**I don't own anything in the Harry Potter universe; if I did, things would have ended very differently and I wouldn't have a mountain of student loans.**

A/N: Trigger warning, brief instance of suicidal thoughts.

oOoOoOo

If heaven and hell decide that they both are satisfied

And illuminate the 'no's on their vacancy signs

If there's no one beside you when your soul embarks

Then I'll follow you into the dark

Death Cab for Cutie, I Will Follow You into the Dark

oOoOoOo

"So, you reckon there are seven?"

She nodded. "That was the number he asked about when he first discovered them, and as you're aware it's considered powerful in a magical sense as well. The diary, the ring and the locket have already been destroyed. To my knowledge, discounting the one inside him at present, the other three were still intact when we were captured."

"And you have no idea what or where they are?"

"I have theories about two of them," she explained, sheepishly. "Given Bellatrix's reaction, I'm pretty convinced that at some point there was one in her possession, most likely in her Gringotts vault."

"And the other?"

"The snake, Nagini," she said. "I know it wouldn't be rational to make a horcrux out of a living thing, but he's too attached for her to just be a normal familiar."

"Alright," he said slowly, placing his interlocked fingers under his chin while he thought. "Just to be clear, Dumbledore, in all his infinite wisdom, thought it was a good idea to task three students with finding and destroying these? Rather than the numerous aurors and dark magic specialists in your blasted Order?"

"That's what I said!" she exclaimed, louder than she had intended, sending her into a coughing fit. When she recovered, she continued, "But Harry was dead set on not involving anyone else because of that stupid fucking prophecy."

"The prophecy saying either he or the Dark Lord has to kill one another?"

"That's how he and Dumbledore interpreted it – it was actually phrased, 'neither can live while the other survives,' which in my opinion is too vague to say for certain that that was what was meant. Also, divination as a general rule is rubbish."

He inclined his head in agreement before once more sinking into a contemplative stupor.

"You know Granger, as far as deathbed requests go, this is a pretty big ask," he said weakly, shooting her a scathing look. She had to suppress a smile at his slip, knowing he had been making a conscious effort to call her Hermione.

"I'm not really asking you to do anything," she defended, "but if I die, and if Harry and Ron died without telling anyone what we were doing, someone needs to know. I would prefer it be someone in the Order, and someone not currently imprisoned with no way of reaching the outside world, but circumstances and all…"

"You're stuck with me," he finished. She nodded.

"Draco, horcruxes aside, if you get out of here, if you want to defect… take your mum and get to the Order. Her sister Andromeda is probably your best bet, I'm sure your mother will know how to reach her."

"Hermione, you have to know that there's no way they'll buy that. We'll be stunned, if not killed, on sight."

"You have to try," she pleaded, the conversation from the past several hours was starting to take its toll and she was breathing heavy. "Tell them what happened. Tell them about me. If Harry is still alive, tell him… tell him that I told you to remind him to never use cat hair in a Polyjuice potion. He'll believe you."

"Okay, now I know you're delirious. Get some rest, it's not like I'm going anywhere."

oOoOoOo

As Hermione drifted into a restless sleep, Draco sat and watched her twitching, sweating form with introspective eyes. If what she'd said was true, which at this point he knew better than to doubt, many of his previous assumptions shifted.

There was a chance, however slim, that Voldemort would lose this war, and that changed everything. He got up from the ground next to her and quietly paced the length of the room.

If he ever managed to get out of this hell hole, and wasn't completely mad by the time it happened, would he have the courage, or stupidity, to do what she had said? To defect?

The past several weeks had been perhaps the strangest of his life, save for sixth year when he was periodically killing small animals by stuffing them into a broken piece of furniture.

Hermione, no longer just Granger, had pushed and challenged him in a way he wasn't familiar with, extending opportunities for reconciliation over and over again until he finally grasped one like a man drowning.

He had told her things he'd only ever hinted to Theo and Blaise, things he dared not dwell upon himself, and rather than rebuke or blame him, she simply accepted them. Accepted who he was, who his life had shaped him to be, and that terrified him more than he'd like to admit.

While the sex had come as a bit of a shock, the truly stunning part of it was that it was not unwelcomed. In this place, in this cold grey nothing, she was something warm and vibrant. Something to cling to. He knew it was selfish, but he feared what would happen to him when that light was snuffed out. Not for the first time he cursed his wretched aunt.

He heard Hermione stir behind him and moved closer for a moment, but she was still asleep, mumbling to herself. He didn't know if he was prepared for what would come next. Several days ago she had laid it out, talked him through the stages and symptoms she would most likely experience with surprising objectivity – most of which he was unfamiliar with. Illnesses, at least of this nature, simply didn't progress this far in the magical world. He shuddered to think how frequently it must occur among muggles for it to be common knowledge.

