As always, so much love goes out to my beta, RESimon. I've also gone back and cleaned up any errors from earlier chapters — thank you all for bearing with me. I had a hand operation during the time that I was releasing many of the earlier chapters and relied heavily on voice typing, which often resulted in odd phrasing that slipped past me. Thank you all for bearing with me and continuing to follow the fic— I know how annoying typos can be! An especially huge thank you from both myself and RESimon goes out to Darkcat18 for helping point out said errors. You saved us both quite a bit of time!

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Hermione crashed onto the hard floor, the impact taking the wind out of her lungs. She coughed, sitting up as she looked at her surroundings. They had landed in a dimly lit stairwell somewhere in St. Mungo's, where a loud alarm blared overhead from an unseen source. The man she had been transported with was on his knees, scrambling forward toward where his wand had tumbled down the steps.

"Stupefy!" Mercifully, Hermione hadn't relinquished her own tight grip on her wand. Hermione's spell hit him from such close range that the man flew forward, tumbling down the steps and landing twisted at an unnatural angle. The stairwell door in front of where the man had landed slammed open, crushing his twisted body against the wall. Instead of a St. Mungo's employee dressed in Healer garb however, a figure dressed in full Death Eater regalia attempted to squeeze through, blocked only by the body that forced the door to remain half shut. Hermione scrambled backward, wide-eyed as she took in the alarm that continued to blare and the man that was trying to squeeze his way into the stairwell.

St. Mungo's was under attack.

Hermione shot out a nasty slashing hex at him as she sprang to her feet, her heart thundering as she tore open the door beside her, stepping out into chaos. Healers ran about, popping away along with various patients as attendants ran past, dropping the emergency portkeys in their hands. Hermione shouldered through the chaos, her heart aching as she realized that she and Malfoy had brought this down on the hospital, on all these weak, innocent people—

It was then that high pitched screams began.

At the end of the hallway, the elevator had opened to reveal a group of Death Eaters who ran out, slashing down anyone who happened to step in their way.

The Healers were disappearing with the patients quickly, but not nearly quickly enough, and Hermione took advantage of the thinning crowd to throw up shields around those who had yet to flee. This, of course, redirected all attention to her. The frenzied crowd was thinning rapidly, and the Death Eaters zeroed in on her, immediately unleashing a litany of curses. She repelled them and threw back her own, the hall erupting into further chaos as spells whizzed around.

Hermione dodged a spell that glowed a frightening green, whispering of death as it grazed past her shoulder. She responded by exploding an abandoned hospital bed before ducking into a doorway, smiling satisfactorily when she heard multiple cries of anguish as the splintered mass flew about. When she stepped out of the room, however, her heart dropped. The door to the stairwell banged open, admitting at least a half dozen more opponents— too many. The hall was empty now except for them, and they all stormed toward her, impeded momentarily only by the blasting hex she threw at the wall opposite where she stood, leaving an explosion of concrete and plaster. She shoved her hand into her back pocket, throwing the small pouch of powder she had inside of it into the hall before exploding it, too.

Instantly, they were plunged into darkness. Hermione stumbled back into the room, biting back a curse as her shin hit the edge of the bed. Outside, she could hear the curses and shuffling of the Death Eaters as they made their way towards her, and she knew she had only moments before at least some would stumble upon the room. She scrambled back further until her back hit the wall, allowing her hands to roam along it desperately as she heard the footsteps outside drawing closer— there.

Her fingers grasped the windowsill just as she felt a spell ricochet through the room in the darkness, barely missing her.

"Reducto!" she screamed, shattering the window into a heap of glass that glittered in the night sky.

Outside, everything was burning.

Tall, criss-crossing lines of flame divided the street, which was dotted equally with fleeing figures as it was with dueling ones. Hermione gaped at the display, watching the chaos in the street as Death Eaters dueled against an unseen target. People fled the scene, their screams echoing in the night amongst the chaos. She looked down, realizing that she was three stories up. Not terribly high, no, but to jump…

A hand snatched her cloak then.

"I've got the little—" the man's triumphant cry cut off as Hermione stunned him.

