A/N: So maybe going back through and re-editing all my old chapters and uploading them to AO3 is a mistake because I am growing so wholly tried of this story that I started another one last week and I've been working on that. Don't worry, no plans to stop this one or anything, it's my baby. But be on the look out for a Marcus Flint x Hermione Granger WIP coming soon. Marcus x Hermione? Who even am I? As always, thank you for reading and reviewing!
oOo
If you asked Hermione how many times she'd been covered in blood, she would not have been able to tell you. Her blood. Harry's blood. Ron's blood. She had been hunted, she had been tortured, she had survived a war, she had witnessed death and she had caused it.
Hermione could not count the times she had been covered in blood.
A part of her brain took over that was normally inaccessible, the part of her brain that did not contemplate, did not falter. His screams were deafening, but to Hermione's ears they were distant.
They needed to get out of the street.
She grabbed Remus, pulling him off the ground with magic laced into her fingers and wandlessly levitated him into 12 Grimmauld wizard struggled against her, crying out in agony, but Hermione's magic was strong and his was weakened. The witch rushed him into the house.
Later the memory of his screams would cause her to sob ugly tears, but right now this was not the time time to hesitate. This was not the time for tears.
She flew him through the old house and onto the kitchen table, using magic to rip off his jumper and undershirt.
The damage was extensive.
Hermione had witnessed horrifying accidents from apparating. Susan's leg. Ron's arm. She was not squeamish.
Muscle and flesh had been torn away from each other, exposing the former to the air. Hermione was certain some of Remus's deltoid was missing, left behind on the outskirts of Malfoy Manor. He was writhing and struggling against her magic. He was going to tear the rest of his skin off.
"Remus!" she screamed, grabbing his face, forcing his eyes to lock onto hers. "I need you to be still, love!"
But his eyes were not the sage green she'd come to adore, they were brilliant gold shining with pain and rage. He grabbed her shoulders with a strength she could not match and flung her across the room. Hermione hit the wall behind her, knocking over a cabinet in the process, her back cracking with a pain she ignored.
Damnit.
"Remus," she pleaded, scrambling back to his side, "if you don't stop struggling I will bind you."
Her friend growled at her, snapped his jaws inhumanly. Binding him would increase the trauma of the situation and would only work for so long on the enraged werewolf, but Hermione had no choice.
"I'm so sorry," the witch whispered and raised her wand.
A crack split the air and Hermione looked up to the terrified visage of Sirius Black suddenly in the kitchen. Later she would worry about how he was there, why he was there, but right now she was thanking every god that came to mind. Every god that might have sent him.
"Hold him down!" she commanded and Sirius rushed to her side, grabbing Remus' wrists.
"What the fuck happened?" Sirius asked, struggling to pin down his much stronger friend.
"Splinched," was all Hermione said as she threw off her back pack and opened it. "Accio dittany!" A small vile flew from her bag and into her waiting hand. "Keep him still!" She opened the vile and began dripping the brown liquid onto Remus' wounds.
"Shh," she shushed him, wiping the sweaty hair from his face, "we've got you, we've got you."
Slowly Remus' eyes closed and his body stilled to just the rhythmic rise and fall of his chest as Sirius and Hermione witnessed muscles twist back into place and skin grow anew. Sirius' grasp on his friend's wrists relaxed until he removed his hands entirely and Hermione, seeing this, pulled a dreamless draught from her bag and carefully held it up to Remus' lips.
"Drink this, love," she whispered, tipping the liquid into his mouth with gentle care, "you need to sleep."
Remus obeyed and his body quickly slumped, muscles relaxing as the draught and dittany finished their work.
With a ragged breath, Hermione pushed both her hands into her mess of curls and pulled at the roots, grounding herself with the stinging sensation.
It's done, it's done, he's fine, he's fine, he's fine
She shut her eyes tightly. Pulled at her hair. Bit her cheek.
She tried to breathe but found herself quite unable to.
"Oh gods, this-this is my fault," Hermione babbled, shaking her head frantically, "I resisted- I resisted the apparition and he was splinched. It's my fault-"
"Hermione." She felt hands wrap themselves around her wrists, strong hands. "Hermione."
