at the back of his mouth. The hate seeped through the memories that were flashing up in his mind too, and twisted the feelings of helplessness and self-loathing into an overwhelming need for revenge.

Footsteps thudded down the corridor toward Draco and Hermione, and she stared up at him with wide, worried eyes.

"Draco?" Her voice was gentle, as though she thought he was a scared animal that needed to be reassured lest it flee. He gritted his teeth so hard it felt like they were going to crack. He wasn't scared. Rostan. Fuck. Shit. He couldn't do this.

"Draco?" Soft fingers drifted over his cheek and he flinched away. He wasn't scared. He wasn't. His blood thumped loud in his ears, his heart crashed in his chest as it beat; the anger, it ate him up, swallowed him whole.

"Please. Please! Stop! I'll do it. I'll do it!" Draco's voice rose to a cracked, broken attempt at a scream as fingers of pain lanced through his bones. He couldn't take any more. Anything was better than this. Anything. Even that.

"What was that?" Rostan paused and the pain retreated, and a large hand slipped to cradle the base of Draco's skull, tangling in his hair and ripping his head back sharply. He met Rostan's eyes and then slid his gaze away down to the floor, shame choking him.

"Please." He would never forgive himself. "Please, I'll do whatever you want." He would never forgive himself, never. Never. "Whatever you want. Just stop - stop…"

"Yes, you will. Because you're a filthy, blood-traitor whore," Rostan said, and something broke inside Draco's chest. Snapped, and all defiance left him. He was nothing.

"Yes," Draco whispered, as Rostan placed a finger beneath his chin and forced it up, made Draco meet his eyes. "Yes."

The chains released and Draco fell to his knees and screamed at the pain of impact on the cold stone floor that was slick with his blood, panting and retching, and then Rostan's hand was in his hair, pulling him up to his knees and he grinned down at Draco and said open your mouth andhedid hedid hedid and he would neverforgivehimselfnevernevernever and one day Rostan would. fucking. pay.

"Draco, we have to -"

"No. I have to."

---

"You have to stay here," Draco told her in a rough, urgent tone, thick and hoarse and nearly unrecognisable as him. His cheeks were ashen beneath the blood and his eyes were filled with a bleak kind of rage. Hermione blinked at him, her fingers snapping out to close around his wrist and hold him there in front of her. She wasn't going to let him go out there and face Rostan without her backing him up. It was stupid. Irrational. Far too dangerous. Draco obviously wasn't thinking clearly, and why would he be right now? She could only imagine what must be going through his head.

"But -" she began to protest, one ear sharply attuned to the sound of Rostan approaching, slow and steady.

"Stay fucking here!"

"Draco!" Hermione refused to hide in here while Draco fought. It was ridiculous, and the mere thought made her want to hyperventilate.

"He's mine," Draco snarled, his features contorting with a wounded hate that didn't belong on his face, the full force of his fury burning into Hermione. She felt sick, seeing him staring at her like that, the hatred making his eyes as flat and shiny as coins pressed into his face. "For once in your life, Hermione, fucking do what I tell you to," he hissed and his hand planted against her sternum, he pushed her back sharply. Shock - and pain from her bruised ribs - suffused her as she gasped in a breath and stared at him; on the verge of tears like a hurt child.

Her hand went to her chest and rubbed where Draco had shoved her and his expression cracked. He wavered there before her with apology stricken on his features.

"Go then," she said in a tiny voice, and took another step back from him, her own hurt and her empathy for him warring inside her, and Rostan was approaching - there wasn't time for this.

"Hermione…" he began in a torn, placating tone, and she shook her head.

"Go," she repeated gently, forcing a wobbly smile of reassurance to her lips, trying not to show her hurt all over her face and failing if his expression was any indication. "I'll stay here." The footsteps treading down the corridor echoed closer and after a brief moment of hesitation Draco turned without a word and limped out the door, wand raised. "Until you need me," she finished in a whisper, sickness roiling in her belly. He was so brave. Braver than she could be, and she didn't think he even realised it.

Draco had tried to hide the play of emotions over his face since he'd seen Rostan but Hermione had seen right through this mask. Self-loathing. Shame. Hatred. Fear. Her heart ached for him, and her own fear made her breath come short as she moved to the door and pulled it ajar. She could see Draco in profile through the gap, standing in the middle of the corridor with his wand held in his silver hand, struggling to keep his features schooled into cold bleakness.

"Trying to hide the little missus, were we?"

A chill trickled down Hermione's spine at the sound of that voice, and Draco's shoulders stiffened and his face darkened. He seem to have trouble getting the words out, looking dreadfully, painfully like a beaten dog trying to stand up against its master. She bit her tongue hard enough to bruise and only just barely stopped herself from storming out into the corridor and hexing Rostan into oblivion. When Draco finally managed to speak the words were thin and bitterly cold.

"If I recall correctly, Rostan, the last time we duelled you ended up on the floor trying to hold in your own intestines."

Hermione couldn't see the Death Eater from her vantage point but she could hear the anger in his voice. "You should've finished the job, you little prick."

