Disclaimer: All characters belong to JK Rowling.
Content Warning: Depression, post-traumatic stress, and references to suicide and miscarriage.
What voice is this cut in the air
as though a wound itself had speech
Give her small hands
Give her dark hair
Give her a wound no word can reach
- Christian Wiman, Once in the West (2014)
Chapter 30: Hagiography
There were many times—in those intervening months—when Harry wondered whether George would say Hermione Granger was broken now.
He need not have asked, though. He saw his brother-in-law often in those weeks and the answer was written in the lines of his face, in the tightness of his eyes.
The day after she woke, she was taken home. They set her up in the library, at her request, so that she'd be close to the things she loved.
The pain was overwhelming. The eight cocktails of potions for her lungs and the burns kept her in a near-constant stupor, her body only stirring when they changed her dressings. They would send Hugo to Mrs. Weasley at those times, as the screams could be heard through the house like a tocsin.
Then, a week later, the nightmares began.
He and Emi were there for the first one, on the night shift while Ron and the Grangers caught up on much-needed sleep. Emi had been reading in the sitting room while Harry fixed tea when they heard it—a scream that tore the air like a meteor rending the sky.
They ran to the library and found her thrashing violently, as though fighting someone off.
"Hold her still!" Emi shouted. "Not too tight or she'll hurt herself!"
As he gently took hold of her ankles, Emi said through her tears, "Hermione, love, wake up! You're all right! Please, wake up!"
But she could not seem to wake. Only when they forced a sleeping draught through her lips did she quiet and, even then, she struggled faintly against their grasp.
Emi eventually excused herself and went to the washroom, where Harry could hear her sobbing quietly.
Silent, he went to Hermione's side and watched the uneven rise and fall of her chest for some time. He wanted to reach out his hand, to smooth away the damp curls from her brow.
But...he did not deserve such intimacies now.
The next day, they told Healer Holbrooke what happened. She was hesitant to prescribe a stronger sleeping potion given the other potions in her system. She advised they let the dreams run their course in the hopes that they would fade with time.
But they did not fade. Night after night, the lot of them—Ron, Harry, Mr. and Mrs. Granger, Emi, Lakey, Ginny, Mrs. Weasley, George, Angelina—the whole entourage of anxiety was made wretched with fear.
Their misery stood in stark contrast to the world outside. For, during these same weeks, the hagiography of Hermione Granger was written.
Everything she had done in her life was looked at with new and rapturous eyes—her bravery during the war, the founding of N.S.P.E.W, the passage of the House-Elf Reform Act, her more controversial trials as a young counselor, her involvement in the Muggle-born camp at Hogwarts and wizard-Muggle exchanges at the Ministry.
Visiting the Saturday after she was brought home, Maisie told them N.S.P.E.W. had received thousands of galleons in donations since Hermione's attack. Prominent magical businesses announced they would start paying their house-elves, as Hogwarts had done nearly a decade before. Flourish and Blotts couldn't keep her book, The Magic in Me, on the shelves nor the children's series that mythologized the Golden Trio's years at Hogwarts. The Wizarding Wireless and the Daily Prophet were engaged in a vicious bidding war for her first interview, conveniently ignoring the fact that no one had answered their interview requests.
Her apotheosis was not contained to Britain. Ministries of Magic across the Continent, the Americas, Africa, and Asia passed resolutions condemning the attack. Gretchen Ohlen, a Swedish scholar and member of the International Confederation of Wizards, whom Hermione greatly admired, spoke before a plenary session of that body and called Hermione's attack a "wake-up call" for the wizarding world. The torture and burning of the Brightest Witch of Her Age was proof that blood supremacism was still deeply entrenched in magical society and must be ripped out, root and stem. She called for the adoption of the long-stalled House-Elves' Rights Charter and for each member government to work with civil society leaders in their own countries to identify and repeal discriminatory laws and practices against Muggles and Muggle-borns.
