Dumbledore's reply didn't come in until the last week of July.
Hermione had been losing track of time for all the days she was spending
with Draco. She realized that although he wasn't the nicest guy on earth,
he wasn't the most horrible either. She actually enjoyed his company and
felt incredibly disappointed when every time he went to kiss her, Narcissa
somehow interrupted them.
When she received the reply, she was frustrated that Dumbledore's letter didn't say all that much about Narcissa's condition. After she had read the little advice he did give her, ("Narcissa Black has had a hard life. It's safe to say that her marriage conditions were not much unlike your own 'marriage'. She's had a lot to live up to and I'm sure as long as you support her, she'll do just fine,") she couldn't help but feel empty. Narcissa' ramblings had only gotten worse. When Hermione first arrived at the Manor, Narcissa could at least recognize when her own husband was calling her. Since then, her mental health had deteriorated and she would no longer heed to the incessant calls from both Lucius and Draco.
"I feel so helpless!" Draco exploded while sitting inside the kitchen on the afternoon that Hermione received her reply from Dumbledore. She hadn't told Draco for fear that he would be angry. "Mum's only getting worse and Dad's being blind to it all!"
"I know," Hermione said sympathetically. "There must be something we can do."
Draco gave a snort of contempt. "Like what? Take her to a doctor ourselves?"
"Yeah!" Hermione's eyes brightened. "Your father can't stop us!"
"He can kill us afterwards instead," Draco replied, hatred growing on his face. "Besides, it's his fault she's like this; how can he sit there and pretend nothing is happening?"
"How could he cheat on your mother with her own sister?" Hermione reminded him and Draco's eyes grew even darker. "These are the little things that you have to remember."
"Even though I don't want to."
Hermione decided that it was time to get Draco out of the house and into the sunshine for a bit. His failure to find a job and to reclaim his old job at the Ministry left him feeling dark and desperate. Hermione could see him sinking lower every day, so on the fourth of August, she woke him up at the crack of dawn with loud, rapturous knocks at his bedroom door.
"Get up!" she hollered through the solid wood. "We're going out!"
"Where?" Draco appeared at the door, his blanket draped over his head, looking like a lost, scared little child.
"Diagon Alley," she told him firmly. "Now get dressed."
"Yeah, right," he muttered, trudging back to bed, his blanket dragging on the floor. He flopped down onto the mattress face-first, leaving Hermione standing alone in the doorway.
She walked in the room and raised her wand steadily. "Ventilo," she muttered under her breath and the mattress flew off the bed and began turning in the air. Draco was heaved to the ground where he grumbled madly.
"There's no arguing with you, is there?" he mumbled as he headed towards the washroom.
"Nope," she replied happily, leaving the room. "I'll be downstairs in the kitchen; meet me when you're done." She practically skipped down the stairs and greeted Narcissa who was counting cereal bits on the table.
"Morning, Bella!" Narcissa replied just as cheerfully. "Do you know if Mother and Father are going to the fair today? I know that our aunt and cousins will be there. You and Sirius should really try to get along, you know."
Hermione stopped in her tracks to hear what else Narcissa was going to say about Sirius Black. But Narcissa had already begun to count her cereal pieces again, ignoring the fact that Hermione had even entered the room.
After breakfast was said and done with, Hermione practically had to drag Draco out of the house. "I didn't actually think you were going to make me go!" he cried, digging his heels into the carpet as Hermione tugged on his hand. His blond hair was falling limply over one eye. "Why do we have to go anywhere?"
"Because I said so," Hermione bossed, pulling him out the door into the sunshine. "I know you feel bad about your mother," she added quietly, "but she'll be just fine. She's just got to adjust to so much right now."
"Unless Dad gets swallowed by some giant machine at work," Draco retorted bitterly, "Mother won't be happy for a long time."
Hermione chose to ignore this comment as they made their way to Diagon Alley. As usual, it was packed with witches and wizards all buying their new supplies for the school year. Hermione ran into several of her students from Professor Flitwick's Charms class and spent a large amount of time talking to them. When she finally got away from a group of four of them, she noticed that it was nearing one in the afternoon.
"Time certainly flies!" she exclaimed, pulling Draco by the hand to get him motivated.
