Chapter 15: The Connections that Changed Them
"How Does it Feel" by Avril Lavigne.
"What, a little under a week before Christmas do you feel obligated to play Christmas Angel or something?" Narcissa Black was waiting for Hermione outside her Arithmancy class, where no protective friends would be with her. Narcissa had some small bruises on her neck that her shirt collar mostly covered, and there were some small scratches on her hands, but the signs of damage Hermione still bore were far more noticeable. Hermione stepped around Narcissa and proceeded down the hall, ignoring the young Slytherin girl, but Narcissa followed her.
"You didn't have to do that," Narcissa said. "You didn't have to fight them. Lucius is my boyfriend. The others are my friends." Hermione lengthened her stride slightly, still ignoring Narcissa. She wanted to turn around and slap the girl for calling people who hurt her so badly 'friends'. Sensing that feeling in Hermione, Narcissa changed the course of her questioning.
"What do you expect me to do, then?" She asked. Hermione stopped abruptly and turned to face her.
"Excuse me?" Hermione said coolly.
"You helped me. I'm in debt to you," Narcissa said. "What do you want?" Hermione was really struggling to not slap the pretty fifth year girl in front of her.
"Nothing, Narcissa," Hermione said firmly. "I don't want anything from you. I didn't want those cowards attacking you when you couldn't defend yourself."
"I can defend myself," Narcissa retorted.
"You couldn't, then," Hermione countered. "They caught you off guard."
"No, they didn't!" Narcissa shouted. Hermione blinked.
"What?" Hermione asked, confused. Narcissa suddenly looked uncomfortable.
"They didn't catch me off guard," she said softly. "They're Death Eaters. I don't fight back. I can't fight back." Hermione stared at Narcissa in disbelief.
"You let them hurt you?" Hermione asked, "If they attack you, you just stand there and take it?"
"Don't you dare patronize me!" Narcissa protested. "You may think submission is weak, but amongst Death Eaters and the Dark Lord, it keeps you alive! Fighting them makes you a threat to them, and threats to them get killed!"
"When they're attacking you for no reason?!" Hermione contested, "It's not like Malfoy was ordered to attack you! He was hurting you just because he felt like it!"
"I love him!" Narcissa shouted, furiously blinking back tears that were forming in her eyes, refusing to cry. "I don't care if you don't understand that! Yes, he can be cruel, but I love him and I support him! I support them!" Hermione said nothing. She didn't need to. Narcissa's expression alone spoke volumes. The normally hard-faced young girl let her features betray her lack of conviction in her strongly spoken words. Once Narcissa realized she'd receive no response, she gave Hermione one more angry glare and stormed off.
Harry, Ron, Remus, and Tonks were all at the Burrow, helping the Weasleys pack up their things to move to the Shrieking Shack. Even Harry's owl, Hedwig, and Hermione's cat, Crookshanks, were being moved along with them. The Weasleys had taken in both pets after Harry, Hermione, and Ron had left them, and both the owl and the cat had taken to their adoptive family very well.
Emotions were still on high as they worked. Before Dumbledore and Snape had left the awkward Order meeting, they had made it clear to all the Order members that Harry and Ron needed to remain in their separate hideout in order to remain as inconspicuous as possible, and to keep as much attention as possible off everyone else. Harry and Ron were going to leave once the packing was done. Every Order member was also instructed to act as though they still believed Dumbledore to be dead and that Snape had killed him, in any situation. Ever since that evening, Mrs. Weasley in particular had become prone to random fits of crying and hugging Harry or any of her own children so tightly that they could barely breathe.
"I still can't believe Hermione is back in our seventh year with us," Mrs. Weasley said to Remus as he helped her load odd items into a particularly large box. Harry, Ron, Tonks, and Ginny were close by, conjuring more boxes to load up. "Tonks, you and Bill were just babies!" Remus almost dropped the Weasleys' strange family-location clock.
"Oh, Remus, I thought we were past that!" Tonks said, accidentally conjuring a pair of socks, instead of a box. "Yes, you're older than I am. So, what? You're a werewolf, I'm a metamorphmagus, and we love each other!" Harry, Ron, and Ginny laughed as Tonks drove her speech home by turning her hair, lips, and cheeks the same blushing pink color. Remus and Molly laughed lightly.
"Age aside," Remus said, "I never expected anyone to really love a werewolf."
"I was worried you'd never let that idea go long enough to let someone in," Molly said. "James, Sirius, and Lily got closer than anyone else did. You just couldn't let people in. Truth be told, Tonks got lucky. You let her in more quickly than any of us expected."
