Chapter 6: Lost a Couple Screws
24 December 1924
BELOVED BACHELOR MISSING: A REFLECTION OF HIS LIFE AND LEGACY
By Rita Skeeter
Mr. Draco Malfoy, a decorated war veteran and formidable ally of law enforcement, was one of the most notable faces of the opposition to the rise of communism in Great Britain. He stood proudly beside King George V at his 58th birthday celebration to voice his support of the London Metropolitan Police in their attempt to rid the city of its communist and Irish Republican Army (IRA) enthusiasts.
Mr. Malfoy was, in fact, so entrusted by the police that Chief Inspector Horace Slughorn hailed his unfailing knowledge in an ongoing investigation. "The young man is quite well-connected," Chief Inspector Slughorn told us. "He is infallibly clever, just like his father. I have known Mr. Draco Malfoy for nearly all his life! We are quite close, I would say, and I trust him as I would my own son. An honest and kind man, through and through, he is." Despite the Daily Prophet's best efforts, no more can be said about the investigation, but we do know that Mr. Winston Churchill himself has approved of Mr. Malfoy as a confidential informant on the case.
Furthermore, due to the quiet and almost predictable show of Mr. Draco Malfoy in public throughout the last two or so years, we can presume that he was so enthralled in assisting the police with their civil duties to better London to make more than the necessary appearances. It is because of his generosity and usefulness, that we cannot fault him for not gracing the public more often during those years.
Per usual, Rita is entirely off course.
At this point, I would say she was so beyond the scope of reality that she practically made up history as she saw fit. Though, I suppose at this point in time I am quite bias seeing as I have spent years beside Draco and know precisely how he feels about law enforcement (hint: it's not fucking supportive).
You know what else? I wish – I wish – the past few years had been as boringly quiet as Rita and all of London would have liked to believe. If there was any reason as to why Draco did not grace the bloody public as often as he usually did and smile for the cameras and insist that the Most Charming Smile award go to blubbering Lockhart for the umpteenth time, it was definitely not because he was generously aiding Slughorn's investigation.
I would know. I was in the fucking middle of what actually happened.
At least she got one thing right, and that was Draco's loud opposition to any communists or IRA in the city. Though, being not entirely dim-witted as Slughorn would like to believe (not that he ever spoke to me, but simply because I was a woman and that was apparently evidence enough; the fucking sexist buffoon), I highly doubt he or the King himself approved of Draco's methodology for ridding the city of its invaders.
Ah, well.
It's not as if I was above violence by then, either.
See one, do one, teach one or some fuckery like that.
3 May 1922
"Nott!" Astoria bellowed, sweeping into the dimly lit man cave in the back of one of Theo's pubs and smacking him upside the head. "Nott, wake the fuck up!" He jumped up immediately, swinging his arms wildly, brandishing a blade. She expertly missed his groggy and drunken attacks and moved on to the other men in the room.
"Oi, Satan!" Theo groaned, slicking his hair back and rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. "What the fuck did you do that for?"
Hermione chuckled and leaned against the banister, watching as Astoria promptly ignored him and poured a jug of water over Marcus and Blaise's heads. "Wake up gentlemen! Rise and fucking shine!"
"Fuck," Blaise swore, glaring up at her.
Hermione dutifully threw him a kitchen towel, grabbed a bottle from behind the bar, and poured the three of them some hot brandy. Meanwhile, the other petite brunette assaulted Graham with the palm of her hand until he all but fell off the sofa he'd been crookedly snoring on. "What the fuck?" He grimaced, righting himself and rubbing at the back of his head. "What the bloody hell was that for?"
Astoria leaned down to add, "Wake up. Go home. Kiss your wife. Feed your kids. Grab your weapons and meet Draco at the Manor." She stood tall and straightened her jacket and pencil skirt, then sauntered over to where Hermione had made herself comfortable in a booth.
"Fucking hell," Marcus groaned, emptying his cup and levying for another.
Theo crossed the room on wobbly legs and swiped the bottle from Hermione's grasp, pouring himself and the other men another round. "Why the fuck are you two here, eh?" He asked over his shoulder.
Hermione ignored him and arched a brow at Astoria quizzically. "Montague's married?" She asked. When Astoria nodded, Hermione blinked and turned to Graham, aghast. "You're married?" She squealed. "You have kids?"
"Penny," he coughed, still favoring one of his temples. "Your tone. It wounds. Why the fuck do you sound so shocked, eh? I'm offended, truly."