Most surprising for Harry, however, was the effect of Hermione's attack on the Callahan trial. The connection between Callahan and Hermione's abductors leaked within days, though the public remained ignorant of the existence of a recording or Malleus Maleficarum. Hermione's opening statement from the trial was republished in the Prophet and re-broadcast on the Wireless. And like they had read Harry's mind from weeks before, the public began to call for the Camerons to be allowed into the courtroom once the trial resumed. Then, the leaders of the Muggle-born caucus within the Wizengamot approached Emi and asked her to spearhead a legislative campaign to amend the 2008 Muggle Protection Act to allow Muggles to testify in wizarding courts. They proposed calling it the Granger Amendment.
Emi's eyes had grown quite bright then, but she hesitated, thinking of the time commitment and what it would mean for her caretaking duties. But Ron took her hand at the kitchen table.
"She'd want you to do it," he said quietly. "It can only be you."
She agreed.
Work had also never been more demanding for Harry. He and Matt interviewed Yvain on eighteen separate occasions. The ex-Auror let them scour his memories through Legilimency as they attempted to piece together whether Callahan or Rudge had recruited any others, whether Rudge had ever made contact with the remaining Death Eaters in Britain. Yvain's memories provided useful leads—including the discovery of a network of hide-outs Rudge had used for twenty odd years—but they found no evidence that anyone else knew of or sought to carry out the contents of Malleus Maleficarum.
With the immediate danger seemingly past, Harry turned his attention to reforms to the Auror Department. Minister Shacklebolt suggested the establishment of an independent committee comprised of retired Aurors and community leaders who would propose recommendations to overhaul Auror recruitment and training, expand diversity programmes, and establish an anonymous channel to report radicalization concerns without fear of reprisal.
Harry readily agreed. But, a few days later, Gwen presented him with a list of twenty-seven Aurors whom Callahan had spoken to during Recruitment Weeks at Hogwarts. He also thought of the Department's self-proclaimed "Old Guard"—those Aurors whose careers began before the war—who had supported Callahan in those early days when the charges were not yet public.
And Hermione's quiet, ferocious voice in an empty kitchen came to him. No, a committee could not be enough. They needed to identify and sack any blood supremacists in the ranks now.
Deputy Chief Putnam stared between Harry and Matt, disbelieving.
"You want to do what?"
"All Aurors, including myself, will undergo screening via Veritaserum to determine whether they hold blood supremacist views. If they refuse to undergo screening, they'll be dismissed from the force."
"You cannot be serious," he sputtered. "That's—that's a gross invasion of privacy."
"The screenings will be conducted by human resources under the strictest standards of confidentiality. Even I will not see the transcripts."
"You're mad..." Putnam breathed, pale skin turning a mottled red. "You—you won't like what you find. Everyone—everyone—holds some prejudicial views. If you force us all to do this, you won't have half a dozen Aurors left."
"We're looking for the gross offenders, Roger. Those who can't be helped with training. I wish there was another way, but it must be made absolutely clear: if you're a blood supremacist, you cannot be an Auror. Full stop."
Putnam's mouth opened, then closed, small eyes darting between them.
"No one will submit to this. There'll be resignations en masse."
"Maybe," said Harry, tapping her quill against his desk. "I hope that's not the case. If it is, we'll rebuild from the ground up."
"And the Minister's approved this plan, has he? The Wizengamot?"
The corners of Harry's lips twitched. "I've informed them this is my sole prerogative."
"Well," said Putnam, getting to his feet, "I-I won't sit here while you destroy the Auror Department. You'll have my resignation in the morning. Good luck with the lawsuits."
The door slammed behind him.
Matt sighed, running a hand over his head. "Sometimes the trash takes itself out, sir."
Harry found himself laughing like he hadn't in weeks.
As the Granger Amendment gained momentum, an incredible possibility emerged: the Camerons might be able to testify against Callahan if their memories could be restored before the trial resumed. Their testimony was not strictly needed to convict Callahan given the public's mood and Yvain's revelations, but Harry, Ron, and Alex all agreed. The Camerons deserved the opportunity to tell their story, to look into the face of the man who'd upended their lives, to see the awareness dawn in Callahan's pale eyes that the words of Muggles had helped put him away.
Given the expectation that the trial would need to resume in a few months, Ron recommended they bring in three additional people to assist Alex in his work: Emi, George, and Maggie Dwyer, the head of the International Division for Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes.