She ripped herself away from those hands. Those comforting hands. She deserved no comfort.
"No," she spat, but the venom was all self-directed.
My fault, my fault.
"Hermione," Sirius reached for her again, but she took a step back, still pulling at her hair. "Remus is going to be alright, you've done it, brilliant witch, you've helped him," the wizard pleaded with her. "I-I know, it's so hard to see someone you care about like that, I know you're shaken up. Blood is so-is so traumatizing."
He was so calm, so reassuring that it only served to further anger her.
And what the fuck was he even talking about?
"This. Is. My. Fault," she hissed between gritted teeth. How dare he try to comfort her.
Sirius reached out a hand, fingers stretched towards her and then stopped, letting the hand hang between them.
Hermione stared at that hand, she noted how his fingers were longer than Remus' and more delicate, strong but less calloused. She stared at that hand, but she did not move towards it. She did not reach out for it.
"Did I tell you," she whispered so low she could barely hear herself, voice laced with a manic frenzy, "did I tell either of you that his was the first dead body I ever saw?"
She looked at the ground. At the table. At the wall.
Anywhere. Anywhere except at him.
"What?" Sirius asked cautiously and then Hermione did look and she hated herself for looking because it wasn't her Remus on the table anymore, it was Professor Lupin.
Dead.
Pale.
Unmoving.
And she choked one whatever words she had been forming next.
Sirius closed the distance between them with such abruptness Hermione had no time to react before his arms were around her, steadying her. She pulled away but there was no conviction behind the movement and Sirius held her fiercely, whispering comforts into the top of her wild mane.
"You don't understand," she mumbled into his Auror robes, "you don't understand, it's my fault," she repeated until her words flowed together and became nothing more than a pained whine.
Hermione Granger, Brightest Witch of Her Age, could not save them all. What use was brilliance? What reason to exist, even with all her cleverness, if she could not save them all?
Even now, her second chance, Remus was injured and Gideon-
With a gasp Hermione pulled herself away from Sirius, her eyes now wide and alert. "Gideon," she whispered, before moving her hands to her mouth.
Sirius stared down at her puzzled. "Gideon?" he asked slowly.
"Dolohov cursed him," Hermione began, her eyes frantically darting as her mind whirled, "I have to send a patronus, I have to tell them what potions to use."
She could still save Gideon.
"Where would they have gone?" Hermione's eyes snapped to Sirius, filled with renewed purpose and in that purpose, determination. "Where would Fabian have taken Gideon?"
"If he was injured on a mission?" Sirius mused, running a hand through his hair. "I'd guess Hogwarts, to Minerva and Pomfrey."
The witch nodded vigorously. "Yes, of course!" Hermione raised her wand, summoning her evanescent blue otter. She whispered potions to it and ingredients and doses, having recovered from this curse herself she felt confident she knew what to do. "Fabian Prewett," she commanded the otter, "find Fabian Prewett."
And when she was finished, the otter leapt into the air and bounded off, disappearing through a wall. Hermione gripped her wand, steadying herself with the feel of it in her hand, calmed by the knowledge that she could still do something.
She took a deep breath, swallowing her panic, consuming her own anxieties and forcing them down deep into herself.
She would not cry.
"Wait," Hermione looked over at Sirius in his Auror robes, "how did you get here?"
"Oh," the wizard frowned, shoving his hands into his pockets, "I was on an assignment-" and then his face morphed from sheepish apprehension, which only furthered Hermione's curiosity, in to unadulterated panic. "Oh fuck, oh fuck!" he yelled, suddenly rushing past Hermione out of the kitchen and to the front door. "I-I have to go back! Shite! Oh fuck, I left Al!"
"Al?" Hermione asked, hurrying after him. "Sirius, how did you apparate into the house?"
Sirius was already out the door and onto the street. "I'll tell you later, I promise I will." He whirled around, grabbing Hermione by the shoulders. "I'm so sorry, I have to go, I have to-"
"Go," Hermione nodded. "I've got Remus. Go."
His grey eyes softened and he brought a pale hand to her cheek, tucking an unruly curl behind her ear. "I-I'm sorry. Are you sure, are you alright?"
"I'm fine, really, I've got this," Hermione answered, her voice steady.
