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Years Ago From Now: Chapter Eight
They looked at each other in silence for a long time, trying to wrap their heads around the strange new world they had both found themselves in. At times, either would start to speak before stopping themselves.
Eventually, the question most pressing Hermione came up. She needed to know who else they could turn to for help if it came down to it.
"Does anyone else know the things you just told me?" she asked, quietly. It was strange looking at Lucius Malfoy in a new light. Whereas before she had seen him as a constantly judging, manipulative, evil aristocrat, she thought she might be able to see the cracks now that she knew what to look for. His eyes were not necessarily cold or uncaring, they were closed off. Purposefully. Manipulative… that was very necessary in someone that had his position in life. Evil… apparently that was just not true. Aristocrat? Well, that still was.
He swallowed before answering. "My mother died almost three years ago, so no one. For a time, Kingsley Shacklebolt was a friend, back in Hogwarts. When the Dark Lord started to rise, he drew his line in the sand. I feel he was a bit surprised at what I told him I stood by, but… I had never given him reason to believe I would ever be willing to go up against the Dark Lord. There was no resistance back then, so I didn't believe I could safely go anywhere. We were just boys. I think he believes what everyone else does now, but he'd be most willing to give me a chance. It seems too risky. He is just a junior level auror… maybe when he has more power within the ministry…"
Hermione sighed, knowing that the Kingsley she knew fully believed Lucius to be rightfully locked up in Azkaban for the rest of his life. Wow, to be one person on the inside and to display an entirely different one to everyone around you… how did he manage it?!
"What can you tell me about how you came to be here?" Lucius asked in return.
"Not much about the process at all… Where I come from the war is finally ended, in our favor. How is your occlumency?"
He raised an eyebrow in amusement, and she blushed. Of course, it must be excellent for him to be pulling off his ruse. "Right. Well… I am afraid it isn't going well for you. I was invited to Malfoy Manor to meet with Narcissa Malfoy. She said some very strange things and eventually said she had every intention of seeing you rightfully freed from Azkaban. I think she did something to the food. My memories of everything are very fuzzy, but it isn't like there is a pensieve in here to check things out better. I… I don't know what happened. I woke up here in her bed…in her body. Well, her body as it would have been many years previous."
Lucius looked pale as she finished. "So…. Despite him being killed and this happening at least 15 years from now as you said you met me in 1992… I have another fifteen years at least of hiding like this? Serving him? And, I still wind up in Azkaban with no one knowing?"
She looked at her lap as she answered. "Twenty years."
He looked positively sick at the thought, and Hermione couldn't blame him. "Is it possible that what you lived through won't happen to me?"
Hermione frowned, shaking her head. "That's what I have been researching. I… well, I have used a time turner before. This, obviously, sent me much further back, but there is no reason to believe that the construct of time is different. What has been will be, regardless of what we do. To purposefully do opposite,… well, it might create a paradox, but I'm unsure of what the effects to that would be. Things could end up much worse. In fact, most signs point to would end up much worse.We could just cease to exist entirely? Perhaps we just can't change anything… it seems as if we are on a predestined path, though… especially considering… Well, let's put it this way. The Narcissa Malfoy I met in that garden is nothing like what Mink told me the Narcissa Malfoy I replaced is like. She sounded much more like me, and…"
"Boden!" Lucius interrupted.
When the house elf appeared, Lucius nodded quickly. "Boden, please fetch me the pensieve, and… also," he looked at Hermione. "You still haven't eaten dinner, and… well, I know the baby isn't yours but…"
Hermione nodded. "Food would be nice."
"What do you like?" he asked, politely.
"Some fruit and… fish perhaps?"
Boden disappeared with a crack and returned with the pensieve, placing it on the desk.
"They be making dinner in the kitchens," he informed them.
"Thank you, Boden. Bring it when it is ready," Lucius said.
Hermione looked at the spot Boden disappeared from, thinking of Dobby for a moment. His relationship with Lucius seemed entirely different.
"There is no house elf named Dobby?" she asked, quietly.
Lucius shook his head, "Not at this time."
She nodded in response. She stood up from her chair and walked to the nightstand where her wand was. Grabbing it, she walked back to the pensieve, thinking of the memory of Narcissa in the garden. Slowly, she removed the memory, feeling as if it went fuzzy in her own memory. Not worth recalling, a mere wisp of the past.
Lucius cleared his throat, looking at the pensieve nervously. "What should be the protocol of what you share with me about the future?" he asked, looking at her seriously.
