Chapter Three: Remembrances
Hermione decided to leave the package until morning. Her nerves were frayed from his unexpected appearance, and she longed to leave the ubiquitous thoughts of Malfoy aside and sink into sleep with only the pleasant memories of the evening. She could hear the sounds of her roommate Daphne puttering around in their kitchen, and thought perhaps of going out to join her. But she decided against this action, thinking that perhaps the strain of their tentative relationship would just add to the oncoming headache she could feel, and opted for sinking back into her bed.
Her dreams were not consoling, however, and she found herself awake at three in the morning, and walking out into her kitchen for a frustrated cup of late night tea.
She was angry that he could still, whether in person or in memory, bring her emotions to such turmoil.
'It was just sex. You don't fall in love in a month, and besides, you were seventeen. Who falls in love when you're seventeen? It was never real.' This was her mantra whenever her thoughts turned to Draco bloody Malfoy. They had an "affair" of sorts her seventh year, right after he had met with Dumbledore and joined the Order. They were Head Boy and Head Girl, and it was easy to find relief they both needed in such a stressful, destructive time with each other, feeding off of the other's vulnerability and strength. It had lasted a month, maybe two, before the real battles started, and Hermione had found herself facing the very unwelcome truth that she had fallen in love. He had ceased being the one dimensional Death Eater in training that she, Harry and Ron had always viewed him as, and during her time with him she could see the other aspects of him. His intelligence, his desperation, his acerbic wit which was sometimes toned down with a surprisingly gentle sense of teasing...and more. His courage to turn against his family, specifically his father, his ambitions, his grace.Malfoy became Draco to her in those months, though she never spoke his first name to him, outside of bed, until she saw him fall on the field.
It was not that she had never wanted to see him again, far from that. He was never far from her mind these past four years, though she fancied herself past the romantic attachments. She had a sinking suspicion that she might have to admit to herself that she was still in love with him when she called out his name one night with her last boyfriend. That had proved an extremely awkward situation, and resulted in a painful breakup where she was accused of being, using Ron's term, a 'scarlet woman'. But that was two years ago, when he disappeared completely from her life, and she thought that by now the hold he had over would have passed. She had reasoned that the lingering emotions she attached to the memories of he and she were due to the way she had never settled anything. She had loved him, but was never able to tell him so. She would wonder, sometimes, that if things had been different, if they hadn't gotten together in a night of desperation, clinging to each other like they were the only things that could prove that they were real, that life still existed, what may have happened. Could they have gotten over their hurtful and tumultuous childhood struggle and found the real selves within each other in a normal way? Would they, once the smoke of the war had passed, been able to find some semblance of a real relationship?
She walked back to her room, determined to force her mind into the metaphorical blank slate, and actually get some sleep this time around. Instead, she found herself staring at the crimson package, the light of the fireplace adding warmth to the color. She decided to open it now; perhaps that was why she couldn't sleep. She couldn't imagine what it was, why he was giving her something now.
"It's probably some ridiculous piece of jewelry," she murmured disdainfully. "Cost a bundle and I bet he didn't even pick it out himself."
She removed the paper carefully, and opened the lid of the think black box. When she looked at the contents, her heart dropped. Holly and Ebony, it's shape and gleam something she could never forget, having used it faithfully for seven years. Her wand. It was the first important piece of magic she had ever received, aside from the Hogwart's letter. But the most shocking of all was that it wasn't broken!
"Can you even fix wands?" she wondered aloud, as she picked it up. But there was no denying that it was hers, and not just another wand similar to her old one, she could feel it when she held it.
Her mind was spinning, and holding this old piece of wood she could not even attempt to ward off the memories of how this wand had been broken in the first place.
Hermione was standing in the middle of the Quidditch Pitch, her school cloak folded tightly around her with one hand to ward off the surprising chill of the early July morning, her other hand clutching her wand so tightly that her knuckles were turning white.
