Breath Mints / Battle Scars
XXXVI
February 2nd, 1999
It's two in the morning.
She's been sitting in McGonagall's office for more than four hours, sipping long-cold tea from a cup that clinks whenever her shaking hands put it back on the saucer.
She'd been honest with Draco and Theo about the possibility of this — about the viability of what was claimed in the Prophet. Logical Hermione had been forthright that it could be done.
But she's come to realize that logical Hermione and the rest of herself are disjointed. Out of step. Separate.
And the rest of herself never saw this coming.
"What can I do?" she asks for the hundredth time, voice a dull croak.
McGonagall sits tiredly in Dumbledore's old chair, still pouring over the countless indictments she'd been handed by Dawlish shortly before he incarcerated a good fourth of her student body. "You can get some rest," McGonagall says, voice somehow both stern and compassionate — an undertone of exhaustion.
"I can't—"
"Miss Granger…"
"I just stood there, Headmaster." Hermione sets down her teacup on the edge of the desk. Wrings her hands. "I just stood there. I watched. I can't—"
"I know how much you care for Mr. Malfoy—"
"All of them," she deadpans, unable to control it. Admitting it both out loud and to herself for the first time. "I care about all of them."
McGonagall quirks a sage brow.
"I need to know what I can do."
"As I said, Miss Granger, you can get some much-needed rest—"
"Headmaster—"
"Much-needed," McGonagall interrupts, raising her voice as she stands, "so that you will have your wits about you when we go to the Ministry tomorrow."
Hermione blinks. Blinks twice.
"We?"
"Yes," she says curtly, vanishing both their teacups — a clear indication of dismissal. "As their Headmaster, I cannot function as a character witness. You, on the other hand…"
"Yes," she blurts immediately. "Yes, absolutely. I'll do it."
"Think carefully on it, Miss Granger. Think on the consequences and the cost before you fully commit yourself."
"I know—"
"It will be exhausting. Painful. Alienating. A media circus, if you will — and your own character will be called into question—"
"Headmaster, I want to do it."
McGonagall clutches her shoulder gently. "Think on it," she says. "I insist. And meet me here at nine o'clock, if you're truly up to it."
Hermione bites back on anything further she planned to say. Makes herself nod. Makes herself stand. Her legs are numb from so many hours in the chair, and a steady ache has built up at the base of her skull.
"Thank you, Headmaster," she murmurs, heading for the door. "I'll see you in the morning."
"Think on it."
The dormitory is quiet but Ginny is awake. Of course she is.
"What are you doing?" she asks through the parted, crimson curtains of her four-poster, watching as Hermione lays out her nicest blazer. Her nicest skirt.
"I'm going to the Ministry in a few hours," she says quietly. At least she can tell Ginny the truth.
"'Mione, there's nothing you can—"
"You don't know that."
Ginny sighs. Sweeps the curtains aside and comes to sit on the corner of Hermione's bed. Hermione is brushing nonexistent lint from the pencil skirt, pointedly avoiding her eyes.
"I thought you made a decision," says Ginny.
Hermione swallows thickly. Unfolds and refolds the skirt.
"I thought you decided you were done. No more. For your own sake—"
"He said he loved me."
It comes out in a rush. A breathless, almost incoherent whisper. It's the first time she's allowed herself to acknowledge it, and hearing it from her own mouth is like a weight dropping into her stomach.
Ginny goes very still. Hermione sees her mouth open and close once or twice from her periphery, but can't bear to look at her head on.
"…When?" she finally manages to ask.
Hermione clears her throat. Starts refolding the blazer instead. "A few hours ago."
Ginny glances down at her hands. Up at the ceiling. Sighs.
"Git," she says after a moment, and Hermione's eyes lock on her at last. Ginny shrugs. "I mean…it just — that just complicates everything."
Hermione nods numbly. Feels a small pulse of satisfaction at hearing her own thoughts validated.
"And his timing is rubbish."
She manages a weak smile.
Ginny seems to hesitate before asking what she does next. "Does this mean you've forgiven him?"
Hermione glances away. Catches a glimpse of the broken pendant, sitting lonesome on her nightstand. "No…" she murmurs. "No, I don't forgive him." She swallows another knot in her throat. "I don't think I'll ever truly forgive him. For any of it."
"…But you love him."
