Notes: Thank you for your continued interest in this piece. We have so much adventure, angst and romance to go. I'm so excited to continue to share this with all of you. I hope you will enjoy the roller coaster.
WARNINGS: Explicit references to sexual assault.
15. Roses Fearfully on Thorns Did Stand
The hours and minutes crawl by like snails. Draco would be content to actually watch snails at this point. Anything but the drip of time falling in steady increments as the sun rises and sets and he knows nothing except hollow anticipation and the growing fear that he will have to leave this room or he will be forgotten entirely.
Draco knows such forgetting is inevitable when one is dead—and he is something very like that as far as the world is concerned—but he cannot stand the thought of being forgotten so completely.
Perhaps it is misguided ego or simple cowardice. Right now, he can't distinguish between the two.
He gives Potter and Tom another week. He marks the wall with deep slashing hashes when the sun sets each night. He could be more creative, could create his own magical alarm clock keyed exactly to the moment he desires, but his desire to use a wand wanes as time as grows arbitrary. In the end he is no wizard at all, just as his father has long suspected.
Of course, that's nonsense. Draco could blast his way out of here at any moment, penetrating the wards, then the town. He could imperio the Muggles and eat fine dinners of succulent meat and finely aged wine. He could crawl back to his parents and claim a miracle, that he was somehow strong enough to survive the flames the Order conjured to eat away his corpse.
But then he would be back in another prison, a worse one with no hope of escape and the impossible weight of expectation. He might have taken the fine food and luxurious manor for granted, but he will never take this stillness, this absence of expectation for granted.
He may eat as poorly as Hermione Granger once did—he didn't have the foresight to ration the supplies Potter left—but he knows his freedom isn't in peril. He has become accustomed to both the plain food and the knowledge that his future is within his control. The minor upset of one is certainly worth the other.
He still needs to get out of here.
Draco sighs and lets his head fall against the wall. He stares up at the ceiling and counts the tiles for the second time that day. There are 542. He knows. He's counted them nearly as often as there are tiles.
He's cross-eyed and staring rather vacantly at the far corner when Potter pops into existence across the room. It takes several seconds for Draco to react. He is so used to nothing happening that Potter's arrival hardly seems real.
Draco ceases his count before Potter can wonder why he's standing by the wall staring upward like an utter moron.
Potter drops onto the bed, flopping backward with little regard for the fact that he now sprawls across where Draco spends his restless nights. The sight of Potter's dark hair splayed across Draco's pillow is enough to increase Draco's pulse to an unnatural flutter. He forces deep breaths and sits on the lone chair in the room. He will not let Potter see the growing evidence of his reaction.
"So have you heard from your partner?" Potter speaks to the ceiling, but clearly addresses Draco.
Draco admitted to having help, but kept Tom anonymous. Potter is in no position to deal with the complex reality of a partially-resurrected Tom Riddle. And Draco has no desire to think about Tom more than absolutely necessary.
"No. I would have let you know." It's true, the coin Potter gave him at the beginning of this mess still burns a hole in his pocket.
The other boy sighs, long and dramatic and full of far more exhaustion than Draco can imagine. "Right. I just—what could possibly be taking this long?"
"I imagine he wants to make sure she's in decent health." It's the only acceptable excuse Draco can think of.
"He?" Draco winces and watches alarm chase away the exhaustion on Potter's familiar features. The boy pushes himself up to sitting and leans toward Draco. The air in the room goes from placid to charged in the space of a second. "You let me believe your partner was a girl."
Draco's teeth bite into his lip as he looks up at Potter through his lashes. He might have done exactly that. "Well… no. He isn't a girl. But we…"
Draco abruptly cuts himself off as he realizes that in his desperation to explain his omission to Potter, he nearly admitted his bizarre relationship with Tom. He feels heat consume his face, rushing toward his collar bone. He snaps his eyes shut and wishes he'd just bloody held his tongue.
"You what?" It's clear Potter sees right through him just from the tone. When Draco doesn't answer, Potter sighs and says, "I'm not going to judge you for being involved with a boy, Malfoy."
That's a relief, but it does nothing to reduce his mortification. He supposes it will be worse if Potter ever learns the identity of the boy in question. That offense will surely be worth severe judgement. Draco determines to never let the two of them meet. It's entirely implausible, but Draco's beyond rational thought.
The cot creaks as Potter moves. A moment later Draco feels the warm puff of Potter's breath across his face. Draco swallows around a lump of dread. The other boy is far too close and knows far too much.
"Look at me, Malfoy." Potter's voice is gentle, timid even, but Draco keeps his eyes screwed shut. If he doesn't see it, it isn't happening. The denial is childish and utterly beneath him, but he can't seem to help it. As always, his cowardice wins.