"I would have. Unfortunately, I was under the Imperius at the time." Draco sounded almost bored, detached - until he said the last three words, filled with vicious intent. "I'm not now." He flicked his wrist and a bolt of sickly yellow magic left his wand. Hermione heard the fizz of magic dissipating on a shield charm a second later, and then Rostan's laugh. Her skin prickled with hot disgust; she remembered that sound too well. Draco blocked a hex and sent one of his own flying back at Rostan, and then the corridor filled with the blur of streaking lights - both men using curses and hexes aimed to wound not kill. That relieved her, in a way - she would have a chance to take Rostan down and get Draco to safety if one of Rostan's hexes found its mark.

She clutched her wand tightly in her sweaty hand as she watched, and only just barely managed to stop herself from running out there. She needed to be fighting with him, as he threw up shield after shield, ducked and side-stepped curses, his silver hand flashing through the air so fast as he delivered curse after curse. Hermione itched to be out there. Rostan would use her against Draco, use her as a distraction, she told herself firmly. And Hermione didn't think Draco was in any mental state to handle it right now if Rostan targeted her in particular. And he'd said he needed to do it alone, and she understood that, but…

A line of blood welled on Draco's cheek, and Hermione could see the yellow-white of fat revealed by the short, deep gash. She swore to herself, jittering on her feet. A short grunt of pain from Rostan a moment later and she wished she could see the man, but Draco was grinning. It distorted the gash on his cheek in terrible ways, and his teeth were bloodied. Hermione felt physically ill to her stomach with fear. And then Draco was blocking a spell, both hands gripping his wand as the force of Rostan's spell against his shield drove him back several feet, and further before it stopped. She couldn't see him anymore and panic crept up her with spidery fingers. She pressed her face closer to the gap in the door.

And then pain erupted in the side of her face and body that pressed against the door as it was slammed open with immense force, sending her spinning, falling, careening away. She flailed for something to stop her from falling but her body slammed back into something hard before she could stop herself, and fiery agony spasmed through her back. Then Rostan's voice sneered through the air as a hand clasped around her throat, yanking her upright with her back still grinding painfully into the hard thing - a desk? - behind her. She had no idea where her wand was.

"Incarcerous," he said and Hermione shuddered as ropes snaked around her - ankles, knees, wrists, upper arms - and coiled so tightly that the rope cut into her flesh. She was dizzied and dazed, Rostan's hand around her throat, his breath on her face as he stared down into her eyes with a pleased leer. She had to do something. Her head snapped forward as hard as she could manage and connected satisfyingly with Rostan's nose, and he let out a cry of pain and several choice swear words, his hand around her throat tightening as he shook her like a dog.

"Be still, bitch, or I will kill you," he told her and stabbed his wand into the tender flesh beneath her jaw, grinning at her with a fierce, frightening kind of pleasure.

She snarled at him wordlessly, fury and panic roiling up in her and nearly making her mindless with the need to be free, but she didn't think Rostan made idle threats. She didn't try to head-butt him again, just glared daggers, her mind racing. He was going to use her against Draco after all. Oh god. And Draco would cooperate, of course he would, because there was no way he would risk Hermione's life. She hated this, all of it - her helplessness, Rostan, the way every situation fell apart like this. It wasn't fucking fair.

"Malfoy!" Rostan called with a laugh in his voice that made Hermione want to rip his face off with her bare fucking teeth. "Malfoy. I have your little mudblood at wand-point, and if you try anything I will kill you. I am, however, willing to exchange her for you. Throw your wand in here, and come in with your hands up." Silence was Rostan's only answer, and Hermione held her breath, praying that Draco wouldn't listen to the Death Eater. If Draco gave up his wand then they would both be as good as dead. He wouldn't be that desperate, would he?

"Throw your wand in here, Malfoy." Rostan grasped Hermione's bonds and used them to shift her to the floor, him crouching over her and facing the door. "Crucio," he whispered happily, and Hermione screamed. She tried not to because she knew what the sound of her screams would do to Draco, but she didn't have a choice. The pain took that away from her, and wounded wails tore out her throat. It blinded her to everything but a haze of red, feeling as though she was being flailed alive as her body tried to convulse against the bonds of the incarcerous and failed.

Then nothing. The pain of the Cruciatus went away, leaving her limp, aching and sore from all her other wounds, staring at Draco with blurred vision. "Draco…don't…" Hermione got out in a faint plea, but she knew even before she spoke that he wasn't going to listen to her. He stood silently in the doorway and his face was full of stony despair and resignation. His wand clattered as it slid over the floor. Rostan gripped Hermione's throat with one hand and accioed Draco's wand, removing his hand from Hermione's throat long enough to tuck Draco's wand in his own wand sheath.

And then he stood and advanced on Draco while Hermione could only lie there and watch, fear and anger seething in her useless limbs. Rostan backed Draco up against the wall and jabbed his wand tip into the flesh beneath Draco's chin, leering while Draco closed his eyes and seemed to try to steel himself.

"You won't harm her?" he asked, and Rostan laughed.