Hermione shrugged. "I don't know. I wish I did, but as far as I know this has never happened before. I think it is important that I see what she said to me though. There aren't many details as to what happens in the outside world during our conversation. You being in Azkaban is mentioned, but that is all that is related to you directly."
"Very well. I will leave you to it and trust you to fill me in on what you believe is wise," he said, gesturing toward the stone basin. Hermione nodded once before approaching it and, with a deep breath, submersing herself in her past and their future.
The memory started in the hall of Malfoy Manor, and she watched as Hermione Granger was greeted by Twinkle, Narcissa's elf. "Miss Granger, Mrs. Malfoy is waitings for you in the gardens."
Hermione smiled and politely thanked the elf, following it out toward the gardens.
Hermione could see Narcissa seated in a wrought iron chair under a willow tree. The weather was beautiful outside with large puffy clouds and the sun shining brightly.
The first thing that seemed especially strange to Hermione was she noticed for the first time that Narcissa made her tea the same way that her guest did.
"Hermione, life brings continued surprises to you. In the future, I think you will see your future as being very dark indeed. I think you will feel isolated and as if you have to hide who you are. I wish to reassure you there. The closest person to you, your husband, will love you all the more for the things you believe you must conceal. The path you will be on is just that, though, your path. You are meant to do what you will do and nothing you can hope to do will change it."
Narcissa's vague words certainly did make more sense hearing them now. The only strange thing seemed to be that she expected Lucius to love her. This did seem to be confirmation that what was happening was destined, however. It would make life slightly more bearable to know that she would not make the world explode or something equally dramatic, but… she did not want to be Narcissa Malfoy! She fully intended to find a way out of this mess if there was one.
All the while, she watched herself enjoying the orange marmalade on toast that Narcissa did not touch herself, even after recommending it. She had not thought anything of it at the time…
Pulling herself from her thoughts, Hermione heard herself ask if Narcissa could be less vague and tuned back in.
"No, I can't. What I can say is that… if you give in to what the future holds for you and accept it, you will find that it is exactly what you want. You will find happiness, despite the pain, and you will ultimately not wish for anything different than the hand you have been dealt. Eventually, you will find that you don't truly know what is to come for you. It is a position I find myself in now. Your lack of surety will not be victorious over your hope though. Truth will out. And so will good. Have faith."
She listened as Narcissa shared her supposed distaste with divination, stemming from a (mostly) fraudulent teacher. She would have to ask Lucius what the real Narcissa thought of the woman. They both ate the lemon bars, seeming to both enjoying it to equal extents.
The questioning turned interesting as Narcissa mentioned not only knowing Hermione's future husband but having had sex with him herself. If what was happening was truly how it was portrayed, she was practically being told they would have a sexual relationship. Despite knowing now that Lucius was not the evil man she had always taken him for, she certainly had no personal feelings for the man that she could imagine growing into that of willing to have sex with him.
She listened as Narcissa shared things about Hermione that only she knew, and Hermione felt her cheeks heat up again as Narcissa talked to her about the first time she had sex with Ron. This time, she was able to listen clearly, even as she watched her other self start to struggle under the effects of what seemed to be a reaction to a potion.
Hermione jerked up from the table, seeming off balance and watched as Narcissa joined her, putting a hand on her shoulder. "Miss Granger, to answer your earlier question, yes… I've slept with the man that will be your husband. And you will sleep with mine. They are, after all, the same person. Just like you and I are."
Suddenly, she was pitched out of the memory, landing back in Narcissa's bedroom in 1980.
Hermione couldn't bring herself to meet Lucius' eyes, and at the same time, she could feel his eyes burning a hole in the top of her head. "So?"
Hermione cleared her throat, "Yes, well… I think she had something put in the food. We both drank the tea and ate some lemon bars that she said was a new recipe she'd never had. I love lemon bars. She made her tea the exact same way as I do… How does Narcissa take hers?"
"Black, like her soul," Lucius said, a bit of disgust seeping into his words at the thought of his missing wife.
Hermione ignored the jab, nodding. "She did encourage me to have orange marmalade and toast but took none for herself. I think it was a mixture. The marmalade started the response and something in the lemon bars triggered the dizziness that she knew would only last a few moments before I am guessing I passed out."
Lucius nodded. "Anything you think I should know?"
Hermione blushed once more. "She spoke in very vague terms about my future. Uhm, do you and Narcissa know a Sybil Trelawney? Did Narcissa put much stock in divination?"
"I do not believe I have ever met someone by that name, but it is possible Narcissa did. She did have a respect for divination, and thought she was quite adept at reading tea leaves. I think it's ridiculous, personally, with a few great exceptions."
