Chapter V: If I Cannot Move Heaven, I will Raise Hell

(Virgil – Aeneid)

Hermione wakes up the next morning in a tangle of bedsheets, her skin slicked with sweat and the place between her thighs shockingly damp.

For an incredulous moment she wonders if she's wet herself, but no. Not even she is that naïve.

She knows exactly why she's so wet. She spent the entire night trapped in intensely vivid, painfully erotic dreams of Draco Malfoy – dreams of his mouth on hers, her mouth on him, his fingers (and more) in her. For a girl who has never, ever had a wet dream in all of her seventeen years, it's a little bit unexpected.

It figures that the only boy who's ever turned her on would be a demon.

She considers the possibility that Draco is some sort of incubus who's placed a lust spell on her. But she doesn't think that's the case. For one, now that she's awake, she feels a lot more clear-headed about him, and surely a lust spell wouldn't have dissipated so quickly. For another, while she'd have to be blind not to consider him attractive, she isn't attracted to him. She can't be. He wields his sexuality like a weapon, not an asset.

With clinical detachment she considers masturbating to ease the ache. But it's 6.05 a.m., and she's already lost five minutes from her allotted half-an-hour to read the Financial Times. Hermione hates unplanned variations to her routine. Her brain will just have to overcome her body and push all of that desire right away.

Immersing herself in a highly technical article on the Federal rate cuts soon cures her. Pleased at the restoration of her equilibrium – there's nothing Hermione hates more than hormones and emotions – she turns her mind to the question of all the knowledge she gained last night.

She suspects she can discard Draco's grandiose claims of owning her. Surely she'd feel it if she were under the control of someone other than herself. When he speaks, she doesn't feel the urge to obey him, nor does she feel particularly attuned or inclined to him.

Besides, she'd already made a deal with another demon before him: his father. Can a soul belong to three people at once?

It seems unlikely, but no possibility can be ruled out. She could always ask Draco. He would tell her…but then another of her precious questions would be gone. She's still smarting over the loss of the rhetorical question last night. She needs to do better if she's going to be hanging out with the devil's son.

Fortunately, another source of information has opened itself up to her.

Hermione feels a frisson of combined fear and anticipation roll up her spine as she remembers that she still owes him five kisses. Obviously, she has never kissed anyone before, and she can't quite believe that there exists an individual who seems to actively want to kiss her. He probably only wants the experience of being with a Mudblood – although he was contemptuous enough of them yesterday that it seems odd.

Still, hypocrisy must surely be the least of a demon's flaws. Maybe that's all there is to his interest: a drive to gain new knowledge, specifically of what it's like to kiss a human. This drive is probably the one motivator in the entire universe Hermione truly understands, since it's more or less the same reason why she even gets up in the mornings. She can hardly deny someone else their own attempt at acquiring a new experience.

On the other hand, although Hermione agreed to Draco's deal because she sees absolutely no way it can hurt her, she'd rather be safe than sorry when it comes to his motives. Hence her intended destination today.

It's Thursday, a day earmarked in her diary for rereading the medical books she mentions in her personal statement. It won't do to be tripped up in her interviews by being quizzed on a text she hasn't read for two years. But despite this very important task, after breakfast she finds herself wandering down the cracked pavement of St George's Avenue.

She hesitates as her feet falter outside the unprepossessing façade of the Church of Hogwarts. Doubts are beginning to curdle inside her. Is she making a terrible mistake? Draco warned her that, if the Order of the Phoenix finds out about her deals, they'll kill her. He's a liar. But that doesn't mean it isn't the truth.

Yet she can't stop now. Now that she knows there's a demon-hunting organisation, of all things, a scant half-mile from her front door, she can't just go placidly back to her mundane life like it isn't even there. That would drive her insane. It's bad enough to be a human in the demon world; worse to be a human who acts like the demon world doesn't exist, with its intricacies and mysteries she hasn't even begun to get to the bottom of yet.

Filled with fresh resolve, she walks into the church.

An odd sensation flickers over her skin as she passes the threshold. It feels a bit like a giant fan has just sprayed water all over her. They do that in the streets of Saudi Arabia, when it's pushing forty-five degrees in the height of summer: set up giant fans and let them pump out a fine cooling mist. That's what it feels like has just happened to her.

But her skin is dry, and as she clears the doorway the sensation vanishes.

The church looks subtly different. It takes Hermione a moment to work out why. The table on the far side which had only a single candle on it yesterday is now full of them, tall waxy red tapers crowding and jostling each other for space on its surface. Yesterday she'd have assumed it was for a religious service. Today she wonders if it's part of the mysterious demon-killing ritual Draco refused to tell her about.