"We'll see. Maybe you can persuade me to leave her unhurt, traitor," the Death Eater sneered, and Draco flinched and then let out a tiny, wounded sigh. He had to have known Rostan wouldn't let her go Hermione thought, so full of anger it was choking her, making her heart thunder and gallop, her limbs trembling inside her bonds. He had to have known. His eyes were pleading on Rostan, and the naked supplication on his face made Hermione's stomach curdle and churn.

"Swear you won't hurt her. It's not her you want, it's me."

"No."

Draco hit out at the Death Eater then; his fist slamming into the other's stomach, and then his cheek, hands flying out and shoving the other back. Hermione's body was exploding with tension as she beg-beg-begged for Draco to get the upper hand. Disarm Rostan. Get his wand back. Kill the bastard. Rostan groaned and stumbled back several steps, doubling over and choking for air. Draco surged forward, face carved in lines of cold anger, but Rostan was faster.

"Crucio," the Death Eater snarled at Draco, and Hermione moaned under her breath as he went crumpling back against the wall, legs going out from under him.

Rostan grabbed him before he could fall and pinned him with one hand to the wall, letting up the Cruciatus. Draco wrenched in a sob of air and lifted his blonde head, shaking it slowly as though he was trying to clear the fog of pain from it. He tried to lash out at Rostan again but the other man just snarled another short Cruciatus, giggling as Draco nearly bit through his lip in his attempt to muffle his screams. Hermione watched in horror as Rostan repeated the Cruciatus several times, yelling herself hoarse as she begged the Death Eater to please, stop. He ignored her, of course. And then finally he seemed satisfied and stopped, jabbing his wand back beneath Draco's jaw.

"You're weak," Rostan said, and Draco let out a gurgling snarl and half-blindly struggled again. His eyes were glazed, Hermione could see, and his limbs still shook with the effects of the Cruciatus. Rostan seemed to enjoy Draco's attempts to fight him, a cruel smirk splitting his face. "You're a filthy little blood traitor whore and you're weak. You're weak because I broke you, and you're mine because I broke you. And so much fun to break, you were, boy; so delicious when you finally begged me, when you were wriggling on my cock."

Draco made a horrible, guttural sound and his shoulders slumped and head bowed; a puppet with his strings cut. Hermione clenched her fists, nails biting into her palms, poison writhing in her belly as Rostan's words drilled into her head.

"Do you remember?" Rostan's fingers trailed over Draco's lips and he shuddered but ceased his fight altogether, and tears welled up in Hermione's eyes. "Do you remember how much easier, how much more pleasant it was when you just let me take you like the little whore you are? Bleeding and crying, begging me for more, begging me to fuck you until you were screaming?"

Rostan drew out a little hum, and Draco shuddered and jerked again as the Death Eater pressed his lips to Draco's. Hermione stared in horror. This couldn't be happening. He had to have a plan. Someone had to come by and save them. This couldn't be happening. Fury and terror boiled up in her, and she wondered if this was how Draco had felt when Lucius had tried to rape her that day in the cell. The kiss was light and tender, Draco's lips unresponsive but unresisting beneath Rostan's and his eyes wet with tears, and Hermione wanted to murder the man. An alien, bloodthirsty rage ate her up; she wanted to tear him apart piece by tiny piece and cheer while she did it.

Rostan drew back. "You know you always beg for it in the end, whore. You're already mine, already broken - I just need to remind you of that. And I will. So why don't we skip that part, and you just say the words." Draco was silent, head still bowed. "But…I suppose if you need to be reminded of your place - need to be reminded to be obedient - there's always your mudblood girlfriend to convince you, isn't there?"

Hermione went rigid on the cold stone floor as Rostan's gaze ran over her body slowly, a leer on his lips. He looked like a shark; cold and merciless, and eager to rend at flesh and taste blood. She made herself stare back at him without blinking, showing her anger and not her fear because she refused to give the bastard what he wanted. His grin grew wider, one hand still holding his wand to Draco's throat, the other dragging little scratches down Draco's cheek. He licked his lips, his eyes turning to Draco.

The scratches were livid down Draco's cheek, his shoulders slumped, and although his face was in shadow Hermione could see his full lower lip was trembling. He was cowed and defeated and something in Hermione raged silently at the sight; it took her back to the weeks of capture and torture, of seeing him half-naked, dripping with blood and screaming as they inflicted yet more unbearable pain. And even then he hadn't looked as broken, as terribly, horrifically defeated as he did now.

"Don't," Draco whispered. "Don't hurt her. You don't have to. I'll do…I'll do whatever you want." Hermione moaned quietly in sickened denial. Draco couldn't give in, he couldn't. But he had. "What-whatever you want. I swear."

"Do you, whore? Do you swear?" Rostan asked, that disgusting smirk still playing over his mouth as he dug his nails deeper into Draco's cheek, and Hermione whimpered at the horror of the moment. A desperate panic to get out to not let this happen seized her and she pointlessly struggled against the incarcerous again, but of course the bonds only tightened further, digging deep welts into her flesh.

