A/N: Thank you so much for your reviews, favorites and follows! Hermione and Theo definitely have a lot of things that they need to talk about, but they are making strides in the right direction. You can follow me on tumblr (nauticalparamour) where I post sneak peeks, story updates and answer questions! Also HUGE HUGE thank you to accio-echo for beta reading this chapter 3 Seriously, she is so amazing...I keep giving her chapters with like no turn around time and she keeps getting it done and I am so so thankful for her help!
Please let me know what you thought of chapter six and be on the lookout for chapter seven next week!
Their trip to the apothecary was uneventful with no one the wiser that Theo and Hermione Nott might be trying to brew veritaserum in their townhouse. In their correct time, it was incredibly well regulated, but in the early 70s, there were not as many protections in place. They had agreed that they did not want to raise any more suspicions than their reckless betting already had. Theo had returned to the betting office himself, collecting their huge sum of galleons before depositing it at Gringotts. They had grown quite a fortune and there were still a few more sure bets to place, but they were perfectly well off for now.
It was uncomfortable to brew with Theo, if she was honest. She had spent so many years keeping a watchful eye over Neville, constantly worried about the impending disaster when he inevitably got his potion wrong, leaving her in state of concern whenever she worked with a partner. Then, in sixth year, she was finally able to work on her own and had found a new ease that she didn't know she could have with brewing. To suddenly have someone standing beside her again in the cleared out basement of their townhouse made Hermione's concerns come back involuntarily, not matter how precise his chopping was, or how careful he was when counting stirs of the cauldron.
"You don't have to worry so much," he finally snapped when he sensed her hovering behind him while he completed the first of several critical steps in the month long brewing process. "I'm not a fuck up like Longbottom. I'm a better brewer than you are."
Hermione was unused to this snide, prickly side of Theo being directed at her. Reeling back, she sucked in a deep breath, unsure of what to say, torn somewhere between wanting to apologize and protest at his assessment. "I don't know about that," she said with a frown. "I had better marks than you, even in potions."
He turned to face her once he'd added in the the ground newt tail, eyebrows furrowed in frustration. "That might be true, but I'm still a better brewer than you. I've been helping my father since I was a child, and you aren't comfortable with the process. You worry too much and are too rigid to be a truly good brewer," he said sternly, leaving no room for further argument. "Look, I'm not trying to belittle you, but you don't need to hover around me. I'm here to help you and you will just have to accept that you don't always have to be the one to take care of things between the two of us. I'm capable."
Hermione wondered where the Theo who had complimented her abilities just earlier in the day had gone, and she bit her lip, hoping that he didn't see how wobbly she really felt. "I'm sorry," she said, even if she didn't really want to apologize. It was going to be different working with Theo, but she really did need to get used to putting her trust in him. "Old habits die hard," she offered, remembering how he'd said something similar about calling Ginny 'Weaselette.'
Theo gave her a brief nod, before fixing the hair that had fallen across his forehead while he'd been over the hot cauldron. "That needs to simmer for a few days now," he said, determined to gloss over the previous unease of their discussion. "Would you like to start practicing Occlumency? We can construct a better backstory at the same time."
She agreed, leading the way up the stairs to their well-appointed parlor, settling into one of the comfortable couches that they had recently purchased. Theo settled into the open spot next to her, stretching his long legs in front of him. "I hope I'm good at this…" she said nervously. "Professor Snape tried to teach Harry in fifth year and it was all a disaster."
He snorted in amusement, rolling his eyes. "Whoever decided to pair them together was determined to have Potter fail then," he said. "Snape had no tolerance for him on a good day, let alone trying to teach something as difficult as Occlumency. Besides, Potter just wasn't suited to the art, he'd have struggled no matter what."
"It was Dumbledore," Hermione said with a frown, still unable to forgive the Headmaster for having known that Harry would have to sacrifice himself the entire time, rather than trying to find a way to get rid of the soul piece that had attached itself to her friend.
It was clear that Theo didn't know how to respond to her accusatory tone and settled for lecturing on the idea of Occlumency. "The most successful way to think of Occlumency is not to think of building up big walls and blocking off memories, but rather, showing someone what you want them to see," he explained. "If you put up a big wall and there is no memory where one is expected, it will be very obvious and a master legilimens would be capable of dismantling any wall that you'd put up."
"That makes sense," Hermione agreed.
"Let's try something with your parents," he said, pulling out his wand so that he would be able to cast the spell. "Show me a typical evening in the Granger household in Hong Kong." Making eye contact with her, he didn't give her much chance to prepare herself before he was entering her mind, slipping in gently.
