Twenty-Four: That Breaks From Within

There had been an oddly audible hum of approval emanating from Malfoy since her revelation. It mixed with the cloud of anger hovering over him and morphed into something dangerous.

She'd figured it out, she was certain. What she could not figure out was Malfoy's reaction to obviously hearing that she'd figured it out. He seemed almost…happy that she had. Wasn't an evil mastermind supposed to want his plan to stay a secret?

He'd left her in the library again, allowing her enough alone time for Ginny to find her. They spent hours together once again, Hermione updating her on her newest breakthroughs.

Malfoy didn't come for her until long after Ginny had left and when he did, it was with a cloud of darkness and the scent of alcohol surrounding him. He made his way across the library without he was inches from her he stopped to bend over and brace each hand on either armrest, leaning forward into Hermione's space.

"What are you doing?" she asked, cursing the breathlessness in her voice. He was so close that she could taste the smoke and whiskey on his lips without actually touching them.

He didn't answer her, just stared, messy fringe in his eyes.

"You're infuriating." he whispered finally. Hermione's eyes narrowed in confusion. "And brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. Do you know how long it took me to figure out the purpose of the colosseum? Longer than I care to admit. But you-" he sighed and Hermione flinched when one hand reached up to tuck a piece of hair behind her ear.

Something wet splashed onto her white blouse. When she looked down and saw red spreading through the fibres of fabric, that alone broke her out of the staring contest she'd found herself trapped in.

"Are you bleeding again?" she hissed. One corner of his mouth tipped upwards. "Why are you always covered in blood?" she shoved at him and spun them around, pushing him down into the chair she'd been sitting in.

She kicked his legs apart and wedged herself between his thick thighs, kneeling down while wrenching his blood soaked shirt up to expose his chest.

There, carved into his pectoral, in the same messy, sharp scrawl as the word on her own forearm was the word:

Whore

Hermione's nostrils flared and anger rose inside of her to a degree she hadn't experienced in a long time. The word was moving in Hermione's blurred line of sight and it was then that she realised he was laughing.

"Ever the bloody Gryffindor." he sighed. Hermione glared, hand diving down between them.

Malfoy's eyes widened infinitesimally before he realised she was looking for his wand and when she pulled it out of its holster, he arched a singular blond eyebrow.

"Hold it." she snapped. "And give me your hand." He did as she instructed, studying her through the haze of intoxication. When Malfoy gripped his wand, she fisted his massive hand to the best of her ability, carefully scrutinising the carving. "I can remove it." she said suddenly and it took his sluggish brain a moment to catch up with her words. The moment he did, his gaze darted questioningly to the still present word on her arm. "I was too late. The magic had set in. There's still time." She was rushing through the explanation and examining the way the blood running down his chest was growing darker and darker as the black magic bound itself to him. "You need to make a choice. It will hurt and I need you conscious because I have no magic. Do you understand?" she asked when he made no move to respond to her.

His dry, slow nod betrayed the wavering concentration and irritation. Between the pain, the alcohol and the blood loss she was certain she would lose him sooner rather than later.

The syphoning charm rolled off of her tongue easily and he echoed her with a barely-there slur, using his magic to accomplish her goals.

It felt wrong, seeing the outcome without feeling the familiar pull inside of her. It made her feel cold and empty inside. But there were more important things to worry about, like the collection of blood and sludge suspended in midair.

"I thought this shit was permanent."

Hermione glanced up at him for a moment, taking in the sweat beaded on his forehead and the tension in his shoulders.

"It was."

She readjusted her grip on his hand and made the motion again, reciting the spell a third time and wincing along with her patient when he jerked and brought his other hand down hard on the armrest of the chair. The thick, tainted blood moved slowly through the incisions and based on its appearance, another few minutes would have left the word on his chest indefinitely. As it was, the dark magic was weaving itself into the core of him already and pulling it from him was like peeling apart nerves and blood vessels.

He held it together shockingly well through the first bit. By the time she'd cast the spell a fourth time, his hand was shaking and she was holding it still with both of her own.

"Fuck," he groaned. His face was pale and his hand was white around the armrest.

"Be glad you're at least intoxicated." she snapped. She tried to keep the images of his aunt out of her mind and subsequently out of his but when he flinched, slightly, she knew she failed. "Sorry." she whispered awkwardly.

"Save it," he snarled. "Pipsey," the elf appeared with a pop. Hermione let him have the moment of respite, waiting until the little creature reappeared with a bottle of firewhiskey. He wasted absolutely no time uncorking it and proceeding to tip the liquor down his throat. When he nodded, she took his hand again and began once more.