"Yes," Draco said dully and lifted his face as if in submission, bruised and bloodied lips still quivering and eyes shining like mercury, wet and wide. His fingers crept up Rostan's arms tentatively to bury themselves in the Death Eater's hair. Draco's hair fell white over his eyes as his shoulders fell back against the wall, his hips tilting out in an obscene invitation. His face raised to Rostan's and lips parted, long fingers tangled ever-so-lightly in the other man's dark hair; it looked like old habit. Bile rose in Hermione's throat and she swallowed it down, unable to look away from the grotesque scene.

Rostan kissed Draco then; slow and deep at first, and then brutally, biting and probing and Hermione couldn't breathe. She was frozen in horror, watching the tears streak Draco's cheeks, the way his fingers slid through Rostan's hair like they did when he kissed her, and how he kissed the Death Eater back instead of remaining unresponsive - he was defeated and compliant. Hermione was really, truly going to throw up everywhere. She couldn't watch this - this - this - a sob caught in her throat - this disgusting mockery that degraded Draco and coerced him to be complicit in his own rape. But there wasn't a single fucking thing she could do, bound as she was.

Rostan pulled back a fraction and grinned at Draco, wand wavering at Draco's throat. "I'm going to fuck you until you're bleeding, whore, and then I'm going to let you watch while I fuck your little mudblood. I'll -" He didn't finish. Draco's jaw clenched and bunched, and with a grunt of effort his hands - still cradling Rostan's head as if in participation with the Death Eater's sick games - wrenched hard. And Rostan's head wrenched with them. Hermione choked in a gasp as the startling, skin-crawling crackle of bone echoed through the room, the cords in Draco's neck standing out and face reddening with the effort it took.

Rostan's eyes went glassy and empty then, and Draco let go of the body as it fell in a heap. Hermione flinched at the heavy thump of dead weight, and then relief took the edge off her panic as the ropes binding Hermione fell away and dissipated with Rostan's death. Draco flattened himself further into the wall, his hands flexing in the air as he stared down at Rostan's body where it lay crumpled at his boots. Hermione scrambled onto all fours and used the desk next to her as a crutch to help pull herself upright, panting and gasping.

Draco looked catatonic; standing statue still against the wall, his gaze fixed and blank on the Death Eater's body. Hermione approached him carefully, slowly edging up to his side because right now she didn't think startling him would work out well. Her hand stretched out to him, fingertips just barely brushing his upper arm through his leathers.

"…Draco?" A juddering rasping noise escaped Draco and his eyes tore from the man whose neck he'd snapped, darting about wildly and passing unseeingly right over Hermione's face before he screwed them shut. Eyes still shut Draco smeared his wrist frantically over his bitten, bruised, kiss-swollen lips; to rid himself of the lingering sensation of Rostan's mouth invading his, Hermione imagined. Then with a little moan - despair, relief, disgust? - he slid gracelessly down the wall, hunching over and burying his face in his hands. She crouched beside him, somewhat relieved by the fact that he had reacted at last and stopped standing frozen there like a statue. She laid her hand lightly on his shoulder.

"It's over. It's all right, Draco. It's over," she told him in a tone that was meant to be firm and reassuring, tears thickening her voice. He struggled to breathe for a moment before managing a deep, shaking inhale. "It's over," she said again and Draco let the breath out on a sigh, his hands dropping from his face. He stared blankly across the room as Hermione stayed crouched next to him, rubbing his arm soothingly as he hitched and struggled for air. He ignored the crumpled body at his feet and just breathed, until eventually each inhale and exhale came easily and evenly.

Hermione wished there was something she could say to help but her mind was blank, and she didn't want to say the wrong thing to Draco right now. Besides, he didn't seem to need her to speak. So she just kept kneading his upper arm, attempting to exude silent supportiveness while trying not to crumple into tears in the raw relief of aftershock. After several long minutes Draco scrubbed his wrist over his mouth again and fixed bloodshot, red-rimmed eyes on Hermione.

"I thought I would feel better right now," he confessed in a hoarse half-whisper. "But I don't. Not really." Hermione made a small humming noise of sympathy and shared pain and opened her arms to him, her back braced up against the wall. Draco kept her gaze a few seconds longer, and then with a shaky sound that could have been a sob or a sigh he twisted toward her, sinking his face against her shoulder. His arms slid around her waist and his breath hitched again, and Hermione laid a gentle kiss on top of his head, holding him very tightly, as though he were a child in need of comfort.

She left her lips pressed to his hair, stiff and streaked dark crimson with dried blood, and tried not to cry as his shoulders shook and dampness soaked into the shoulder of her leathers. Hermione whispered soft assurances and comfort into Draco's hair, and his fingers clutched bruisingly hard into her back, his breath hitched in and out. She lost the battle against her tears, and they dripped down into his hair, making the blood run. She would give him some time, before they had to go back out there and resume the fight for their lives. Give him just a little bit of time.

---

Hermione looked like she very much wanted to hold his hand as they headed at a brisk if limping pace back up the now empty corridor. Like she wanted to cling to him while he cried and comfort him - as she had in the classroom where Rostan's corpse lay - and Draco felt a twinge of shame that Hermione saw him acting so weak over that.

