Please Note: My names for the Grangers come from a story I wrote back when. They are literally only acknowledged in canon as Dr. & Mrs. (which was stupid in itself, because her mother was also a Dr.), or Mr. and Mrs. Granger.
Chapter Three
She must've nodded off as he carried her through the massive house, because the next thing Hermione knew, she was settled on a particularly cushy chaise. Forcing open her eyes—God, even the soft illumination of the candlelit chandelier overhead seemed to hurt—she was met with the concerned face of Narcissa Malfoy. The blonde witch was carefully dabbing Hermione's face with a cool, damp cloth.
Looking past the other woman as she sat perched on the edge of the chaise, Hermione searched the room. The five of them were gathered in a lovely, dark-wood accented parlor. Lucius stood in profile, pouring over some enormous, aged tome in his hands, Draco leaned against a wall, unsuccessfully fighting off a yawn, and Thorfinn . . . .
Thorfinn Rowle paced back and forth before Lucius, appearing quite impatient . . . flustered, even. His hand waving in a circular gesture, he spoke to the elder Malfoy in a hushed rumble of sound. Possibly he was relaying to Lucius what he'd noted during their conversation in her kitchen? What was it Thorfinn had said? Really did a number on you, didn't he? Presumably, the 'he' in question was Dumbledore, since Thorfinn'd gone on to tell Lucius that the deceased Hogwarts headmaster had been a bit more 'heavy-handed' with her than they'd thought.
That seemed correct, so far. Lord, her head throbbed.
"Finally awake, are you?" Narcissa asked in a low voice.
"I've no idea what's happening to me," Hermione admitted, not really caring if she sounded weak in front of the Malfoys just now. Her ability to withstand anything had dwindled in a blink; the pain radiating through her, the sick twisting in her stomach, chipping away at her emotional and physical fortitude. She simply wanted answers, even ridiculous answers that she couldn't bring herself to believe were true.
"You've apparently been fighting the breaking of several very strong, layered charms that have been cast on you over the years." Narcissa sighed, a sound of distinct displeasure. "He really didn't want you remembering anything. Not that you could've had very much to remember, given how young you were. So unnecessary a measure."
"I don't understand why he'd do that," the younger witch agreed, frowning. Her voice was only escaping in a whisper and she hadn't even meant for that, but it seemed to steal her breath just to speak at all.
"Because he was a man who knew a means to an end when he saw one," Lucius chimed in unexpectedly, though he didn't look up from his research—at least Hermione assumed it was research, given the current situation. "I very much doubt he intended you any actual harm, if that sets your mind at ease at all. He probably didn't believe anyone but he could have realized your true parentage, so he likely planned to have you live out the rest of your days under a happy lie."
She completely ignored the second part of his statement. "A means to an end? How could that be me? What are you even talking about?"
He snapped shut the book and pivoted on his heel to face her directly. "Come now, Miss Granger," he said her surname with a hint derision, she noticed. "Surely you've been aware all this time that your friend Harry Potter would not have succeeded in ending Voldemort without you at his side, yes?"
"Well, yes, but—"
"Salazar Slytherin was a genius in nearly every sense of the term, it is only natural that if Dumbledore learned of you, he'd assume that you would follow in your father's footsteps. He assessed your intellectual worth, your magical skill, even at so young an age as you were entering Hogwarts, only just coming into your abilities, and set you in Potter's path."
Hermione winced, shuddering. "This can't be true, it just can't, okay?" she hissed out in an angry whisper, even as she curled in on herself, wrapping her arms around her horridly uncomfortable midsection. "My true parentage is that I'm the daughter of Dalia and William Granger. Simple bloody dentists! We knew each other, but Harry and I didn't even become friends until after Quirrel let in that mountain troll that attacked . . . ." Her voice trailed off. Why had that mountain troll made a point of going into the lavatory, of all places? If it was so thick it couldn't have gotten into the castle on its own, why would it have occurred to the creature to go through a closed door when an open corridor was within its field of vision?