By the time she had finished drawing the poison from his body, he had moved beyond intoxicated and was planted firmly in his drunkenness.

She'd long since forced him to get rid of his shirt and now he looked a bit like a ghost; pale, shimmery, bloody. Only, the word whore was now simply a flesh wound.

A weak groan caught in his throat when she lifted his hand again and she sighed.

"Tergeo,"

She forced him through the motion but when he said nothing, she reached up and lightly slapped her palm against his cheek. He jerked and levelled her with a rather pathetic glare.

"Tergeo," she repeated, prompting him along. He said the word and his head fell back against the chair, chest rising and falling rapidly with the pain of it all.

"Fuck. Yeraright bitch, you know." he muttered.

"Yes, I've been told." She dabbed at the word with his already ruined shirt and studied the jagged letters. "Episkey, now. Come on. Almost done."

When the charm closed the wound completely, he sighed and shut his eyes, trying to slow his heavy breathing. Without thinking, Hermione reached for him, resting her right hand against his chest and running her thumb over the smooth skin where the horrible word had previously been.

His skin was cold and she could feel his erratic heartbeat under the pad of her finger, but at least he was no longer bleeding dark magic. Now that she was looking at him, he was completely covered in scars. Sectumsempra had done a number on his torso and there were countless others whose origin she could not name.

"Careful, Granger. You're drooling." The sound of her surname from his mouth caused her to jolt as though she'd been struck by lightning.

"Am not." she snapped, ripping her hand away.

"How mature." he drawled with a small smirk.

She looked him over then, from his hooded eyes, bare torso, to the defined vee that disappeared into the waistband of his trousers. He was well and truly drunk. The wall of occlumency was still present in his eyes but it was weak and littered with holes and cracks. With the backdrop of books behind him, it looked seven different kinds of wrong and it did not help that at that moment she became very well aware of the fact that she was still standing between his legs.

The moment that thought crossed her mind was the very same moment she decided to move and that was the moment he decided to lean forward and take her small hips in his hands, keeping her firmly in place.

"Don't." It was clearly an order, but there was no compulsion, only genuine want.

"You're drunk." she shook her head.

"It will make your goal that much more attainable." he countered and Hermione hated the fact that she felt nothing but guilt at that idea. "Are you scared?" his smirk was infuriating.

She should take the opportunity. His guard was down. He was lonely, tired, in pain and yet she had spent the last two hours carefully, painfully removing the word whore from his chest, left there by a woman who took advantage of him and she had no desire to do that to him too.

She should. She should want to. If she let him do what he clearly wanted to do, she wouldn't be able to be used for the spell.

But Voldemort would kill him, undoubtedly.

"Fucking Gryffindor." His palms shifted, dragging slowly up her ribs, and why didn't Gryffindor sound as much like an insult anymore? "Maybe because it isn't."

"Stop that."

"No." he leaned even closer and if she thought he smelled of alcohol before, it was nothing compared to now.

He was beautiful. It was entirely infuriating because she was trying to think and instead she had a faceful of Draco fucking Malfoy. Grey eyes, sharp angles, perfectly imperfect hair that had fallen out of its carefully designated place. His chest and arms were massive and defined and covered in scars and the look on his face was so intense she thought she might crumble. He was sitting in her reading chair and she knew good and well that she would never be able to read in it again because it would forever smell like whiskey, smoke and sin.

"Is Teddy Lupin dead?" the words tumbled out in a rush before she'd even realised she'd finally managed to put the thought together.

Whatever emotion had been visible before was overrun with anger. With his tenuous grip on occlumency, the anger was present in full force and it terrified her. When she tried to move away, he held her tighter.

Prefrontal cortex. That was the part of the brain which controlled her rational thinking.

She was certain it was damaged because he had tortured and essentially murdered his aunt. He murdered Dumbledore. He was at Voldemort and Bellatrix's beck and call. She did not know the exact number of people he had killed and tortured. He was trying to wipe out an entire race of wizards and witches.

Yet the part of her that felt things and controlled her flight or fight response, the amygdala, wouldn't allow her to run.

She'd never really been a fan of flying anyway.

So when Malfoy pressed his fingers to her temple, she held still until she flinched with the force of his memories that slammed into her.

Images of Andromeda and a baby with blue hair.

A woman bragging of all her horrific contributions.

Polyjuice potion.