Blaise smacked him again, then artfully dodged the return blow. He wiggled his brows at Hermione, "Ever wonder why Draco stuck him on the babysitting duty?"
Hermione blinked. She hadn't really thought about it actually, but now she tried to see him in a new light. She struggled. Graham was hardly the most paternal of the group, though she supposed if it was between him and Flint, then it would make more sense to have him training the potential new Death Eaters.
"And your wife?" She pressed, surveying the smirks and laughs shared among the men. Astoria quirked her lips knowingly as well. "Who is she? Where is she?"
"Elsewhere," Graham waved, shrugging. "With the said kids."
"What the fu - "
"Oi," Theo said, splashing cold water on his face and coming to sit beside Hermione, propping his feet up on her lap for a split second before she swiftly kicked them down. "Montague's a good husband. A good father." He paused, eying his mate. "I think."
"Fuck you," Graham shot back.
Astoria preened at the small bout of chaos that ensued between the four men, the spoke up in a trilling tone once they had quieted enough for her to be heard. "How many kids do you have, now?" She arched a dark brow at him, sending Hermione a sidelong smirk, and crossed her arms over her designer lapels, awaiting his response.
"Two," he replied automatically. "No, wait. Three."
Hermione shook her head, muttering, "Fucking idiot," under her breath as Astoria went on with the teasing interrogation.
"And how old are they now?" At that, Graham visibly grimaced. Theo outright laughed and playfully swatted Blaise, the two of them waiting their friend's reply with wide, stupid grins.
"I don't bloody know," he snapped. "Babies. Five, six, eight. Fuck, leave me alone." He looked over at Hermione again. "Don't listen to these fuckers, I'm a good father. Even if I wasn't," he cautiously drawled. "I'm a damn good husband."
"I still can't believe this," Hermione exhaled. "Why is she never around? How come, until now, I have never heard of her, hm?" She surveyed the soft chuckles that swept across the dimly lit room and sighed. "She doesn't know what you do, does she?"
Theo spoke up, tipping the last of his drink to the back of his throat and setting it down with a loud clang. "More or less."
"What is that supposed to mean?" Hermione challenged, giving him a disapproving look. His lips twisted into his usual playful smirk that meant he didn't plan on elaborating. She sighed.
Blaise, then, chimed in. "Less of the more, and more of the less." He winked at her and she shook her head, standing up and following Astoria toward the door.
"Don't be fucking late," Astoria ordered, throwing an accusatory finger around the group of them. It settled on Theo with an added narrowing of her pale green eyes, "I'm talking to you especially, Nott." Then, she looped her arm in Hermione's and directed her out of the dark pub and into the bright, busy streets of London. "Come on," she dimpled, nodding to their driver – "St. Paul's, Kreacher" – and slid into the backseat behind Hermione. "We don't want to be late, either," she added.
Hermione and Astoria strode into the church – the latter performing the sign of the Cross dutifully while the former stumbled through the motions as more of an afterthought – and joined Narcissa in one of the middle pews.
Her head was bent, and her jet-black hair spilled out of its half-updo onto the silvery white strands cascading down her shoulders; between her gloved hands, deep emerald lace per usual despite what Blaise and Daphne claimed to be the summer of pastels, was a glass-beaded rosary.
"Dear Lord," she murmured, eyes closed in concentration. "Make this year pass well. Let none get hurt, and make them that do, not Death Eater's." Her breath fell evenly, and Hermione kept her eyes trained on the posh woman rather than following Astoria in closing her eyes and nodding along to what she said. She was enthralled by every word that fell from Narcissa's tinted lips.
"Watch Flint," Narcissa went on. "Because he is the only one his brother will listen to, and I don't want to have to be responsible for that little shit."
Hermione's jaw dropped; she surveyed the other churchgoers to see if anyone else had hurt the slight, and then turned her attention back to the woman beside her when she ruled that nothing was going to come of it. As Narcissa went on, Hermione anxiously awaited the inevitable bolt of lightning she presumed would strike.
"Watch Montague," she continued without missing a beat. "Because he has so many depending on him, and again, I don't want to be responsible for taking them in. Especially not Marietta, that bitch."
Astoria's lips quirked into a tiny smirk as Hermione stifled a bout of dry coughs.