Through her contacts in Eastern Europe, Maggie was able to secure the shipment of roughly six hundred magical blood samples. The cost was immense. Harry, Emi, George, and Maggie agreed to split it (Harry taking the brunt) and to not tell Ron or Alex, who had enough to focus on.
While they waited for the shipments to arrive, Alex completed the genetic analysis on the fifty or so samples they'd purchased from Knockturn Alley. On a rainy February night, three weeks into her convalescence, he updated them on his findings in Ron and Hermione's sitting room.
"The same seven gene areas keep showing up as anomalies," the doctor said. "Seven areas that are consistently different from non-magical DNA. Fifty samples is not enough to go on, but it's a significant finding."
"So," said Emi, staring at her feet, "say you analyze the six hundred samples from Europe and find the same seven anomalies. What then?"
Alex swallowed. "Then, I think we're ready to design the gene therapy."
"And this gene therapy," said George slowly, "it'll permanently give the Camerons the ability to perform magic?"
"If it works, yes."
The five wizards exchanged looks.
"When will the shipment get here?" asked Harry.
"We put a rush on," said Maggie in her faint Irish accent, "but they've never received an order like it. I've paid off a couple suppliers already so they don't flag it for customs. My guess is we'll get the first shipment from Romania in two weeks, the rest will trickle in after."
"And how long does it take to develop the therapy?" said George.
"In principle, it can be done quite quickly," said Alex. "There are companies in my world that specialize in that. But there are regulations and approval processes we'd never get through. I'm hoping my former professor—the one who's been doing the genetic analysis on all these samples—can do it himself or knows someone who can without asking questions. Needless to say, everything we're doing is very illegal."
The wizards shared another look, more amused this time.
"At least the Auror Chief is in on it," Ron smiled faintly, gripping Harry's shoulder.
They laughed, tense faces momentarily brightening. But Harry saw that Alex did not laugh. As much as the doctor felt like one of them now, it was moments like this that reinforced the separateness. Alex was beholden to his world's laws, not theirs. And despite Harry's influential contacts in the Muggle world, the doctor could not rely on the Auror Chief to save him if the plan went sideways. The wizards risked their money. Alex risked his license, his livelihood, and potentially his freedom.
"So," Harry said lowly and the others leaned in to listen, "we all need time. Emi to pass the amendment, Alex to develop the therapy...and Hermione to heal."
"Will Bruton agree to delay the trial much longer?" asked Ron.
"He should," he said. "He won't want it to resume in this climate. It's the Wizengamot I worry about. They have rules on how long they can suspend trials...I may have to call in some favors."
"It'll be worth it," said Emi softly. "She needs time."
And they all nodded, the levity leaving their eyes as quickly as it had come, like a flare in the darkness.
Because, by that third week, they all knew something was wrong.
Very wrong.
The worst of the pain was over. She started taking five potions a day, instead of eight. Ron and the female members of the entourage were diligent in changing her dressings and the violent red welts that threaded her skin slowly began to fade.
But Hermione was not well.
Like a crumbling house with fresh paint, the exterior was improved while the interior was vacant and hollow.
She barely ate. She hardly spoke. She laid in bed for hours, staring out the window, eyes empty. When they talked to her, it seemed to take a great while for their words to reach her, if she acknowledged them at all. She occasionally mustered the energy to read, but would invariably grow frustrated and push the book away. And still, the nightmares came.
Mostly, she wanted to be alone. The only person whose company she seemed to tolerate for extended periods was her mother's and Harry commonly found Elaine Granger sitting beside her only child, reading to her softly and coaxing sips of tea through her pale lips.
The effect on Rose and Hugo was devastating. They summoned Rose from Hogwarts two days after Hermione was brought home. Over those first few days, when Hermione was heavily drugged and disoriented, Rose and Hugo would stand by their mother's bed, hold her hand, and whisper to her that they loved her, that she was going to be all right.
Rose eventually had to return to school and as Hermione's outward health improved, they saw her make attempts at interacting with Hugo, but the effort always seemed to drain her and she'd eventually curl into a small ball and whisper that she wanted to be alone.
Like waves of attacks on a besieged castle, they brought others in to see her.