Teddy babbling happily. Andromeda, smiling.

Hermione staggered backwards then and stared at the agonised looking man in front of her.

"It wasn't her." she realised.

"No," his voice was hoarse.

"You're hiding her?"

"Yes."

Hermione reapproached him.

"If he finds out, he'll kill you."

"So I've been told."

"Why?" she reached for him and brushed her knuckles against his freezing cheek and watched as his eyes betrayed him, fluttering a bit at the contact.

In that moment, he reminded her of a story she'd once read of a man named Atlas; condemned to carry the weight of the heavens and earth for all eternity.

The pieces of him were starting to come together a bit. He was tired.

"Because it's the right thing to do." he shifted in the chair, away from her until he was hunched forward, head in his hands. "I think."

Hermione's heart broke.

She stepped towards him again, enough so that his hair was brushing her stomach. He felt her there and reached out, settling his hands on her hips once again to hold her in place when he pressed his forehead against her with a shaky breath.

"I just want to feel something again. Anything." the words came from somewhere deep in his chest, throaty and hoarse and muffled against her body.

So she threaded her hands through the hair at the back of his head, softly moving her thumb back and forth.

The breath of air that rushed out of him told her just how long it had been since someone had touched him without hurting him. If there hadn't already been tears tracking their way down her cheeks she would have cried at the way he leaned into the contact, desperate for it.

He didn't stop her when she crawled onto his lap, straddled him, wrapped her arms around his broad shoulders and held him.

She held him until the tension seeped from his body and he fell unconscious, head heavy on her shoulder. When Hermione eased him back into the chair, he didn't so much as twitch and she found herself mesmerised, in a morbid sort of way, by the fact that he still looked tense and on guard, even in alcohol induced sleep.

There was something brewing inside of her that she hadn't felt in a long time because in looking at this man and fitting those puzzle pieces together, she'd learned one thing: Maybe she wasn't completely alone.

Maybe it would be easier than she expected to get him to help her.

And so for the first time in forever, Hermione Granger felt almost hopeful.

When she woke up, Malfoy was gone and instead, she was sitting in the chair.

She'd been right of course, it smelled so strongly of him that she quickly extricated herself and realised she was still trapped in the library. She eyed her piles of books; three of them. One of those she'd already read, one of those she thought would be most helpful, and one with those she thought could be helpful.

There was nothing to be done about the Colosseum. The blood had already been shed. They needed to stop Voldemort before he even got the chance to use it. The more pressing issues at hand were that she had three months to get Ginny far away, she had no idea how many horcruxes remained and there was nothing she could do about any of it without her magic. So the first step was removing the brands and none of her books talked about enslaving magic. It had been outlawed so long ago.

Shortly after Pipsey arrived with her breakfast, a crack of apparition interrupted her reading. It was Theodore and before she could scold him for scaring her half to death, she caught a look at the sheer terror covering his face.

"Theodore, what-"

"Where's Draco?" the volume of his voice made her flinch.

"I haven't seen him today. What's-"

"I need to find Draco." he snapped, lifting his hand to stop her mid-sentence.

"Talk to me, Theodore, maybe I can help."

He laughed at her and she tried not to be insulted.

"Of course you'd think so. You think that everything can be solved with love and light and whatever the fuck else you pride your side on."

"My side?"

"Your side." he yelled, stalking towards her. "All this positivity bullshit and love conquers all and- you know where that got me?" He raised his hands and whatever he'd been about to do fell flat, because when Hermione cowered away from him, he crumbled. The horror on his face crushed her. He looked so small and heartbroken and devastated as he stared down at his hands, shaking his head back and forth, that she didn't have it in her to be mad or afraid.

She made her way to him, wrapping her arms around his waist. He fought it for a moment and she felt the tension and tremors in his body. She felt how little he wanted to be touched. She held on until he caved in on himself, collapsing into the physical contact with a shuddering exhale that sounded incredibly painful.

She felt Malfoy's presence before the doors even opened. She felt the chill in the air and the resigned foreboding in him when he saw Theodore, with tears dried on his hollow cheeks, and when Malfoy pulled Theodore away from her, the man looked as though he expected an execution.

"What is it?" Malfoy asked gravely.

"I was trying to save her. I didn't want her used for this. She doesn't deserve that. She's too pure and she's done nothing wrong. She took her goldfish to a healer, for fuck's sake." His laugh was empty and hollow. Malfoy's shoulders tensed. Hermione could see the outline of every muscle through his sleeves.