"Watch Zabini," Narcissa whispered. "Because he is as likely to hurt himself as anyone else." There was a pause, and an obvious exasperated sigh as she moved on to the final prayers.
"Watch Nott," she breathed. "Because his temper could rival the devil's himself and I do not wish for him to die and go on antagonizing the poor fucking bastard until he sends him back to us, his attitude renewed."
Hermione closed her eyes for the last prayer, sending one silently herself.
"Watch my boy," Narcissa murmured. "Watch my darling Draco. I know what he is, but he does what he does for us." She paused, her eyelids flickering open as she regarded the virginal fixture at the back of the church. "I think." Then, she signed the Cross and added, "Amen."
Hermione followed in Astoria's footsteps to sign and whisper, "Amen," as well before standing in the pew and exiting the church. Outside, Hermione angled herself toward the other women and frowned, "Since when are you all religious?"
"We aren't," Astoria replied primly. "Though, some days, it's better to be safe than sorry."
"But - "
"Penny," Narcissa interrupted in a reprimanding tone of finality. "Don't question it." She instructed Kreacher where to go and then settled herself in the back seat between Astoria and Hermione. Narcissa turned to the latter of the two and went on, "I used to do that every morning during the war." She sighed. "I hope soon I'll be done with it for good."
Hermione chewed her lip.
She seriously doubted that was the case, but there was no point in arguing with Draco's mother.
A few weeks later, the three of them waited at platform four for Pansy and Daphne to arrive back in London from the end of their school year, leaving the men to hoard up in the Manor as they had done for the past two months. With Neville Longbottom evidently missing, Draco wasn't taking any chances on that front, and so only the women had been allowed to run various errands for the Death Eaters.
Hermione supposed she should be thankful nothing had come from Longbottom, but she had the sinking feeling that wouldn't last forever.
Immediately after his arrest, Draco had sent word to Greg and Vince that they needed to desist their work in New York and return back to London at soon as possible. It wasn't safe for them, especially if there was any connection made between Longbottom's opium, his employment by Draco, and its relation to the influx of wealth from America. The prohibition income would have to be sacrificed as well.
It hardly had a severe impact on the family and the company since most of the money they'd made had been laughably ludicrous and well beyond even their aristocratic spending habits. Still. It made a difference in some respects when Draco had already set in motion the plan to overthrow Karkaroff but now had no monetary reason to hold a legal betting shop in Graham's name.
"Miss Greengrass! Miss Parkinson!" Winky called out excitedly, waving them down as they stepped off the train.
Narcissa stepped into place and held out her arms for the women to fall into, "Oh, my darlings!" She exclaimed loudly enough for several heads on the platform to turn. There was a frenzied rush of commentary followed by a few flashes of light. "Pans," Narcissa said affectionately, caressing her cheek. "Daph," she added, brushing the fine blond waves of the other woman.
This was precisely what Astoria and Hermione had been waiting for.
"Now, Penny," she whispered, sliding out of the second car and rushing toward the platform.
As the cameras continued to go off, and Rita Skeeter herself marveled at the three women embracing emphatically, Astoria and Hermione slinked off to the last car of the train. The plan had been to utilize the British press' presence to distract anyone lingering about with a connection to the Order.
"No doubt by tomorrow morning there will be a cover story proclaiming Daphne and Pansy angling for Narcissa's favor," Hermione muttered with a roll of her eyes.
Astoria's laughter cut through the air like bells, "It was always between them, wasn't it? It's a wonder Draco doesn't quietly indulge in the rumors and place a ring on one of them during an outing."
Hermione shifted through the remainder of the people on the platform and stepped onto the train car, adding over her shoulder, "Or, better yet, he should take turns moving a ring between them and see what that horrible Rita woman thinks of that."
"Bloody brilliant, Penny," Astoria beamed. "Let's bring it up at the next family meeting." Then, she shot herself down the aisle at a brisk pace, heading toward seats eighty-four and eighty-five. There were two men in dark coats and uncharacteristically large hats, tipped low to cover their faces. "Hello, gentlemen," Astoria remarked.
The taller of the two yelped while the other snapped his head up and gasped, "Bloody hell, woman!" – "Satan," Astoria corrected with a wink – He looked nervously around the empty train car before standing up and beckoning for the other man to follow. "I thought Draco said - "
"He did," Hermione said. "I'm here." She nodded to Greg and Vince and turned on her heel to exit the train. "Come on," she told them, waving them behind her through the crowd as they slipped out of the station and into the second car. "Hurry," she added, noticing the press begin to tire of Narcissa fondly asking the two women how their journey was.