Stupid Draco. It would've been safe to tell her; Hermione's no murderer. Probably.

Dumbledore's painted eyes follow her as she makes her way to the pews, which are empty apart from the very person she wanted to see. What a lovely coincidence.

Harry Potter is sitting alone in the middle of a pew with his head bowed, shoulders hunched inwards. Hermione cautiously slides in next to him and waits for him to look up. He does so a moment later.

"Hermione!" He smiles, eyes crinkling behind his glasses. "It's great to see you again."

"You too," she says. Her voice is a little rough; she's never been good at social interactions. At least not with other humans. Draco seems to have been a different story.

"I hope I haven't interrupted your…praying," she says awkwardly.

He shrugs easily. "It's alright. I was done anyway. How's your hand?"

She looks down at the raw, healing skin of her palms. "Fine, thank you. It doesn't really hurt any more. I appreciate the plaster."

"Well, I'd like to be a doctor someday, so thanks for letting me practise on you," he says, grinning.

She blinks. "Me too! Which universities are you applying to?" It occurs to her that this is jumping the gun a little bit. "Um – how old are you?"

"Seventeen, just going into Year Thirteen," he says. "You?"

"Same here," she says eagerly. The purpose of her visit has momentarily been driven out of her mind by the prospect of finding a kindred spirit, one who can empathise with her over the intense stress and countless drafts that is the UCAS application cycle. "Which school do you go to?"

"You probably won't have heard of it, it's pretty far from here," he says evasively.

An answer that indirect probably means his school is a comprehensive. Hermione is jolted by the memory of the last time she spoke to someone from a comprehensive: a girl on the Tube who called her a posh bitch when Hermione unwisely answered her enquiry as to which school she goes to.

It's true she's hopelessly middle-class and she takes knowledge for granted. But she isn't trying to be those things. She just doesn't know any other way to be than herself.

The recollection of the emotions she felt on that occasion – the embarrassment as other passengers stared and whispered, the feeling of exclusion, her awareness that she can't even commiserate with her classmates because they loathe her know-it-all behaviour too – rises up inside her, reminding of her purpose. She didn't come here to swap sixth-form horror stories with a half-blood demon boy. She came here to use him.

Before he can ask her the reciprocal question about where she goes, Hermione indicates the table of candles. "Quite the ritual you have going on there," she says. "Some sort of sacrifice of candles?"

He laughs at her joke, but it sounds forced. "We are a church, after all," he says. "Candles and churches are sort of like bread and butter, aren't they?"

He waits a beat for her to respond. She doesn't. A careful guardedness begins to creep into his expression.

"Can I help you, Hermione?" he asks. "I mean, I assume you didn't come into the church this morning because you'd like to repair your relationship with Jesus."

His relationship with Jesus can't any better than hers is, considering he's half a bloody demon, but Hermione ignores his second sentence in favour of answering his question.

"I'm… curious," she says honestly. "About what you do here. What exactly is it you believe in? What are your teachings? For that matter, where are your parishioners and priests? It's only ever been you, which you have to admit is a little bit strange..."

She breaks off. She hadn't intended to say quite so much, but something about the way Harry is watching her, head tilted to the side, made the words come pouring out. She compresses her lips together.

"Wait there," he says suddenly. "Wait there just one moment."

He gets up and runs to the staircase at the back of the room, the one which leads up to parts unknown. Hermione looks bemusedly after him. What's going on now?

He's gone for what feels like an interminably long period of time, even though the Always On display of her Samsung phone tells her it was only three minutes. When he returns he's smiling.

"Yes," he says simply.

"Yes?" she echoes. "Yes what?"

"You," he tells her, "are going to get all of your questions answered, if you come along to the church at eight tonight."

For a moment she thinks she must have misheard him. All her questions answered? Really? That seems… suspiciously easy. She wasn't expecting quite so much out of her foray here today; she'd expected to have to work up to anything serious.

Then his words penetrate. She shakes her head. "I can't leave the house at eight. There's no way my parents will let me."

He looks faintly astonished, as though the concept of strict parents is a novel one. Hermione feels resentful. She knows she's far more cloistered than other teenagers her age, with their parties and drugs and boyfriends. It's not that she necessarily wants those things, but she couldn't have them even if she wanted to anyway.

"Why don't you tell your parents you're having a sleepover with a friend, then come here?" Harry suggests.

"I don't have any friends," she says, so bluntly and forcefully that he blinks.

"Well," he says, "maybe I can fix that. Let me call someone over. I think you'll like her."

He fishes his phone out of his jeans pocket and dials a number. She suspects he was on the phone when he vanished a few minutes ago, as well, but this time he stays out in the open and lets her hear his side of the conversation.