Bearing cards and flowers from Ministry colleagues, Emi and Lakey told her how beloved she was, how the Granger Amendment was proceeding, how eager everyone was to see her again.
One grey afternoon, Maisie perched herself on Hermione's bed and read to her in her high, squeaking voice. Hermione hadn't been able to look at her and the free elf left after a couple hours, ears drooping.
George sat with her on a Saturday morning, speaking to her in his soft, low voice, telling her what he knew of loss and darkness. But, closing the door quietly behind him an hour later, he told Ron and Harry that she hadn't taken in a word.
Daniel Marin, with his sardonic cheerfulness, was able to get something out of her that no one else had—a smile—as he recounted a disastrous haircut his husband, Michael, had endured. Yet, she could not seem to hold onto the conversation, her responses growing increasingly listless and short.
But it was one visit in mid-March that elicited the strongest reaction.
"Hermione?" said Ron gently, easing open the library door. "You have some visitors."
The Camerons shuffled inside, Duncan at the front. The eleven-year-old held a large, handmade card that Harry had charmed: a broken heart held together with a Muggle plaster.
"M-Miss Hermione?"
The rise and fall of her breathing stopped. She turned slowly on the bed and stared at the Muggle family. Then her eyes filled with tears and a tight sob burst from her throat.
"No, please..." she whispered. "I can't. I can't."
Ron escorted them from the room. As Harry shut the door, his and Hermione's eyes met, just briefly, before she hid hers away.
On a brilliant Thursday evening in late March, Healer Holbrooke asked to speak to Ron and the Grangers alone. The Grangers were with Hermione so Ron asked that Harry join. They sat in the dining room that had once hosted an exceptional and strange dinner party, the setting sun shooting shafts of red light through the windows, intersecting the exposed beams in the ceiling like cross-hatching.
"She's dropped over a stone in weight," the Healer said solemnly. "She's not doing her exercises. If she doesn't improve soon, she may never regain full use of her legs." She hesitated. "I take it she still hasn't opened up much?"
Ron shook his head, staring at his hands.
"I think," she said haltingly, "I think it might be time for her to speak to someone...a professional. She needs to start talking about what happened to her or..."
Ron's face—always in a permanent state of pallor now—paled further. As with many things, the magical world was not particularly progressive when it came to mental health. Mr. Weasley had suggested the same for George years ago, but the bereaved twin had always resisted.
"I reckon you're right," Ron said thickly after a moment. "Does Mungo's...?"
"We don't specialize in that sort of care," the Healer said gently, "but I can provide a few references."
Ron nodded numbly.
They fell silent. Healer Holbrooke looked uncomfortable.
"I hate to ask this, but...where do you keep Hermione's wand?"
Harry and Ron stared at her.
"In the library," said her husband.
"You may—just for the time being—want to keep it elsewhere...and any other objects she might use to—"
"She's not...she wouldn't..." Ron trailed off.
"I know," she said softly. "But the mind is powerful with its creations. It can convince anyone to do anything. It doesn't make her weak. She just needs help."
After several more minutes, they escorted Healer Holbrooke to the door. Harry and Ron lingered in the foyer, listening to Mrs. Granger's steady voice through the library door as she read from a book they didn't know.
"Ron," Harry said, working his jaw, "I should've told you ages ago..."
He stared at him. "What?"
"There was...there is a recording of what happened."
"A recording?"
"Yes. Rudge recorded what happened on the law, what he forced her to say. I-I don't know for certain but...with the way she reacted to the Camerons...I think she's torturing herself over it. You've—you've got to talk to her."
The light eyes darkened to gunmetal. "You've known about this for two months and never said anything?"
Harry forced himself to meet his furious gaze.
"I didn't want anyone else to hear it," he murmured. "But there's no choice now. You've got to listen to it, Ron...tell her, tell her it doesn't matter."
"Where is it now?"
"In my study."
They apparated onto the steps of Clymene Court. Ginny came out from the kitchen, looking at them curiously as they climbed the grand staircase.
Harry set up the gramophone on his desk and retrieved the gold recording, which he had placed under the strongest wards and protective spells he could conjure.
