A/N: Hi friends! I'm sorry this is a bit later than normal tonight. Due to some content issues, I had to revise a large chunk of this. Turns out my writing style has changed a lot since I started drafting this in 2016 lol! A million thanks to my stellar beta, tofadeawayagain, for stepping in tonight to help me work out a scene that was troubling me and LadyKenz347 for also pointing it out. Seriously, on top of those of you who continue to read and enjoy this story and the lovely authors I get to work with, I truly can't believe how lucky I am sometimes. Y'all mean the world to me, so thank you for your thoughts and time.
Chapter 35 - Reversed Two of Swords
Her ears were ringing, a horribly disorienting pulse that distracted her from the chaos around her for a moment. Slowly, her surroundings came back to her, each piece falling in place as the seconds ticked by.
The ringing faded incrementally, and she stretched her fingers slowly, taking inventory of her body before she lifted her head. Everything felt whole other than the pound of her head, and when she shifted, her knee brushed against the figure in front of her, his arms wrapped protectively around her body.
Draco.
He'd curled in on their embrace, tucking his head into the space between her shoulder and chin. Their breaths mingled together, and she couldn't tell whether the heartbeat that pounded erratically was hers or his.
Slowly, she pulled away, taking care not to jolt him too much. Dirt and mud had sprayed outward from the destroyed horcrux, the grime sticking to her exposed skin where the outward pressure had blown her shirt up.
"Draco?" She moved again, eyeing the tear tracks down his cheeks as he blinked up at her, eyes glassy. "I'm here, Draco."
Echoing the words he'd said to her so many times in the dungeons of his ancestral home seemed to jolt him out of the stupor, and his gaze focused on hers. "Is it gone?" he whispered, voice hoarse and strained.
It crushed her to see him so broken, the emotions shattering the last wall she'd built to distance herself from him. Blindly groping for his hand, Hermione heaved out a stuttering breath. "It's gone. You destroyed it."
His snorted laugh gusted over her, derision colouring his tone when he spoke. "I cowered, Granger. You destroyed it, not me." His eyes shuttered, gaze sliding away from her. "I don't deserve that credit."
"Don't." When he refused to meet her eyes, she reached up, snagging his chin between her fingertips. "Draco Malfoy, you do not get to hide from me." She shifted, directing his gaze over her shoulder. The smouldering remains of the cup glinted from the depths of a crater, and she startled for a moment, heart skipping at the carnage of the magic. Had they been responsible for that? Clearing her throat, she directed her attention back to him. "You did that." At the subtle roll of his eyes, she amended, "Okay, we did that. Are you happy now?"
Inexplicably, his face brightened, a genuine smile lighting the dark shadows that had come to shroud his features. It was strange, though not altogether unwelcome, and she cleared her throat, unable to tear her gaze from his. "What?"
He leaned upright, searching her face as his hand came up, pushing a curl behind her ear. "There you are." Tender hope laced his words, and her stomach swooped in response. "You came back to me." Slowly, he lowered his lips to hers. It was everything the fear driven kiss on the broken porch hadn't been, and this time Hermione allowed herself to fall into it.
Something in her soul settled, and a peace she hadn't known for some time washed over her. Of their own accord, her hands lifted, fisting in the front of his filthy shirt as he turned, cradling her jaw in his hand as though she would shatter if he handled her any less delicately. And then he broke away, her lips chasing his for a moment before he rested his forehead against hers with a deep sigh. "I missed you."
She couldn't rightly say the same-she'd not known there was anything to be missed-but she smiled, lids falling shut in contentment as she whispered the one truth she could offer him: "I'm sorry."
The apology loosened a torrent of emotions, and she pitched forward, wrapping her arms around Draco.
Home. She was home.
Behind them, Theo surreptitiously cleared his throat, and both Draco and Hermione turned. "I wondered if you were ever going to come up for air," Theo snarked, a relieved grin pulling his features upward. Luna approached from behind him, wrapping her arms around his waist as Narcissa lingered behind, inscrutable emotions colouring her eyes. Gently disentangling himself from Luna, he strode forward and offered Hermione a hand. "Glad to have you back, Granger."
A broad grin spread across her face, relief palpable within her as she clasped it and rose. "Glad to be back."
They spent the remainder of the day planning, Narcissa's commanding tone guiding them through the remaining horcruxes as she confirmed their suspicions: locket, diadem, snake. At least two of them were with Voldemort, making Theo and Luna's case even stronger.
They had to return to Hogwarts.
Luna was confident that the Grey Lady would know something about the diadem. As she consulted with the group about where they should look for the ghost once they entered the castle, Hermione fought the nerves that coiled in a tight knot in her chest. She'd never intended to return to Hogwarts.