"Draco." His entire body shivers at the sound of his name on Potter's lips. It's horrible and wonderful. Everything he imagined it to be and so much less. "Please, Draco."
And he's helpless against that voice and those words. He lets his eyelids crack open and finds Potter kneeling the floor in front of him. The visual is enough to send searing heat crackling through his veins, but he somehow finds the strength to mask his reaction.
Satisfied that Draco is now making eye contact, Potter rocks back on his heels. "Look, I don't know much about the norms of the Wizarding world, but in the Muggle one, your preferences come with a lot of complications and prejudice. But I've never felt that way. I don't necessarily understand how to you feel—I've only ever liked girls—but I would never judge you for it."
What Potter means to be reassuring is a kick in the gut. Draco nearly chokes as a hysterical sob threatens to rip from his throat. All this time. Merlin and Salazar, all this time.
He's thought of a million reasons they can't be together. They are from rival houses. His father has actively tried to kill Potter on more than one occasion. They are on opposite sides of a war. Potter thinks Draco is an arrogant arse and accidently tried to kill him once. They are supposed to hate each other on principle alone. After all, Draco is a Malfoy and Potter represents everything that threatens the old pureblood families.
Bloody everything except that Potter simply isn't interested. Not because of who Draco is, but because of what he is—a boy.
He takes a choking breath that comes out part laugh, part fractured sob. All the reasons he imagined don't matter. In a handful of months, he and Potter have overcome all of those seemingly insurmountable obstacles. They are civil. They are on the same side of the war. There is nothing to keep them apart, nothing to prevent Draco from eventually wooing the boy he adores. Nothing except basic biology.
The irony nearly tears him in half. It certainly cracks his soul, hairline fractures bursting outward until he fears a single word from the dark boy on his knees will disintegrate Draco to nothing more than ash and dust.
He feels a warm hand on his cheek and looks into a blurry face. Salazar, he's bloody crying. The mortification freezes him in place as Potter quickly pulls his hand back.
"I…" Potter seems to have no idea what to say. Draco doesn't blame him. His reaction to Potter's attempt at comfort is confusing at best, hysterical at worst. Potter tries again. "I didn't mean to upset you. Is it something I said? I… I'm sorry. I have no idea what to do here, Draco. I'm a bit…"
Lost? Terrified? Ready to run away and never come back? Draco can think of plenty of things to insert into Potter's last sentence. To the other boy's credit, he doesn't back away. Instead, he pulls Draco into his arms, grip tentative and awkward.
It is perhaps the worst thing he could have done. Now Draco has no hope of stopping the blubbering mess that is his current existence. Feeling Potter against him, knowing the boy chose to hold him this close, but knowing that anything more is utterly impossible is breaking his heart in new and unbearable ways. He wants to scream from the pain of it, but he keeps his jaw clenched shut. He has already fallen far too low.
Potter pats his back with gentle taps that seem as lost and confused as Draco feels. When Draco's chest no longer heaves quite so unbearably with the horrible truth, Potter leans back a hair. "Do you want to talk about it?"
Draco emphatically shakes his head. He would rather crucio himself for a week than tell Potter what the fuck is wrong.
Potter continues to pat him awkwardly on the back. Draco isn't strong enough to pull away. After several long minutes filled only by the sound of Draco's sniffles and Potter's steady breaths, the darker boy asks, "is it me?"
Draco chokes on snot. His voice is a dismal imitation of human as he rasps, "what?"
"Did I make you…" Potter has the grace not to say cry. They both know what he's asking.
Yes. Yes, Potter absolutely made Draco sob like a thirteen-year-old girl, but he's not about to admit that.
His chest is burning. Salazar, he never knew heartbreak was so bloody painful.
Wait.
Draco gasps as the pain rises to a fever pitch. He reaches beneath his plain black tee and rips out the pendant he's hidden beneath. Even the chain is searing hot. He claws it over his head and abruptly stands, staring at the coordinates that glow red hot on the back of the coiled serpent.
He has never been more thankful for Tom Riddle.
"Granger's safe."
Potter surges to his feet, eyes locked on the pendant. "How can you tell?"
It is only as Potter's desperate emerald eyes roam the shape of the pendant that Draco understands what Tom has done. This information is for his eyes only. He is not meant to share her location with Potter and he certainly can't tell Potter what he knows. It is clever, very Tom.
Where mere hours ago Draco might have been upset by the prospect of traveling to a destination where Potter could not follow, now he is relieved. Tom may be a twisted bramble of confusion, but at least he is not the thorny branches of unrequited love.
"My partner," it is odd to call Tom this, but the term is accurate enough, "and I have a system only we can access. A bit like what you and I have with the coin."
Potter's eyes spark with ardent hope. "Where is she?"