"What did you do?" he asked quietly. Theodore's red eyes landed on Malfoy which such gut wrenching regret that it knocked the breath from Hermione's lungs.

"Elodie's pregnant."

She and Malfoy hadn't been alone since their interaction in the library. Theo's confession had resulted in Malfoy disapparating on the spot with both of them in tow. Theo had cried and Malfoy had paced and Hermione had listened.

It had gone as well as could be expected until Malfoy offered a solution that had earned him a fist to the face. Theo had been livid only to fall apart moments later, sobbing apologies. The brunet eventually left with a hasty goodbye and the need to return to Elodie before anything else could go wrong and Draco disappeared through the floo with Blaise's name on his lips.

Since his departure, Hermione had not moved.

Her eyelids felt heavy but she was too preoccupied to sleep because maybe, for the first time, she may have had an actual plan. Malfoy had more good in him than he had ever come close to letting on. She was certain now that he would help. She would just have to be smart and that was something she had always been good at. She was studying her imaginary board when he appeared in Death Eater robes with a cold look on his face.

"I have matters to attend to." That was the first six words he'd spoken to her since the previous night.

"Be safe." She whispered.

His face hardened instantaneously.

"Nothing has changed." he snapped.

"Hasn't it?"

"Fuck," his hand rose to pinch the bridge of his nose and Hermione stayed silent where she sat. "No." It had though because she could use him. Which meant that now they had a chance. And that was all she needed. He pointed at her. "Do not succumb to optimism." he snapped. "I am bound to obey him. There is nothing I can do for you." he thrust his arm towards her, shoving his Mark into her line of sight but Hermione said nothing. She knew better now. She knew he would help if she could ensure the safety of his mother and find enough loopholes.

"Do you and Theodore know how to get the brands off?" she asked from her spot on the floor.

"No." he barked, starting to pace.

"I'm not asking you to help me escape." she said quietly. He paused. "It's just a question. I won't do anything that will risk the life of you and your mother." he scoffed. "I won't. I'm trying to figure out how to stop him. I need my magic for that." she sighed.

He fell completely silent and it stretched on for what seemed like ever. Hermione pretended to focus completely on her book and didn't look away from it until he was standing directly over her.

"I will have Theo look into it." he said through gritted teeth. Hermione inhaled deeply and got to your feet.

"Thank you."

Malfoy scowled.

"Do you understand what you've just done, Granger?" her name in his mouth sounded like sin and storms. "Do you understand what you're asking me? That you are asking me to risk my mother's life? Theo's life? My life?"

"You can-"

"Ah, yes, occlusion. You and Theo and your fucking cureall. You have no idea what you're talking about. Neither of you do." she didn't know when he'd gotten so close again. "Would you like to know what I've had to do to keep him from going through Theo's mind? Yours? Do you know why my mother is the way she is?" his eyes were an inferno - a sinkhole of quicksilver drawing her in. "I've gained his trust." he spat the word with so much venom that Hermione recoiled - slamming straight into the wall. He closed the gap that she'd created. "I have done every single thing he has ever asked, without question, so that when I told him there was no need to exert himself in that way, he believed me.

"Instead, I spend every free moment, every waking hour, building brick walls around everything everyone has ever done so that my mind does not get everybody I care about slaughtered." He was nearly panting now. "I'm good at it. Too good. So he started torturing me to distract me, thinking I'd fuck up. And when I didn't?" His dark laugh made Hermione's blood run cold. "That's when dear Aunt Bella stepped in." his hands were walling her in, preventing her from looking away, even when the look in his eyes became too much. "And my mother? During the battle when I found out what she'd done - that she'd lied, I tried to obliviate her-" Hermione flinched, "I fucked it up. Obliviation in the middle of a shit show like that - I didn't obliviate her - I completely obliterated her. She's gone. And you know what? It's fucking worth it. Because if he had found out what she had done to protect the precious Chosen One?."

He laughed and hung his head.

"How did I end up with you?"

His head snapped upwards, surprised eyes darting back and forth across her face.

"You killed Dumbledore for your father. You gained his trust for Theo. You sold your soul for your mother. You risked your life for Andromeda. He did not give me to you as a token of his gratitude. What did you do?"

His smirk was devastating. I am bound to obey him. That was what he had said.

"Clever girl."

"Why?"

"He would have given you to someone far worse."