Sirius gave her a long, searching look and Hermione shivered under his gaze, before nodding and dropping his hands.
"I'll be back soon," he assured her and then disapparated into the night.
Hermione allowed herself a moment to stare at the spot he had occupied just a moment ago on the sidewalk, her own hand resting on her cheek, and then she shuffled back inside.
oOo
Hermione had levitated Remus to his bed, taking care not to wake him as she floated his sleeping body up the stairs and carefully tucked him under his blankets. She sat next to him for a time, enjoying the sight of his chest rising and falling with the rhythm of his breathes, just enjoying the sight of him breathing. Until she realized just how unimaginably creepy that was.
She reached out her small hand and gingerly brushed a strand of shaggy brown hair from his forehead, letting her fingers linger on his head for a moment.
It's not getting any less creepy, Granger. Hermione sighed, pushing herself out of the chair by Remus' bed, and quietly tip toed out of his room. In the hallway the witch looked down at herself, covered in blood and sweat, and frowned. She needed a shower.
oOo
The scorching hot water was a welcome reprieve, burning away the remnants of that night's misadventures. She scrubbed her skin until it was raw and tinged pink, flipping her curly hair upside down to shampoo the fuck out of it.
When she finally found herself wrapped in a pair of oversized pajama pants borrowed from Remus and a clean t-shirt, Hermione felt world's better than she had an hour ago. She wanted a cup of tea, a warm blanket and to curl up on the chair besides Remus. Hermione was exhausted, beyond exhausted, she was practically dead, but sleep was a reward for the triumphant, of which Hermione could not currently count herself amongst.
No, she would not sleep. She would stay by Remus' side.
But first, tea.
Hermione was in the kitchen, taking the first languid sip of her tea, when she heard the Floo roar to life in the parlor.
Odd. She tilted her head. Sirius apparated in earlier, what's stopping him now?
"In the kitchen, Sirius!" she called out, taking another sip of tea and was not surprised when the door the kitchen swung open, she was, however, surprised to see Fabian Prewett standing in the doorway.
"Fabian?" she barely squeaked out as the wizard barreled towards her. Hermione felt an acute flash of panic as she was suddenly swept up in Fabian's arms, encompassed entirely by the wizard's much larger frame.
They stood like this for a moment, Hermione's spine as stiff as a tree, Fabian's arched in order to wrap himself around the much smaller witch.
"F-Fabian," Hermione ventured cautiously and slowly she felt the wizard take a deep breath, but he did not let her go.
Well this is entirely unexpected. Maybe I am dead.
"He's stable," Fabian whispered into Hermione's shoulder, his grip around her loosening. "He's stable and Poppy said it was all your potions' work."
"Oh, Fabian," Hermione relaxed, wrapping her tea-less arm around the wizard. She tried to think of something clever and gracious to say, but Hermione Granger was spent.
So instead, she cried, consumed with relief.
Fabian pulled away, looking down into her puffy face. "Hey, hey," he whispered with a small laugh, gently sweeping unruly strands of hair out of her face, "why're you crying? I'm the one with a nearly dead brother."
Hermione laughed, wiping her cheeks with the back of her hand. "I know," she sniffed, "gods, I'm just so relieved. This night has just been so fucked up and everything went wrong and I'm just so relieved."
Fabian's eyes narrowed, but there was no suspicion in his features, just confusion. "You're an odd witch, Granger," he said for not the first time that night.
Hermione laughed through her tears. "Isn't that the truth of it, though?" She took a deep breath, sucking the wayward tears back in. "So, is that why you're here then? To let Remus know Gideon's alright?"
"Ah actually, no," Fabian admitted, shoving his hands into the pockets of his jacket. "I ah, I came to thank you."
Hermione snorted into her tea. "Me?" she asked before taking a sip. "The 'odd' witch you don't trust?"
Fabian flashed her a crooked smile that for a moment looked so like Fred her stomach twisted. "Still don't trust you, if I'm being honest, but credit where credit is due. I'm not so beastly as to not be able to thank someone who has most likely saved my brother's life. I can't," Fabian began, his smile dropping, "I can't tell you what it would be like to lose him. Gideon, I mean. He is," the wizard lifted his hand as if he could accio the right words to him, "he is a part of me."