Knowing that she was officially out of time, she sucked in a quick breath before bounding out the window, stifling a scream as she rushed through the air. As the ground flew closer, she managed to mumble a levitation charm on her cloak and a cushioning charm on the ground just before she reached it. The result was a less than graceful landing, but a landing nonetheless. Her heart continued to race as straightened, reeling about what she had just done. Still, she drew on her adrenaline and let it pump her forward as she examined the scene around her, wand at the ready as she observed the Death Eaters scattered in the street, all furiously aiming spells in one direction. Her heart dropped as she somehow knew deep within her who they must have been aiming at.

Her husband.

She felt frozen as she stood and watched the scene unfold before her, eyes whipping to the scattered Death Eaters, some who struggled to put out the fire while others shot back deadly curses in return. As a patch of fire was put out another sprang up in its place, keeping some Death Eaters at bay while the heat seared them even as others continued to attack him. Her hands trembled even as she clutched her wand, knowing that even if she began to attack from this side, she could not guarantee that they wouldn't both perish.

As the thought crossed her mind, there were several cracks around her as new people joined in the battle. These, however, were not dressed in Death Eater garb, but were instead wearing regular clothing with their faces uncovered. Order members, she quickly realized.

Her relief was stunted with fear as she realized that despite reinforcements, Malfoy was still disguised, and most Order members — even those who knew about them — could easily mistake him for a foe, even despite his lack of Death Eater garb. No, they were no safer than they had been moments prior— she would have to act quickly indeed. She took a deep breath, then pointed her wand at herself before whispering one word: "Aguamenti."

Instantly, water began to spray from her wand, drenching her from head to toe until water dripped into her eyes, blurring her vision.

She took off at a run, grasping at her wand with slippery fingers the best she could as she fired off random curses at the dark-robed figures that blurred past as she charged toward the fire. She no longer knew friend from foe, trusting that any Order members she accidentally stunned would soon be rescued by their peers. Her clothes clung heavily to her, so laden with water that her movements felt almost sluggish. The heat was unbearable as she drew nearer to the fire, her heart racing as she felt herself begin to tremble as she charged closer and closer still—

And then she jumped, flying through the white-hot flames and tumbling to the cobblestone in a tucked roll, hoping to extinguish any flames that she had picked up. Flames licked the air all around her, and she looked up to see Malfoy only a few feet away, his wand trained directly at her even as she caught the light of a litany of spells sailing through the flames toward him. A curse whizzed past her head, and she sprang up, throwing back the hood of her cloak that had fallen over her head in her haste.

"It's me!" she shouted, raising her hands.

He froze, watching as she ran toward him, barrelling into him and clutching as much of him as she could before disapparating.

X

They landed in the main room of their cabin, both still heaving for breath. Hermione's teeth chattered as the cold wetness started to seep into her bones in the absence of the overwhelming heat of the flames, and she had just finished drying herself when Malfoy snatched her by the shoulders.

The muscles in his neck strained against his skin as he shouted, his nostrils flaring with each word as he started to shout at her. "What the fuck were you thinking?!" he thundered, his grip on her arms tightening as he shook her.

"I was thinking that you had trapped yourself in a ring of fire—"

"We shouldn't have been there in the first place!"

"And how is it my fault?" she shot back, throwing her hands in the air.

"Your fucking portkeys, Granger!" he slammed a hand into the wall. "If you had just let the damn things go—"

"And what, start murdering people?"

His nostrils flared sharply as he glared back at her. "They were going to murder you, and they damn near succeeded!"

"You don't even know what happened, and you're already throwing out accusations!"

"What I saw was that damn pouch in your hand, like it always is, as if they would have spared you even a thought before severing your hands to make you drop it."

She gritted her teeth. "That's not all that it's about, Malfoy!"

"Oh really? Because everything seems to be about your bloody morals with you Gryffindors—"

"Or maybe it's because I wasn't trained to be a murderer!" she shouted back. "Has it ever occurred to you that this" —she gestured wildly around them— "was not where I thought I'd end up, what I thought I'd have to be doing?"