"No." The sharpness in her voice shocked even her. "You could have given me to someone else, someone who wouldn't have… hurt me like that. Why you? You hated me. You- you-"

"Were a child," he snarled, slamming his palm against the wall by her head, "I hated you because you were brilliant. I hated you because you were the Brightest Witch of Our Age and my father beat me for it. I hated you because he almost caught me with that fucking book. I hated you because they made us brew Amortentia and mine was supposed to smell like Pansy - like expensive perfume and-" he laughed again and he was starting to sound insane.

"Why me, Granger? Because you're the only one smart enough to stop this. And I'm the only one strong enough to make sure he doesn't find out you're trying to. I'll talk to Theo. But you better make it worth it."

Her chest heaved up and down. His lengthy confession was looming over her like a tidal wave and there were so many other things she needed to focus on. Like a plan. A plan would be good. But…

"What book?"

A muscle in his jaw twitched.

"Drop it." That anger was back in full force.

"What book?" she asked again, louder. His eyes were as cold as ice where they bore into her, unrelenting. "What? Regretting your little temper tantrum? You can't undo it, so-"

"Want to bet?"

"You can't take back everything you've already said so why don't you finish it? Lose your nerve already, Malfoy? Merlin, you've always been such-" His furious growl stopped her dead, as did the sting of his hand tangling in her unruly curls. He used the leverage to angle her face in a way that allowed him to meet her eyes directly. The position ached - he was so much taller than her but-

"It was a book on Basilisks, you insufferable swot."

And for the first time in Hermione's life she'd been rendered speechless because that would mean that in Second Year, Draco Malfoy had overheard plans regarding the Chamber of Secrets. In Second Year, Draco Malfoy had defied his father. In Second Year, he had ripped a page from a book at Flourish and Blotts and - fucking hell.

They'd been wrong. They'd been so wrong.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

There was some other snarky comment on the tip of his tongue, she could see it when his lips parted but his pupils were blown just as wide as hers, his breathing just as hard, his heartbeat just as wild.

So instead of waiting for whatever bullshit insult he had in mind, she reached out, wrapped her hand up in his robes and pulled as fast and as hard as she could, until his lips collided with hers.

It wasn't gentle and it wasn't romantic.

It was desperate and messy and violent. She felt his groan somewhere deep inside of her, felt it vibrate through her and shake her to her very core. His hands held her face in a way that made her almost certain his fingerprints would leave their imprint on her skin forever and when he kissed her she felt him in her veins and his breath in her lungs like her magic, as though it had always been a part of her. Malfoy pulled her lip between his teeth and his growl filled her mouth and entered her bloodstream, burning her alive until she whimpered, the sound just as desperate as his hold on her and when that little noise reached his ears, his feral reaction almost made her knees give out.

He caught her though, cupping the backs of her thighs and lifting her up so effortlessly. Her legs locked around his waist on instinct and the way he had her pinned between his thick body and the wall knocked the wind out of her.

The way in which she handled him was such a contrast to the way he touched her. She was gentle; carding through his hair carefully and diving into the kiss with everything she had because this felt like breathing after being underwater for too long and as much as she wanted more and wanted to take more, he'd suffered enough.

But Malfoy… he manipulated her flesh under his hands as though he could claim her as his, holding her so tightly she knew she would bruise and she didn't care. He was rough with her. Like they'd run out of time because he was living on borrowed minutes as it was.

And when he bit her lip, hard enough to draw blood, he pulled back, staring at the bead of blood with a sickly and awed look on his face. He drew his thumb across it, smearing it over her mouth like lipstick before throwing himself headfirst into the kiss again and Hermione surrendered. She didn't fight when he belted one arm around her waist and crushed her against him so tightly it hurt. She didn't fight when he fisted her hair, angling her head the way he wanted it. She slipped her arms around his neck and her fingers into his hair, holding him there as long as he'd let her because imprisoned or not, that was the first time in a long time that she felt free.

Twenty-Five: That's Why We're Stronger Attempted Non-Con

Malfoy avoided her after that. She remained in her room and only saw him on the days he retrieved her for the Colosseum. The training stopped too and now that most of the younger, weaker ones were dead, she took to exercising on her own. Anything she could do in the confined space, she did. Pushups, mostly. She'd come to learn that upper arm strength was almost more helpful than anything.

She went weeks without seeing anyone. Theodore had stopped visiting, she hadn't seen Ginny since that day, and when Malfoy did come for her, he didn't speak. Hermione Granger was losing her mind. It affected her more because it effectively felt like she'd had her hope ripped away and it hurt.

She'd held books again. She'd left this room. She'd…been kissed. And had a plan. And then nothing.

