Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Author Note: I actually updated quickly so you should be proud of me. Okay, this chapter should make the title of the previous one oh so clear and it also explains a lot of Ron's behaviour. Another thing, I surprise myself with how much hatred I write Ron with when he's actually pretty much my favourite character, excluding Severus and Viktor, in the entire series. Strange that, but then that's writing for you. Oh! And this chapter gives this story its name! I love when this happens!

Breaking the Habit

Chapter Nine – Breaking the Habit

In what felt like a heartbeat, nearly three months had passed since the day the couple admitted their feelings for each other and had begun a relationship. Viktor had remained in the country so he could be with Hermione, not wanting to miss a moment of being with her. She, however, seemed to be spending more time at the hospital. She had been moved temporarily to the birthing ward and spent most of her time up to her elbows in placenta and blood, though she reflected the later was not particularly different from her previous position.

Except, she found that spending all that time around newborn children and, for the most part, happy couples created a certain longing for such a thing. When she went home at night and watched her boyfriend, she could see themselves in those roles. She knew that he would be a wonderful father, if the way he treated her was anything to go by, and hoped that someday they could have a family. She felt that thinking in such a way was putting too much trust in the future, especially while the war with the Dark was still raging.

Yet, she could not extinguish that spark that had come to life in her heart. Perhaps it was because it was her instincts telling her to get a move because her biological clock was ticking or it might have had something to do with the warm memories she had of her own childhood. She pulled herself from such thoughts as she pulled her cloak tighter around herself and hurried down a dark street. She had stayed at St. Mungo's longer than she had intended and when she had finished with her last patient, she realized that it had grown late.

Her breath hung in front of her face in a cloud and her toes ached from cold. It was close to Christmas and the earth had frozen up. A shiver raked her frame a particularly frigid breeze buffeted against her, making the hem of her cloak flutter. She paid little attention to the exact direction she was going, her eyes fixed on the ground to keep herself from slipping on the treacherously icy ground. This proved to be her downfall for she bumped into someone and let out a soft squeak as she found herself suddenly off balance. Had this person not grabbed her arms, she would have tumbled. She turned her face up to the man and smiled, before she realized who he was.

"Thank…Ronald!" She cried, immediately trying to twist out of his grasp.

She had not seen him in about two months and the sheer shock of seeing him made her freeze. His fingers dug into her biceps as he stared down at her, a look of intense hatred twisting his boyishly handsome face. She immediately tried to twist out of his hold but found it entirely impossible to free herself. Either she had grown weaker or he had definitely built up more muscle since the last time he imprisoned her.

"Let me go!"

"Unless I don't remember right, I'd say you still belong to me." He growled, those cornflower blue eyes of his glowing with sick depravity.

A scowl wrinkled her forehead as she glared at him. "I never belonged to you. I am no object to be owned, Ronald. You never seemed to understand that. I am my own person and am beholden unto no one. If you don't let me go, so help me Goddess I'll…"

"You'll what? Scream for help? If you haven't noticed, Hermy, nobody's around. There's no one here to save you from little old me."

She shuddered at the nickname and tried to quash the despair bubbling up inside of her. He was right; they seemed to be the only two people in the world. They were completely alone and she rapidly swallowed the balloon of fear clogging her throat. Forcing herself to find some of that Gryffindor courage, or at least some bravado, fire sprang into her gaze.

"I don't need anyone to save me." She spat. "You clearly haven't noticed that I'm not some damsel in distress. I never have been and I don't ever intend to be." That was partly a lie, for she knew she truly had been helpless before Viktor reemerged into her life and gave her something to live for. "And even if I was, there is one person who would not think twice about saving me."

He let out a hiss. "Krum…He hasn't dumped you yet? You were a terrible girlfriend and an even worse fuck. Oh wait," he mocked, "does he tell you that he loves you? You know that's only so he can get into your knickers. It sure as hell worked with you."

An icy dart burrowed through her heart as the memory of giving her virginity to this man suddenly sprang to mind. Tears sprung to the corners of her eyes and she tried not to sniffle to force them away. Her first time had been nothing like what happened in those romance novels she secretly read. If anything, it was the exact opposite. While it had not been rape, that came later, he had thrust into her a few times and then climaxed. Not to mention, he barely fulfilled that instinctive need to be filled.

As she felt herself drowning in terror, the warmth and tenderness Viktor showed her reappeared. Suddenly her spine was infused with steel and even Ronald saw something change in her hues. That certain weakness he always played upon disappeared, almost as if someone had snatched it away. Her knee jerked forward quickly and connected with his groin. He let out a pathetic noise as his crotch was crushed and free her, bringing his hands down to cup himself. She jerked backwards and pressed herself against the far alley wall, watching him for a moment. She drew her wand out of her dirty healer's robes and pointed at him, rapidly digging through her brain for a sufficient curse.

One came to and a soft smirk spread across her lips. She whispered the word, almost as if it was too hideous to speak loudly, and a stream of delicate gold light trickled from the corner of her wand. Her expression held darkness as he fell and began to writhe, small choking noises slipping from his throat. A sense of pride rushed through her as she realized what she had done, what had taken her so long to do. She finally broke the habit of giving in and being weak, she had found her strength.