"You know," Hermione said, taking the note from Dobby, closing the door and crossing the room to hand it to Draco. "If Dobby knows to come looking for you here, it's only a matter of time before Narcissa does as well."
He took the note, unfolding it and reading it contents quickly before sighing and dragging his gaze back up to meet hers with an amused twitch of his mouth. "It's not like I intended to hide out here permanently," he remarked. "It doesn't take a clever mind to add your bedroom to the list of possible places I might be if not in mine."
"Oh?" Hermione leered, swinging one leg over his lap and straddling him at her small, chestnut desk. "You have an entire list of places, do you?" She nipped at his ear, then whispered, "Do tell, Mr. Malfoy."
A satisfying shudder ran over his body.
"Is that jealousy I hear in your voice, Penny?" Draco countered, brushing his thumb across her cheekbone, jawline, and exposed clavicle.
"No," she gasped as his lips replaced his fingertips.
A gentle laugh escaped his lips, vibrating against her skin. "I can assure you, Miss Clearwater," he teased. "Theo is half as delightful as far as company goes, compared to you. For one thing, he hogs the sheets gregariously."
"How dare he," she quipped, feigning disgust. Her fingers slowly unbuttoned his oxford, peeling the soft material back from his sculpted shoulders and digging her nails into the hot skin. "He should be punished," she added, brushing her lips against his.
Draco bit at her bottom lip, pulling it between his teeth and holding it captive. Like he did with many parts of her. Hermione shivered as his hands wound through her hair, tugging unkindly at her curls and exposing her neck. His mouth was warm and searing, punishing in its own way despite the gentle trail of kisses he left down her throat.
"Mhmm," he murmured. "I agree." Draco lifted Hermione by her bum and walked her over to the bed, lying her against the mattress and falling to his knees at the end of the bed. "How should I punish him, you think? I am very skilled at torment," he teased, nipping at the bare skin of her calves as he peeled away the stockings, "or so I'm told."
You most certainly are, she thought, biting down on her lip to stop a moan from escaping as his mouth moved up her thighs. His breath was burning, churning something deep inside of her. It built and built, slowly but surely.
"I'm sure you'll think of something," she gasped, his tongue flicking across her slit.
He brought his head up to rest his chin on her hip, replacing his tongue with his deft fingers, encircling her torturously until she was so slick and the heat inside of her threatening to burst that she arched her back, swiveling her hips against his palm to create more friction. Draco, ever the attentive partner, slid his fingers in then curved them against her clit, rubbing expertly as the ball in her lower abdomen coiled and coiled, then came undone in a single burst.
"I'll need your help, Penny," he murmured softly against her bare stomach. She writhed, riding out the first wave and preparing for the second one that was soon to come if he kept doing what he was doing to her. "I always need your help." He bit at her pebbled skin, causing a yelp to escape her lips, then flicked his tongue over the already fading mark, licking an apology against her. "Once made equal to man, woman becomes his superior."
Hermione sat up, grabbing at his longer hair and yanking his head back until he let go of her clit as well. "Socrates again?" She challenged with a skeptical dark brow. He only smirked, shrugging his nonchalance as if to say, Well, he had a point, didn't he? And against that, she could not argue.
She pulled the summer shift dress over her narrow shoulders and crawled back onto the bed, patting the silky, champagne-colored sheets with a mischievous grin. "Draco," she breathed as he rid himself of his trousers and slid onto the mattress beside her. "I believe it should be I who torments you today, hm?"
His silver eyes glinted at the allusion, but he leaned back against the pillows, pulling her naked body on top of his burning one. "Who is to say that tasting your sweet euphoria on my tongue is not torment enough?" He challenged. She pushed him playfully away and propped herself on all fours over his torso, shimmying down his chest one bite and kiss at a time. "You," he exhaled, "will be the death of me, Penny."
Hermione didn't bother hiding the smile that crept over her face and met his eye as she lowered her mouth over the tip of his cock. "Perhaps," she said, pulling back with a loud pop. "I want you to taste your salty, savoury elation on my tongue." His eyes widened, pupils dilated, and Hermione reveled at how easily he came undone by her. It was only fair since he had the same, if not a more prominent, effect on her resolve.
Draco's penis was beautiful.