Hermione focused, remembering a dinner that she might have had when she was home for summer, before fabricating some of the details, like the local cuisine instead of the Sunday roast her mum would have made. She imagined her father in brilliant blue wizard's robes, quite pleased with the on the fly changes. Keeping eye contact with Theo was a bit uncomfortable...she wanted to look away before memories of their morning in bed slipped back in, embarrassing her. She could feel him pushing at the edges of the memory, examining little threads while memory Hermione proudly gave them her end of term marks.
After what felt like an eternity, Theo was pulling back, a proud look on his face. "That was a very good first attempt," he praised her, his hand pressing to her knee in an awkward, affectionate squeeze. "But the fabricated details were a little bit flat...what did your father's wizards robe feel like? How did the food smell and taste? It will be fuzzy in your memory, but some of those sensory things will stick out."
She blushed from the praise, but refocused herself hearing his feedback. Theo gave good notes, the perfect blend of compliment and room to improve that made Hermione want to try again and again until she could get it right. "Let's go again," she insisted, feeling the most like herself than she had since...well maybe even before the horcrux hunt.
Theo smirked at her need to prove herself. "Okay," he nodded, finding her wide open eyes a second time. "Legilimens."
br
It had taken several weeks, but they had finally gotten to the point that they could leave the veritaserum brewing on its own for a few days. There had been a while where one of them had to stay with it around the clock, leaving Hermione to spend two awkward dinners alone with the Blacks, claiming that Theo had gone back to Croatia to tie up some loose ends. If they didn't believe her, they made no mention of it.
Theo had also taken several solo trips to the cave that held the horcrux to examine the wards surrounding it, something Hermione thought would be much more enjoyable than picking out a new house elf with Walburga and her sons; Regulus's breathless notes about what made a superior servant churning her stomach. But, it was true that he had far more knowledge than she did when it came to the complex warding that Voldemort had placed on the cave.
Theo had even begun crafting wards for their townhouse using both of their magic as part of the Nott family. It was an odd feeling to know that she was so thoroughly included in the Nott family now that her magic would lend their warding strength, something that seemed far more intimate than sharing a bed with him, even if he no longer did his best not to touch her, inevitably pulling her to rest her head on his broad chest in the night.
"He hadn't put anything to notify him about any disturbances on the cave, even if the wards are tampered with," Theo told her casually over dinner, trying to temper his optimism. "Probably figured there would be animals that would trip them all the time, or that the rest of his defences would be sufficient."
"That's probably why he had to go check for himself with Kreacher," Hermione said with a frown. "He needed to see for himself that it was still there."
"The good news is that we will be able to get into the cave. It will be difficult to unravel the wards, but between the two of us, it won't be impossible," he said brightly, going over the plan of what they would do when they got there. "Then we will be able to apparate to the island at the center of the cave freely."
"But we still don't know what the elixir guarding the locket is," Hermione said with a frown. She had no way of knowing if Dumbledore would have survived it, seeing as he had been murdered by Professor Snape not long after ingesting it. According to Harry, he'd been weak and unstable in the end.
"Yes, and there is no getting by the blood ward at the entrance. One of us will have to give some blood to get past and one of us will have to drink the elixir," he explained. "I'll drink the elixir."
"No, Theo -" Hermione said with a frown, feeling dread creeping in at the thought. "If something were to happen to you...I'd be left floundering. You would be able to get much further in this world. I don't even know what robes to buy without you!"
He gave her a small smile. "Don't sell yourself short, Hermione," he said in response. "You were willing to sacrifice yourself by going alone. I know you could accomplish what we've been sent back for. But in any case, you are far better at thinking on your feet in high stress situations than I am. I am confident that you will be able to heal me should something go wrong with the elixir, though I doubt that it has any purpose than to make you touch the inferi-infested water."
The thought made Hermione uneasy, but she could see her point and she could further see that there would be no convincing him otherwise. "We had better go now," she said with a frown. "Otherwise it will be another month before the veritaserum is completed and we have such a large chunk of time free."
With that decided, Theo offered her his arm and side-along apparated with her to the entrance of the cave. She immediately cut her hand and pressed it to the stone at the entrance, giving Theo an imperious look. "If you are going to drink the elixir, then I will give the blood sacrifice," she said firmly. "Besides, it's probably just meant to weaken the drinker any way. I'm going to give you the best shot at getting through this."
He frowned in response, before leading her inside of the cave where they could begin dismantling the wards. "The anti-apparition ward is tied in with the rest of them. We will have to peel them back like the layers of an onion," he explained matter-of-factly, before raising his wand and beginning the simple counter charm to the ward that produced an overwhelming sense of dread to fill the cave.