Could that have really all been some ploy? Could Albus Dumbledore have really—? A shock went across the back of her head as if she'd been struck. She shut her eyes tight and cried out.
Narcissa cast a worried look toward the wizards.
Scowling, Thorfinn stepped away from Lucius and came to stand before Hermione. He lowered to his knees, bringing himself eye-level with her, though he waited until she met his gaze before speaking. "I went through exactly what you're feeling now. Just before my charm broke, I fought against what I was starting to recall and for a moment just before it was all over, I really thought 'I'd rather curl up and die than bear anymore of this.' You're a smart girl. Try, just for a moment, try to consider that it might be true."
She didn't want to feel sick anymore, she didn't want to hurt anymore, she was surprised her body wasn't giving out right now. But she couldn't. Even to try and entertain that this might help, she couldn't do it. The words wouldn't connect in her mind, no matter how she tried.
Pain lanced anew through her skull and her eyes welled up. "I can't!"
Appearing unexpectedly warm for a moment, he reached out, gently cupping her cheeks with his hands. "Sorry, maybe I don't didn't go through exactly this. Yours seems a lot worse than what happened to me, but . . . ." His gaze searched hers as he went on. "Your body rebelling this much against a thought? Does that feel normal to you?"
A shivering breath escaped her as she stared at him. No, none of this felt normal at all. Discarding a ridiculous notion was one thing, but truly trying to consider anything they were saying could be true intensified the rippling in her gut and the agony pounding in her head.
"I don't know what's going on," she managed in a whisper that was barely a thread of sound. Her parents might not be her parents, a Death Eater who'd once seemed more than happy to kill her was acting gently with her, the Malfoys were being . . . helpful and even, dare she think it, nice? The world had gone mad! "None of this makes sense, but you're all . . . you're all talking about it like it does."
Thorfinn pursed his lips as he looked over her pained expression. Exhaling sharply through his nostrils, he dropped his hands and stood. Pivoting on his heel, he directed his attention to Lucius. "No more. We can't tell her anything else until the charms are broken."
Lucius sighed, shaking his head. "It might actually prove easier to break them if she has more reason to question—"
"No!" Thorfinn just about roared the word, he was at the end of his patience with this. They should've started working to dispel the charms the moment he brought her here. "Look at what it's doing to her! Your way might end up killing her, Malfoy. We do this my way, now."
Lucius shook his head once more, seeming insistent. "Rowle, I really believe that—"
"I could give two shits what you believe!" Thorfinn's booming voice sent a shiver through Hermione. She was only vaguely aware of Narcissa leaning over her protectively as the wizard standing in defense before her went on. "I agreed to work with you because of the trust our fathers put in the Malfoys, but so help me, if she dies, you die. I assume we understand each other?"
Hermione tried to block out what Thorfinn had just said. She didn't need anymore questions running around in her head and making her—as Thorfinn had suggested, himself—want to curl up and die.
"Father, he's right," Draco piped up, his voice weary but placating from where he'd fallen, slumped against the wall. His head tipped back, he was watching the scene with bleary, half-closed eyes. "I've seen how she looked through everything from being literally petrified to Aunt Bellatrix torturing her, shortly followed by believing she'd lost her best friend and an entire bloody war with him. Never have I see her look like this."
"I don't get it," Hermione said, her voice nearly lost in the room, despite the momentary silence following Draco's observation. "Why's Rowle so upset?"
Narcissa glanced up at the aforementioned wizard—he'd turned his head to dart his gaze toward Hermione, his expression uncertain—before answering. "That's a discussion best left for when remembering stops being so dangerous for you."
Lucius breathed out an unhappy sound, even as he nodded. "So be it." He held out one hand, that ancient tome still clutched in the other. "Should be easier now that we have both her and the wand that cast the first charm."
Hermione looked down at herself as Thorfinn pivoted to face her, his own hand out toward her. In a slow, numb movement, she unwrapped her right arm from her torso. Unbelievable. She was still clutching Salazar Slytherin's wand!