Hermione nodded, her face softening further. "I understand," she said, thinking of George who has to stare at his brother's reflection every time he sees his own, George who always looked disheveled because he had broken mirror he's come into contact with since. "I mean, I don't have a twin, but- but I know someone who did and he," Hermione stopped for a moment, Fred's face replacing George's in her mind, only discernible by the most minute of differences. "He was never the same," she finished, bringing her cup of tea to her lips.
Fabian leaned back, bum resting on the edge of the kitchen table. "Well, thank you," he said again quietly.
Hermione gave him a half smile. "But you still don't trust me," she observed.
"Gods no," Fabian laughed easily, "I know too little about you to trust you, Granger. But I won't look a gift horse in the mouth as the Muggles say."
Hermione rolled her eyes good-naturedly. "Y'know, for a pureblood you seem to know quite a bit of Muggle culture," Hermione noted, remembering a few comments the wizard had made before in passing.
He nodded. "Yea, I dated a Muggle girl for a bit, had to do a moderate amount of research so I didn't appear like a complete nutter to her. Told her I went to boarding school on the continent, so that helped, especially when I didn't know who Elton John was."
Hermione laughed, the sound escaping from in a half snort. "I'm sorry," she apologized with a giggle. "Boarding school on the continent? I'd venture even Europeans know who Elton John is. However did you meet this impressionable girl?"
The smile Fabian gave to her so easily, though not always genuinely, softened and Hermione found it could become quite endearing. "Ah well, that's a long story involving some undercover work at a Muggle bar that didn't go to plan."
"Sounds interesting, I'd love to hear it one day."
"Maybe I'll tell you one day."
"What happened," Hermione asked, "between the two of you, I mean. Not together anymore?"
Fabian's smile dropped and Hermione wondered if she shouldn't have asked, but curiosity killed the cat. Seeing a more genuine side of Fabian had her intrigued.
"No we're not," he admitted slowly, "It didn't ah, it didn't work out."
"I'm shocked," Hermione joked, attempting to lighten the mood, "a handsome devilishly charming wizard such as yourself couldn't keep a cute girl under your spell? I hardly believe it."
"Think I'm cute do you?"Fabian wiggled his eyebrows.
"Your aesthetic qualities are based on empirical evidence, they're not an opinion," Hermione drawled.
Circe's sake, are we flirting with Fabian Prewett again? Get it together, Granger.
"How do you that?" Hermione asked, frowning into her tea.
"Do what?"
"Do that?" Hermione repeated, gesturing broadly at Fabian.
"I'm afraid you'll need to be more specific," the wizard chortled.
Hermione scrunched her nose, thinking for a moment. "You go from absolutely insufferable, calculating, distant to suddenly charming and jovial. It's disconcerting in the most obnoxious way."
Fabian looked down, smiling to himself, and then back at Hermione out of the corner of his eye.
"See, that right there! That's what I'm talking about!" The witch pointed an accusatory finger at him.
"What am I doing?" He laughed.
"Oh don't play coy," Hermione huffed, "it doesn't suit you. You know exactly what you're doing."
"Tell me anyway," he asked, voice saccharine.
"Oh circe's sake," the witch mumbled, placing her free hand on her hip. "You're trying to throw me off kilter, get me all out of sorts by being downright flirtatious."
"Hmm," Fabian rubbed his chin. "A bit forward of you to presume I'm flirting."
Color crept across Hermione's dark face, hot with embarrassment, but she would not be played. She knew what he was doing. She was not some addle brained child, she was Hermione Granger, Brightest Witch of Her Age, One Third of the Golden Trio, she'd saved the sodding world for fuck's sake.
The witch clenched her jaw. "Listen, maybe this usually works out for you, this sort of-of manipulation but I'm going to have to kindly request that you cut the crap. You don't have to trust me or even like me, but the going back and forth between revealing your true colors and then putting on this charismatic mask is just annoying. If I did save your brother's life, the least you could do it just be honest with me."
Fabian gave her an odd look, lips pressed together, head cocked to the side. It was a look she couldn't quite translate, but it left her feeling something akin to unease deep in her stomach. Slowly he pushed himself off the table, standing up to his full height and with calculated movements, he took a few steps towards her.
