June 15th, 2009
(7:00am) Don't pick up a paper
(7:00am) Who am I kidding, you hate the papers
(7:00am) Hermy
(7:01am) DO NOT PICK UP THE PROPHET
(7:10am) You already did, didn't you
(8:12am) Skeeter, is a bottom dweller
(8:12am) Pay her no mind
(8:15am) Granger
(8:15am) Bottom.
(8:15am) Dweller,
(8:32am) Are you not coming in today?
(8:32am) You don't have to come in
(8:33am) I'm just wondering
Hermione almost made it to the office.
Normally she would've apparated straight there, the wards were custom designed by both herself and Draco to allow only the two of them access, but she was in pleasant spirits and had decided, since things were going well with the latest case with the Ministry, she deserved a treat. She stopped by the little bakery across the street from their office, intent on getting herself a sencha green tea and Draco a coffee, black with two sugars, when it had caught her eye.
Hermione gasped, nearly dropping her bag, as the headline knocked the wind from her lungs with all the force of a stray bludger.
WIFE OF RONALD WEASLEY AND BEST FRIEND TO THE CHOSEN ONE SEEN ON SECRET DATE WITH MALFOY HEIR
"For the love of all that is holy!" Hermione snarled, lip curled feraly, and pulled her wand from where it was pinning the loose bun to her head.
Her hair cascaded around her in a wild fury, free if its encasement, while her right hand raised.
Hermione Granger was a vision of fury.
"INCENDIO!"
And all the papers caught fire.
The barista and bakery patrons stared in horror. One, a portly wizard with thick eyebrows, was caught with his mouth so agape that a piece of croissant slipped from his pale lips.
The cafe was in such a quiet state of shock that Hermione, and most probably everyone else, heard the wayward croissant plop to the tiled floor.
The witch in question twisted her wand back into her hair. "I'll pay for those," she said before dousing the flames and then, her nerve suddenly failing, promptly rushing out the door.
oOo
(9:03am) Sawthepapers
(9:03am) Itscompletelystupid
(9:05am) Didyoutakethedayoff?
(9:05am) Youshould
(11:35am) Imworkinglatetonight
(11:35am) Justrelaxathome
(11:41am) Iloveyou
(1:24pm) Rita Skeeter, out of retirement for this bloody shite
(1:26pm) I'll talk to my contacts in the Prophet about this
(1:26pm) Heads will roll
(1:27pm) And you know I'm not joking
(5:56pm) Hey you don't have to respond to my texts
(5:56pm) Just
(5:57pm) Answer me when you're ready
(7:12pm) Obviously Weasley must know we're not having some sort of affair
(7:12pm) Obviously
(7:15pm) I'll have someone handle this
(7:25m) See you tomorrow?
Hermione looked down at her phone and then tossed it onto the nightstand besides her. Ron was working late at the store, Rose was tucked into her crib and Hermione was alone in bed imagining all the things she would do to Rita bloody Skeeter if she ever saw the vile woman again.
Being trapped in a jar would be the least of her worries.
She'll be begging for that jar.
The witch took another sip of her wine, though as discussed she was not much of a drinker, the nondescript red blend was a welcome reprieve from the flurry of anxiety that was sloshing about in her stomach.
Hermione had been down this road before.
Ron was a media darling and even Harry these days was painted like the hero he was, but Hermione was always- always the Jezebel.
One third of the illustrious Golden Trio. Heroine in her own right. Brightest witch of her age.
It meant nothing to the tabloids.
I wonder how long Molly will refuse my owls this time.
Hermione took another sip of her drink.
oOo
Another scream split the air. Marcus wiped the rain, coming down in sheets and clouding his vision, from his eyes to no avail.
"Granger!" he cried again. The clearing they had shared every night for weeks now was empty or, at least, he was pretty bloody sure it was empty as he could barely see a foot in front of him. "Where are you?"
She screamed again, a wordless terror.
No, she was not in the clearing.
His body stiffened from the sound, urging him to action, but where was she? Her scream was so tortured he was genuinely terrified. Could someone be injured in a dream? Maybe? Granger would know, she would know if someone could get injured in a dream, but currently Marcus couldn't fucking find her.
The wizard closed his eyes and inhaled deeply. He exhaled for two heart beats longer than the inhale, focusing on the sound of Granger's voice.
To his left. The screams were coming to his left.
Marcus ran, his arms cast before him blindly, pushing away tree branches and soaked leaves. "Granger! Granger, where are you?" he continued to yell and was answered only by her scream.
Marcus was not a Gryffindor, he was not a wizard with a penchant for recklessness nor did he put much stock in bravery over self-preservation. However, he was also no coward and, as a rather intimidating man, had found himself afraid, truly afraid, only a handful of times in his life.
He was afraid the first time he fell from his broom, bones shattering.
He was afraid the morning his mother collapsed in the dining room.
And he was afraid now, running through the woods, wayward branches scratching the skin of his face, his arms, his hands. He was bloody terrified.
Adrenaline spurred him on, her screams were growing louder. He had to be getting closer.
He had to.
And then there were no screams and somehow the dread that had replaced the blood in Marcus's veins turned to ice.
It was so much less terrifying when she had been screaming.
Why had she stopped?
"Fuck, fuck, fuck," he repeated desperately. For a moment Marcus attempted to convince himself that this was just a dream and everything was fine, but Marcus Flint was a wizard and he might've had to repeat his seventh year, but he wasn't quite the idiot everyone expected. Marcus Flint had known that first night what Hermione was still barely convinced of; this was real.