Hermione lifted her wand, helping with the charms work. It started out simple enough, but the further that they went, the more and more difficult it became to complete. Theo had done a good job of breaking the wards down into smaller pieces, but there was no denying the immense power that Voldemort had to complete this task on his own. She could feel the ripples of raw magic dissipating as the wards dropped one by one, each wave seeming to grow larger and large like waves on the ocean.
By the time that the last ward had fallen, Hermione was sweating from the effort, breathing as if she had just run for an hour. Casting a quick tempus, she saw that they had spent nearly an hour working together to take it down. "This was amazing," she whispered to Theo, looking at him with wide eyes. "I mean...I knew he was an accomplished wizard, but this is a show of magical force. And he's hidden it away where no one can see it."
"He's capable of much worse," Theo said with a serious look on his face, sounding as if he knew. "We should try to apparate now. I'll go first in case something happens." He did not wait for her agreement, instead disappearing from before her eyes with a loud crack and reappearing across the still lake on the little island moments later.
Cursing under her breath that he was well determined to go off and do things on his own, Hermione gripped her own wand tightly in her hand, visualizing the island across the lake and apparating there beside Theo. When she got there, he was standing in front of the column holding the locket covered in the elixir, using his wand to try and siphon off the liquid. Even though she knew it would be a lost cause, she began to lend her magic to anything she could think of to get the locket, including banishing it. To their collective dismay, the elixir remained untouched and unmoving in it's basin.
"I guess there is no other way around it," Theo said with a frown. He picked up the half shell that had been provided, filling it up as much as he could before bringing it to his lips. "Well, here goes nothing."
Before Hermione could even say an encouraging word, Theo was gulping down the first mouthful of the elixir, dipping the half shell in again to get more of the water. It seemed that his strategy was to drink as much of it as possible as quickly as possible, but the effects of the potion quickly caught up to him. She watched as he gasped, dropping to his knees, the shell falling to the sandy ground beneath them.
Theo pressed his hands to this throat, to his stomach and cried out in utter agony. She had never heard anyone make a noise quite like that, not even when she had splinched Ron. It was so visceral, making tears well in her eyes, because she knew...she knew that she was going to have to make him drink more. Grabbing the shell, Hermione quickly refilled it, noting that he only had about two or three more swallows to go.
He clutched at her leg, still hunched over in pain. "Please, Theo, you have to keep drinking," she pleaded, gently tilting his head up to look at her. His eyes were filled with a look of betrayal...of confusion, as to why she would force him to keep hurting. Still, he took the offered shell to his lips and drank down what he could. When it was empty, he pushed away at her hands.
"No more," he keened as tears rolled down his dirty cheeks freely. "Please, no more. I can't-" He was cut off by a low whine, no longer able to articulate his words.
Hermione filled the cup once more, seeing that she would be able to grab hold of the chain if he just hand this one last drink. "It's the very last, Theo, I promise," she said, tears beginning to fall from her own cheeks when she saw how much her husband was hurting. And it was all her fault. "Drink it," she commanded, holding the shell to his lips until he swallowed it all down.
He did as he was bade, stronger than she could have ever imagined. Turning her attention back to the basin, she grabbed at the chain, pulling the locket free from the remaining liquid. She choked out a noise of success, glad that they were done with this, before grabbing onto Theo's hand roughly, apparating him back to their townhouse as quickly as possible.
With his arm thrown over her shoulder, she half-dragged him towards their bathroom, dropping next to the toilet.
"Water, please," he whined, still crying. "I need water."
"You need to throw up first," Hermione insisted, knowing that the best defense against the elixir would be to get it out of his system. Using an emetic charm, she rubbed at his back while he hunched over the toilet bowl, spewing until the last of the poison was expelled from his stomach. Then she accioed a cup, before filling it with water. Handing it to Theo, she watched as he greedily drank it down. "Go slow, Theo," she said half-heartedly, knowing it was too much to ask.
Once he seemed to be moving in the right direction, she stood from the bathroom floor. "I'm just going to get some potions to make you feel better," she promised, pushing his sweaty hair back from his face, looking at his dark circle-rimmed eyes.
Hermione collected what she needed as quickly as possible, before returning to Theo's side. She knew that the potions would ease his pain, but only time would make it fade completely. Determined to help him as much as possible, she spent the evening with him lying on the bathroom floor, with his face pressed against her chest, holding him while he cried mumbling about his mother and how much it hurt.
She knew that they had said they would do anything to win the war, but this was the most visceral instance of sacrifice they'd handled so far. She just hoped that it wouldn't break them.