Which didn't make it a very difficult task for her to take it between her lips and torment him as she saw fit; her tongue licking up his shaft as her hand wrapped around it, pumping vigorously as her lips continued to slide up and down his throbbing length.
One meticulously timed shift of her fingers lower, a bit of applied pressure, and he was coming in powerful bursts at the back of her throat. Hermione smiled inwardly, licking away the last of his salty desire for her and brushing her slick lips on the back of her hand, crawling back up his torso to mount him.
Her hips collided with his rhythmically as she straddled him, bouncing up and down.
Hermione rode him until she felt the barrier of another euphoric release break and come undone, drowning her. She came over him, hard, and digging her nails into his biceps. There wasn't a moment for her to catch her breath before Draco leaned forward, enveloping her in his arms and hugging her close to him.
"Pen," he gasped.
This was what he needed.
Intimacy.
He always did that. He always shifted them, from whatever position they were in, to hold her close at the end. Draco's breath was hot and ragged as his lips brushed against her shoulder; the rough pads of his fingers pressed into her scapulae, and his legs quivered against hers as he held them together and closer, closer, closer.
Lying on their backs, tangled in the silk sheets, limbs intertwined, they caught their breath for what felt like hours.
Finally, Hermione broke the silence, sitting up to prop her head and sex-crazed curls up on her palm. She regarded him, his relaxed state, for a full thirty seconds before ruining it. "What did the note say?" She asked.
Draco sighed.
"You never miss a thing," he said, turning his head to survey her warm, brown eyes on him. "Do you, Penny?" She lifted her shoulders as best she could and quirked her mouth into a lopsided smile as if to say, What is there to be done about it?
At her insistent expression and prolonged silence, he tilted his head back and drew her into his arms.
"Very well," he declared. "It was – It wasn't good, per se. But it also wasn't bad."
Hermione sighed, trailing her fingers through his hair, along his jawline, across his lips. "So descriptive, Draco," she teased. "I understand perfectly well now. I see the light." She thought she was funny. He, evidently, did not. He flipped her onto her back and pressed his body against her, barely hovering to inhibit the weight from crushing her.
She gasped; all of the air leaving her lungs in a single, electrifying hiss.
"Pen," he growled against her lips in a low, warning tone.
Hermione bit down on her lower lip, then held her breath as she lifted her chin to pull at his lip instead, taking it between her teeth and sucking on it. Savoring the taste of him. His shoulders relaxed minutely as she continued grazing her lips along his jaw, marveling at the sensation of his pale stubble on her swollen mouth.
He exhaled steadily.
"Scabior has no idea what I meant when I asked about Longbottom's arrest." Draco said, his silver eyes flashing a dark, slate grey as the tone of conversation shifted. "He basically admitted that there was no record of it ever happening. Nothing." He shook his head. "I just don't fucking understand what I'm supposed to do with that information."
Hermione chewed her lip, brows furrowed in attempt to come up with a formidable response, but a loud bang on the door interrupted her efforts. There was another thunderous rapt before it burst open and Theo stormed in, arms folded and pale eyes blazing.
"Oi!" He bellowed. "You two better get the fuck downstairs right now or Narcissa is coming up here herself. Personally, I volunteered to save both of your skins, but I would have rather gone another day without seeing Draco's pale arse, understood?" He rolled his eyes at them scrambling apart. "Get a bloody move on, eh?"
Theo spun and aimed himself back out the open door, not bothering to close it, and muttered, "For fuck's sake," loudly under his breath as he left.
Hermione instantly flushed, but Draco simply leaned across the bed as they redressed and kissed her roughly, laughing against her lips. "Bloody Nott," he swore.
She shook her head, twisting her traitorous curls into a suitable chignon before following him out into the corridor and down the main staircase. "No," she corrected. "Bloody Narcissa." However, in response, he merely winked down at her as his palm guided the small of her back into the main sitting room where it had been luxuriously decorated for Draco's twenty-seventh birthday.
There was a heat wave the weekend of the Twenty-Second Annual Charity Fundraiser for Children in Need which made walking through the cobblestone streets of London positively killer.
Hermione's heels clacked loudly against the stone as she made her way around the High Street, bobbing in and out of shops for various things on everyone's wish list; dark chocolate for Greg and Vince, new lipstick for Pansy and Daphne, di for Theo to defile, and a keychain for Narcissa's newest addition to the family cars.