"Hi?...Yeah, hey, Gin…Can you come over to the church? There's someone I want you to meet… Awesome, thanks. See you in a bit."

He hangs up and grins at her. "She's on her way."

They don't have to wait for long. A few minutes later the door to the church swings open, and in stalks the most beautiful girl Hermione has ever seen.

She's tall and slim, her stride slinky like a jaguar's, her hair a long wine-red curtain that streams down to her waist. She has porcelain skin that looks as though it has never encountered the sun, and when she takes off her sunglasses Hermione sees that her eyes are brown. But not brown like her own. This brown isn't muddy: it's moonlight on amber, ringed with gold.

"Hi," she says, smiling at Hermione. Her teeth are just a little too sharp for comfort. "I'm Ginevra Weasley. You can call me Ginny."

"Hermione," she says automatically.

"Hermione, this is my girlfriend," Harry interjects, standing and going to wrap his arm loosely around the girl's waist. She leans into his side like a cat. "I was thinking maybe you could tell your parents you're staying with Ginny tonight?"

"What?" Hermione says incredulously. "Um, I don't – that is –"

"Don't worry, Hermione," Ginny says with a smirk. "I don't bite."

"No, of course not, but –"

She can't voice her real concern. Have you figured out I'm a demon-bound human? Is this an elaborate plot to lure me to your house and kill me? Why else would you actually be willing to give me answers?

No, that's silly. If they wanted to kill her, Harry's had ample time to do it all morning. If she wants answers, she's going to have to take risks. Christopher Columbus didn't discover America by staying safely tucked up at home.

"I'm just… a little uncomfortable around strangers," she says, which is true. "Sorry. I'd really like to stay with you tonight, if you'll have me."

"Of course we will," Ginny says. "Though I do have six older brothers, so you may regret your arrival… Here, take my number!"

They swap contact details, then Hermione announces that she'd better be going and rushes home.

She's deeply torn. On one hand, she desperately wants to go; Harry promised her answers, and she gets the feeling that he's a man of his word. These answers are even unattached to strings, unlike Draco's.

But on the other hand… there are Draco and Theodore. They'll be appearing in her bedroom at midnight again tonight, just as Lucius commanded them to. There's another mystery there. Why would the devil order them to do that? Does it have something to do with her wish? She can't tell whether or not she hopes so.

She doesn't know when this eight p.m. appointment will be over, but she needs to be back in her own house by midnight. She can't risk them catching her in the house of the Weasleys. If the Church of Hogwarts is a front for the demon-hunting Order of the Phoenix, and Ginny is attached to Harry who's attached to the church, it's a fair guess that she's mixed up with the Order as well. Draco definitely does not need to find out about Hermione's actions today.


It feels like an eternity before the clock ticks over into six p.m. and she finally hears her parents' key in the lock. Immediately she throws down Adam Kay's This Is Going to Hurt and flings herself downstairs.

"Mummy, Daddy," she says. "Had a good day at work?"

She nods through her mother's graphic description of a root canal and waits for an opportune break in the conversation. She needs to pick her moment. She has never, ever asked for something like this before.

No, that's a lie. When she was eleven she asked her parents if she could go to the birthday party of a prep school classmate who'd announced a class-wide invitation. It seems he hadn't had her in mind when he extended it, because when she showed up with her present he had her ejected ignominiously.

"Mummy," she says, taking a deep breath. "Can I go to a sleepover tonight?"

Her mother freezes with a forkful of spaghetti Bolognese halfway to her mouth. "A sleepover?" she repeats, as though she has never encountered the concept before. "With who?"

"Ginny Weasley," she says, as steadily as possible. "I met her today when I went out for a walk this morning."

"I've never heard of a Weasley," her father says in suspicion. "You can't possibly spend the night at the house of someone you met on the streets today!"

Hermione begins to sweat. She needs to be at that church tonight.

"Ginny goes to Westminster School," she lies. "We have some mutual friends."

Her parents appear slightly more mollified. "It's very irregular," her mother says. "Why can't you wait to have a sleepover until we've actually met her? You've never been on one before."

No, no, it needs to be tonight. Hermione shakes her head. "Please, Mummy. I'd prefer it to be tonight. You know I have no volunteering commitments on Fridays."

Her parents exchange glances. "Let's talk to the girl first, then we'll see," her father says at last.

Hermione rings Ginny, restraining herself from jiggling her leg up and down with nervous energy as she waits for the call to connect.

"Yeah?" Ginny drawls when she picks up.

"It's Hermione," she says into the phone. "My parents were just wondering if they could speak to you before I come over?"