This was real.
He had stopped running, stopped moving, stopped breathing. He didn't know which way to go. "Granger!"
There was no screaming, but the forest was far from silent. The rain pounded the ground with unrelenting violence and within his chest, Marcus's heart thudded with equal intensity, filling his ears with the sound. He called her name once more, feeling his throat strain from the effort of it. That pulling of muscles, almost making him cough, was the most discomfort he had felt in this previously pleasing dreamworld.
He had never been too hot nor too cold, he'd never stubbed his toe or stepped on a rock. A branch had never scratched his cheek or his arm. Nothing in these dreams had ever been unpleasant.
Until now.
Marcus was finding this pretty sodding unpleasant.
He yelled her name again and again and again until his throat strained and his voice cracked and then he yelled, "HERMIONE!"
He'd never said her first name. Not to her. Not in conversation. It was always Granger.
Until now.
For a heart beat's time nothing happened and then-
And then she screamed.
And Marcus ran.
Pushed forward by purpose, by terror, by the dawning realization that yes, he and Hermione Granger were friends and say what you want about Slytherins, but Hufflepuffs don't have a monopoly on loyalty.
As he ran he called her name, her first name, and she in turn continued screaming and as her screams grew louder, a clear indication that he was getting closer, they morphed from wordless into horrifying.
She was begging for help.
A low hanging branch knocked him on the forehead, but he'd taken worse hits to the cranium and continued on. Branches reached out to trip him at the ankles, but his reflexes were honed by years of athletics; he would not fall. Even as his bare feet slipped on the mud soaked earth, he barreled forward, screams filling his ears until-
There she was!
Huddled on the ground, black dress soaked through, hair a wild mess of tangles obscuring her face. She screamed again and Marcus could now clearly hear the sobs that were laced into those screams, he could see the way her whole body shook from the effort.
He raced to her, sliding to his knees as he finally made it to her side.
"Hermione, Hermione! I'm here, Hermione, I'm here." He grabbed at her hands, pulling them from her face. "What's happening-"
She looked up at him, dark cheeks stained with tears and rain and mud, and when his russet eyes met her pools of deep amber, Marcus had just enough time to wonder if she could see him before he felt a pull in his stomach.
When the spinning subsided, Marcus noticed first that the rain had stopped and second that the screaming persisted. Hermione's wrists were still in his hands, he was staring into her face.
Her beautiful face that now had shockingly lost all its color.
But she wasn't looking at him.
She was also not the one screaming.
The screams were coming from everywhere.
Marcus followed her gaze over his shoulder, never letting go of her wrists, and looked on in growing horror at the frozen events unfolding inside what he could now see was an opulent old manor parlor.
Two figures were frozen like someone had paused a Muggle movie.
A version of Hermione, dirty and bloody and much more like the girl he remembered in school, lay on the floor unmoving. Straddling her, knife in hand and equally frozen, was a black haired woman, frightfully pale, mania contorting a face that was probably once lovely, but now was twisted with cruelty.
The woman looked vaguely familiar in that aristocratic way Marcus grew up associating with the other pure blood families, but he couldn't place her.
"No," came a small whimper, snapping Marcus's attention back to the witch in his hands. "No, no, no," she cried.
Was this part of the dream?
"What's happening-what-" He searched Hermione's face desperately, eyes racking across her delicate features.
Delicate features? When the fuck did he become this person?
Later. He'd think about that later.
"No, no," Hermione repeated, voice barely above a strained whisper. She wrenched her arms from his grip, her small hands flying to her neck.
Biting his tongue was all Marcus could do to keep from gasping.
How had he never noticed the scar? He hadn't spent time just staring at her, it was true, but they'd passed every night together for weeks and yet this was the first time he'd noticed it. The scar was thin but still, it cut across the length of her neck under her chin; a wretched pale line. Marcus turned back to the frozen scene and saw again the knife wielded by the mad eyed woman atop the younger Hermione.
He nearly gasped.
A memory.
Holy sodding fuck, this was a memory.
He had heard it, the stories of the war were not secrets, at some point it had been mentioned in his presence that Hermione Granger had been tortured and survived. Survived what older more experienced witches and wizards had not.
Her name was spoken with a reverence at times even amongst the aristocracy. Brightest Witch of Her Age.
Here she was, sobbing before him.
"It's not real," he soothed, pulling her towards him. "Hermione, I'm here. It's not real."
He whispered soothing comforts into her wild mess of curls. Or at least, what he hoped were soothing comforts. Marcus had never been one for consoling others, but Hermione's hands were gripping his shirt like the way you grip a broom when you're free falling: with your life.
Her face was buried in him and he could feel more than hear her cries against his chest.
Marcus tried to think back to his mother, the only person who had ever been able to calm him; he thought of her hands in his thick hair and lips on his forehead. He thought of the gentle lilt of her Devonshire accent. His mother was a descendent of the toad witches of the south west, she knew how to sing to the Old One and how to soothe beasts. She had always known how to comfort him.
"It's over," he whispered, rubbing circles into her back. "I'm here and it's over."
Hermione shifted her head, tilting her neck back, and stared up at him. He drank in the sight of those eyes. A brilliant golden brown, like a cat, and for the first time that night, Marcus finally felt as though she was seeing him.
He was unprepared for the things those red rimmed eyes were doing to his stomach.
Her lips moved almost imperceptibly.
"Marcus?" she breathed.
He smiled with a relief he felt deep in his chest.
And then like the snap of an apparition, they were back in the clearing.