A/N: joanvindiesel gives the best frikkin reviews ever! Thanks for reminding me why I love this story so much. :) This quick update is dedicated to kawaiishiella, BrightestWitchOfHerAge16, TsukiyoTenshi (for always being patient ;), adrianiforever, MystereRaven, and the incomparable mh21 for wanting the next update that much! Enjoy lovelies.
PART 2: Hogwarts
Chapter 25
mending bruises
"Wouldn't want them to find your wands now would we?" The blue eyed stranger spoke as they came round the aged and gloomy tavern, to what could only be described as the side entrance. It led to a set of stairs and in the apartment above rested a Spartan styled home. Below the drinking songs and gruff voices of the Hog's Head carried on a dim lull. Here all was surprisingly peaceful.
After gently easing James onto his couch, the Wizard began to whisper healing spells with every complex swish of his wand.
Hermione's feet somehow found the strength to carry her to a large empty painting, set over the blazing hearth. She knew the faded portrait was magical and wondered who was painted into it. Despite all her shot nerves and post adrenaline rush, she jumped when the old man spoke over her shoulder.
"They won't come looking for you here. I suggest you both rest while you can. Merlin knows my brother won't allow it once he gets his clutches on you two again," he muttered.
Hermione turned round to face their mysterious savior, her eyes seeking James just beyond and she was relieved to see that whatever spells the man had whispered over him seemed to be working.
The stranger was watching her pensively and rubbing his hands together nervously. "That was a very foolish thing you did back there, you know," he finally said.
Her eyebrow arched at his insinuation. Though she felt like collapsing any second, Hermione hadn't lost her new found courage. "Like interrupting a duel between dark wizards and children?"
His brow creased for a moment, eyes narrowing and crinkled by the many lines that gave character to his face.
Something about him was troubling her subconscience, a nagging sensation that told her she should recognize him. And as she took in his wrinkled and stoic features, she felt that once, he might have smiled quite often.
As if to answer her silent question he laughed, so suddenly, even James stirred from his delirium. "Good Godric!" he man said. "You are just as she was, before! Damned fool was telling me the truth for once!"
Eyes narrowed, Hermione challenged, "Who are you? Why did you save us? No one else in Hogsmeade tried to help any of us."
His laughter abated, the bearded man's eyes twinkled with fresh light. "Not all of us are heroes Hermione. Most of the people in this town came here to avoid trouble with outside affairs, not welcome them on our threshold." His gray-blue eyes flickered up to the portrait behind her and filled with something else before settling on the belligerent schoolgirl across from him. "I am Aberforth, owner of the Hogs Head. And I am a little more foolish than most of the Wizards in this village, undoubtedly the most stubborn. When I saw the dark mark right over my tavern, I thought I'd have a look at what caused it…and there you were!"
Hermione was at a loss for words. Aberforth knew her name, yet there was something beyond the knowing in his eyes, as if he knew something she did not. There was also something disturbing about his manner, in spite of the laugh lines in his face, as if he had forgotten how to smile or be happy decades ago. His smiles and twinkling eyes were something new. Hermione was certain of this and dubious as to the cause.
"Mione?" a weary voice intoned and snatched all her attention from their savior. Hermione stumbled in her rush to reach James's side. She smiled wearily the moment he opened his eyes to her. The tension in his body eased instantly, replaced by relief. He took in their surroundings with amusement after and said, "Where in the heavenly corners of your eyes are we, love?"
"Only you would joke at a time like this." She shook her head all the while running her hands over every one of his patched wounds till she was satisfied.
"Only you would second guess a Wizard's handiwork, Witch!" He sent a nod to Aberforth, a grin tugging at his cheeks, on a young face that was constantly finding reasons to smile. But this time, for once, the smile didn't reach his hazel eyes. His only joy was seeing her smile at his ridiculousness, his victory in distracting her from the terror he had allowed them to face together. James wished he'd followed his first instincts and done as Padfoot ordered him to.
Instead of running around trying to be the hero you son of a hippogriff.
With a smile still faint on her face, she said, "You didn't see what he tried to do to you…what he would have done if…" Fear choked her words from passing her lips and she gasped for breath, clutched at her throat and envisioned in those seconds a world without James Potter in it.
"James…" she breathed.
I could not exist…
Humor forgotten, James instantly grabbed his Witch and pulled her tightly into his arms, ignoring the sting of his freshly mended flesh. Because she needed this even if she didn't realize it and because James needed to feel her too. He remembered more of what almost happened in that alleyway than Hermione realized. Thanks to countless Daily Prophet photographs the dark silhouette of their enemy was already familiar to him.