Not when she'd left for the horcrux hunt with Harry and Ron, not when she'd had Theo plant the false memories in her mind, and certainly not after stunning Ron on the grounds near the macabre display of Dumbledore's preserved body. What had once been so familiar to her only encouraged a sea of trepidation to wash over her.
Her breathing had escalated, harsh exhalations pushing past her lips though she tried desperately to quell them. Black spots danced in the air around her; without thinking, her hand squeezed Draco's in her lap.
I'm here, Granger. Familiar and warm, his voice washed over her, carefully echoing down that connection he'd forged with the casting of the spell.
"What do we do?" She fidgeted with her transfigured cloak sleeve, pulling the thin material down over her knuckles. Without direction and fighting the panic that clawed up her throat, she was adrift in uncertainty.
Luna shrugged, suggesting, "We could split up."
Tension immediately shot through the room, and Hermione rocketed upright. "Absolutely not. Not after we've just found each other again." She'd made that mistake before, and she wasn't eager to make it again. Particularly not given their recent narrow escapes from Death.
But Narcissa nodded, carefully folding her hands on her lap. "It is perhaps the best chance we have." Pursing her lips, the woman considered the crackling fire before continuing. "While not ideal, if something were to happen… at least we wouldn't lose everything in one fell swoop. And while one group of us works on obtaining the horcrux, the other could create a diversion."
There was a bitter truth in her words that Hermione didn't want to acknowledge, couldn't acknowledge as Draco's hand cinched tighter around her own. She canted her head anyway, thinking aloud. "If we split up, we'd need to remain in contact. Patronuses will be too conspicuous." She chewed on her lip for a moment. "We could duplicate the spell on the parchment, but it would take time."
Narcissa shifted uncomfortably, her visage pale, and Hermione felt a knot lodge itself in her throat. Time was a luxury none of them had, least of all Narcissa. But Luna leaned forward, frowning at the parchment. "Why not duplicate the parchment?" Looking up with large, round eyes, Luna offered a tentative smile. "We really only need two copies. One for you two—" Her eyes passed over Draco and Hermione "—and one for us."
Despite the nerves that seemed to wrap around her throat in a vice grip, Hermione nodded, gesturing to Luna to duplicate the parchment.
A flicker of a smile flit across Narcissa's face, and Hermione felt another pawn falling into place as the woman's gaze softened and she turned, taking her son's hands in her own. "My dragon, I've long known what was waiting for me with this war." A faraway longing softened the woman's face further, and Hermione could see the beauty she had been in her youth as she reached out and smoothed a hand over Draco's mussed hair. "But you, dear son… you have a chance to live beyond this, to have a family. To have the love I never had."
A prickling discomfort welled in Hermione's throat at watching the woman say good-bye. And though she longed to move, to get up and allow them some privacy, some part of her knew she needed to be there. If for no other reason than to support Draco and disprove any lingering doubts Narcissa might have—Sight or not. When Draco's fingers curled in on themselves, Hermione's heart constricted, and without thinking, she sent an echo of his own reminder to her through their connection: I'm here, Draco.
His shoulders sagged as some of the tension went out of them. "Mother, I'm— I'm sorry."
Narcissa swallowed thickly, tears sparkling in the matriarch's eyes. "As am I, my dragon. As am I."
Hermione tore her gaze away from them as Draco leaned in, curling into the embrace his mother offered. It was a small modicum of privacy in the small quarters of the cabin, but it was the least she could offer to the woman who saved her life.
As though she'd sensed the shift in Hermione, Luna settled on the floor next to her, propping her chin on Hermione's shoulder as the blonde witch detailed the charms that she'd used to create them.
The spellwork was simple enough. However, replicating the concealment charm correct would have taken Luna far more time than they had, and Hermione found herself grateful that Luna had simply offered to duplicate the parchment. Even now, as she listened to the girl's lilting voice discuss the way the Marauder's Map was charmed and how she'd used those in conjunction with the D.A. charm, Hermione appreciated the cunning needed to weave the complex warding spell.
Perhaps the influence of the Slytherins would be their saving grace in more ways than one.
Positioning herself on the other side of the parchment, Luna summoned her gifted wand and pressed the tip of it to the paper. "It's a rather simple incantation to ensure that the spells accompany the copy; it's the wandwork that the tricky part." She pressed her lips into a thin line, the faintest hint of her tongue poking out the side—a habit Hermione had noticed when they began taking classes together so long ago.
As Luna's wand traced intricate patterns over the parchment, familiar incantations falling melodically from her lips, Hermione watched, transfixed.
It was much like layering protective spells over her campsite with Harry and Ron. Each spell fed into the next, building on one another and offering strengths to mend a prior charm's weaknesses. It was beautiful in its complexity and brilliant in its craft, though she never expected any less of Luna. After several minutes of quiet, concentrated spellcraft, Luna twisted her wand again, a shower of golden sparks arcing from its tip toward the parchment. With a brilliant smile, Luna leaned back, speaking into the silence as another copy of the parchment settled on top of the first. "All done."