Only 'nothing' was filled with echoing screams and Lucius Malfoy's shouting. It made her wonder when he'd lost his mind. He hadn't always been that way. She remembered the days where he looked put together, the days where he'd hit his son with a snake-head cane. All of it reminded Hermione of a phrase her mother used to say: the straw that broke the camel's back.

Malfoy's was his mother and his need to protect her. She wondered what Lucius' was. Bellatrix's? More than anything, she wondered what hers would be.

Any discernible passage of time had ceased to exist after the first two weeks. Pipsey came and went while Hermione slept so there was nobody to even ask. There was only sleep, food, pushups, screaming, and the Colosseum. Those things occurred on repeat.

And then the trips to the Colosseum stopped and she didn't know why.

It had been weeks since she had seen Malfoy, or anyone for that matter, when a particularly awful bout of screaming started outside her room. The sounds hardly phased her anymore and that itself made Hermione sick.

When it stopped altogether, cutting off with terrifying abruptness, Hermione held her breath. She'd started doing that in recent days. Those creatures deserved some recognition, some honour in death and if all she could give them was a moment of silence then she would. At least this one had died relatively quickly.

Only, before her moment ended, a distant boom shook the Manor. Hermione wondered what it said about her mental state that she hardly flinched, other than tightening the ball she had curled into. The boom sounded a second time, closer and louder. That time she did flinch.

A wave of heat rushed over her before the debris did. The stones and rubble pelted her like shattered glass and that? That was her straw.

When she was able to peel her eyes open in the midst of her chest crushing panic, she was met with a face full of Lucius Malfoy.

His eyes were both wild and dead. She didn't know how that was possible. His hair was greasy and stringy and blood caked and clinging to his face. He was covered in blood spatter and grinning like a man possessed. It was the stuff of vivid nightmares.

She met his gaze head on though, as though he were a rabid animal. She knew enough not to show fear. It worked. Until he reached for her.

"Golden Girl," he murmured, pinching both of her cheeks between his fingers. "So special." he spit the words at her with utter hatred. "So much fuss for such a plain thing." he frowned. Hermione remained frozen, staring into reptilian eyes. She shook beneath him, feeling each repulsive bit of the man touching her. "It's not as though you're actually made of gold, are you?" he squinted, clearly asking himself. Not that she would dare respond. "We could ruin her. We could." he whispered. "Draco would fall out of favour with the Dark Lord. She'd be unusable. She would, she would. She'd be broken. I could break her. Yes, I could!" he screamed, pounding his fist against his head. Hermione heard the sob leave her before she felt it rising.

She'd been in pain before. She'd been impossibly angry. But she had not, that could remember, been this terrified. Worse still, her options were limited. As long as the brand remained, she had no magic. She was not able to leave her room, so she couldn't run. And he had magic so her chances in a fight were slim.

He was groping her now though and her brain was refusing to function. She could feel it shutting down. Lucius Malfoy's hands were tacky on her skin as they shoved beneath her shirt and she knew without looking that it was blood. She fumbled for his arms in a futile attempt to stop him but her brain wouldn't work, her words wouldn't work and without both of her most effective weapons, she felt utterly helpless.

When his head bent towards her breast, she felt his teeth and then there was nothing but her own screaming and searing pain.

Absently, she wondered if this was the sort of thing he did to the others he hurt. The fire spread throughout her chest and to the rest of her body. It was a different kind of pain than that which she had experienced previously. It was this all consuming, mind breaking hurt that felt like pieces of her were being ripped away with all the force of an erumpent.

It was easier, she realised, to let her mind do what it wanted to do and shut down, until blackness encroached, confusion wrapped her up, the pain faded away and shock descended like cold fog.

Draco POV

Attempted Non-Con

He knew that screaming like he knew his name. It was branded on his soul, a permanent fixture in his memories. It haunted him and lived in corners of the Manor and recesses of his mind. It had a life of its own.

He would literally have done anything to never again hear it in real time. He had done any and everything he could think of. Yet, there it was, bouncing around off of marble walls and cackling portraits.

Draco felt all-consuming anger take over as he began the death march to her quarters. The rips in his wards were palpable. The spells were weeping and reaching for one another to close the holes and do their jobs. Father was never meant to find her and if he did, he shouldn't have been able to reach her, dammit.

It had been ages since he'd lost control of his magic. He'd been a second year maybe, the first time Lucius had hit his mother. The energy was crackling inside of him now, clawing at his skin in some desperate attempt for an outlet. He could not remember the last time he'd been so angry.