He had never truly opened up to her about what it was like, the details of what happened. He had raged and wept about it in front of her once after the cell, but he had never shown her how weak and broken it made him feel - he had never just fallen into silent tears like he had in the classroom. Not outside of the cell, anyway. Draco knew he shouldn't care, that he should be comfortable being completely raw and vulnerable in front of Hermione, but he wasn't.

Not about that, and not right now, when they needed to be cold-blooded and clear-headed. He'd fucking come to bits in the middle of the biggest battle of the war, and wept in her lap like a mewling bloody infant. Draco was ashamed, and with that came the need to reassert himself; he knew that was what he was doing, but he couldn't seem to bring himself to stop it. He needed to be cold and hard, to lock all emotion away and just focus on the fight - and it was thankfully easier now after his little crying jag. He had to keep his guard up, had to keep himself fucking focused, had to refuse Hermione's comfort, because if he took it then he just knew he would shatter again.

Hermione kept looking at him out of the corner of his eye as their boots thudded quietly on the stones, and he pressed his wounded lips together hard, soaking up the pain that lit up in him like a fire as he did so and using it to fuel him. "I'm fine, Hermione. Would you stop looking at me like I'm going to spontaneously combust?" he snapped shortly, trying to stay calm. Focused. Everything was fine. Rostan was dead, and Draco was fine. She flinched and her steps faltered a moment, hurt flashing over her face and guilt pricked at him.

"Sorry," she mumbled, eyes fleeting up to his face and then back to the corridor ahead of them, and he sighed inwardly and cursed himself for being a bastard who apparently only dealt in emotional extremes.

"I'm not fine then," Draco got out reluctantly, with a great deal of effort spent trying to keep his voice steady. "All right? Honestly, I'm not bloody fine. But I'll do. Just…stop looking at me like that. It's putting me on edge." He was weirdly proud of how normal he sounded, considering, and it must have worked because Hermione let out a weak, watery chuckle.

"We're in the middle of all this, and that just…happened, and me looking at you is putting you on edge? My god, Draco." She sounded like she was following his lead and trying very hard to sound flippant too, and fuck he appreciated that so much right now. Draco grabbed Hermione's arm, yanking her to a stop in the middle of the corridor, and then hooked his arm around her waist and pulled her flush against him. She gasped at his drag on her arm and then relaxed as his arm slid around her, leaning into him with her limpid eyes calm and soft on his face, and the faintest smile on her lips.

Draco took a deep breath, oddly having to steel himself to do this. Maybe because it was easier to shut everything down and try his best to be like one of the Muggle robots he'd seen in the movies, or maybe just because he felt dirty after what Rostan had done - what Draco had let him do. But he dipped his head to Hermione's anyway and his lips moulded to hers; soft and gentle, mouths opening and moving together, tongues slipping and probing ever so delicately. The kiss tasted like salt and copper, hot and slick and so fucking sweet.

He broke away after a few long, delicious seconds that set his heart racing and jolting, and swiped his thumb gently over Hermione's lips. She was flushed and breathless, and despite the grime of battle on her she looked beautiful - breathtaking. He allowed himself a moment to take in the sight of her and enjoy her startled, dizzied surprise, and then locked himself back down.

"Come on," he said then, turning away and heading briskly down the corridor again. He glanced over his shoulder at her; standing there stunned with her fingers pressed to her lips as she stared after him. "Hermione," he said sharply, with a trace of amusement cutting through the numbness he tried to cover his roiling emotions with, and she hurried after him.

"What was that?" she asked him, and Draco could feel her eyes sweeping over him carefully - worried and filled with an aching kind of love that made him feel uneasily exposed still.

"Something," Draco told her helplessly. A reminder, an assurance, an expression of love, a distraction, the last outlet he would allow himself before all this was over, or perhaps a self-indulgent comfort… Everything and nothing, and he'd be damned if he could explain it. He thought perhaps he was getting a hold of his feelings now, forcing his mind into a state of deliberate flippancy. Everything was just fucking roses right now Draco told himself, and made himself believe it.

"Something," he said again in an almost annoyed tone, which made it clear the subject was closed. Hermione harrumphed quietly and frowned to herself, but didn't ask any more questions. She seemed relieved by both the kiss and his manner, and that had been the point. She froze a moment later as they reached the intersection - straight ahead taking them toward the bridge to the Great Hall, and the right-hand turn taking them back the way they'd come originally when running from the enemy. Before they had run into Rostan. Shit. Draco grimaced; calm, he told himself - everything is fucking fine.

"Wait," Hermione said sharply, head cocking to one side.

"What -?"

"Shh!" she hissed, holding her hand up, head still tilted in that straining-to-listen position. He listened too and heard the distant sound of yelling mixed in with the crack of battle magic, coming from the direction of the right-hand corridor.

"Fighting," he said shortly. "But we should get to the Great Hall; there are Healers there, or should be, and we both need at least some cursory healing before we charge back into the bloody fray."