"I can't tell you." The words don't even hurt to say. He feels bad for Potter—the boy loves Granger after all, but Draco is no longer his. The cold slap of reality has seen to that. He still cares for the raven-haired boy. Still imagines what his soft skin would taste like beneath Draco's lips, but it's purely theoretical wonder—or so he tells himself. In any case, something fundamental has shifted and now Draco can breathe when he meets Potter's charged stare.
"You can't or you won't?" Potter is one wrong answer away from furious.
Draco is amazed by the volatility of the boy's emotions. He's gone from calm and comforting to hell-raising in the blink of an eye. It reminds Draco uncannily of Tom.
"Can't." Draco isn't lying. Tom is one clever bastard.
Potter's teeth grind. The boy's fists clench around thin air a handful of times before tightening into primed weapons.
He glares at Draco, but his mouth is set in a resigned line. "Then go already. And contact me as soon as you can. I need to see her."
It is because Draco knows Potter will never see him as anything but a comrade—perhaps one day a friend—that he asks the question which has been burning at the back of his mind since he first visited Hermione Granger in the dungeons. "What the bloody hell did you do that got Granger captured?"
Potter flinches, as if Draco has crossed the space between them with his firsts or his wand and not mere words. He sucks his lip into his mouth and gnaws on it for several moments before answering, "it's a long bloody story."
Draco sits back down in the chair and gestures toward the cot. Potter endured his breakdown; this is the least he can do. Perhaps this is what true friendship is like, seeing the worst of each other and not looking away.
"Granger's plenty safe now. I have the time."
Potter's eyes are haunted vortices of agony as he meets Draco's steady gaze.
"It all began with Ron Weasley."
Pain rips through her. She feels fingers digging into her thighs, drawing blood as they rip away the last vestiges of her paltry clothing. She is stripped bare and she is burning, tearing, breaking.
Her mouth is too dry to scream. She tries anyway.
Hermione's eyes snap open as pain flashes white-hot between her legs. She gulps in a frantic breath, eyes tracing unfamiliar shadows. For one horrible moment, she thinks she's back in that cell.
But no, there's a window above her bed and the faint light of the Elbe shipping lanes can be seen in the distance.
She is shivering, her whole body its own catastrophic earthquake. She crawls from beneath the covers, suddenly unable to stand their weight. Her thin sleep pants and simple tee should be plenty warm in the mid-summer heat, but chills race down her limbs. She searches the wardrobe until she finds a soft black jumper. It's far too large and smells of cloves. She inhales the scent deeply before sliding it over her head. Her shaking arms are swallowed by the sleeves.
Taking a steadying breath, she wraps her arms around herself and shuffles out into the common area. It's completely dark outside, so it must truly be the middle of the night. She follows the soft murmur of voices down the hall until she finds Tom and Draco hunched over the small kitchen table.
They both look up as she enters. Tom is immediately on his feet. He reaches her in the space of a heartbeat. He doesn't need to ask; he can see it in her face, in her slumped posture and uncertain gait.
He pulls her to him and for half a second, even that makes Hermione flinch. He freezes, then waits until she nods to reel her all the way into his chest. His heartbeat is a frantic echo of her own.
"Are you…?" Draco clearly isn't certain what he should ask.
Hermione swallows thickly, still tasting terror. "Nightmare."
His stormy eyes darken in understanding. "I could brew you something for that."
"Please."
Once she might have refused, caught up in the belief that she was strong enough to solve her own problems. But she is no longer so naïve. The horrors that chase her into sleep aren't the type she can slay with mere will power. She has been safe for over a month and the fear is as fresh as ever. She despairs that it will retain its knife edge no matter how much time passes.
Tom brushes his lips over her tangled hair. "Do you want me to come back with you?"
They sleep in separate rooms, but more often than not their nights end with Tom cradling Hermione's trembling body, her mind clawing at the recesses of despair, her excruciating memories more real than even his warmth.
She doesn't answer, but slips her fingers through his. He squeezes her hand and says something to Draco Hermione doesn't quite catch. The other boy nods, his gaze heavy with pity. Hermione hates it. She turns away before it can puncture her tender heart. He does not have the right to pity her. Draco might have helped to save her, but he was her jailor first and she will not forget that.
Her temples are throbbing now too. The mess of her life is too convoluted for her to sort, especially with the echo of grimy fingers still creeping across her skin. She tightens her grip on Tom's hand and follows him back to her bedroom.
He slips out of his jumper and quickly shucks his trousers, belt thumping on the floor. Hermione doesn't bat an eyelash as he pulls off his shirt as well. She's become accustomed to the chiseled perfection of his torso, the gently defined pectoral muscles above the hard lines of his abs. She has no idea if he works to achieve this physique or if being magically resurrected comes with certain perks.
