Chapter One

Thirty years ago…

Hermione never did understand the concept of death. As she gazed over the glossy polish of the casket before her, she just couldn't bring her mind to accept the fact that it was her own father and mother in there. To her, they were merely being buried alive, unfortunately caught in a deep slumber that no one could wake them from. Whether or not they were really dead or just sleeping made no difference to her.

The funeral had been a small one. Though the Grangers were relatively friendly people, they seemed to lack actual friends. Very few close neighbors showed up along with what little family Hermione had left. She had been furious to see such a short amount of people care about their death.

Clinging to Harry's hand, she let a tear slip down her delicate cheek. Though so much anger consumed her, she was greatly relieved to have Harry and Ron there with her. Words could not express the amount of gratitude she held for the Weasley's and all they had done for her.

The caskets were slowly levied into the pit as the priest Hermione had never met before now read scriptures from the bible. For the last time, she silently wished her parents good-bye forever as the wooden box was lowered out of sight.

Their death was tragic. If it had been something normal like a car wreck or illness Hermione could be more understanding. But it wasn't…

They had been murdered. Hermione recalled the night all too clearly. A group of Death Eaters had crept into her house late at night. She had tried to fight off as many of them as possible, but it was difficult being one witch with one wand against a dozen and a half cold blooded demons. They had come for her, but realizing that there was no way they could capture her alive, they ended up killing her parents instead. Hermione had witnessed it with her own two eyes. When the death curse had been sent to her mother, time itself slowed down. Her father had lunged in an act of protection, receiving the curse himself. When the second curse struck her mother, time came to a screeching halt.

Hermione had snapped. Some would call it something along the lines of an adrenaline rush. Others would consider it a psychotic break down. She had sent curse after curse towards the creatures in her home. Some of the curses were ones taught to her in school. Most were dark curses she had learned from books in the restricted section of the library. She had killed ten of them before the rest remaining apparated out of her house. She was then left alone to deal with the lifeless figures of her dead mother and father. She was left alone to die as well.

Everything had changed. Calling her a new person would be cliché. She was more than just a new person, she was a breed all her own. The plain, unnoticeable Hermione Granger was lost in a sea of black clothing symbolizing the mourning she would endure for the rest of her life. Hidden behind various concealment charms were thin white lines adorning her arms and legs.

She had always thought she was the type of person who could cope through anything. That coping didn't seem to work now. Somehow, Hermione had found herself in the bathroom slitting her wrists with a sharp kitchen knife. It had surprised her how much the pain on her arms felt good compared to the pain inside. She repeated her actions on multiple occasions. The more she cut the more she found she liked it. The pain was addictive and it soothed her.

Walking back to the small church, she stayed hand in hand with Harry. They weren't dating, never had. They were more of like brother and sister so the thought of them having any relationship like that seemed incestual.

Ron was silent as he took Hermione's other hand into his. None of them said a word as they got back to the chapel. Reaching the parking lot, she was at a lost. Turning to her two best friends her eyes were leaking tears from an empty faucet.

"Now what?" she whispered weakly. Harry beckoned her closer to him and wrapped his arms around her. Hermione couldn't take it anymore. All the emotions starting pouring out of her as she sobbed endlessly in his embrace. Ron's heart visibly shattered as he watched her breakdown. Harry slowly rubbed her back with his hands, squeezing her tightly in his arms, and kissed the top of her head.

"It's ok, Hermione," he said trying not to cry himself. He couldn't stand seeing her this way. "You're going to make it through this, Ron and I will make sure of that. We're both here for you."

Ron rocked back and forth of his feet. He wished there is something he could do for her, but he knew there wasn't. All he could do was be there for her; she'd have to fix the rest herself.

"Hermione," he said softly, putting a hand on her shoulder. Hermione disconnected herself from Harry and moved into Ron's now open arms. He reenacted Harry's movements and began stroking her back. Hermione continued to cry in his chest.

"You know you have to come stay at the Burrow?" he asked. Actually it was more of a command than a request. Hermione began to pull away and reject his offer, but Ron wouldn't have it. He kept his grip tight on her until he felt her relax into his arms and stop struggling. "I'm not taking a no from you," he said stubbornly. "Harry and I are not going to just leave you alone for the rest of the summer. You're coming to the Burrow until school starts and we'll figure everything else after that." Ron could feel Hermione's bushy hair bob up and down as she accepted his proposal. The boys sighed to themselves.

"I just can't believe," Hermione began, stumbling over her words. "I just can't believe that they were murdered like this. And for no good bloody reason!" The anger inside her began to build as her world came crashing down again. "Why them? Why me? How can Death Eaters be so relentless like that?"

"Because they're Death Eaters," Harry stated cautiously. "Voldemort has them trained to be that way. They have no heart."

"I should have done something," she said. "I couldn't have saved them!" Her breaths were staggering more now as she fell into a deep hole of shame and guilt. "I was stronger! I could have killed all of them! I could have been quicker—"

"Hermione there was nothing you could have done," Ron interjected. "You fought as hard as you could and did better than anybody else given the circumstance. You were outnumbered eighteen to one, this is nobodies fault but the ones who killed your parents. Don't blame yourself."

Hermione pulled away from Ron. Her eyes mingled hate, fear, and grief. She tried to wipe away the tears streaking down her face but they kept coming.

"I don't believe that Ron," she whispered. Harry sighed deeply and cringed with her words. Slowly he began running his fingers through the stray hairs framing Hermione face.

"You have to believe it Hermione," he said. "If you don't accept the fact that this isn't your fault, you'll never survive. Trust me, I've been there several times."