"When you're having fun," he replied sarcastically. They had a something quick to drink in the Leaky Cauldron before heading back out into the sunshine. It beamed down on them, causing Hermione to break into a heavy sweat.
"Let's sit down," she puffed, taking a seat on the steps to Gringott's bank. Draco followed her lead and they waited until they caught their breath.
"Look at that guy!" Hermione giggled, pointing at a wizard who was obviously trying to pass for a Muggle. He wore a large top hat that kept sliding over his eyes and a long tailored coat, which almost reached the ground due to his short stature.
"Gee, do you think he wants to appear taller?" Draco asked as the little man passed them. He tipped his top hat to the two of them before struggling to keep it firmly rooted on his head.
Hermione giggled outrageously. "He's sweet, though," she said, her eyes following the short man through the street. When she turned back to Draco, she saw his face only inches from hers. "What?" she asked, smiling at him.
He leaned towards her and gently pressed his lips against hers. A sharp intake of breath caught in her throat as she kissed him back lightly. When they finally parted, Draco smiled back at her. "I'm really glad you talked me into this outing."
"I didn't talk you into it," she said, shoving him playfully. "I had to literally flip you out of bed and drag you out here."
He shook his finger at her in mock menace. "Remind me to get you back for that," he said, referring to the mattress that was still spinning in circles over his bed. "But for now," he stood up, pulling Hermione to her feet, "we go back to the Manor so we can sit outside in some form of shade."
"Alright," Hermione agreed, figuring that they had been out of the house, wandering, for at least three hours. If she could get him out like this every day for the rest of the summer, he just might turn out healthy in the end.
All of Hermione's good hopes were dashed upon their arrival back to the Manor. There was a large group gathering in the front yard and neither Lucius nor Narcissa were anywhere to be found. Draco began pushing past people and cursed under his breath as he passed a Ministry official.
Just inside the doorway stood an attendant from St. Mungo's Hospital. "Where do you think you're going?" he asked, jabbing Draco in the chest with his finger.
"Um, I live here," Draco retorted. "What happened?"
The attendant's eyes narrowed. "You live here, you say? What's your name?"
Draco looked indignant. "Draco Malfoy. My father is Lucius Malfoy and my mother is Narcissa Malfoy. Now let me in!" He pushed past the attendant, but the attendant jabbed a finger into Hermione's chest, causing her to cry out slightly.
"What's your name?"
"She's with me." Draco closed his fist around Hermione's hand and pulled her past the grumpy St. Mungo's worker. Upon entering the sitting room, Hermione let out a gasp of shock. Even though there were several people standing around the bottom of the staircase, she could still see the sight they were hiding.
Narcissa Malfoy's body lay, mangled and broken, at the bottom of the stairs.
Draco's face paled incredibly as his mouth flailed without sound. His eyes scanned the crowd for a familiar face, finally coming to rest on Lucius Malfoy. Lucius' face was even paler than Draco's but his mouth was set in a thin line as he stared down at Narcissa.
"Dad!" Draco cried and judging from the look on his face, Hermione wasn't even sure he knew he yelled it.
"What happened?" Hermione asked softly, stepping forward. She gripped Draco's hand tighter as they neared the crowd.
"She fell," Lucius said simply and several of the witches in the crowd gave him seething looks.
"She's alright, isn't she?" Draco asked, peering through the looming figures. "I mean, she only fell, right? That's why a guy from St. Mungo's is here?"
"Damn it," cursed a heavyset wizard. "I told that attendant to go back already!" He pushed his way out of the crowd and Hermione got a full view of Narcissa's body.
Her head was bent at such an angle that could only mean her neck was broken. One leg was still draped up on the stairs while her arms lay motionless around her limp body. But one thing stood out to Hermione: her face. For the first time since Hermione had known her, Narcissa Malfoy looked peaceful.
"She's alright, isn't she, Dad?" Draco continued to question, panic rising in his voice. "I mean, she'll wake up and be okay, won't she?"
There was something in the way that Lucius held his head that told Hermione the answer before it was spoken. "No," Lucius said, coming over to his son. "She's gone."