Hermione's eyes were wide and vague, and Draco had the sinking sense that she wasn't listening to him in the slightest. "It's Harry. Harry and Ron - my god those are Harry and Ron's voices! They're okay!" She shot Draco a manically joyous look, and it sent an odd thrill through him to see the wild abandon on her face, teeth gleaming white in the blood and dust that spattered her skin. "We have to go to them," she said as if it was blatantly obvious; the only choice. Draco balked at that slightly - what they needed to do was find a healer to patch them both up a bit before they went flinging themselves into another fight.

Hermione correctly interpreted his expression and frowned. "No. Draco, please. Please, I can't just leave them. I have to find out what's going on - Ron will want to know I'm alive, they might need our help! We can't just -!"

"Fine," he said shortly and nodded, repressing a smile at the relief that spread over her features. "Fine. Come on then, let's go find your precious Potter and Weasley." Draco tried to sound scathing when he spoke the two other men's names but failed rather dismally; as much as he was loathe to admit it he too would feel wrong about not going to help them. They were…friends, of a sort, and he couldn't just piss off and leave them. And if he tried to insist Hermione would go on without him anyway. Hermione's answering grin lit up the dim corridor and sent trickles of warmth through his veins, and then she was jogging limpingly toward the sound of voices.

Draco fell into place at her side and swapped his wand to his left hand, because despite the burns that made moving his arm painful, with his wand in his left hand he could cover Hermione's left while she covered his right. She gave him a quick look, but they both knew he was as good at duelling with his left as with his right and while it hurt him, he could do it. They rounded a corner and were confronted with the sight of a small, pitched battle, none of the fighters noticing them yet. The enemy were bottled up and stuck in cover near Hermione and Draco's end, and their side were spread out down the corridor behind meagre cover.

"Shit," Draco swore, eyes casting over the scene and taking it all in. Multiple red heads were visible through the chaos of curses - the Weasley twins, Ronald Weasley, and Ginny - and Potter was there too of course, as well as two girls that seemed vaguely familiar. Bones and Abbott? Well, who gave a fuck, really. Not him. Draco grinned mirthlessly, not looking forward to what was inevitably going to be them braving a gamut of curses in order to get to Hermione's friends. His friends. Their friends? Draco gasped in a shaky breath of fear and really wished they'd just gone for the Great Hall, because right now he was shaken as hell and felt like being an utter coward.

The others were fighting against a swarm of Voldemort's lowliest followers - the scum who didn't merit Death Eater status - and looked to be holding their own well.

Lights streaked the air and chunks of stone were being gouged out of the walls of the corridor as spells missed their targets, or were ducked, and the air smelt like lightning. Hermione flicked her wand by his side and a bolt of light streaked out - one of the enemy who stood with his back to Hermione and Draco went slamming up against the corridor ceiling and then was driven back down against the floor with a series of cracks. The man twitched, moaned, and then went still, and Draco raised an eyebrow at the violence of it. Not usually Hermione's preference.

He took a breath and let it out and then aimed an Avada at another of the enemy who had just noticed the two of them; there was no time to fuck around, and with the memories of Rostan vivid in his mind it was extremely easy to summon the hatred necessary for the curse. Hermione didn't say a single word of mildly disapproving protest, just dashed straight into the fight heading for Potter and Ronald Weasley, heedless of Draco's call for her to stop. He swore a slew of filthy words and wove into the skirmish after her, flinching, ducking, and blocking his way through the crossfire, nearly getting fucking exploded twice and getting scorched once.

"Fucking single-minded bitch," he mumbled under his breath as he flung hexes left and right, racing the last few feet to take cover with Hermione and Potter behind a pillar. She and Potter were gabbling frantically to each other, and Draco bit his tongue and provided covering fire while he waited for the two of them to finish their reunion - Merlin, she looked so fucking happy and he wasn't about to ruin that. Weasley - not the twins or the girl but Ronald - was across the corridor behind another pillar, and flattened himself back against the wall as the green streak of a Killing Curse seared past him. His eyes met Draco's and he grinned wildly.

"Good fun, huh?" he yelled at Draco, milk white beneath his freckles, hands trembling, voice all bravado. Draco snorted.

"Terrifyingly so," he called back with a smirk, popping his head out and sending a sectumsempra down the corridor. It missed and he swore and pulled his head back into cover. "I see you survived the giants."

"And I can tell you're just bloody overjoyed, mate," Weasley yelled with a laugh, and Draco rolled his eyes. He was glad. The murmur of Potter and Hermione's voices behind him ceased, and a hand clasped his shoulder in brief greeting.

"Malfoy," Potter said startlingly close to his ear, sounding ragged, dead on his feet.

"Potter," Draco answered without looking at the boy-who-lived - soon to be, he remembered with a jolting pang of sympathy and what felt frighteningly like grief, the boy-who-died. Shit. Draco set his lips in a straight, emotionless line and sighted on a man's head and upper body sticking out of a doorway down the corridor. He hit him with an entrails-expelling curse and his stomach turned as, a second later, guts sprayed into the corridor.