"I agree with you. And so did the Narcissa I met with. We both had a… dislike for a Seer that faked the vast majority of her predictions. I only know of a few that were ever real, though those were very important predictions," she said, thinking over what else had been said.
"Is Twinkle an elf here?" Hermione asked, wondering if she would have any information, however unlikely.
"No, there is no Twinkle," Lucius said.
Hermione finally gathered the courage to look up. Lucius was looking at her curiously, as if he were studying her. "She seemed to allude to what has happened. She said that… that my future husband and her husband were the same people… and then that we were the same person. That was the last thing she said."
"So it sounds as if you might be here for good," Lucius said. His voice tried to display sympathy, but she could hear a bit of excitement in it. She couldn't blame him too much… she could understand his desire for an ally. She doubted those feelings would linger if he knew what their relationship was to become if Narcissa had been telling the truth. Not wanting to hunt down and kill muggleborns was one thing, but being married to one? That might be too big a leap for Lucius Malfoy. She was sure the expression on her face wasn't entirely warm.
He sighed and continued. "I know that I have not been fighting in a war as long as you, but I didn't expect this to end soon. I have spent my life knowing exactly who I was supposed to be to everyone. From my perspective, you being here… can you not imagine what that is like for me?"
Hermione nodded, trying not to be negative. She still would be trying to get back, but he need not know that. Until then, she would do whatever she could to make sure that he stayed on track. She wasn't sure if she even could do different.
"Well, I am here for the time being," she encouraged.
"Did she say what… do we get along well in the future?" he asked, uncharacteristically stammering a bit.
Hermione blushed hotly this time, and she could tell he noticed. "We… if what she was saying is true, we have a… happy marriage, all things considered. She seemed very intent to get you out of Azkaban."
"Do we have the child?" he asked, looking at her rounded stomach.
Hermione nodded, very aware that she was in a mere bathrobe and a gown. "Yes, I knew him in school."
"Definitely a boy, then? The healer said, but… its strange to think of it as a definite thing." Lucius asked, almost seeming to take a step toward her. "He survives? He's well?"
She nodded once more. "Yes. He survives, but… he was in a similar situation as you are now. I don't know if he knew you were not who you pretend to be, though."
Lucius looked incredibly sad. "Well, supposing you are correct, things should just happen as they will regardless? Especially if this already happened on some plane?"
Hermione nodded, looking a bit sick at the thought. She certainly had no desire to live Narcissa's life.
Lucius did step closer, then. "I cannot lie and say that a part of me is not overjoyed that you are here, but I understand how hard this is for you. I won't try to push things in any direction, but… can you try not to resist what does happen? I don't want to be in conflict with you, Nar-…. I feel as if I should know your name."
Hermione sucked in a breath. The idea of living under the name of Narcissa Malfoy was not something she wanted to do, but… it seemed as if that path was in place. At least until she figured out how to get home. Besides, though he didn't seem to hate muggleborns… she still was uncomfortable with telling him that (in a way) he was married to one. And, they had certainly interacted.
She shook her head, eventually. "No. I think I should keep that to myself until it needs to come out. We cross paths a few times, and it is necessary that you treat me how you are meant to. If we do become… friends, you might want to treat my younger self differently. It's easier that you don't know. It will be easier to play your part that way."
He was quiet for a moment before nodding. "So what comes next, then?"
She shrugged. "You help me to find a way to seamlessly merge the Narcissa that you know into the Narcissa that… that I am."
"And what does that look like by your best estimation?" he asked, eagerly.
She was thoughtful for a few minutes before answering. "A quintessential pureblood trophy wife that, while she agrees with the Dark Lord's general philosophy…. doubtlessly loves her husband and son above anything else in the world."
Lucius smiled gently and for barely a moment before a smirk took over its place. "Sounds like we have some work to do, then."
Author's Note: Hopefully this clears up a few questions. The timeline will be a close to canon as possible. There will be things to explain why things happen a certain way and much more going on that wouldn't have been visible when reading the Harry Potter book. The idea though, ultimately, is to make it so close that this truly could have been happening the entire time you were reading Rowling's, all the way up to the epilogue. I was not a fan, personally. The only liberty I have had to take so far is related to the timing of deaths of members of the order during the first war. It was kind of murky, and I think there were a few minor mistakes made on JKR's part... I'll explain when we get there in… 15 or 16 chapters.
Thank you so much for your wonderfully kind reviews. I hope this chapter and the ones in the future further compel you to respond. 😊 PLEASE, let me know about any plot holes you think you find.