Hi everyone! I apologize in advance for the longer A/N, but I feel it's quite necessary at this point.
I know I've been quite sporadic and MIA with updates of late. I've been going through some stressful times in my personal life, and writing has had to take a bit of a backburner at times. It's been a while since I mentioned it, but I'm also having ongoing issues with one of my hands, which makes it quite difficult to write at times. I've also just dedicated a lot of time over the past year to writing, and I've been feeling a little burned out and in need of a little regrouping. In a year, I posted 50 chapters of A Contract Most Inconvenient and 21 chapters of Entanglement. It might not be a lot to some, but it's quite a bit to me in retrospect.
Because of this, I'm going to continue to be sporadic for the foreseeable future. Writing is something I have always and will always adore, but I also need a bit of time for self-care — not just for my hand, but just to regroup and get myself back into a headspace where I update more frequently again. This of course doesn't mean that I'll be disappearing, but just that I'll continue to be sporadic in hopes that I can write ahead more make a decent chapter buildup which will be quite a help in the long run. Thank you all so much for following and bearing with me.
I'm hoping to focus a little more on this fic than ACMI at the moment (we have 10-15 chapters to go at this point I'm estimating), so I sincerely hope that the wait won't be too long. I wanted to give you all an update on where I've been regardless. I also won't be disappearing at all - I'm always around on discord and I try to answer asks, etc. in as timely of a manner as I'm able. Thank you all for following and reading my fic — I can't tell you how much it means to me. xx
I have so much love for my beta, RESimon. Thank you for everything you do. A second thank you goes out to shestoolazytologin for being such a lovely alpha. You guys are an amazing team to work with.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Harry's eyes burned as he glared into hers. His eyes were still shockingly emerald even in the darkness, and Hermione's heart stuttered at the familiarity. The cold fury in his eyes a perfect picture of every nightmare she'd had about this very encounter for months, yet now that the moment was here the pain of seeing him was magnified tenfold.
He removed his hand from her mouth and stepped back, his features twisted with disgust asthe space between them grew wider.
"H—Harry." Her voice was little more than a whisper that nearly dissipated completely over the lump that had lodged itself in her throat.
"Don't." She hadn't realized that she'd been reaching toward him until the venom in his voice stopped her mid-movement.
It was only one word, but it pierced like a knife all the same. Gone was the familiarity, the vulnerability that she had grown so used to, that she had dreamt about one day receiving again. His face was still as readable as ever, and what she saw there had her pressing a hand to her chest in a vain attempt to alleviate the pain that blossomed within her at what she could read plainly on his face.
It felt like looking into a mirror. Before her stood someone who'd been slowly broken over time, the splintered fragments of what they'd once been marred by the burdens that they carried. In his eyes, she recognized the same haunted look that she saw when she chanced a glance into the mirror, spied the same distrustful tension that vibrated through his body as though he were coiled to strike. He was haunted by terrors of the past, any optimism for the future eroded by the bleakness of each day that passed.
"I've thought of so many ways," he spat out a short, humorless laugh, "so many excuses for why you did what you did to me. I'd lie awake at night, wondering why you would spend all of that time planning with us, knowing how much we needed you, relied on you. I thought that you would never have chosen to disappear on some secret mission unless it was a matter of life or death. But then I remembered that Horcruxes—- everything we've been striving to rid ourselves of this war — was literal life or death."
Hermione's heart spasmed. "Harry—"
"— I waited for an explanation, an apology, anything. But when I got it, I realized how much worse your apologies with no explanation were than if you'd just bothered to show yourself—"
"Please," Her hand twitched toward him and she forced it to stay at her side. "Let me explain—"
"And then I realized that the only thing that would make me understand would be if you were dead."
His words were as jarring as a strike.
He moved closer until he was but a breath away. "Yet, when I heard your voice, the first thing I felt was relief. Relief that you'd come back, that you would be able to say something, anything that could explain away why you did what you have done to me. "
Hermione's heart stopped and restarted at a race as she realized the implication of his words.
"And instead— " he slammed a fist against the wall beside her head, "instead I find out that the only reason you came back was for a pregnancy detection spell." He fell silent then, yet the tension that vibrated his body practically screamed.
Hermione opened and closed her mouth several times, knowing that she was expected to say something, anything, and instead came up with nothing, nothing at all—
"Was it worth it?" Harry's voice was low and tinged with venom, "spreading your legs for some bloke while we waited for you?"
"Harry—"
"Don't." His nostrils flared. "Don't speak my name as if — as if words will ever be enough to explain why you abandoned me. Why you promised me time and time again that we would do this together, then left anyway. Don't—"
"Harry."