As she turned to leave, she murmured. "Feel what I felt."

She cast a final glance over her shoulder and felt her stomach lurch. His robes had bunched up as he twisted and on his left forearm, burnt into his freckled pale skin, the Dark Mark hung ominously. Sickness pooled in her abdomen as a hoarse sob escaped her. Without pausing to think, she shoved her wand back into her robes and fled.

Lucky for her, Harry had bought a house in Diagon Alley not long after they all graduated and had told her that she would be always welcome. She stumbled to across the slick road and hit the front door with her fist, her petite body shaking with the intensity of her tears. She might hate Ronald, but his betrayal cut her deeply. She could have handled him being an abusive bastard, but with the added knowledge that he had aligned himself with the darkness that killed without caring, raped and destroyed all things good it made her ill.

The door opened and her balled hand stopped centimeters from Harry's chest. She had not seen him for so long, but she spared no time for greetings and simply flung herself at him. His arms rose unbidden around her and he bodily pulled her into his home, closing the door behind them. He somehow got her into the sitting room and onto the sofa. He sat down beside her and let her sob into his shoulder, bewildered. Her words were lost in the force of her weeping and each time she sucked in a breath to speak, she choked on the horror of what she knew. She pulled away after a few moments, silent tears streaming down her cheeks, as she gripped his hands tightly.

"Hermione…" He asked quietly, his voice concerned.

Overwhelming love for her best friend swamped her as a faint smile tugged at her lips. But that smile faded as the seriousness of her news stole any joy from her.

Ignoring her tears, she spoke. "I haven't been very honest with you the past year." He opened his mouth, but she shook her head quickly. "By the end of this, you'll be crying too. This is going to be so hard for me to say, so please don't interrupt me. My relationship with Ronald went sour a little before the last Christmas when I lost my maidenhood to him. He stopped becoming the sweet and kind boy I had fallen in love with. He hit me for the first time on the first of February. I thought it was only because he lost his temper with me, that it would only be that one time.

Oh Goddess, I was so wrong. Since then, his temper only got worse. You remember the last time we came to dinner with you? He got so angry when he saw you touch me in that chaste hug. He forced himself on me when we got home." She closed her eyes for a moment as a fresh wave of misery washed over her. "Again and again as the weeks passed he would rape me. Harry, he broke me. I cannot even begin to describe the pain that tore me apart and shattered my spirit…" She trailed off and looked down at their twined hands, sniffling.

He suddenly embraced her and pulled her against his large frame, hugging her tightly. It was then she heard his breathing catching in the back of his throat and realized that he too was crying. She pulled out of his embrace and smiled in a watery way. She tenderly brushed his tears off of his face, before leaning her head against his shoulder. She knew then how much she had missed her completely platonic, but so affectionate relationship with Harry Potter. The phrase that a person did not know how much they had until they lost it really made sense to her then as she basked in the completely accepting love that seemed to radiate from him.

"I'm sorry I didn't help you. I should have seen it! We stopped seeing each other and in the rare occurrence I saw you, you looked so terrified and small. Oh Gods, I'm so sorry…" His face was buried in her hair as his torso shook as he cried from the intensity of his guilt. "I promised I wouldn't let anyone hurt you when we graduated and I failed you. I failed you…"

She looked up at him and shook her head, catching his cheeks into her hands. "No Harry, you could never fail me. Please, don't cry."

"But I couldn't save you, you are all alone with him."

She sighed faintly and she shook her head once more. "No, I'm not. Viktor rescued me from him, he took me away from my hell."

Harry's tears began to dry as his eyes widened in surprise. "Krum? I thought you stopped talking to him…"

"I had." She murmured, a faraway expression on her face. "But I guess he was meant to be here with me. We actually live together now."

"You what!"

A delicate flush rose along her cheekbones as their sadness faded away. "We live together, though we have yet to sleep together. I-I'm not ready for that just yet." She once again remembered what had first set her off and cleared her throat.

"What is it?"

"Harry…You won't believe me when I say this and I wouldn't tell this to you if I had not seen it with my own eyes."

"Just tell me, you know I'll believe you. You've never been anything but truthful with me, excluding this past year."

She breathed in deeply as if readying herself for what she was about to say. "Ronald is a Death Eater. I saw his Dark Mark."

Perhaps if she had not just told him about what she had experienced under said Death Eater's hands, he would have laughed such a comment off as make believe. But the look of such horrified conviction in her caramel coloured orbs and the way her fingers picked at the loose threads at her robes conveyed the truth. He let out a pained noise, the colour leeching out of his face.

"H-He betrayed us…"

"I know." She whispered, feeling the exact same hurt he was.

His arms went back around her and they simply sat there on his couch, quietly thinking and crying about the loss and perfidy of their best friend. When Harry moved some time later, he found the weight of Hermione to be entirely still and her chest moving in the rhythmic breathing of sleep. He carefully laid her down on the sofa and conjured a blanket with his wand, settling it over her small body. He would floo Viktor and tell him where she was, but at that moment he needed his best friend more than her boyfriend did.

Please review because it makes me happy and I updated quickly!

Blessed Be

Ame