"Gone where?" Draco let out a hollow, bitter laugh. "Gone where, huh, Dad? Back to insanity, where you drove her? Is that how she fell? Thought she could fly or something?" In the process, he had dropped Hermione's hand and she searched desperately for it to calm him down.
"I never did anything of the sort," Lucius hissed and Hermione was surprised to see tears in his eyes. "I didn't drive her to anything! She did it all herself, with the silly memories of her sister. She thought Bellatrix outdid her in every possible way and when I made the simple mistake of falling for Bella's charm, it drove her to think that Bella was the perfect sister and she had taken me away from her."
"Simple? It wasn't so simple to her, was it Dad?" Draco gestured to his mother on the floor, where wizards were living her gently with the tips of their wands. "It was actually so incredibly complicated that you drove her mad with the thoughts."
Before Lucius had a chance to fight back, an elderly witch in the crowd snapped. "Your wife and mother is dead!" she hissed at them. "Have a little respect." She lowered her head and Hermione copied her actions, tears dripping off her face slowly.
But Draco didn't hesitate. He pushed past his father and Hermione and darted for the door. The attendant tried to stop him on the way out, but Draco reached for his wand and the attendant back off, hands in the air.
"Draco!" Hermione cried desperately as the wizards carrying Narcissa's body passed by her. She made a move to run but Lucius' hand on her shoulder made her stop.
"Leave him be for now," he told her softly. "He'll need to be by himself."
When Hermione looked at Lucius, she saw not the man that she loathed for so long, but a widower; a man who had lost almost everything in his life, except for his son who had just run off. She felt sorry for him, for the first time since she had met him, she felt sorry for the old bastard. He stood there, tears dripping down his face, as the crowd around them began to depart and leave the house.
"You should have taken her to a doctor," Hermione said softly before heading upstairs. No matter what the excuses were, she was convinced that somehow, in her madness, Narcissa had fallen down the stairs and killed herself. But was it an accident or was it something more?
There were two routes, Hermione thought to herself as she climbed under her covers in her bedroom. There's suicide; Narcissa was so mixed up in her own mind that nothing seemed clear. Or there's murder; maybe someone didn't want Narcissa to discover any more nasty secrets from anyone's past.
With the sun shining outside, streaming in the window, causing Hermione to turn away to shield her teary eyes, she wondered how such a poor, confused soul could ever have their life snuffed out so quickly.
When she received the reply, she was frustrated that Dumbledore's letter didn't say all that much about Narcissa's condition. After she had read the little advice he did give her, ("Narcissa Black has had a hard life. It's safe to say that her marriage conditions were not much unlike your own 'marriage'. She's had a lot to live up to and I'm sure as long as you support her, she'll do just fine,") she couldn't help but feel empty. Narcissa' ramblings had only gotten worse. When Hermione first arrived at the Manor, Narcissa could at least recognize when her own husband was calling her. Since then, her mental health had deteriorated and she would no longer heed to the incessant calls from both Lucius and Draco.
"I feel so helpless!" Draco exploded while sitting inside the kitchen on the afternoon that Hermione received her reply from Dumbledore. She hadn't told Draco for fear that he would be angry. "Mum's only getting worse and Dad's being blind to it all!"
"I know," Hermione said sympathetically. "There must be something we can do."
Draco gave a snort of contempt. "Like what? Take her to a doctor ourselves?"
"Yeah!" Hermione's eyes brightened. "Your father can't stop us!"
"He can kill us afterwards instead," Draco replied, hatred growing on his face. "Besides, it's his fault she's like this; how can he sit there and pretend nothing is happening?"
"How could he cheat on your mother with her own sister?" Hermione reminded him and Draco's eyes grew even darker. "These are the little things that you have to remember."
"Even though I don't want to."
Hermione decided that it was time to get Draco out of the house and into the sunshine for a bit. His failure to find a job and to reclaim his old job at the Ministry left him feeling dark and desperate. Hermione could see him sinking lower every day, so on the fourth of August, she woke him up at the crack of dawn with loud, rapturous knocks at his bedroom door.
"Get up!" she hollered through the solid wood. "We're going out!"
"Where?" Draco appeared at the door, his blanket draped over his head, looking like a lost, scared little child.
"Diagon Alley," she told him firmly. "Now get dressed."