"Voldemort is on the rise." Aberforth spoke their mutual fears aloud.
While Hermione only buried herself further in James' bloodied cloak, he gathered his wits and turned to face his godfather's younger brother.
The elder Wizard watched the painting above the fireplace mantle grimly. Without turning round, he added, "He will see his plans succeed this time. He has been planning this for decades you know. Once he is rid of my brother, he will begin the first reign of terror…"
James nodded and tried to sort through everything they had been through. But Aberforth's words had the opposite effect on Hermione.
Rousing her from her very un-Slytherinish melt down, she demanded, "What do you mean your brother?" A slight tremor altered her voice, making it childlike instead of the young woman she was becoming.
Aberforth turned only slowly to meet her eye, a soft smile on his grizzled face as he replied, "Dumbledore."
Hermione gasped as memories of her Uncle's countless tales came rushing to the forefront of her thoughts. "Aberforth…how did I not see?"
He pulled a pocket watch from his coat then, a long-chained golden heirloom and met her eye once more with that undeniable knowing. "I am more than pleased to make your acquaintance, Hermione Dumbledore. But I must request you do not tell my brother of my interference, or the duel I just interrupted. In fact, I think it might be in your best interest not to tell him you were even here today."
"Why?" James bluntly and suspiciously asked. Brother of his godfather or not, James was no stranger to Aberforth or his hatred of his elder brother.
Without turning away from Hermione, he answered, "Because I have my own reasons to look after you two that have nothing to do with him. And because the two of you killed at least two Death Eaters in self defense today. Do not fool yourselves into thinking that defying the Dark Lord will go unnoticed. Pray your Slytherin friends do not learn of these events and hate you for it Hermione. And do not be fools to imagine that even the light wouldn't use you for their own agenda Mr. Potter. Your best defense is your trust in no one but yourselves and those dearest to you."
Turning to the portrait, an even brighter smile lit his face.
Curious, Hermione came to stand beside the much taller Wizard. Her eyes widened to find a young woman had appeared and was currently smiling down from the formerly empty painting.
Aberforth nodded to the figure in the portrait. "Very well, if you are certain it is safe…"
James shuffled over to them, but neither turned to aid him and his pride wouldn't have stood for anything less.
Hermione couldn't tear her dark eyes from the pale ones transfixed on hers from above. Slowly, she wrapped her hands around Aberforth's strong arm without hesitation and to his surprise. With hardly a whisper, she asked, "Aberforth…who is that?" And when he didn't answer her, she glanced up to find his eyes wet with unshed tears and gleaming down at their joined limbs.
"This is my sister, Ariana…" he rasped.
Hermione glanced up at the Witch in the painting and watched her walk away. Without her quiet presence the portrait felt sadly empty. "Where did she go?" she asked.
James came to her other side and placed his hand on her arm as he hitched to rest his weight on his better leg.
Aberforth's words drew her gaze. "She found a safe way for you to enter the castle. It will take you into the Room of Hidden Things. From there you shall find your way to your dorms. Do not pause in the hospital wing or talk to anyone, for that matter. Should they ask, you went on a walk about the lake and came back early."
James nodded. "Better hurry, then. The boys will be waiting for us there I just know it." He tipped his fingers to his head in salute. "Thanks for everything, mate. You saved our lives tonight. Won't be forgetting this, long as we live, Marauder's honor," he said with a grin and promptly climbed into the portrait.
Hermione was aided by Aberforth's waiting arm, but he squeezed back in a silent signal before she could follow. Whirring back around to face him, she found tears disappearing into his beard, brokenness and happiness in his eyes.
"Hermione…" he began, "promise you will visit me every trip you make to Hogsmeade from now on?"
She smiled at him, one of her rare, brilliant, all encompassing grins that turned her into a genuine beauty, though she didn't know it. Without a second thought she threw her arms round his neck and whispered into his ear. "I promise."
Aberforth's portrait led them into the Room of Requirement, a place not even James or the Marauders had discovered until this night. The joy of the discovery, "something that shall change everything," he declared, with that special gleam in his eye, was dampened by their weariness. They couldn't shake the weight of so much coming together and falling apart in a span of twenty-four hours.
In twenty-four hours, Hermione mused, they had given in to their feelings, saved their classmates, killed Death Eaters, faced down the Dark Lord and been rescued by Albus's estranged brother. After that, finding the Room of Requirement seemed insignificant.
Hogwarts was cold, eerily silent and mysteriously empty when they entered the fourth floor corridors. Hand in hand they passed to the Head Dorms, recently dubbed Marauders's Headquarters and entered to the shouts of one very frantic Werewolf.