Her words had been harsh, she knew, but she couldn't find it in herself to take them back, even as she watched a deeper tension set in his already rigid stance and feel the flare of his anger tickling at her consciousness.

"Is that all you think of me?" he spat out a short, humorless laugh. "That I was raised by murderers, to be nothing but a murderer whose only purpose is murdering—"

"That's not what I meant! You're so— so calm over the idea of just killing people and it's bloody alarming!"

He stalked closer to her, his broad frame looming over her. "Has it ever occurred to you that all I want is to survive this, for my mother to survive this, to see her have the peace she deserves?!"

"There is more than one way to win this war, Malfoy!" she snapped, tilting her head back to meet his gaze evenly even as he continued to loom over her. "Not every method requires that we kill at every turn, and I know that you know that too."

Malfoy scoffed. "I've told you this before— I do not care for your pretty morals."

Hermione's eyes narrowed. "You say that, yet Kingsley informed me that two more Death Eaters arrived at St. Mungo's after the last mission other than the one I sent myself. So do not stand there and pretend that you don't understand this, because you do!"

"What I understand is that there are things that we must do even if you don't want to because this is war and our goal is to survive, not save every bloody person that crosses our path—"

"Fuck you, Malfoy," she spat.

They were both breathing heavily, her fists clenched while he was taut and tense, his face still flushed red with anger as he glared back at her. Now that they were alone, she felt the emotions that her adrenaline had suppressed during the battle rearing up— a swirl of fear, anger, and desperation settling in the air between them, a ball of swirling tension.

And before she could register her actions, tell herself to stop this, stop it now, she surged forward and snatched his face, dragging him down into a hard kiss. He was frozen for a long beat before he snatched her up and kissed her back hard, picking her up and carrying her backward while she wrapped her legs around his waist, arching into him as he squeezed her bum hard. Their kisses were rough, open-mouthed and filled with heated breaths and bitten lips.

There was no passion in this, only a pure and almost primal need. When he finally deposited her roughly upon the desk, sending books and piles of parchment alike tumbling to the ground and scattering around them, she tore at his shirt until he helped her drag it over his head, immediately sealing his lips to hers once more. When she clawed at his trousers, he slid his hands up her shirt and into her brassiere, causing her to gasp out a moan as he pinched a nipple while she finally freed his hard, leaking cock. He was thick, enough so that her fingers couldn't close around him as she pumped him steadily.

He pulled back only to tear off her trousers and knickers in one swift movement, leaving her bare from the waist down. He threaded limber fingers through her nether curls, finding her already excessively slick and ready for him from the overwhelming feeling of their combined need that had resulted in an intense heat pooling between her thighs. His fingers came back glistening wet, and he rubbed off the slickness on her thigh before plunging his cock into her without ceremony. She cried out immediately, grasping at the desk around them for purchase. She heard an inkwell tumble over, and even as she felt the wet slickness of the ink on her palm she found that she didn't care, instead opting to grasp onto him, her hand leaving slick black marks across his pale, muscled torso. His thrusts were hard and determined, him chasing his release as she snaked her clean hand down to her clit, rubbing it fiercely as she chased her own.

Her orgasm tore through her not a moment later, and she cried out loudly, biting down onto his shoulder while pressing herself closer, seeking more friction on her clit. He dragged her hips forward suddenly as he started to pound her harder, causing her to slump back against the wall. The room was filled with the lewd sound of skin slapping against skin, punctuated by her moans and his low grunts. He came with a shudder, his cock pulsing hard in her just as she managed to crest another, smaller orgasm.

It was silent for a long while, the only sounds their heavy pants as they both caught their breaths. Malfoy had leaned forward, bracketing his muscled arms on either side of her as he caught his breath. She could feel his release steadily sliding down her thighs, coating her skin and staining the parchment that was still littered atop the desk. When their breaths finally slowed, Malfoy slowly straightened, and she slid off the desk, gathering her clothes.

And without another word, she slipped into the bedroom, closing the door behind her.

I know you've all been waiting for this, hehe. Can't wait to hear your thoughts!

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