"Yeah, right," he muttered, trudging back to bed, his blanket dragging on the floor. He flopped down onto the mattress face-first, leaving Hermione standing alone in the doorway.
She walked in the room and raised her wand steadily. "Ventilo," she muttered under her breath and the mattress flew off the bed and began turning in the air. Draco was heaved to the ground where he grumbled madly.
"There's no arguing with you, is there?" he mumbled as he headed towards the washroom.
"Nope," she replied happily, leaving the room. "I'll be downstairs in the kitchen; meet me when you're done." She practically skipped down the stairs and greeted Narcissa who was counting cereal bits on the table.
"Morning, Bella!" Narcissa replied just as cheerfully. "Do you know if Mother and Father are going to the fair today? I know that our aunt and cousins will be there. You and Sirius should really try to get along, you know."
Hermione stopped in her tracks to hear what else Narcissa was going to say about Sirius Black. But Narcissa had already begun to count her cereal pieces again, ignoring the fact that Hermione had even entered the room.
After breakfast was said and done with, Hermione practically had to drag Draco out of the house. "I didn't actually think you were going to make me go!" he cried, digging his heels into the carpet as Hermione tugged on his hand. His blond hair was falling limply over one eye. "Why do we have to go anywhere?"
"Because I said so," Hermione bossed, pulling him out the door into the sunshine. "I know you feel bad about your mother," she added quietly, "but she'll be just fine. She's just got to adjust to so much right now."
"Unless Dad gets swallowed by some giant machine at work," Draco retorted bitterly, "Mother won't be happy for a long time."
Hermione chose to ignore this comment as they made their way to Diagon Alley. As usual, it was packed with witches and wizards all buying their new supplies for the school year. Hermione ran into several of her students from Professor Flitwick's Charms class and spent a large amount of time talking to them. When she finally got away from a group of four of them, she noticed that it was nearing one in the afternoon.
"Time certainly flies!" she exclaimed, pulling Draco by the hand to get him motivated.
"When you're having fun," he replied sarcastically. They had a something quick to drink in the Leaky Cauldron before heading back out into the sunshine. It beamed down on them, causing Hermione to break into a heavy sweat.
"Let's sit down," she puffed, taking a seat on the steps to Gringott's bank. Draco followed her lead and they waited until they caught their breath.
"Look at that guy!" Hermione giggled, pointing at a wizard who was obviously trying to pass for a Muggle. He wore a large top hat that kept sliding over his eyes and a long tailored coat, which almost reached the ground due to his short stature.
"Gee, do you think he wants to appear taller?" Draco asked as the little man passed them. He tipped his top hat to the two of them before struggling to keep it firmly rooted on his head.
Hermione giggled outrageously. "He's sweet, though," she said, her eyes following the short man through the street. When she turned back to Draco, she saw his face only inches from hers. "What?" she asked, smiling at him.
He leaned towards her and gently pressed his lips against hers. A sharp intake of breath caught in her throat as she kissed him back lightly. When they finally parted, Draco smiled back at her. "I'm really glad you talked me into this outing."
"I didn't talk you into it," she said, shoving him playfully. "I had to literally flip you out of bed and drag you out here."
He shook his finger at her in mock menace. "Remind me to get you back for that," he said, referring to the mattress that was still spinning in circles over his bed. "But for now," he stood up, pulling Hermione to her feet, "we go back to the Manor so we can sit outside in some form of shade."
"Alright," Hermione agreed, figuring that they had been out of the house, wandering, for at least three hours. If she could get him out like this every day for the rest of the summer, he just might turn out healthy in the end.
All of Hermione's good hopes were dashed upon their arrival back to the Manor. There was a large group gathering in the front yard and neither Lucius nor Narcissa were anywhere to be found. Draco began pushing past people and cursed under his breath as he passed a Ministry official.
Just inside the doorway stood an attendant from St. Mungo's Hospital. "Where do you think you're going?" he asked, jabbing Draco in the chest with his finger.
"Um, I live here," Draco retorted. "What happened?"
The attendant's eyes narrowed. "You live here, you say? What's your name?"
Draco looked indignant. "Draco Malfoy. My father is Lucius Malfoy and my mother is Narcissa Malfoy. Now let me in!" He pushed past the attendant, but the attendant jabbed a finger into Hermione's chest, causing her to cry out slightly.