She forces herself to meet Ginny's eyes, even as her words stab, gouge, flay something deep inside.
"I don't know what I feel."
Ginny's gaze is sober. "I think you do."
Hermione shakes her head. "Stop it, Gin."
"It's the tru—"
"Stop."
Ginny's lips snap shut. She gives her a tucked, doubtful not-quite smile. "Okay," she says, and she slips off the edge of the bed. Heads back to her own.
Hermione puffs out the breath she didn't know she was holding.
"Family name?"
Hermione tugs nervously on the hem of her blazer, standing slightly behind McGonagall as she produces a list and retrieves her spectacles — clears her throat.
"Accrington, Bainbridge, Berrow, Bulstrode, Carter, Cowley, Cram, Davis, Dedworth, Evercreech, Goyle, Greengrass — both of them — Lofthouse, Malfoy, Meads, Montague, Nott, Parkinson, Phipps, Pucey, Rowland, Sykes, Thatcham, Whitehead and Zabini."
About halfway through the list, Hermione starts to panic. There are more than she realized — and some of the names she doesn't even recognize.
How does she defend someone she doesn't know?
Think on it, McGonagall had said…
The flustered clerk is struggling to take down all the names, and McGonagall seems to be making a point of reading them as swiftly as possible, perhaps to solidify the ridiculousness of the situation.
"And what is it you'll be needing?" he barks, aggravated, shaking out his quill hand once he's finished.
"Hearing dates, full lists of charges, and we will require visitor badges as well."
The clerk squints at her. "Visitor badges to see which?"
"All," McGonagall says primly.
His lip curls up in irritation. "I'm fairly certain that won't be—"
"Give the Minister my name," she snaps. "He will authorize it, I assure you."
That's possibly the only thing working in their favor. Kingsley as Minister. Still, there isn't much he can do to override a Wizengamot decision — nothing, in fact. These trials will determine everything.
She doesn't realize she's biting at her nails until a cuticle tears and bleeds. She has to force herself to fold her hands behind her back.
The clerk leads them grudgingly through the atrium, handing them visitor badges, and they pack into an already crowded elevator.
But she isn't prepared for —
"Miss Granger?"
"It is — it's her!"
"Hermione Granger, bless my soul — it's an honor."
From all sides, witches and wizards extend their arms to shake her hand, even as McGonagall does what little she can to ward them off.
By the time they step out, she's dazed and shaken up, glancing back over her shoulder and staring, incredulous, as the elevator zooms backward and down.
"I didn't realize…" she mumbles, but McGonagall is already leading her away.
"Try to relax."
They're on one of the lowest floors of the Ministry — the temporary holding cells; a large, ward-guarded amalgamation of cells with capacity enough to contain all those awaiting a trial.
It's dark and cold — and it reminds her too much of the Department of Mysteries. The black tile floor, the dim glow. She shivers and earns a concerned glance from McGonagall.
"Here we are," grunts the clerk, unlocking a door that leads to a long, multi-celled corridor.
"Which cells?" asks McGonagall.
"I'm certain you'll figure it out."
He and McGonagall exchange glares as he locks the door behind them, and then — for a long moment — it's silence.
McGonagall squares her shoulders. "I think it's best I let each of them know our intentio—"
Hermione has already started off down the hallway. Hears McGonagall sigh. "Miss Accrington?" she calls out and begins her work, but Hermione is already so far down the corridor she barely hears.
She casts Lumos, repeatedly swaying her wand from side to side and occasionally catching sight of a squinting, familiar face — but not the familiar face. Not the one she needs to see.
Her pulse is gaining speed, her breaths coming in short, nervous puffs, and the light of her wand is fractured by the trembling of her hand. She hadn't realized until now how desperately she needs to —
"Granger?"
It's Zabini.
She cuts her brisk pace short so suddenly she almost trips, rushing to the bars his arms are dangling lazily through.
"Are you alright?" she blurts instinctively, dimming the light when he grimaces into it.
He quirks an eyebrow. "As good as can be expected." Then he gestures limply at her. "The fuck are you doing here? And with…is that McGonagall I heard?" He nods toward the far end of the hall she's come from.
"I — yes, she's…we're here to…well—"
"Help?" And his tone is so disbelieving — so sarcastic, it's almost tragic.
"Yes," she says, watching his face screw up in confusion.