She knows the lines of chest like she knows the wrinkles of her palms. Objectively, he is gloriously handsome, but desire isn't something she feels anymore. Maybe one day his perfection will draw heat to her core, but for now all she feels as she curls against the hard panes of his chest is safe. And safe is more important than anything else.
The rhythm of their breathing clashes, then merges into one. She relaxes exhale by exhale, her shoulders loosening from hard lines to shapeless puddles.
Only when the tension has abated does Tom murmur, "we should probably talk about this."
Beyond the acknowledgement that passed between them the night of the crime, they haven't spoken about what Hermione endured or what Tom felt. It is between them always, an anchor, but just out of sight, beyond reality. Except it is real and Hermione is beginning to understand that no amount of denial will get her through this. The part of her brain that still remembers the summer she spent immersed in basic psychology knows she can never move beyond this if she doesn't acknowledge what happened to her. If she can't find the strength to face the truth.
She thinks she would rather burn for eternity than face this.
"His hands felt like spiked sausages. The dig of his fingers made me want to claw away the skin he touched."
Hermione's jaw drops and she spins in the circle of Tom's arms. Molten sapphire eyes meet hers. Her voice is a faint tremor of mismatched syllables when she admits, "I would tear off every inch of skin he touched. Gut myself if I could."
"I know." He speaks in only the barest whisper. It is more than loud enough. "I scrub in the shower for hours, but I can't get the feel of him off me."
"I can't…" she swallows around the lump of horror lodged in her throat. She has thought these words a thousand times, but saying them will give them power. She clings to Tom's luminous stare. "After being used like that, after he put his filthy penis in me without any regard for my body or my mind, I can't imagine ever wanting to have sex again."
There. She's said it. She's verbalized exactly what happened to her on more than one occasion and exactly how she fears it has altered her life.
Tom bites his lip, his gaze nearly as black as the night beyond her window. "And I will not rest until they are all gone. Until every last soul who took that from you is in pieces."
She knows she shouldn't be gratified by his words, by the violence of his promise, but she is no longer naïve. She will never be satisfied, but the prospect of spilling guilty blood will do for now.
She studies the hard lines of his face, made starker by the play of shadows in the darkness. "Do you feel…?" She can't quite figure out how to ask the question. Tom is clearly male, so despite experiencing her final rape with her, he is likely affected differently.
"Feel that way about sex?" he infers. She nods, suddenly horribly aware of their location and his state of undress. But his gentle smile wipes away the rising panic. He strokes her cheek and although there is a slight spark of energy in the wake of his caress, it is not sexual. "No, not in the way you do," he admits softly. "It has, however, altered my perception of sex, especially with a female."
It never occurred to her Tom was considering any other type of sex. She blinks, but lets the information slide away. It's hardly relevant to their current conversation. She finds that talking like this—clinically, scientifically—is far easier than addressing the emotional fallout. "Can you explain what you mean?"
He tilts his head, ebony hair falling into his eyes. "I can try. I'm not sure I'll do an adequate job. I guess before—when I was human—sex was a power play. It was a way for me to get what I wanted." A shadow falls over his eyes and he looks abruptly away. "I used it as a weapon. I'm no longer comfortable doing that unless the circumstances absolutely require such behavior."
"But sex is still a pleasurable idea to you."
He flinches, but nods. "It is."
Hermione collapses against the tangled sheets of her bed and stares into the dark void beyond her window. "I know I should want that as well. But right now, I never want to be touched like that again."
"That's a perfectly natural reaction," Tom says softly, shifting until he lies next to her, their hair entwining atop the single pillow.
She knows he's right, but she doesn't want to be this broken. She has no idea how to fix this. "I want to have children someday. A little girl or little boy to guide through this world. I want it so much it makes my soul ache. But how can I hope to have a child if I can't bear to touch a man?"
"You touch me."
She slants a glance at him. "You know that's different. You were there with me. You're part of the memory. The part that kept me from something even worse."
"But that wasn't the first time you experienced his assault."
It's another truth that has remained unspoken until now. She nods, feels the silken ends of his hair move across her face as she does so. "I can't fully remember the others. I know they happened. I remember the trauma to my body, but my mind fractured, filed memories away in places I can't find."
"I can probably help you find those too. Not that it would be pleasant."
They've talked about trying Legilimency a handful of times since they came to the cottage. Hermione hasn't quite worked up the nerve to let Tom root around in her head and he hasn't pushed the issue.
"There may be some things it's better not to remember."
"Be that as it may, you won't have full control of your mind again until you face all that it contains."
The statement feels like wisdom, which is odd coming from a half-souled boy of the darkest origin. Yet she feels he speaks from a place of truth and experience. Hermione is reminded once again how little she understands him.
But she does not turn away. Instead, she rolls onto her side and flings an arm over his bare chest.
"Stay with me?"
She hears the smile in his voice as he replies, "always."