"What's your name?"
"She's with me." Draco closed his fist around Hermione's hand and pulled her past the grumpy St. Mungo's worker. Upon entering the sitting room, Hermione let out a gasp of shock. Even though there were several people standing around the bottom of the staircase, she could still see the sight they were hiding.
Narcissa Malfoy's body lay, mangled and broken, at the bottom of the stairs.
Draco's face paled incredibly as his mouth flailed without sound. His eyes scanned the crowd for a familiar face, finally coming to rest on Lucius Malfoy. Lucius' face was even paler than Draco's but his mouth was set in a thin line as he stared down at Narcissa.
"Dad!" Draco cried and judging from the look on his face, Hermione wasn't even sure he knew he yelled it.
"What happened?" Hermione asked softly, stepping forward. She gripped Draco's hand tighter as they neared the crowd.
"She fell," Lucius said simply and several of the witches in the crowd gave him seething looks.
"She's alright, isn't she?" Draco asked, peering through the looming figures. "I mean, she only fell, right? That's why a guy from St. Mungo's is here?"
"Damn it," cursed a heavyset wizard. "I told that attendant to go back already!" He pushed his way out of the crowd and Hermione got a full view of Narcissa's body.
Her head was bent at such an angle that could only mean her neck was broken. One leg was still draped up on the stairs while her arms lay motionless around her limp body. But one thing stood out to Hermione: her face. For the first time since Hermione had known her, Narcissa Malfoy looked peaceful.
"She's alright, isn't she, Dad?" Draco continued to question, panic rising in his voice. "I mean, she'll wake up and be okay, won't she?"
There was something in the way that Lucius held his head that told Hermione the answer before it was spoken. "No," Lucius said, coming over to his son. "She's gone."
"Gone where?" Draco let out a hollow, bitter laugh. "Gone where, huh, Dad? Back to insanity, where you drove her? Is that how she fell? Thought she could fly or something?" In the process, he had dropped Hermione's hand and she searched desperately for it to calm him down.
"I never did anything of the sort," Lucius hissed and Hermione was surprised to see tears in his eyes. "I didn't drive her to anything! She did it all herself, with the silly memories of her sister. She thought Bellatrix outdid her in every possible way and when I made the simple mistake of falling for Bella's charm, it drove her to think that Bella was the perfect sister and she had taken me away from her."
"Simple? It wasn't so simple to her, was it Dad?" Draco gestured to his mother on the floor, where wizards were living her gently with the tips of their wands. "It was actually so incredibly complicated that you drove her mad with the thoughts."
Before Lucius had a chance to fight back, an elderly witch in the crowd snapped. "Your wife and mother is dead!" she hissed at them. "Have a little respect." She lowered her head and Hermione copied her actions, tears dripping off her face slowly.
But Draco didn't hesitate. He pushed past his father and Hermione and darted for the door. The attendant tried to stop him on the way out, but Draco reached for his wand and the attendant back off, hands in the air.
"Draco!" Hermione cried desperately as the wizards carrying Narcissa's body passed by her. She made a move to run but Lucius' hand on her shoulder made her stop.
"Leave him be for now," he told her softly. "He'll need to be by himself."
When Hermione looked at Lucius, she saw not the man that she loathed for so long, but a widower; a man who had lost almost everything in his life, except for his son who had just run off. She felt sorry for him, for the first time since she had met him, she felt sorry for the old bastard. He stood there, tears dripping down his face, as the crowd around them began to depart and leave the house.
"You should have taken her to a doctor," Hermione said softly before heading upstairs. No matter what the excuses were, she was convinced that somehow, in her madness, Narcissa had fallen down the stairs and killed herself. But was it an accident or was it something more?
There were two routes, Hermione thought to herself as she climbed under her covers in her bedroom. There's suicide; Narcissa was so mixed up in her own mind that nothing seemed clear. Or there's murder; maybe someone didn't want Narcissa to discover any more nasty secrets from anyone's past.
With the sun shining outside, streaming in the window, causing Hermione to turn away to shield her teary eyes, she wondered how such a poor, confused soul could ever have their life snuffed out so quickly.