"McGonagall, I get — but you…" He hesitates, and then a moment later his expression wipes clean. "Oh. Right. You're here for Malfoy."
She shakes her head. "I'm here for all of you."
"Don't have to lie to spare my feelings, Granger, trust me—"
"I'm not lying," she snaps, suddenly exasperated. Overwhelmed. "I'm here for all of you. As a character witness."
Zabini stares at her a long while, expressionless. McGonagall's distant voice calling out names fills the silence.
"Why?" he asks after what feels like more than a full minute.
She adjusts her grip on her wand. "Because," she answers feebly.
"Because why?"
"Because."
And then she lowers her wand, and he's bathed in shadow once more.
"Sit tight," she says, and then she's back to her search. Back to pacing a furious, nervous path down the corridor, wand whipping left and right.
She wants to call out to him — but she's terrified her voice might crack. Terrified to show him just how deeply unsettled and unhinged she is by all of this.
She needs to keep up a front. To stay strong.
For all their sakes, and for her own.
She passes cells of prisoners from elsewhere — older witches and wizards who look as though they've been there a long while. Passes what she thinks might be a body. Many of the cells are filled with more than one, due to overcrowding.
Her wand hesitates on a pair huddled in the back corner, and it takes her a second to realize that it's Pansy.
Pansy with…
It's Theo. His head is in her lap — unconscious, or so it seems from the bleeding gash at his temple. And she's just…she's stroking his hair. Murmuring to him.
Doesn't even seem to register Hermione's presence.
It's almost hard to look away.
But she forces herself to move on.
Before long, it seems as though there are hardly any cells left — and she starts to panic. Picks up her pace, so accustomed to finding each cell empty or filled with someone else that when at last her Lumos ricochets off of blinding platinum, she almost walks right past it.
Skids. Freezes.
"Draco…?"
His head whips up from where he's seated against the wall, and he stares at her through a black eye.
"Granger — " Seeing him jump to his feet in the blink of an eye almost shatters her resolve. "Merlin, what are you doing? Is it even safe for you to be here?"
His hands — knuckles bruised — curl around the bars and she finds herself instinctively meeting him in the middle, wrapping her own hands around them beneath his.
"Who did that to you?" she breathes, lifting one finger to point to his eye.
"Fucking Dawlish — does it fucking matter? Answer my question, Granger."
"What question?"
"Is it safe for you to be here?"
Her chest throbs painfully because she thinks it might actually be worry in his eyes, and that isn't — that can't —
God.
"It's safe," she murmurs. "I'm here on your behalf."
Draco shakes his head instantly. "Don't. I already know what you're thinking, and don't do it. Don't."
Her brows knit together. "What do you mean, don't?"
"I mean don't, Granger — Merlin's fucking tit. Don't be stupid."
If there was any reaction she'd been expecting, it wasn't this. "I'm your only option for a fair trial—"
"It won't be a fair trial. With or without you. No matter what." His voice is harsh — tense. A rush of words that don't make sense. "I'm warning you, Granger, don't fuck with these people. Don't get on their bad side—"
"What are you talking about?" she demands. "Who? The CFJ? They're just a—"
"They aren't just anything, Granger."
"What are you—"
"Marcus Flint is dead." His voice echoes off the walls. Echoes into the ensuing silence.
Her fingers flex — clammy with sweat — against the bars.
"What?" she breathes.
"He's dead. He was exonerated, and the next day he was dead. Suicide. Sound likely?"
"What are you—"
"His solicitor is dead, too."
"Stop…"
"Dead. Catastrophic Floo accident. Again — sound likely?"
"Stop it, Draco — how do you even—"
"My solicitor came by early this morning. Told me he was dropping out. Had to. Fears for his life. I'm warning you right now, Granger. Anyone who gets involved ends up dead."
"How can that—"
"It doesn't matter!" His sudden shout — the way he yanks on the bars — makes her stumble back a step. "It doesn't fucking matter. You have to leave. Get whoever came with you and fucking leave. Now."
"I'm not going—"
His hand lashes out from between the bars and snatches her arm in a vise. "Hermione, I'm fucking begging you." His unswollen eye is glassy in the partial light of her wand. Bloodshot. Crazed. "I'm begging you. Please." He squeezes her arm, and for the briefest of seconds, his thumb swipes across her skin — a caress. "Please. Go."
Her breath hitches.
"Go."