"Oh thank Merlin!" Remus exclaimed, snatching James from Hermione and hugging him so fiercely, his feet scaled the air. "You damn bastard! Didn't give us so much as a word! It was hell down there! Dumbledore's been in fits ever since and nearly a fourth of the school is in the hospital ward."
James's laugh was weak, his smile an effort, yet he clamped his tall friend's bent shoulder. "Moony, you should have known better than to think we'd get tangled up in that mess! You forget I had the Princess of Slytherin Self-Preservation with me," he added with a wink.
Neither of them saw the immediate suspicion in the Marauder's amber-gray eyes. And James did his best to evasively answer all the rest of Moony's direct questions.
Hermione barely heard or saw anything other than the wild silvery eyes of the slighter darker Marauder, currently burning into her. Hermione had been unable to tear her eyes from Sirius from the moment they entered headquarters. It was impossible to do anything else after he set his hands on her shoulders and set his eyes to roving over her frame to make sure she was in perfect condition.
Pete had long ago passed out on one of the red plush couches in front of the dying fire. Sirius Black had not rushed them like he had first intended. Only seconds before their arrival, he had been ready to give in and tell Dumbledore, damn all the promises he made on Marauder's honor and whatever shit they had spouted about blood brothers. He wasn't going to let honor stand in the way of his best friends's lives.
"Sirius, I'm fine," she whispered softly, unaware how young and fragile she sounded now.
His silver eyes glazed over as they returned to hers, his mouth set in a grim line. Without speaking, he crushed Hermione into him, caved her within him. And into the shell of her ear, just because he didn't want Moony to hear, he hissed, "Don't you ever disappear on me like that again, Hermione. I can't stand to lose either of you."
Shivering from exhaustion and the ripple of emotion echoing the brush of his lips against her ear, his surprising warmth gave Hermione a different kind of pleasure.
"Easy there mate. Keep your paws at a respectful distance from my girlfriend's arse." James continued to try and placate his friends, mainly to avoid Remus' damned sixth sense.
Sirius' large hand at the small of her back was enough to shake Hermione from whatever spell he had cast over her. Blinking numbly, with frown creasing between her brows, she allowed James to pull her away.
Sirius turned before she could read his strange expression better.
"Don't think you're getting away so easily!" Padfoot's usual bravado had returned as he embraced the mate who was closer to him than a brother would ever be.
While James laughed and called his best mate a string of names, Remus smiled softly over to Hermione. Their eyes met and whatever mysteries Remus had been seeking that James denied, Hermione nonverbally offered to him.
"Glad to find you both alive and well Miss Dumbledore," he said while wrapping his arm around her shoulders and sliding round to give his two trouble inviting best mates their own reunion. In spite of the ease of his tone and embrace, Hermione saw the worry and trepidation in his amber eyes. She knew that Remus, for some unexplained reason, saw through their lies easily. For his own reasons, however, he was going to keep quiet. Perhaps so as not to upset Sirius any further.
Oddly enough, James tossed out jokes that fell flat because Sirius never turned to meet his eye and only muttered low to himself. So James Potter took to twiddling his thumbs and readjusting his glasses on the bridge of his nose. His fingers itched to snatch his Witch away and no one but Wormtail missed this.
"Me too, Remus." Hermione finally replied with a smile, only to be tugged almost instantly away by James.
The Marauders were helpless to watch the pair flee to James's room, unable to do anything but accept their quickly mumbled excuses.
"It's been too long of a day to talk about it now mates. I'll hear enough tomorrow when my duties come back to bite me in my hooky playing arse, yeah? I solemnly swear you can torture the answers out of Mione instead."
"Wha-?" Her protest was drowned when the door snapped shut securely behind them. And the moment they were inside James' many wards, she jerked from his grasp. Setting hands on her hips, she shouted, "Just what was all that about, James Potter?"
Only pausing to send her a frustrated frown, James took not time in shedding his robe and throwing his filthy shirt aside.
Hermione was painfully and instantly reminded of the source of his most recent bullshit.
Discolored whelps spotted his back and chest, bold beneath a layer of dried blood. James groaned as he flung his bloodied shirt aside and held himself up by the post of his bed. "Shit, that hurts…"
"James!" Hermione let her cloak drop instantly and ignored the tattered state of her silver dress as she rushed to meet him. Delicately she ran her fingers over his mottled skin and flinched at his hiss. "Oh darling…I thought Aberforth healed you? So this is why Remus was giving us those looks…" Her frown deepened when he twisted his head and revealed his senseless grin. "Are you seriously laughing at this?"