"I saw Parkinson around ten minutes ago with Seamus. She was fine, then. Barely a scratch on her," Potter offered as he cast a spell - a fucking stunner of all things, this was a war, didn't the bastard understand that? - past Draco's shoulder. Draco felt a surge of gratitude that Potter would think to tell him that, and a small amount of the tension in him seeped away at the knowledge that Pansy was probably still all right.

"Thanks, Potter."

They didn't speak of the dead. There would be time later to list the dead, except Harry - Potter - would be counted among them then, and Draco's heart did that uncomfortable twisting thing again as he felt sick at the thought of the other man dead. It wasn't fucking right, but then what was? But instead of speaking further they focused fully on the battle at hand - and with Hermione safely behind Draco's back for once he could fully focus. She kept growling with annoyance, wanting to swap out with Draco and take her turn peeking out from behind the pillar, but both he and Potter steadily refused. In the end she gave up with a furious huff, and he and Potter shared a brief smirk.

Curses split the air as the nine of them fought hard, and eventually they gained the upper hand over the enemy - wearing them down with the constant barrage of curses and hexes. It took time - Draco had no idea how much, but it felt like fifteen minutes or more. Voldemort's people were in cover and every time Draco or one of the others stuck their heads out from cover, a multitude of curses came flying at them. Weasley caught a cutting hex to the cheek that scored lightly along his cheekbone, and Draco suffered a nasty stinging hex to his left hand, but otherwise their side went unscathed.

They were turning the tide, but it was slow fucking going, and frustrating as hell. Draco's head ached in time with his heartbeat, as did half the other wounds he'd sustained, and his mouth still tasted like Rostan despite kissing Hermione, and it was a Merlin-damned fucking struggle to keep himself together. But he kept fighting with the others and finally they whittled down the enemy to two lone men, taking cover either side of the doorway at the end of the corridor.

And that was when it happened. One of the remaining men sent a curse streaking down toward them all, a seething inky black cloud of magic that fairly dripped with Dark magic, everyone ducking for cover automatically. And then someone screamed. A female voice and Draco spun, his eyes fixing on the back of Hermione's head. She was all right; his heart started beating again. Her hands were clasped over her mouth but it hadn't been her who'd screamed. It had been Ginny Weasley.

She was a little way further down the corridor, her face contorted with grief and red as her hair as she stared at the body lying on the floor not three feet away from her, and screamed. A Weasley twin, Draco realised as Hermione let out a choked sob, but which one he had no fucking idea. He felt infected by the dazed sort of horror that seemed to have swallowed everyone else; staring numbly as the other twin ran out and sank to his knees at his brother's side, heedless of the two remaining enemy fighters. The unhurt twin let out a great, gasping sob and wrapped his arms around his brother, shaking him, staring into his face desperately, madness bright in his eyes.

"Fred! FredFredFred…" It was a litany of his twin's name, over and over in a voice that sounded barely human. And then George buried his face against his brother's chest, shoulders shaking and horrible, ripping cries tearing from his throat. "No…nononononono…"

Draco looked away, unable to watch. He told himself it was only because someone needed to take down the two remaining enemy fighters before George got himself killed, but really it was because his chest hurt and tears were welling in his eyes. He couldn't stand to bear witness to George's grief. To see him weeping over his twin's body. Draco couldn't stand to be reminded of how much he actually cared about everyone in this corridor, and how much it hurt him when they were hurt…or killed.

To Draco's surprise it was Ronald Weasley whose curses joined his own as he focused on taking out the last two fighters. From the corner of his eye he could see the other man was crying, but his face was hard and his wet eyes emanating rage - Weasley looked fucking dangerous.

The two of them traded curses with the enemy for a moment as Abbot and Bones kept a shield up around George and the others. Ginny's hysterical sobs and George's broken cries of his twin's name and his sobbed denials were drilling into Draco's ears, and his jaw bunched as he swallowed hard and tried to ignore their grief. Fuck, it was painful to listen to, and it had to be so much worse for Weasley.

The two enemy fighters left just wouldn't fucking fall - their cover too bloody good - and the fight stretched out, wearing on Weasley who no doubt just wanted to go to his brothers' sides. The other man's chin started to tremble, his anger turning his face blotchy and his shoulders heaving with his gasps for air, and Draco kept half an eye on him, unease prickling over his skin. And then Weasley snarled and stepped out into the open like the thick fucking idiot he was, advancing on the enemy and screaming the Killing Curse over and over.

Draco swore inwardly and debated whether he should rush out and drag the git back into cover, risking his own life, but then Weasley's fourth Killing Curse caught one of the men, and the other fell to Draco's sectumsempra. Weasley kept his wand up as the final man fell, staring blankly down the corridor and still wrenching in huge gasps of air. He looked like an enraged animal, ready to attack anything that moved. Draco bit his tongue and then gritted his teeth and approached the other man.

"Relax, Weasley," he said very quietly and calmly, placing a finger on Weasley's wand and pushing it slowly down. "Ron. Ron - keep it together. They aren't getting up again. Don't go fucking psychotic on us all."