When he crossed the rubble that used to be a wall of her bedroom, he saw Lucius on top of her, covered in blood that he hoped to Salazar was not hers. His vision whited out moments before every bit of glass erupted, exploding across the room like small raindrops.

His voice was unrecognisable, even to himself when, in words that sounded like liquid death itself, he spoke.

"Hello, Father." Lucius froze and whirled on his son with anger in his eyes. He glanced at his wand where it lay and then at the girl covered in smudges of blood. "Choose your next move carefully," His hands were folded carefully behind his back and still, when Lucius lunged, a quick wordless spell sent him flying violently into the wall. "You're aware of the Dark Lord's orders regarding the Mudblood, are you not?" he snarled, stalking towards him until he towered above the body. His father's sneer told him all he needed to know. "You would have your own son killed? To make a point?" he tsked and crouched in front of him. "Poor form, Father." Draco's nostrils flared. "What would mother think?" he cocked his head in a mocking expression of sadness.

"We'll never know, will we, Draco?" he hissed, spitting a glob of blood at his son. "You destroyed her. Destroyed her!" Draco nodded without any hint of remorse in his occluded expression.

"You are lucky I do not repeat the phenomenon. Get up. And get out. If I see you anywhere near this wing again, I will deliver you to Karkaroff myself."

Lucius rose to his feet and shoved past Draco, pausing at the destroyed door frame.

"My boy," he said sadly, head hanging between hunched shoulders. "You were my pride and joy, my legacy. I gave everything for you to become the man I knew you could be." Draco scoffed and Lucius sent him a scathing look over his shoulder. "You are nothing but a disappointment and a disgrace to the Malfoy name." His skin itched. He could feel his magic inside him, still vying for release and tempting him to skip over countless phases of his plan. He was at least strong enough to resist that for just a little while longer.

"I consider that an improvement." Draco responded. "Leave."

When Lucius had disappeared over the destruction, Draco reached Granger's side in three long strides. Her eyes were vacant and her usual rats nest was an absolute catastrophe. Her shirt had been discarded and cuts and scratches covering her bare skin were oozing blood. It wasn't until he bent forward to get a better look that he saw them for what they were: bite marks.

His magic clamoured for attention once again, shoving at his skin in painful prods as he gripped the bedsheets in white knuckles, hardly able to draw breath through the tense way in which he held his body. He looked away long enough to calm himself to a more manageable level before brushing her hair away from the wounds. He hadn't realised how long it had gotten since she'd been here, always tied up and braided. It was much thinner in chunks where he guessed his father had torn it out.

Breathing was taking up more of his concentration than it usually did, even more so when he gently used his thumb and forefinger to see how deep they were; roughly six millimetres. Fuck.

He wiped his hand on his cloak before moving to open her eyes further. They were nothing but blank pieces of parchment leaking tears over his fingers.

"Fuck," he whipped around and slammed his fist straight through the lantern on her side table. His occlusion was eroding. He could feel it. She was bleeding again. She'd screamed again. She'd been tortured by a family member again. And he still didn't know how far Lucius had- "Fuck."

He needed to call Theo because healing had always been Theo's forte. All Draco had been good for was destruction and murder. Hell, he couldn't even send a patronus after his friend because he had never had a memory with enough happiness in it to conjure one. So he Flooed him, hoping against hope that the wizard was in his own manor. Granger's body had started shaking when he called Pipsey. The elf took one look at the scene and squealed, vanishing on the spot to gather whatever she deemed necessary.

Theo arrived before she could return. Draco was tucking blankets around her as the shivering worsened and when Theo cleared his throat, Draco stiffened for barely a moment before Theo's hand between his shoulder blades forced him to relax a bit.

"Fuck me," he whispered, edging around the larger man to see her better. "Lucius found her," he murmured. Draco nodded.

"Can you fix her?"

Theo said nothing. He paled at the bite marks and swallowed hard, presumably to keep the nausea at bay like Draco was trying to.

"Have a seat, mate." Theo whispered, looking over his shoulder with more softness and sympathy in his eyes than anyone had ever shown towards him. So Draco listened, transfigured a chair and watched Theo work, methodically building his occlumency back up. His hands were clasped and hanging between his knees, head hanging in sheer exhaustion while the bites closed one at a time and Theo cleaned the blood away. The worst of it was surrounding her breasts, completely mutilated. Theo left them for last and Draco wished that he wouldn't have. He couldn't stand looking at it, how thoroughly and literally his Father had ripped her apart.