There's a surprised pause. Hermione, reviewing her words, cringes with humiliation. She sounds like she's seven, not seventeen.

"Sure," Ginny says at last. "Hand the phone over."

Hermione does so. Her mother makes pleasantries with Ginny on the loudspeaker so her father can hear as well, asking innocuous questions which are really designed to ferret out whether or not she's a secret serial killer. How old are you? What does your father do?

Sixteen, and he's a civil servant in Whitehall. Her parents like the sound of that.

But then comes the dreaded question. "Hermione tells me you go to Westminster, is that right?" her mother says.

Hermione holds her breath, but Ginny takes it in stride. "Oh yes," she says smoothly. "Just waiting on my GCSE results, of course, but I have a place there for the sixth form."

"Good luck," Dr Granger says. GCSE results day is in three weeks. With an exchange of goodbyes, she puts the phone down. Hermione looks at her, not daring to breathe.

"Well, she seems like a lovely girl," her mother says at last. "You can go if you want, Hermione, but Daddy will drop you off in the car."

She conceals the relief which is making her knees weak. "That's alright, Mummy. Thank you so much."

Hermione is still fretting over how she'll extricate herself before midnight as her dad drives her to the address Ginny texted her. It's not far from their house, only a ten-minute drive. She can walk that easily tonight. Maybe faking illness? A headache?

Dr Granger whistles as they pull up to an immense double-fronted semi-detached house with four cars parks haphazardly across the sprawling driveway.

"Big house," he says, impressed.

"Ginny has six siblings," Hermione says, already halfway out of the car. "See you tomorrow, Daddy! Goodnight!"

Her father looks like he wants to come in and meet Ginny's parents, but before he can voice it Hermione has already hurried up the front door and pressed the doorbell. Deep inside, a clanging can be heard.

The door is thrown open by a long-limbed young man with locks of flaming hair obscuring one eye. The other one he blinks at her is a pure cornflower blue.

"Hello?" he says throatily.

His voice hits Hermione like a truck. That does it: the Weasleys have got to be demons. He's inhumanly handsome too, with a sullenly sensuous mouth and a jawline that could cut diamonds.

"Hi," she says, clearing her throat. "I'm Hermione Granger? Ginny's friend?"

"Oh, yeah, she told us you'd be coming," he says. "Come on in." He steps to the side, but not far enough that she can avoid pressing against him as she slides past. His skin is blazing hot.

Hermione lives in a wealthy neighbourhood, but even by her standards the Weasleys' house is big. Doors confront her on every side. She hovers next to whichever of Ginny's brothers this is, unsure of where to go.

"Let me call her," he says. "Ginny! Ginny, come down, Hermione's here!"

A door pops open, but it isn't Ginny. It's a curvy middle-aged woman with luxuriant red hair pinned into a loose knot and a smile on her lips.

"Hermione!" she says. "It's nice to meet you."

Hermione holds out her hand for a shake, but is astounded when the woman sweeps her into a hug against her fulsome bosom. What on earth is happening? She's never been greeted so enthusiastically before, not even by her own parents.

"I'm Molly Weasley," the woman says. "Ginny's mum. Have you had dinner yet? You must be starved!"

She ignores Hermione's protests that she's already dined. Ten minutes later, without quite knowing how it's happened, Hermione is sitting at a huge dining table with a heaping plate of chicken pie in front of her and the entire Weasley clan gathered around her.

She's certain now that they're demons – and they must be blood traitors, if they're with the Order. They're each more beautiful than the next, and Hermione would swear to it that the eldest son, a man in his mid-twenties named Bill, even has hellfire burning in his eyes. When they're all in the room together she gets an itch at the back of her neck and goosebumps on her arms.

Ginny has finally come downstairs to meet her guest. She's the one who performs the introductions.

"This is Ron, Harry's best friend," she says, nodding at the boy who opened the door. "He's your age. Then there are Fred and George, the twins, Percy, and Bill. Charlie is in Romania right now or you'd meet him too. And that's my dad, Arthur."

Hermione mumbles greetings. She's uncomfortable with so much attention being on her. Every single one of them is perched on chairs around her, but they aren't eating; they're just watching her eat. Their gazes feel like lasers. She moistens her dry lips.

"So, where am I sleeping?" she asks.

"You can have Charlie's room," Molly says. "We're using it as a spare bedroom while he's off on his travels."

Hermione mumbles acquiescence. It's already seven-thirty p.m., and nobody has mentioned being at the church by eight yet. Should she remind them?

It turns out that she doesn't have to. Once she's finally managed to consume the last bite of pie, Molly whisks the plate away and orders Ginny to show her to her room. Hermione is only too glad to escape the constant press of eyes.