She hadn't even noticed. A corner of her brain began grappling with the questions of how, when, and why a Hogwarts House founder could've cast a charm on her, and an instant shock of pain resounded through her skull in response.
Biting back a scream, she slapped the wand into Thorfinn's waiting fingers. "Take it!"
Draco pushed up to his feet as Thorfinn brought the wand to Lucius. He was nearly out of the room before his mother stopped him.
"Draco? Where are you off to?"
Letting out a short, disgruntled breath, he rubbed the heel of his palm against his eye. "Going to do something more useful than sitting on my arse?"
Narcissa shot him a quelling look.
Her son's shoulders drooped and he held up his hands. He had all he could do not to roll his eyes at his mother. They were a family of Dark wizards and witches who'd mistakenly supported someone who might've brought about the destruction of Wizarding Britain, and she was cross with him over language? "I'm going to brew her a sleeping potion. She should get some rest while those two sort this out. Besides, there's a chance what we have to do to break the charms won't exactly tickle. It's probably better if she sleeps through it."
The blonde witch nodded and waved him off. Turning her attention to the men left in the room, she said, "Rowle, we should probably move her someplace more comfortable for the time being. Assist me, would you?"
Thorfinn was back beside the chaise in an instant. Stooping, he slid his arms beneath Hermione and lifted her as carefully as he could manage—he wasn't exactly a man known for delicate movements, after all.
Narcissa shot to her feet and led the way through the parlor. As she stepped into the corridor, she called out, "Draco? She'll be in the Hollyhock Room when that potion is ready."
Hermione grudgingly let her head droop to one side, her cheek resting against Thorfinn's chest as they made their way through the house and began climbing the long staircase. There she went, noticing that he wasn't uncomfortable again. And the rocking motion of his gait beneath them was soothing.
Fighting to keep her eyes from closing, she asked, "The Hollyhock Room?"
Narcissa waved in a dismissive gesture with one hand, her other clutched into the length of her dressing gown and nightdress to keep the fragile material away from her footfalls on the staircase. "The very first lady of Malfoy Manor absolutely adored her gardens. Named all the guest rooms after the flowers that had been planted for her."
Since she'd stopped trying to fight with her own thoughts, the pain and the queasiness had subsided a bit, but the struggle with her body had left Hermione entirely drained, worn out.
Her head was spinning again, slowly though, and she felt an overtired sort of giddiness. "D' you have a favorite, Mrs. Malfoy?"
The elder witch glanced back at Hermione as they reached the top of the staircase and started along the corridor. "Room or flower?"
Hermione curled her fingers into the front of Thorfinn's robes simply to have something solid to hold onto, though she could not seem to make her hands grip any tighter. She thought perhaps she was asking—that she was talking at all—for the simple sake of keeping her mind occupied with anything aside from the thoughts that were bringing her such pain. "Both, I suppose."
Narcissa frowned thoughtfully as she stopped before a door and pushed it open. "I would have to say black baccara rose, and the Tulip Room. Don't take that personally, dear, the Hollyhock Room is simply the closest to the staircase. I presumed Mr. Rowle wouldn't want to be too far away from you when he returns to the parlor."
Watching through half-closed eyes as Narcissa pulled back the quilt and fluffed the pillow—oh, right, the Malfoys had been forced to give up their elves as part of their probation following the War—Hermione shook her head. Or, rather, she tried to, but the attempt really only resulted in sad little wobble against Thorfinn's chest. "Why is that?"
"Oi," Thorfinn, who'd been quiet all this time, cut in then. "I thought it was clear such discussions are best saved for when your own memories won't have you knocking at death's door?"
Why was she listening to any of this? Why was she reluctant to uncurl her fingers from Thorfinn's robes as he carefully settled her on the bed? Why couldn't she string together two thoughts that made sense out of all this?
He frowned just a bit, the expression pensive, as he slid his hands around hers and gingerly pried her fingers from the fabric. "Try to rest, that's all you need to do right now. Little Malfoy will be up in a moment with that potion, I'm sure."