Ron gulped and turned his head, his eyes very blue and very fucking angry, bloodshot and welling over with silent tears. "My brother is fucking dead you arsehole," he got out, sounding on the edge of sanity, voice shaking and cracking and wand jabbing into Draco's chest. Draco made himself stand very still, resisting the urge to hex the bastard before Ron snapped and hexed him. "You tell me to fucking relax again and I swear to Merlin I will -"

"He's alive!" Hermione's voice broke the air, shrill with worry and relief, and Draco and Ron snapped their heads to stare at her in perfect unison. She was crouched over Fred's body, her face alight with hope. "Just barely…but he's alive!"

George sank back onto his heels and began to cry in earnest, and Ron - shit, Weasley…Ron, whatever - dropped his wand from Draco's chest and his shoulders slumped. Ginny was clinging to Harry, weeping, and Bones and Abbot seemed to be keeping a watchful eye for activity at either end of corridor. Practical; Draco liked that. Ron cleared his throat awkwardly, and Draco glanced over at him with an arched brow.

"Sorry, mate," Ron said uncomfortably, shooting Draco a worried, tense half-smile. Draco shrugged.

"No harm done, Weasley. Shouldn't have told you to relax," he said crisply, and then Hermione was talking over everyone else, her eyes roaming sharp over the group.

"We need to get Fred to the Hospital Wing now - if he doesn't get medical attention soon then…" She trailed off, but everyone knew what she had omitted mentioning; Fred Weasley would die. As far as Draco knew, the Order should still have mass amounts of people guarding the stairs - trying not to let any of the enemy get past the first floor. Hermione was all business as Ron went to George and hauled him up off the floor into an embrace, and Draco stared at the lot of them uncomfortably, keeping at a distance. He thought perhaps he was having a badly timed epiphany, as worry for the others surged up in him.

"Susan and Hannah, you take Fred to the infirmary, all right?" The two girls nodded in response to Hermione's crisp order, and Bones - Susan? - levitated Fred into the air, Hannah reinforcing the spell with her own charm and stabilising his unconscious body. "George, of course you go with them. The healers will do their best, George. He's got a fighting chance," Hermione added, squeezing the uninjured Weasley twin's hand and giving him a sympathetic, tiny smile. George just nodded blankly and fell in beside his twin's floating body. "Right, let's go - we'll escort you to the stairs and then we have to split up, all right?"

There were nods all around, and then the group headed for a staircase, reaching it without further incident although the sound of battle reached their ears clearly. Hermione hugged George before he began up the stairs after his twin's body, and then she retreated to Draco's side, biting her lip and looking drawn and full of grief.

"Go with them, Ginny," Harry said quietly as the girls and George headed up the stairs with Fred, with steel in his voice that Draco sometimes forgot the other man had. "Go with them."

"No!" the redhead protested tightly. "No, Harry I'm not leaving you. Not now." She shook her head violently and Harry's face hardened. Draco knew why Harry was sending her upstairs to the infirmary - he didn't want Ginny there when he was killed. Fuck. Draco hardened his own features before he gave something away and stared at the floor, Hermione's hand warm and sweaty in his and holding him steady like an anchor.

"You need to be there, in case…" Harry's voice lowered and he murmured in Ginny's ear, but Draco knew exactly what Harry was saying in order to manipulate Ginny to relative safety. She had to go in case Fred did die, and someone needed to be there for George. Ginny's face creased on the verge of frustrated, angry tears for a moment, her fists clenching at her sides. And then she regained her composure and nodded stiffly, clearly beyond miserable and furious at the situation but holding it together. Draco felt some admiration for the girl as she nodded again, her chin up and face coolly composed.

"Fine. I'll go. Just…Harry…be safe." Ginny leant in and kissed him hard and Harry let out a rough, needy sound that had everyone, including Draco, quickly looking away and flushing hot with embarrassment.

Draco stared determinedly at the toes of his boots, only looking up when feet sounded on the stairs and Harry let out a rough sigh of loss. Draco met Harry's eyes, who stared right back at him, a world of pain in the other man's eyes as he wiped the back of his hand over his lips. Draco seized his arm in a rough show of comradeship as they set off again and Harry gave him a small, pathetic smile in return. They were the only ones who knew that that was the last time Harry would ever kiss Ginny, and the knowledge lay leaden on Draco's mind. Their boots all thunked heavy on the walkway as they began across it, bunched together and watchful.

Draco knew how it felt, to see the person he loved most in the world disappear, and to think that he was going to die without ever seeing her again. Empathy for Harry made the memory of the cell vivid in Draco's mind, and he shivered like he'd walked through a ghost. He knew how Harry felt right now intimately and painfully, and he squeezed Hermione's hand tighter as they headed toward the fight. She winced and shot Draco a puzzled, questioning glance and he loosened his grip on her hand, mouthing a silent apology. Merlin, if she died then…then it would all be over.

"I love you," Hermione whispered when Draco dropped her hand so they were prepared to fight, and he swallowed hard, fucking emotion welling up again.

"I love -" A hex shot through the air past Draco's cheek, and he never finished his sentence.