"You called me darling…I think we're making definite progress."
Hermione rolled her eyes and sighed. "Lie down so I can get a better look at these…I'm no mediwitch but maybe…sweet Salazar, what?!"
James was shaking with repressed laughter, fighting his pain and humor all at once. "This just keeps getting better and better that's all. Mione, I'll gladly lie down for you. You want top or bottom first, love? Though must admit, I won't have the stamina I normally would. You'll have to be on top, I'm afraid."
Shaking her wand at him in place of a slap of her fingers, she rushed him. "James Potter!"
Laughing weakly, he darted aside to escape and fell back on the bed.
Hermione crawled up on the mattress after him, until she straddled his waist.
"I give up! Oh good Godric, please let my sweetest fantasy come true!" James prayed, pressing his palms together dramatically eyes shining in spite of everything they had just been through.
Hermione couldn't help but laugh. "You git!" When he only grinned cheekily and set his hands on her hips, she slapped them away with a sniff.
"I think," she began, "after the date we just had we should abstain from all physical privileges until you've earned it."
It was everything she could do to keep from smiling and his knowing crooked grin wasn't making things easier. Because he put his hands right back where they had been and both realized exactly what position they were in.
Clearing her throat, Hermione gripped her wand and hesitated the moment she felt the stain of darkness surrounding it. A wand never forgets the curses it has cast, or the intent of its owner's magic. After quickly casting a cleansing charm to rid the blood from his skin, she paused.
Biting her lip, she set the ancient wood to the side and eyes flickering to his once more, she placed her hands on the bare, hard planes of his chest. Despite his bruising, no one could deny James Potter was breathtakingly beautiful as he was rough in feature.
As she had before, Hermione couldn't help but compare him to Sirius' aristocratic beauty. Unlike James, something about Sirius's personality was unhinged, as if his whole life was tied together with a few threads. It wouldn't take much for those strings to snap…
''I can't stand to lose either of you."
Hermione ignored the moment that had passed between them in the head common room and focused on the wizard who saved her life instead. Catching her lower lip between her teeth, she didn't realize how her every touch, her every look was driving the boy beneath her, mad.
His grip on her hips increased and he couldn't help but to press into her just a hair closer. The friction felt so good compared to their shatty day.
Hermione shut her eyes to concentrate on the chaotic flow of her magic. Once more, the ancient weaves had pieced the curse round her mind and her natural magic together again, only stronger this time, the binding closer to completion. She felt for the abrasions in his flesh, saw the fresh mends of Aberforth's white magic and just how damaged James had truly been. The knowledge struck her, once again, deep and at her darkest hidden fears.
How easily could I lose him forever?
Determined not to fail, Hermione poured her injuries in laying over, mending, smoothing over, healing and gasped when James's hands on her cheeks woke her.
"Hermione?" Concern threaded his husky voice.
Blinking past the temporary blur, Hermione looked down and found his chest perfect once again, though she was unable to do anything about the scars dark magic had permanently rendered. These she immediately traced with her fingers, felt the aftermath of her own magic tingle and caress her before it too faded.
Tears blurred her vision and rather than try to wipe them away as she half expected he would, James let them fall. Instead of stifling her sobs, he pulled her over his chest.
And as she sobbed, he didn't hold the tears back that leaked from the corners of his eyes. He was strength when she needed it most, silently as only they could know to comfort one another.
Afterwards, just on the cusp of dreamless sleep, they discussed how to throw the dark off their scent.
Hermione decided it imperative for her to put on a fresh mask for Slytherin, worried more than ever they would search into her past too deeply and would know she fought against their friends, family. She had killed two Death Eaters this night. For all she knew, their children could be her own house mates.
James was silent throughout. The first Gala event was weeks away, but eyes would be drawn to them now more than ever. No one could know what they had done in Hogsmeade today. Knowing the students they rescued, it would be a miracle if they didn't already have several versions of the truth floating around the castle.
"I have to be the Pureblood bitch, more than ever now," she insisted. "We can't openly date, James. With You-Know-Who out for us…we can't tell Sirius or the boys."
"Why not Padfoot at least, Mione, if they're going to help us…"
"Dragging them into a deeper war with Slytherin isn't want we want, James. If the time comes when we have no other choice, we can tell them the truth. But no one can ever know we killed those men tonight or who we saw…and nothing about Aberforth. Somehow I must agree with him. I don't think Uncle would be keen on knowing we've met."
Defeated and utterly hopeless silence followed her declaration.
"James? What do you think? This really is for the best don't you see?"
"Yeah…I see love."