She had been running a fever for days, scorching to the touch but claiming she was chilled, and she was starting to have trouble breathing properly, the sound becoming gasping and wet when she laid down flat.

What he truly dreaded though, was watching her lose her mental acuity. If Hermione Granger valued anything it was her mind, and knowing that that might slip, that she wouldn't be herself at the end… he couldn't think of anything crueler.

At the end of the day, which was who the fuck knew when trapped in here, Draco Malfoy was simply angry.

He was angry that they were in here.

He was angry at Bellatrix for all the horrible things she had done.

He was angry with his father for supporting a terrorist and letting him sully their home and infect their lives.

He was angry at his mother for staying, though he felt guilty about that.

He was angry at Hermione, both for forgiving him and for making him care, only to go and die. He knew it wasn't rational, and it certainly wasn't fair to her, but that didn't dull the feeling.

And he was angry at himself for firing that damned spell.

oOoOoOo

The next morning Hermione woke to find Draco holding the damp flannel to her forehead.

"It's not going to make a difference," she said bitterly, blinking her eyes open.

"I know," he responded, but merely moved it down to her neck. He paused at the collar of her jumper and she nodded, letting him pull her into a seated position and strip it over her head.

She hadn't worn a bra in over a week, the elastic band only further irritating her mottled flesh. At this point he had seen, touched or tasted her in just about every state of undress, so modesty was a thing of the past. Rather, she focused on laying back and enjoying the feel of the cool, if slightly coarse, cloth as it ran across her breasts and down her stomach.

Draco's eyes fixed on her but it wasn't in a sexual way– not in the purest sense of the word. He merely regarded her body with a comfortable familiarity.

He moved the cloth down her left arm but made no attempt to clean the right. It hurt too much at this point and frankly she had taken to pretending it wasn't there. If she didn't, she would have to acknowledge the disgusting appearance and putrid smell. She gave Draco credit for stomaching it without comment. She had decided it was a distinctly unpleasant way to die, watching your own flesh rot.

Draco finished wiping her down and took her jumper over to the basin, submerging it in the water and wringing it out several times. They had determined the week before that this, followed by a series of weakened drying charms, was not a terrible way to 'clean' their clothes and hair.

Neither said anything about the murky gray color the water took on afterward.

After several minutes and nearly a dozen drying charms, he returned with her jumper and helped slip it over her head, carefully maneuvering the sleeve over her bad arm.

"Do you need to use the loo?" he asked her, to which she shook her head.

"Can you just hold me for a few minutes?" she requested, chest heaving from the effort she had exerted. "I'm so tired…"

Her eyes drifted shut again and she missed the broken expression that flashed across his face.

oOoOoOo

"Where am I?" Hermione asked, half-opened eyes roving around the room.

"You're in the cell, you're okay," he lied to her for the fifth time that day.

"It hurts, I want my mum," she responded in a whisper, choking out a sob while her shoulders shook.

"I know, I'm sorry," he said softly, pressing a kiss to her burning forehead before burying his head in his hands. "I'm so sorry."

oOoOoOo

It was on the twenty-seventh day in the cell that he couldn't coax her to eat anymore, but it had been days since she had moved from the blanket in the corner without him carrying her.

She would wake every so often, alternating between crying for her parents or Potter or himself. He took some sick satisfaction in the fact that she never once asked for the Weasel.

Of all the hardship he had faced, all the darkness that had invaded his existence, this was the worst. Perhaps it was recency bias, but in the deepest parts of himself it felt true.

Draco alternated between laying with her, wiping her brow with the cloth, and pacing the room. He ate her food in addition to his for fear that if it returned untouched too many times that they, whoever they were, would stop sending it. He wasn't sure why it mattered, but the idea of the tray appearing with one bowl, one spoon and one cup felt significant, like it marked an ending that he wasn't prepared for.

There wasn't some grand goodbye, no dramatic last words between them. She slipped slowly, gradually, into incoherency and he reconciled himself to the fact that the last thing he would hear from her would likely be incomprehensible muttering or crying.

He considered briefly that, once she had passed, perhaps it would be easiest to simply end his own life. What was the alternative? Sitting with her body while it rotted? Talking to himself until he created voices in his head to respond? He figured he could make enough shallow slices along his arms to eventually bleed out.

Suicidal musings aside, what he was struggling with at this point, more than anything else, was the purpose of all of it. Why keep them here only to let them die? What could possibly be gained from this?

Hermione cried out for him and he crossed the room to her side, soothing her as best he could before squeezing his eyes shut tightly. He felt as if his life had become an experiment in horror, like some great, unforeseen presence was seeing how far one man could be pushed before he cracked.

Why make him love her only to make him let her go?

oOoOoOo

A/N: A big thank you to my betas, TanzaniteWrites and JustLilyJade!