With a nod to Ron, he cast an impenetrable silencing charm on the door and left. He could not listen to it again. He waited on the steps, head in his arms...trying to force away what had happened on this landing only three months prior.
He had told Ron the truth. He had hoped no one else need hear it—as if confining the knowledge to himself could confine her pain, like screaming into a pillow. But pain was not like that, he saw now. It had to be shared in order to be lessened. And it was clear now that Hermione could not put words to her own anguish, to her own unwarranted shame. She needed help, which required her husband, her confidant.
But why had he waited so long to tell Ron?
Harry was afraid he knew the answer. He feared there was some darker part of his character that, perhaps unconsciously, wanted to keep the recording to himself. When he had to share so much of what Hermione was with others, this was his alone. Yet, what a coward he was. He had the means to ease some of her pain but was too afraid to be alone with her, lest his own guilt overwhelm him.
Harry released a rattling breath that shook his whole frame.
Ron emerged an hour later, white-faced and trembling. He pulled Harry into an embrace.
"I'll talk to her," he murmured into his neck. "I'll talk to her now."
The next morning, Harry received an update on the Veritaserum screenings. Roughly half the force had been interviewed so far. Fourteen Aurors—all from the Old Guard—had refused to undergo screening and resigned in protest. Barbara Lewis, their head of human resources, reported that thirty-six Aurors would need to undergo additional training. Six warranted dismissal from the force.
Thanking her, Harry stood and opened the door. As she left, Harry saw a bright shock of ginger hair making its way towards his office. And all the Aurors stepped out of Ron Weasley's path, like he was the consort to a queen.
"Hey," he said, nodding to Gwen and taking the steps to Harry's office. "Got a moment?"
"Yeah."
Harry shut the door behind him and activated the privacy wards, the windows fogging over like a sudden frost.
He waited for Ron to sit before, heart pounding, he asked, "How was it?"
"I don't know," Ron said slowly, staring at the floor. "She didn't ultimately say much."
"What did you say?"
He released a long breath. "I said you recovered the recording. That only you and I had listened to it. That no one else knows about it."
Harry nodded.
"I know she knows that last bit—that it's not public—otherwise it'd be all over the Prophet. But, I dunno. When I said you and I had heard it, she sort of froze up."
"Like she was surprised?"
"I dunno," he repeated softly. "I have a hard time reading her. Especially now."
"Maybe," said Harry, voicing a worry that occurred to him last night, "she didn't want anyone to hear it. Not even us."
Ron dragged a hand through his hair. "She hasn't given us much choice, has she? She won't talk about it. Until she does...you heard Healer Holbrooke."
"And she didn't say anything at all?"
Ron shook his head. "I told her she couldn't beat herself up about what that monster made her say...that it wasn't her fault. But she just sort of...stared off."
They fell quiet, the soft murmur of conversation and flutter of memos filling the silence.
"I think...I think you had better talk to her."
Harry looked up. "Me?"
Ron nodded. "You went to the law. You saw the aftermath. Maybe she needs to talk to someone who saw what she saw." Then, inexplicably, he smiled weakly. "Besides, wasn't she the one who always pulled you out of your states growing up? Maybe you can do the same for her."
Harry released a short breath. "States" was one way to put it.
"That's not..." He shook his head roughly. "I can't say anything to her that hasn't already been said. Even George..."
Ron watched him steadily for a long moment, the purple blots beneath his eyes stark against his skin.
"You've got to try, Harry. She's...fading. You aren't there every night now. The nightmares...they're mostly about the attack, I think, but there are other ones now...about Bellatrix...and something about her mum and blood..."
Something seized in Harry's gut, the forgotten memory, at once, there. A snowstorm...a miscarriage...a lost brother...how she wished she had been braver...
After all this time...she had never told him. The name "Liam" meant nothing to him.
Harry felt himself nod.
"Thank you," Ron said quietly. "Would you come tonight? I'm taking Hugo to Shell Cottage for the weekend, getting him out of the house. Bill wants me to stay for a night too and Elaine said she'd watch her. But I can stay back if you want me to."
Ron's words reached him very slowly but, after a moment, Harry shook his head.
They parted then and Harry stared, unseeing, at Hermione's quill on his desk for a long time.