A knot worked its way into Hermione's throat, compromising her ability to speak for a moment as they all rose, filing toward the door to the cabin. This might be the last time she saw her friends alive, and the realisation did nothing to calm the dread that had begun to simmer in her core at Narcissa's gifting of the Black grimoire.
Lips thinning into a firm line, Narcissa filled the silence. "Theo, Luna, and I will return to Hogwarts." She grimaced, gaze flickering to the floor before she continued, almost as though she was unable to meet her son's gaze. "Severus owes me a life debt. He'll get us into the castle. What happens after that depends on how well we can make it through the castle undetected."
"I can help with that." With a wave of her hand, Hermione's satchel soared across the room, landing softly on the ground before her. Dipping her hand inside, she caressed the worn fabric of the invisibility cloak where she'd stored it in the bag's depths.
Part of her wanted to keep it — screamed at her to keep it, this last connection to Harry and another third of the Deathly Hallows. Logically, she knew that the cloak was one step forward to her defeat of Voldemort, especially if uniting the Hallows was as monumental as the wizarding world believed it to be.
But a larger part of her, the part that she'd found buried in the memories that she'd forgotten, realised that her friends needed it more than she did. And so she pulled the cloak free, its lengths spilling forth and settling on her legs.
"This is a cloak of invisibility. If I'm not mistaken, it's the cloak of invisibility, one of the three Hallows." Her fingers trailed along the material, marveling at its lack of snags or marring despite its obvious age. "It's how Harry, Ron, and I were able to get around Hogwarts after hours." Hermione didn't miss Luna's obvious flinch at Ron's name, and she wound her fist in the fabric to stop the sharp flash of anger that tore through her. "It's not overly large, but it should be enough for two of you to make it through the castle. Particularly in the dark, lest it doesn't cover your feet entirely."
Extending the cloak, Hermione waited, silence hanging between them. After a moment, Theo reached out, accepting the folded fabric, but it was Luna who spoke. "Hermione, you ought to keep that. One more and you're—"
"The master of Death?" The title felt unwieldy and awkward on her tongue, a crown she'd never wanted. "If I've escaped death thus far, I think I'll manage a little longer."
Hermione didn't miss the flash of satisfaction that crossed Narcissa's face, followed closely by a grimace, but the woman cleared her throat delicately as she schooled her features, drawing attention back to her. "I will request a meeting with Severus. He will allow me to enter through his Floo if he knows what is good for him, and I will hold it open long enough to allow Theo and Luna to enter with me."
Luna's serene smile was tinged with nerves when she finished for Narcissa. "And Theo and I will speak to the Grey Lady." Her tiny hand enveloped Hermione's, her soulful blue eyes locking on Hermione's. "We'll find it, Hermione. I know it."
There was little room in her for hope, but sitting together with the small group that had become family—again, despite the odds—Hermione allowed herself to foster the flame that lit within her, stoked by her magic.
Without further discussion, they all stood, each summoning their belongings, few though they were. The sense of urgency in the room had heightened with the acknowledgement of the cloak as a Hallow, and Hermione tried to quell the part of her that didn't want to allow it out of the room.
It was power, and coupled with the magic in her veins, she wondered if it was an endgame that she was allowing to slip through her fingers. Perhaps it was the only way to defeat Voldemort...
But then her gaze cut to Narcissa, the way she embraced her son and whispered in his ear, tears in her eyes that she refused to let fall, and something told her that she wouldn't allow anything further to befall her son if she could stop it.
Again, the woman's words echoed through her mind. I've known Miss Granger was the last strand of hope we had in all of this.
If nothing else, she'd finish this for Narcissa. Another casualty of the Dark Lord's hand she'd have to avenge.
"What about you and Draco?" Theo asked, his voice low as he embraced her. His trepidation was clear in the way he cupped her elbows and peered closely at her face, fine lines of concern at the corners of his eyes as he tried to gauge what was going through her mind. "What will you do?"
A flicker of fear and resignation deep in his gaze told Hermione he already knew the answer to his question, but she understood his need to ask. If only for the confirmation, she'd have done the same.
"Draco and I go back." A deep breath stuttered in her throat. Though she swallowed, it only seemed to swell thicker, robbing her of the ability to breathe for a moment as she wrapped her friends in a fierce hug, allowing her eyes to mist over. "We're going back to Malfoy Manor."
With a crack of Apparition, Theo, Luna, and Narcissa were gone, leaving Hermione and Draco alone in the cabin.
End of Part III
A/N: Eep! And so we enter the final part of this fic. I can't wait to hear what you guys think! Only 11 more chapters until we reach the end (and that is a terrifying thought).