I'm slightly hungover, but here's part 3 ;-)

Hermione's fingers twitched over the jewelled bands that formed a shining ring in the heavy weight of her hair. A gift from Severus, to…corral her medusa locks. A smile caught her. They were plain on the rare occasion she helped him to brew, but on the dreaded nights when she was muggle-born on parade, they gleamed with jewels and could —if she wished it so— port her back to the front door of her little flat.

Severus Snape obviously appreciated a way to escape.

The festooned hall in the bowels of the Ministry was already packed with the finest in wizarding society. The chattering and guffawing wizards forced a wince and she sloped into the room, hoping that no one noticed her...at least for a little while.

Heat and the heavy odour of bodies and cloying perfumes and the clash of meat and cheese and wine crushed against the tension straining her nerves. Hermione fingered the high collar of her plain gown, her skin already hot to the touch. She was missing a perfectly good dinner date with Severus for this nightmare—

"Mione, there you are!"

Ron burst up to her, all flushed and ginger and the pall of firewhiskey shrouding him. He wrapped a heavy arm around her shoulders, pulling him into the thickness of his body and the spikes of her headache sharpened.

The obligatory smiling pictures of the 'Romance Risen from the Ashes of the War' and perhaps, after she could vanish. Her nerves were tight. Her belly swirling. Unease gripped her and she didn't know why. It had to be just another awful night...and she'd had so many of those since she left Hogwarts the year before.

"Ron, my breathing is not optional."

He laughed loud as if she'd made the best joke...and a flash bulb half blinded her. The stink of potion-thick smoke swept around her, stinging her eyes and nostrils.

Merlin, she wanted nothing more than to tug on the jewelled band and throw herself back to her little flat. Or better yet, lurch into Severus' cottage, demand tea and disappear the night with her attempts to make him laugh—

"So what's your answer, Miss Granger?"

A journalist from The Prophet loomed. He had his official pass tucked into a lurid purple trilby and his stylus paused above a magical slate. His mouth parted in a leer and his eyes shone hot and dark. He stank of red onion.

What…?

Hermione went for her wand and stepped back… And failed at both.

Ron's arm caged her and her wand…her wand was clutched in his sweating and meaty fist. He was grinning at her. And others. Men. Men swamped her. Ones from the Ministry, old school friends —Harry, that shit Cormac— and his foul uncle, the Minister himself, his pale eyes sharp and…and pleased.

She stopped herself from wetting her lips and willed her heart to slow. Panic pricked her nerves. They were all too close, the heat, the stink of them dragging over her stretched senses. "Sorry, what?"

"Your marriage."

"My…"

Harry was grinning at her, as if all his plans had settled into place. Ron's sweaty fingers tightened their grip around her shoulder, digging into the muscle, a hit of pain ramming through her heart.

Marriage?

Another flash, another plume of stinking smoke.

Crushed up against Ron's side, there was no air. She couldn't breathe. The wild thrum of fear chased up through her chest. Her heart drummed. Fast. A flush of heat rocketed over her skin and she tried to focus, not to shake, and cry out and gods, gods…

Marriage.

"It's brilliant!" Ron declared and beamed like a clabbert at the surrounding male horde. "We'll be married on the first turn of the year. Spring is the best time for a marriage bond. Tradtional. And me and Mione are all about tradition."

He squeezed her again and Hermione fought not to throw up. "My parents were married on the same day I've picked…and everyone knows how…successful they were."

Male laughter raked through Hermione's dizzying senses. And another flash of the camera, to catch her dazed expression.

Successful.

Successful.

A quidditch team. His very own quidditch team. That's what he wanted. What he expected. Seven. When he knew, when she'd said she wanted one, perhaps two at most. And Merlin, they hadn't even…

"Of course, Mione will be the perfect role model for all witchkind. A symbol," he looked to the Minister, his shoulder's lifting, "of our peaceful and stable wizarding world."

Jerolin McLaggan's words. Obviously.

Her own world tilted.

Oh gods, in that single statement, in the look that the Minister gave Ron, gave her, fuck… Fuck. He —they?— wanted witches, powerful, clever, ambitious witches, curbed. Harnessed. Ron had always been intimidated by her. Her power. Her brain. Had his…insecurities fallen into line with the Minister's nasty plans? And she, she was the example all would be urged to follow. All choice taken away. Gods…

Her head swam, her thoughts caroming into one another. This…this was what they'd bought when they'd bought her. Her body. Her future. And the future of every witch.

They'd cornered her with her debt.

And from the smug gleam in the Jerolin McLaggan's eye, he was well aware that she had no escape. A default on the debt would see her in Azkaban. A loan, a loan from the goblins, because Harry was bloody beaming at her, but secured how? She'd have no job, no home, nothing.

"Eight, I think, don't you, Mione?" Ron squeezed her bruised shoulder and she held back a wince. "A nice even number. And 'steps and stairs' my mum calls it. The best way. Traditional."

Ron had been rambling on. Eight? Her stomach dropped. Fucking eight. Eight children one after the other in quick succession.

Even with magic, she would be worn down, deliberately worn out.

She wanted to scream at them. Shriek at the injustice, but Ron rambled on and they —none of them— didn't seem to notice that she'd not said a word. Except for the Minister. His sharp gaze missed nothing. Loathsome, bloated tick, that he was.

Hermione pulled in a breath. And another. She'd survived a fucking war. Bore the scars from it, from torture and hatred.

Oh, she had no way out from the horror, but she would be fucked sideways before she made it bloody easy for them to rip away her future.

She snatched at her wand —pulling a cry from Ron and surprised gasp from the crowd of bastard-smug men— and yanked at the band in her hair.

The port key dragged her away to her flat. To quiet and darkness and the cool air of winter on the silent street. She leant against solid, cold brick. Her place. Hers. A tiny little four room flat, one of five above Potage's Cauldron shop. Filled with books and journals, and her things. Ron had never stepped across the threshold. Not once.

For three hard heartbeats, Hermione pulled in deep breaths and fought the shaking of her limbs, the roil of her belly, the edge of panic still making her heart drum and slicking sweat over her skin. Anger chased after and through it. They'd pay for this moment. This plan to bind her, bind the future of every witch into…servitude.

Her flat wasn't safe.

It'd be the first place they'd look for her.

But she did have a safe place.

With a crack of air, she disapparated.