"Do you think I flirting with you, Hermione?" he asked when he was a hair's breadth from her.
She stared up at him, neck craned from the effort. "I know you do," she responded stonily.
"So then why," he began, lowering his face to hers until their noses were centimeters apart, "would you think I'm not being honest with you when I do?"
Oh, I am not going to be made uncomfortable by you, Prewett. I am not going to be played or made to doubt myself.
"Because," she responded, voice clipped, "you don't trust me, you've said as much, and why else would you be flirting with someone you don't trust if not to manipulate them in some way?"
"Maybe the manipulation is just a happy accident?" Fabian smiled and Hermione was reminded of how she had seen Draco Malfoy smile at Pansy Parkinson in their youth; predatorily.
"You're an arse," Hermione whispered, willing her voice not to crack.
Fabian stood back up and laughed. "Yea, probably," he agreed. "But y'know, I've been called worse." The wizard winked teasingly and Hermione was absolutely revolted at the tiny little flip her stomach did.
"Oh, of that I have no doubt," Hermione scoffed, taking a drink from her tea.
"Well, Granger," Fabian began, smiling as he backed out of the kitchen. "It's been fun, but I'll be getting back to my brother now."
"Oh, Fabian, about that," Hermione said slowly, her brow furrowed. Fabian looked at her curiously. "It's just, give him time." The witch looked up, meeting Fabian's gaze with steady intensity. "It's a hard curse to come back from, don't push him to wake up, let him gather his strength on his own."
Fabian was quiet for a moment, his face unreadable. "You've survived this curse before." It wasn't a question.
Hermione nodded, fingering the lip of her tea cup.
"You make out like I'm the trickster," Fabian began not unkindly, "but you're the biggest mystery in this room, Hermione Granger."
The witch lifted her small shoulders in a noncommittal shrug. "Don't go looking too closely at that gift horse," she mused.
Fabian snorted. "Suppose you're right."
And with that, the wizard gave a shallow nod and slipped out of the kitchen. Hermione waited until she heard the sound of him disappearing into the Floo before she too made her exit. Bare feet all but silent against the wood floors as she wandered back up the stairs. She stopped to grab a few of Regulus Black's old diaries she'd been working on un-charming before heading to Remus' room.
The witch settled into the plush chair she'd pulled up to the bed earlier, she'd barely had time to open one of the leather bound journals in her lap when a hand reached out and grabbed her own. Hermione gasped and looked over at the weak smile Remus was gifting her.
"Hey, love," he whispered, shifting his body closer to the edge of the bed, closer to her.
Hermione fell to her knees, books tumbling to the floor. "Remus!" she whispered, gripping his hand tightly. "You should be asleep." But she was desperately glad he wasn't.
"Oh, probably," he agreed teasingly. And he was still smiling at her. How could he be smiling at her after what she'd done?
"Remus," she whimpered, voice breaking, "Remus I'm so," she choked for a moment, any apology seeming inadequate, "I'm just so sorry, I'm so sorry."
"You're sorry?" he chuckled, squeezing her hands. "If I'm remembering correctly, I'm the one who threw you into a wall."
"Oh, that, that was nothing," Hermione said dismissively, "you weren't yourself."
Remus raised a tawny brow.
"Barely even felt it."
Remus' face twisted into a wry smile. "You're a tough little witch, it's true."
"Remus, I-" she tried again, but Remus closed his eyes and shook his head.
"Nope, I won't hear any more of this," he insisted.
"Remus, please let me- what are you doing?"
He was pulling her into the bed and she was too tired to fight him.
"Cuddle with him for a bit."
"Oh my gods," Hermione huffed, twisting to become the little spoon to his big.
"Shhh, be quiet, witch, don't you know I'm recovering," Remus chided. Even turned away from him Hermione could hear the smile in his voice and his tactic worked, she gave in.
His arms were solid around her and it felt so insanely good to be held by someone that she simply just melted into him. She hadn't been held in months, not since Ron had ended their engagement, but she found herself thinking of Harry and a tent and years ago when Ron had abandoned them the first time and they only had each other and she fell asleep thinking of her best friend's messy hair and perpetually crooked glasses.