"That's for sure," Mr. Weasley said as he carried a pile of books into the room. "No girl before Tonks ever got such a hold on your guarded heart. How did she pull it off anyway, Remus?"
"I'm not really sure," Remus said, looking over at Tonks. "I think something just felt familiar and safe. That doesn't make sense though, does it?"
"Remus?" Remus had heard Hermione walking up through the snow before she'd spoken. She had her cloak pulled close around her as she walked up to the edge of the Black Lake, where Remus stood. "Peter, Molly, Frank, and Alice are leaving in a couple days, for winter holiday," she said. "I know Sirius, James, and Lily are staying here at the castle. Are you?"
"Yeah, I've got nowhere else to go," Remus said. "Christmas with a werewolf is a bit of a party-killer for most people."
"Well, it's a gift for others," Hermione said, smiling. Remus gave her a warm smile in return. He might've blushed slightly too, but both his and Hermione's cheeks were already a little pink from the cold.
"Are you staying too?" Remus asked. Hermione nodded.
"Yeah, I've got nowhere else to go," she repeated his answer playfully. "Christmas without a werewolf would be a bit of a party-killer, anyway." Remus laughed lightly.
"I get the point," he said. Hermione laughed. Remus watched her laugh with appreciative eyes. He frowned again when his eyes fell on the fading bruise on her face.
"That bruise is almost gone," he said. Hermione nodded.
"Madam Pomfrey guessed three more days," she said.
"Until the next one?" Remus asked. Hermione frowned at him.
"Even Veritaserum couldn't get that answer out of me," she said. "There is no answer. I can't know for sure, one way or another."
"I suppose none of us can," Remus conceded. "Most of the Death Eaters stay at the castle during the holiday, by the way. That way, the ones that are still underage can dodge the restrictions on magic use."
"And they can all gather together without causing any broad suspicion, if they're gathering on school grounds," Hermione said. Remus nodded.
"Mostly, we keep to our tower and they stay in their dungeon," he said. "And on those occasions when we do intermix, it's rare that at least two professors aren't nearby, ready to intervene if a fight is started."
"And if the fight is between students of the same house?" Hermione asked, though she'd already guessed the answer.
"Not much help for abused girlfriends and Death Eaters low on the food chain," Remus said grimly. "Damage they do to their own is far less noticeable than damage they do to others. You and Narcissa are proof of that. I'm afraid there just aren't that many people with hearts as big as yours. Lily is more like you, too. Both of you are always trying to see the good in people, no matter who they are."
"Sometimes that can be a curse," Hermione said softly, drawing her cloak even closer around her. "It's ironic, really, how trust can cause as much damage as distrust." Hermione's eyes began to well up as she thought of the times she, Harry, Ron, and many other friends of theirs had suffered because of being too quick to trust. Remus gripped her shoulder.
"But distrust, though easier, leaves you all alone," he said. "You'll never truly be alone, because you allow yourself to trust, and others trust in you. Don't ever lose that, Hermione. Don't let that go. It's not a curse. It's a gift." Hermione nodded and smiled up at Remus, then she looked down at her feet. Snow had soaked through her trousers and socks. Remus laughed when he noticed his clothes were similarly saturated. "Let's go back inside," he said. "Some butterbeer by a warm fire will do both of us some good."
"Bellatrix, have you found any sign of what happened to Granger, yet?" Voldemort asked impatiently, pacing the room restlessly.
"No, my Lord. Forgive me," Bellatrix said softly. "Lucius, Macnair, Rabastan, and Rodolphus have all assisted me in searching for her, but we've found no traces of the girl. We found people who claimed to have glimpsed the two boys in various places during the night, but Granger seems to have vanished entirely." Bellatrix and the other Death Eaters held their breath after she finished speaking, each of them waiting to be struck with a Cruciatus Curse or Legilimency. Voldemort attacked no one. He had stopped pacing and was glaring at the floor, lost in thought.
"She didn't just vanish," he said. "She's doing something that we should be stopping. She's doing something that is of the utmost importance to their mission. Potter and Weasley would separate from her for no less…" Voldemort trailed off as he continued to think of what Hermione Granger might be up to. "Draco, what about Ginny Weasley?" He asked without looking up. Draco shuddered slightly before answering.
"Also missing, my Lord." Voldemort's full attention was instantly on the young Malfoy.
"What do you mean by 'also missing'?" He hissed.
"Snape and I both went to the Weasley home yesterday, to assess the area for invasion, my Lord," Draco answered, "but the home was abandoned."
"Abandoned?" Voldemort prodded.