As he straightened to his full, imposing, height beside the bed, words started tumbling from her lips, nearly seeming to form of their own accord. "The way you're acting . . . ." She swallowed hard and tried once more; speaking was becoming a chore again. "Are we—are we supposed to be something to one another?"
Chewing at his lower lip as he held her exhausted gaze, he let a moment slip by before he sighed. He didn't give any response, yet, instead pulling the quilt up over her before he answered. "Rest now. Talk later."
Hermione tried for a nod, but it came off as another pathetic little head wobble. She looked past him to where Narcissa waited in the doorway. "I don't know whether or not to thank you. Suppose that'll have to wait until later, too?" This was madness, but she was too drained to put up a fuss.
"As a matter of courtesy, it's important that you're at least considering it," Narcissa said, a smirk that Hermione thought the blonde witch'd probably picked up from her husband over the years curving one side of her mouth. "Hopefully, when you wake up, you'll know which is the appropriate response."
"I've got it!" Draco's voice filtered into the room from outside as he carried himself up the stairs in the best approximation of a jog he could manage.
His mother stepped aside to let him in, and he trudged over to the bedside. Feeling rather certain Rowle wasn't going to let him close enough to administer the potion, himself, Draco handed the vial off to the other wizard.
Thorfinn eyed him a moment as he accepted the dose. "Why are you so bloody tired? Yeah, I get it, it's the middle of the night, but your parents are fine and they're, well, old."
"I beg your pardon?"
Thorfinn and Draco both winced as they glanced toward the door. Narcissa was regarding Rowle with a severely arched brow as she crossed her arms. Hermione almost felt bad that she couldn't help snickering over the scene.
His brows pinched upward. "Well, you're the eldest people in the house, aren't you?"
Narcissa rolled her eyes and looked away, clicking her tongue in a noise that conveyed both anger and impatience quite eloquently.
"I haven't slept much since the War," Draco explained with a shake of his head, hoping to diffuse the situation before his mother drew her wand and hexed the lot of them. "This was the first night I actually felt like I was getting sleep and then my father comes and yanks me out of bed, throws this complicated and lengthy explanation at me as I'm still trying to wake up, and well, here we are."
Thorfinn studied the younger man's face for a few heartbeats before he arched an eyebrow. "Fair enough."
Turning back toward the bed, he saw Hermione watching them with a glazed look in her eyes. With how tired she must be from just the last hour, alone, he thought a potion to help her sleep shouldn't be necessary, but the youngest Malfoy was correct—breaking the charms was likely going to be rough on her, keeping her unconscious might be the only merciful way to go about any of it.
Huh, look at that. Thorfinn Rowle deciding in favor of mercy! Who'd have thought?
He perched on the edge of the bed and slid his free hand behind Hermione's neck, lifting her a bit. Though he half expected her to take in a mouthful and spit it in his face, she obediently drank down the vial's contents.
"You didn't fight me," he noted, a half-smile playing on his lips.
Now she did let her eyes close as she shrugged, a breathy little laugh escaping her. "Oh, please. You've had more than enough opportunities to torture and kill me tonight. If you wanted that, I'd already be dead."
Thorfinn nodded, laughing as he eased her back down against the pillow. "Good. Rest now. We'll see you in a bit.'
As he rose, she shot out a hand—the motion so fast, given her state, that it surprised everyone in the room—and caught his wrist. He looked at her fingers around his arm for a few heartbeats before lifting his gaze to hers.
She'd forced her eyes open once more, staring at his face as she asked, her lips barely moving for how tired she was, "You promise? Answers are coming?"
His massive shoulders sloped downward as he rested his hand over hers. "I promise."
Nodding, she let her hand fall away from him. She watched him as he followed Narcissa and Draco from the room, feeling the effects of the potion pull her toward sleep faster than her own well-earned weariness was.
As her eyelids drifted downward, the told herself one last time that this was madness. Tried to talk herself into thinking this was all her own imagining. Because that look he gave her just now as he turned to glance back at her one last time before he disappeared out the door—that look of concern in Thorfinn Rowle's blue eyes—couldn't be real.