The low, rumbling voice made them both freeze. She turned her head to see a tall, broad figure standing in the shadows a dozen feet away, blocking most of what little light there was at the end of the hall. Even though his features were barely visible in the shadows, it was unmistakably Kingsley.
Harry tensed before stepping back. "Yes?" His voice was gruff.
"I need to speak with Miss Granger for a moment if you don't mind."
For a moment, it looked as though Harry would resist. He stiffened before he turned and left, not sparing Hermione a second glance. He shouldered past Kingsley without a word and disappeared down the hall.
A tense silence fell in his wake.
"Come," Kingsley said. He didn't wait for an answer, and simply turned and moved off.
For a brief second Hermione debated turning and leaving through the door she'd been heading toward anyway. Her feet carried her behind Kingsley before she could make a decision. It was silent save for the creak of the steps under their feet as she followed him through an open door that lead to a cellar. He stopped when they reached a wide room. It was sparsely furnished with a long table and a few stray chairs. The walls were plastered with maps, notes, and large, blank pages that had likely been charmed for secrecy. The table was similarly filled with maps and parchment.
In one of the seats sat Alastor Moody. His glass eye was affixed upon her as she came to a stop, hovering uncertainly before the table. Kingsley had already stopped and turned, his mouth thinned into a hard line. He was stiff, and his arms were crossed over his broad chest.
"Why have you come here, Mrs. Malfoy?"
Hermione rubbed her forearm. "I...it was an emergency."
"An emergency," he said flatly.
"Yes."
"Do you understand," Moody's voice was a low, dark rasp, "the nature of your mission?"
Hermione met his probing look and swallowed. "Yes."
"Remind us."
Hermione's fist clenched. "To—"
"Stay hidden," Kingsley said. "The most integral part was for you to stay hidden. Do you understand the importance of an ally like Narcissa Malfoy? The wrath of an ally like Narcissa Malfoy?"
She stiffened. "Yes."
"Then why is it that you've come here to take care of your little—" Moody's eye flicked to her stomach then back to her face, "emergency?"
But of course. No one entered an Order safehouse undetected. She'd been a fool for even entertaining the idea that the two men standing before her didn't monitor every portkey, every arrival. By the continued quiet beyond the door she could at least take comfort in the fact that Harry hadn't woken everyone else in the house.
"I had no other option," she said through gritted teeth.
"Options are not something we have been given much liberty with throughout this war, Mrs. Malfoy."
A lick of anger rose in her chest. "What is it that you're implying, Kingsley?"
"Need we remind you of what your duties are?" Moody interjected.
"Duties." Her hands curled into fists. "Duties. That's all you care about, all you see us as — vehicles you can use to fulfill your bloody duties. Tell me," she said, stalking closer to Moody, "does Narcissa know of the duties you've imposed upon us? Upon the son you swore you would protect?"
"Do you think you're the only one who's made sacrifices, Mrs. Malfoy?" Kingsley said.
Hermione's lip curled. "Don't you dare talk to me about sacrifices, as if I don't understand what war is! What it's done to me, what it's done to him, what's it's done to everyone I love — and what's it's done to you," she added, her voice dripping with bitterness. "It's turned you into a thing that's so cold, so detached, that neither of you gives a damn about who you're sacrificing to meet your ends."
"You think like a child," Moody said tonelessly.
"And you think like a cold-hearted bastard."
Moody only gave her a slow look, his mechanical eye whirring as he appraised her. "You've grown more lethal," he said, tapping a finger in a slow rhythm on the tabletop. "No more bodies clogging the hall of St. Mungo's. Instead, you leave carnage behind everywhere you go. Missing tongues, missing limbs, curses that leave them begging for death. How much longer will it be, I wonder, before—"
"Stop." Her voice was a pained growl, the scream she wanted to lash out at him held back by the truth hung between them. "I am not— not your—" Assassin, creature to be used and molded to your will, she wanted to say. But could she? Could she truly say so, when the evidence of the truth lay in the hordes of Death Eaters she'd brought to the brink of death? To the whispers of spells she'd wished she'd never learned that lingered in her wand?
But—
No. There was no denying, just as there was no turning back the clock on what she'd done and who she'd become. The constant reminder of it had manifested itself in her like a jagged piece of glass in her foot, burrowing deeper with each step she took closer to the point of no return.
She whipped her head to glare at Kingsley. "Damn you. Damn you both, and to hell with your duties."