"Including the family's few material possessions, my Lord," Draco said. "The house was completely empty. The Order must have guessed that we'd come for Ginny. They hid her entire family away."
"And there are no Wormtails among the Order, this time," Snape added with a scathing look at Pettigrew. "No Order member will betray the Weasleys." Voldemort's frustration appeared as white-hot rage that seemed to smoke off his pallid skin. He quickly dismissed his Death Eaters to prevent himself from killing half of them there in that room.
"Snape!" Draco called, separating from his father, aunt, and uncles to follow Snape down a long, dusty hallway in the manor where the Death Eaters hid. Snape did not slow for his pursuer, but lead Draco all the way to a bedroom on the second floor. Once there, Snape cleared several rolls of parchment off one of the beds with a sweep of his wand and stored them in a bag that he promptly kicked underneath the bedside table behind him. Draco stood in the doorway, staring at Snape inquiringly.
"What is it, Draco?" Snape said, staring at Draco in a way that warned him against asking about rolls of parchment he'd stored away.
"What am I supposed to do?" Draco asked. "I've already failed the Dark Lord once, and my father and I are both on thin ice since my mother killed herself. I don't know where to begin looking for the Weasleys, and most of the others are busy looking for Granger, Potter, and Ron Weasley. If I can't come up with something soon, it'll probably cost me my life."
"You are not the only one in the dark, Draco," Snape said evenly. "I told your mother I would protect you the best I could, even beyond my Unbreakable Vow to her, but there is nothing I can do for you right now." Draco frowned at Snape, not because Snape couldn't help him with his assignment, but because of the mention of his mother's attempts to protect him.
"Father told me when my mother last came to see him, in Azkaban, she said she'd already asked me to accept Dumbledore's protection with her," he said. "She hadn't spoken with me at all."
"She probably thought mentioning you in some way might sway your father's opinion," Snape said. "Even before you were born, Narcissa's well-being was never one of Lucius' top priorities. If she wanted him to do anything he didn't want to do, she had to make it seem beneficial to others. Perhaps, that day in Azkaban, she thought she could use his higher regard for you to help her argument."
"You make it sound like my father hated my mother," Draco said disdainfully, frowning at Snape. Snape shook his head.
"No, Draco, he loved her," he said. He gestured for Draco to come in and sit on one of the beds. Draco sat on the edge of the bed that hadn't been covered by the rolls of parchment. Snape sat on the other bed in the room, facing Draco. "He loved her. He was just tactless whenever it came to showing it. You may hear some of the others malign Narcissa for disloyalty to our cause, but all the years she stuck by your father despite of his behavior, it all speaks in her defense. She was tolerant and devoted to Lucius when many of us wanted to hang him from the height of his own arrogance…"
"Finally that face of yours is a clean canvas. Who gets to paint it next?" Hermione had just emerged from the Hospital Wing with the bruise that Malfoy had given her completely cleared up. Of all the people to be waiting outside the door for her, Snape was among the last she'd expected.
"That depends on their payment," Hermione answered him loftily. "Malfoy got a broken, boil-covered nose for the opportunity. Have you heard someone tossing around a better offer?"
"None so far," Snape said casually, "but give them time. You're quickly becoming quite the commodity, and not just in pieces."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Hermione asked. Snape just stared at her with a faint, mocking smile on his face. Hermione glared at him and started to walk past him, down the hall. Right as she came level with him, he threw an arm out to stop her. She halted a half-step from where his hand touched the wall and turned to face him. He towered over her by several inches, but Hermione stared up at him, impassive.
"It means, while Malfoy may want to strangle you for how you humiliated him, some of those laughing at him hold praise for you," Snape answered her briefly disregarded question, "for helping Narcissa and for teaching him a lesson that was far overdue. True, it would have been better learned if the Weasleys hadn't come to your aid, but we hear their intervention was of no real significance."
"We?" Hermione prodded, "You want to be more specific?"
"You know who I mean, Granger," Snape said silkily. Hermione jumped slightly when Snape's free hand slipped something into the pocket of her robes. Her eyes remained on his. "That's the password to one of the older prefects' bathrooms in the castle," Snape continued. "It's on the third floor, down the hall past the Muggle Studies classroom. No one ever uses it anymore, but we meet there on occasion. Come meet with us at seven o'clock, Christmas night, if you really want to know what people who understand your true potential are bidding on you." With that cryptic remark, Snape stepped back from Hermione and stalked off down the hall. Hermione reached inside her pocket and pulled out the note he'd left there. She unfolded it and read the single word it bore.
Thestrals