"Here's Charlie's room," Ginny says, stopping on the third floor. "Let me know if you have any issues with it."

Hermione steps in as Ginny flicks on the light. Her jaw drops. It's a small room, and almost every inch of wallpaper is covered with pictures of dragons: paintings, drawings, illustrations of dragons in various sizes and colours, swooping and diving and breathing flames onto unsuspecting forests.

"Oh, my God," she says faintly.

"Yeah, Charlie's a good artist," Ginny says, pride softening her voice.

"They're certainly very… realistic," Hermione says diplomatically.

"Yeah. Well, anyway, you might want to get ready now. We're heading out to meet Harry and the others at the church in five minutes."

Others? Does she mean the other Order members? Hermione still has no idea why the Weasleys and Harry are suddenly so forthcoming. Are they seriously about to 'reveal' the existence of demons to her? If so, why her?

She plans on finding out tonight.

Hermione's in jeans, Converse, and a jumper. When she goes back downstairs to wait for Ginny she's a little disconcerted to find that every single Weasley is also there putting their shoes, apparently coming with them.

"You'll be travelling in Ron's car with him and Ginny," Molly informs her brightly. Ron looks up at the sound of his name. His eyes are heavy-lidded, the ideal definition of bedroom eyes; it's an appealing image, but Hermione isn't sure she trusts someone who seems only half-awake at the wheel.

Well, she has no choice. She goes out to Ron's blue Kia Forte with him while they wait for Ginny. Something about her seems to be putting him on edge: he keeps tapping the steering wheel agitatedly and stealing glances at her out of the corner of his eye.

She's about to ask him what his problem is when Ginny slides into the car. "Sorry I'm late," she puffs. "Quick, let's go!"

The Weasleys pull out onto the road. It's like some sort of convoy – Molly, Arthur, and Bill in one car; Percy and the twins in another; she, Ginny, and Ron in a third. There's little traffic at this time of night, so they reach the church in record time. Ron parks in the tiny carpark designated for shoppers at the Sainsbury's next to the church.

"We're here!" Ginny says, all but rubbing her hands together in excitement. "Come on, Hermione!"

Hermione lets herself be dragged forward. She's experiencing slight qualms, but they're only the qualms of anyone who's been talked into entering a building with a host of strangers late at night. She deals with them through logic as always. Her phone is with her, of course, so she can call the police if necessary. The Sainsbury's is still open if she needs somewhere to flee quickly to, with bright lights, people, and CCTV. They can't do anything to her in there. She just needs to be alert but not paranoid. And keep an eye on the time, of course. Four hours left until her date with a demon tonight.

Hermione files into the Church of Hogwarts ahead of the Weasleys, and freezes in surprise. The building has been transformed. It's usually filled with sunlight and hushed silence, the pews bare and empty.

But not tonight. Tonight, it's filled with people. They're talking and laughing in a muted chatter, draping themselves over the chairs, drinking out of silver gem-studded goblets. They begin to turn as they notice the Weasleys' – and Hermione's – entrance.

"You made it!" Harry says, making a beeline for them. He's swapped out his jeans and T-shirt for dark trousers and a white shirt. Ginny stands on tiptoe to give him a smacking kiss of greeting and Hermione averts her eyes. In the process, her gaze collides with that of Ron, who gives her an eyeroll of shared disgust. Oh, that's right. He's Harry's best friend, isn't he? Must be weird to have him dating his sister.

A silence is falling throughout the church as people see where Harry has gone. Hermione's palms are sweating freely. The largest crowd is gathered around the table of candles, and she catches a glimpse of someone familiar through the throng.

It parts as he comes closer. An unnaturally tall man, his white beard reaching down to his waist, his eyes as blue as midnight frost.

"Hello, Hermione," Albus Dumbledore says genially. "I've been expecting you."


AN: I wasn't planning on updating today, but I couldn't help it. You guys gave me such an amazing response on the last chapter! I'm super grateful to each and every one of you, I honestly can't express how much it means to me when you take a few minutes out to tell me what you think. As you can see, the chapters are getting longer now so I'm really not sure if I can have one ready for tomorrow as well, but we'll see.

This chapter is dedicated to guest reviewer BDShadothe. You make excellent points! I hope I can clear them up for you in future chapters. I will say though, that in the last chapter where Draco claims that his deal with Hermione is actually disadvantaging him, he's not being serious and she knows it. He's exaggerating to make her say yes.

The story does have a fair bit of British life/culture in it, with UCAS and all the rest of it, so if there's anything you find confusing, please let me know! I hope you enjoy, do let me know what you think.