"Did he-" Draco's voice was deep and dangerous when he spoke. He could practically hear the shadows following his words out of his mouth.

"I don't know." Theo snapped, only to pause, take a shuddering breath and physically shake his head to compose himself.

"Is her mind intact?" he asked instead. The look his friend gave him was completely puzzled in a way that grated on Draco's nerves.

"You… She's confunded, mate. That's all." Draco's brow furrowed. He had checked that. Hadn't he? "Only reason I haven't woken her up is I figured it would be less traumatic. She's fine." Theo said.

Fuck, he needed to sort his shit out.

"Finite Incantatem." Theo whispered. There was a lag in activity for what felt like the longest moment in history - and then sheer and utter panic took over her already pale expression and she launched herself off of the bed and into the corner, arms wrapping around her knees.

She stared at Draco, mouthing something over and over.

Theo was saying something too but it all sounded like someone was speaking to him through water until a hand grabbed and shook him violently.

"For fuck's sake, turn around." he hissed. Draco nodded, feeling foolish and furious as he faced what used to be a wall. Theo took a couple of steps away from him, towards Hermione who's whimpering had grown louder. "Hey there, Granger. It's alright now." he murmured. "You're safe." He tripped unconvincingly over the words. Her laugh sounded hollow and pained. "I fixed all of the - damage. It's gone. How do you feel?" Draco nearly winced at the idiotic question. But then she said something he couldn't quite hear and when he tuned into her thoughts instead, he felt the anger inside of him begin to bubble again.

Dirtywhoremudbloodslutpatheticmudfuckerbloodtraitorstopstopstopstop

"Enough!" He shouted, spinning on her where Theo had an innocent hand resting on top of hers. Hermione flinched and the look Theo gave him could have brought a better man to his knees. But he was sick of it. He was sick of all of it. "That's enough." he stalked towards her and dropped into a crouch, glowering at Theo who looked ready to jump between them.

The girl staring back at him did not resemble his school mate. Her brain was not turning with plans and thoughts and options. It was numb; his father's words playing on repeat. She was staring at his hair, utterly terrified but he ignored it.

"Your mind is playing tricks on you." he said tersely, studying the way her eyes took inventory of his very Malfoy features. "Stop and think." he was not gentle. He should have been maybe, if Theo's face was anything to go by. "Take back control. Breathe through it." His words were orders but not compulsion, though he was seconds away from trying that too because she was losing herself. He could see it.

Before he could think too hard about it, he grabbed her hand out from underneath Theo's, ignoring his protest and her fearful intake of breath. Draco shoved her hand between the panels of his shirt, holding her steady despite her attempts to rip away from him.

"I will kill him. Soon. But not now." Draco swore with vehemence and venom dripping from each syllable. He positioned her fingers against one of his many Sectumsempra scars and guided her through tracing them, one into the other. Her breathing slowed as he watched her piece the logic together, Theo's hand resting heavy on her back in the show of comfort he knew to give.

"Get it off." she mumbled. Theo started to pull his hand away but winced at her sharp "no,"

"Then what-"

"I can feel it." the words squeezed between gritted teeth. "I can still feel-his-get it off." her voice started to take on a hysteric edge. "Get it off, get it off, get it off." Theo's wide terrified eyes landed on Draco but he wasn't looking at him. He was focused on her, nodding slowly as he pulled her hand from his shirt and reached to take her face between his hands.

Theo watched as Draco systematically erased his father's touches with his own. He watched and remained a steady presence at the witch's side while his best mate thumbed away tears and imaginary handprints like he knew exactly what he was doing.

The tension seeped out of Hermione's body little by little until Theo was essentially holding her up. It was odd, watching Draco grope a witch without any hint of sexuality in the action. He'd been in the room while he and Pansy fucked on more than one occasion. He'd seen Draco hold a witch's breast in much the same way he was doing now and yet it was in no way the same.

Whatever he was doing was something completely different.

"I need my magic." Those were the first words she spoke when he finished. They were desperate and helpless sounding and for whatever reason that lit a fire in Draco Malfoy's eyes because he gripped her chin tightly when she tried to close her eyes and angled her face in a way that forced her to meet his eyes.

"Pull it together and remember who the fuck you are." he hissed, leaning closer. She was as brilliant as he was dangerous and he would be damned if he let her forget it after everything she accomplished in her seventeen years of life. "You are Hermione Granger. You are not afraid."