She stalked back up the stairs, no longer caring of the noise she made. She found her way back to the door she'd been headed toward before it had all gone to hell, out into the bitter cold that somehow felt warmer than what lay in the house behind her, back into the dark cover of the trees, back to hiding as she'd been bidden to do.
X
She landed in the bedroom. She felt as much as heard him approach, his stress an almost tangible presence that crept softly across the room as if to consume her. He stopped in front of her, and she watched as one of his hands twitched toward her before retreating stiffly to his side.
"Are you…" he faltered. "Are you alright?"
She nodded with a quick, jerky movement. "I'm not pregnant."
A silence passed before he spoke again. "And?"
"And what?" This time, she held her chin high and met his eyes.
"Something clearly happened, Granger."
Her ensuing laugh had a sharp edge. "That matters to you now?"
His lips flattened. "Yes."
"Why?"
His jaw clenched. "Because we have no room for mistakes—"
"I know that!" Heat flushed through her body. "I know that. I know that nothing— nothing is about me anymore, nothing has been about me in a long, long time—"
"Granger—"
"I look in the mirror, and I don't even know who or what I am becoming—" Her lip started to tremble. "I've been stuck for so long now. Stuck fighting a war because of the family I was born into. Stuck with the Order who sees me as nothing but a pawn—" her nostrils flared as she spoke her next words with a bitter edge, "stuck here with you, somehow holding the title of wife while you treat me as nothing more than a hole to fuck — on a good day."
The tension in the room snapped like a rubber band pulled too taut.
"What the fuck do you want from me?" he glared down at her.
"I don't want anything from you." Some part deep inside of her balked at how rash she was being, but she could not stop the words from coming.
"Really now?" He stepped closer toward her. "Because it damn well doesn't seem that way. What exactly is it that you want, Granger? An apology? A long winded speech about my affections—"
"Damn you!" Her chest grew tight. "Damn you for being so—so—"
"So what?" His lips twisted into a sneer. "Prepared to accept the costs of this war instead of sitting about whining about every person that's wronged me?"
"You do not get to say things like that, you don't know what I've gone through— "
"Good. Because I don't give a damn."
"Have you ever given a damn—"
He moved closer until he loomed over her. "I've never forgotten what I give a damn about. And I haven't forgotten what you give a damn about, either. Do you think I don't know that you would run back off to Potter and company once you got even the slightest whiff of forgiveness?"
"You don't know a thing about me—"
He scoffed. "Because being stuck here with you has given me more insight into your petty afflictions than I would have ever liked."
She opened her mouth to curse at him, to say something as nasty as what stirred in her heart was, but instead all she managed was: "A part of me wanted it."
He watched her in stormy silence, his eyes still narrowed at her.
Her heart constricted as she faced the truth she'd tried to bury, the words pouring out now that it had burst forth. "A part of me wanted it," she repeated, her voice breaking. "A part of me wanted to be pregnant. I wanted— I wanted a way out. I wanted to disappear, and focus on our baby, put all of my energy into something good instead of—" she waved a hand aimlessly. "This."
She was met with silence again, but this time it was more resigned, the thick tension that had permeated the air until it was nearly suffocating almost completely dissipated. "I wanted it, and I hate myself for it," she said, her voice dropping an octave.
"Granger—"
"Why do you still call me that?" she held his gaze carefully, searching for even a flicker of what lay beneath his practiced aloofness. "We've been married nearly a year," she shook her head.
All at once she felt weary, so weary, that she sunk down onto the bed and buried her head in her hands. She heard the sound of his footsteps, and when she looked up he was almost to the door.
"Draco."
His shoulders tensed as he paused. "I don't know what you want from me."
"I...I want you to stay." Her voice was small around the words she'd been feeling too fearful to speak. She waited for him to retreat anyway, watching as the tension didn't dissipate from his stance.
And then he turned. He moved toward the bed slowly, his eyes never leaving hers as he drew closer. She shifted until she was curled under the sheets and left them peeled back at his spot. She undressed under the covers until she was in her underwear, and watched as he stripped to his pants as he approached the bed. She hadn't realized it until then, but she wasn't certain that she could ever go back to sleeping alone again. She shoved down the thought and the fear it brought deep, instead focusing on the man that was somehow the source of her comfort and isolation all at once.
He settled into the bed, lying stiff as she extinguished all the light in the room with a flick of her wrist. Then she let her hand slide slowly across the sheets until she could curl it around his chest. He tensed, but did not reject her, and she curled closer still, taking all that he would give her. His touch was light but there as he curled his own arm around her and let it rest on the skin of her side.
It was only when she was pressed into as much of him as she could that she finally fell into a dreamless sleep.
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