He statement was in deed true. Harry had been the martyr for so long, he had forgotten what it was like to let go of death like this. The guilt on his shoulders weighed him down so much it was beginning to break bones.

Hermione turned her head around to look back at the two graves. They sat side by side at a distance of one hundred feet or so from her. She sniffled as she tried to make out their names etched on the marble tombstones. Bill and Geneva Granger they read.

They were dead. They were actually dead. The two bodies laying in those graves were the ones of Hermione's mother and father.

And she couldn't believe it at all.

In relation to Hermione, Draco never really understood the concept of life. One could only define it to a point, and then the rest was such a mystery that it didn't exist. People go day by day in a phase they deem "living." But was it?

Draco looked down the cliff he stood over. The waves at the bottom of the rock bed crashed together giving off a very comfortable sound. The water seemed to move with no effort as it slowly eroded away the giant land mass. It seemed trivial, how something so insignificant as water could carve the greatest wonders of the world. Draco thought over again the question in his head.

Was it?

No.

He snorted. His life wasn't one worth living. Since a baby he was bred to hate and destroy. He was a killer, a monster. He was everything his father wanted him to be. But he was never alive.

Draco couldn't take this monotony anymore. He had been initiated as a Death Eater first thing over the summer. He had spent that summer working his way up the chain. Now he was in the inner circle. Draco sighed. He had become the most powerful wizard of them all. Voldemort favored him far more than he ever favored his father. So why was he miserable?

Draco didn't care for the raids. He wasn't much for all the bloodshed and screams. He never did quite get the same kick out of torturing people like his father did. Don't get him wrong he was no saint either. Draco smirked as he remembered his first raid as a Death Eater. It was some man, unimportant of course, that would sadly remain faceless as well as nameless in Draco's memory forever. He was the target. Draco had massacred his family before his eyes and then left him last to beg for death. The pleadings still rang in Draco's ears… and they still tasted sweet.

Draco had searched far and wide for an answer to why he was the way he was. Though he wasn't overjoyed to kill, he still preferred the screams over death's silence. He had read in a book once about a condition muggle doctors diagnosed people with. They deemed their patients bipolar and had a sort of techniques to treat it. It made sense to Draco, this bipolar disease. He had once thought of seeing a muggle doctor about this, but thought better of it when he realized what his father would say.

That left him where he was today. Alone, standing on a cliff, with only his bitter thoughts to keep him company.

He had no drive, he had no reason. He knew what he was and what he always will be. He was evil. A type of evil that many had not encountered. He wasn't one of those ancient curses that you could just read in a book. There wasn't an explanation for him printed out on a sheet of parchment. He was what he was, and only he knew about it.

He was the perfect killing machine. Draco had no heart, and he knew it. He did what he was told and thought nothing about it later on. He could murder innocent families one by one and it have no effect on him what so ever. That was part of the reason why this monotony was eating at him. He could go on and on with the slaughtering, and still be bored.

The waves continued to crash below. Draco took a steady breath. With all the people he had sent to their graves, he often wondered himself what it would be like to die. That was something that interested him. Life had no meaning. To life, he was just there. He was the dust of Earth, not having any significance than to cover things up and leave others to clean after him. Death on the other hand, who knew? No one was sure about what happens when you die. There are speculations, but no guarantees. Draco liked that. With where he was today he was only guaranteed one thing; a life of programmed murders and no thrill on the side.

Draco wanted that thrill; he yearned for it. Nothing satisfied him anymore, so what harm would this do?

Taking a deep breath, Draco felt his body lean forward. The ocean breeze played on his face like silk. The smell of salty water filled his senses as he smiled.

He leaped.

Leaped from the cliff, leaped from this illness he had carried around all his life. He leaped to freedom.

Feeling the cold water wrap around his body was the last thing he could remember before everything went black.

Pain.

Not just any pain but one that he recognized. His head throbbed with an ache causing him to moan and stir from his slumber. Draco's eyes slowly pried open to reveal darkness.

Was he dead?

He whole body ached as he tried to extend his neck and scan his surroundings. He was in a room, a dark one at that. He could hear the crackling of a lone fire. When his eyes rest upon it, he noticed how blurry his vision had become. He could barely make out the light shooting from its rooted spot. Taking a wheezing breath in caused Draco to launch into a fit of coughs. His body jerked in agony as one cough ran after another.

Draco moaned.

He wasn't dead. Damn.

The sound of a door opening filled his ears and was soon accompanied by a soft hum. Draco couldn't see who it was but could tell by the humming that it must have been a woman. His first instinct was to grab his wand. It just so happened that he had left his wand back at the Manor before his little escapade. Draco cursed himself for his stupidity.

"I see you're awake?" the figure to his right said. Her voice was sweet and sensitive. Draco guessed she must have been no more than in her mid twenties. No longer feeling threatened, Draco relaxed and attempted to respond to her question.

His vocal chords had other plans for as soon as he tried to talk, he felt himself in another raging fit of coughs. He mumbled incoherently to himself.

"Shhh…" whispered the lady. She put her hand on Draco's forehead. His skin was on fire. Reaching to a table nearby, she grabbed a cloth soaked in ice water and put it on his forehead to relieve the fever. "You were in a very bad state when I found you," she said. "It may take awhile for you to recover. You must have been in the water for hours. I'm surprised you weren't dead with hypothermia."

Draco said nothing. He hadn't the energy to. With the pain he was in now, he would most defiantly prefer death. He could slowly feel himself slipping back into a state of unconsciousness.

"I'm Elvyra, don't worry. I'll take care of you…"

Draco slipped further and further into sleep with only one name floating in his mind.

Elvyra…