"This is it," her feverish mind kept repeating, "This is really it." The wards on the school were down, and Hogwarts, which had been hosting the Order for the past six weeks after school let out, was now under siege. Voldemort was here, somewhere, Dumbledore had assured them of this, and accompanying him was many a Death Eater. Hermione had fought her way out to the Quidditch Pitch in hopes to find Ron, having not been able to see him anywhere she had been in the castle. Harry, she knew, had his own mission, and was being well protected as he searched out Voldemort by Arthur Weasley and Professor Lupin. But Ron, where was Ron?
Her stomach lurched as she saw an orange head darting a red light, but not noticing the Death Eater approaching from behind.
"Ginny!" her mind shouted in recognition, and she shot off a Stupefy against the person approaching her best female friend. She looked around rapidly and observed that among those fighting outside the castle, the Death Eaters were outnumbered. The Order had grown vastly in number after fifth year when it was finally confirmed by the Ministry that Harry and Dumbledore were not crazy lunatic liars, and that Voldemort had indeed arisen. Those who were not currently at the school had apparated once they were notified that the wards on the school had been dismantled, and the Order members were quickly joined by Aurors and the resident of Hogsmeade who had been warned via the Three Broomsticks floo of the invasion.
She looked around the Pitch again slowly, searching out for another familiar red head, when her attention was caught by a familiar lean white-haired boy. She watched, aghast, as he was hit by a stream of bright violet light, and she ran to him, artfully dodging a curse, and issuing a Protego against another. She gasped his first name in horror as she saw the blood streaming through his white, cloakless top, and nearly fell in shock. Dropping her wand as she was hit in the side by the elbow of a fighter of the Light side, she dimly noticed that it had broken in the fall, crushed under the foot of the comrade, and she pushed it into the pocket of her cloak. She fell to Draco's side, and took off her cloak and wrapped it around his shoulders, hoping to ward off the morning chill and any complications it might lend to his apparent rapid blood loss. She reached out and grabbed his wand from his hand, ignoring the worried tears that dripped down her face, and attempted some rudimentary healing spells she had taught herself to stop the flow of blood. She moaned as she saw that her spells were working only a little, the cuts from the hex had reduced from gushing, but were unfortunately still flowing.
From behind her she heard a most unwelcome voice.
"Well, does the little mudblood think she's powerful enough to stop this hex?" The taunt was a mix of disdain and mirth, and the coldness of his voice made her skin crawl.
She turned in response, not caring anymore about the wrath she might face from opening her mouth.
"How could you?" she cried. "How can you stand there when he's dying? He's your son!" She wanted to spit at him, rage at him. She wanted to take all of her pain and fear and frustrations and kill Lucius, but not with any stupid spell, with her hands.
He smirked back at her, a smirk that reminded her chillingly of his son's smirk, one she had seen a thousand times, but his was decidedly much more sinister.
"My son? I have no son. That boy is no more a Malfoy than you are a witch. He joined with Dumbledore, he is a betrayer. This is what he deserves to go against me so," he answered.
She could hear the blood in her head rushing, her rage and disgust were building to a point where she wanted to retch. She watched distantly as he raised his wand at her again, and she raised Draco's in response. She heard a voice yelling her name in the distance, and, stupidly, in a very un-Hermione like move, she turned her head back away from Lucius and looked for it's source past Draco's form. She saw a red light shoot past her should, but not knowing where it came from. But she had no more time to look because after that instant, a curse hit her from behind and she collapsed into darkness, her body thrown over Draco's.
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Okay, I lied, but in a good way, right?? This is shorter than the others, but I wrote it and decided that if I wanted to include the rest of the memories, it would be a ridiculously long chapter, so I am breaking it up over this and the next chapter. Chapter four will be a normal length chapter, maybe a bit longer than I've been writing, and it should be up around Wednesday, as promised.
Thanks so much for the reviews, and please continue to do so!
-icewater