Normally this mundane task fell to one of the house staff – almost always to Winky since she had the best taste among them – but they were over the moon with their own list of things to do to prepare for the gala the family would be hosting. Astoria was away for the weekend, running some errand for Narcissa though Hermione had no idea what it was, and being herself cordially not invited to the gala this year, she opted to compile a small to-do list of her own to keep herself busy.
Truth be told, she quite enjoyed the alone time. It wasn't as if she had a lot of it in the Manor with everyone home for the long summer.
Hermione had just purchased a tiny black horse that she thought was fitting for enough for the Rolls-Royce Twenty that Narcissa had custom-painted black with red leather interior, when someone gripped her elbow firmly and tugged her away from the main street where she had been angling to hail for a cab (because Kreacher had rudely declined her car service under the pretense that "Missus was not a real Malfoy or Death Eater").
"Don't scream," a low, male voice whispered in her ear.
Hermione tried to whip her head around to see past the tinted sunglasses and silk tie over her hair, but it was no use. It wasn't until she was obscured by a dark alleyway in an arcade that the bruising grip released her. She spun around with her blade poised and gaped, momentarily foregoing the idea of using it.
"Longbottom?" She blinked. "Neville Longbottom?"
"Yes," he replied coarsely. He eyed the street behind them warily and met her brown eyes with wide, oceanic frantic ones. "I don't have a lot of time. I'm afraid I might have been followed."
"What the - "
He thrust a crumpled note in her hand and immediately backed away, "We need to talk. Meet me there. Half-ten tonight, alright?"
Then, he was gone.
Hermione blinked several times, pocketed her blade, and unfolded the worn paper in her small hands. They were trembling terribly as she read the address, wondering if she could have possibly suffered a vision from the sweltering heat but ruled that out as she recognized the handwriting to be the same as the scribbles written on the packages she used to collect from the Longbottom estate.
That night, Hermione had no trouble sneaking out of the Manor, while everyone else was still out at the gala, and finding her way to the address, though calling it an address was a stretch. The path that led under the noisy, frequented bridge that Longbottom insisted she meet him at was pitch-black and Hermione nearly tripped twice. At the last step, pale arms reached out to steady her as she almost succumbed to a near-fatal fall.
"Whoa," Longbottom said, helping her to her feet and ushering her further under the bridge and out of sight. "You alright?" She nodded numbly. His darkened eyes flitted over her head, "You come alone?"
"Yes," she snapped, "Obviously."
Hermione had done that for her own safety, not trusting anyone else to occupy her since she still wasn't sure whether or not Neville Longbottom was a friend or foe, but suddenly she feared that if he were the latter that she had just made his job of exposing her or getting rid of her that much easier.
Her fingers fluttered nervously to the revolver she'd stuffed in her purse at the last second – nipping it from Draco's bedside table.
"Come," Longbottom beckoned, motioning for her to follow him further into the darkness.
"Fuck no," she shouted back over the roar of the canal the bridge crossed over. The dark water lapping ominously to her left, threatening her just as the icy blue gaze and hollowed face of the man before her did. "I'm not going anywhere else with you until you start talking," she insisted.
He sighed, "I could say the same for you, you know." He arched an ebony brow and added a murmured, "Granger," to prove it.
She swallowed.
"I just want to talk," Longbottom stated. "Somewhere quieter," he added, gesturing emphatically to the thundering water.
"Fine," Hermione grumbled.
They walked in silence for a couple of blocks until he brought her to what appeared to be an abandoned warehouse. Inside, it reeked of stale lager and smoke. In the back there was a rickety set of rusted stairs that bowed beneath their feet as they climbed. Hermione – not for the first time and likely not for the last – imagined what she would think of herself if this was how she died. Would she be surprised? No, because this endeavor seemed no more risky than any other that she'd done. Would she be able to survive any attempt on her life? One quick sweep across the attic room told her no, she probably wouldn't if Neville tried hard enough.
There was virtually no escaping where he brought her.
The floorboards were uneven and moth-eaten. The single lamp swung precariously, illuminating them in a hazy yellow glow. The two chairs he propped up for them had clearly seen better days, but at least the bottle of whiskey he produced along with two glasses were new and inviting.
"A gracious host," she remarked drily, taking the proffered glass and taking a sip, welcoming the numbing of her nerves that accompanied it.
"What can I say?" Longbottom replied. "I was drilled from birth with as much aristocratic etiquette as your precious Death Eaters," he smirked.
Hermione blinked.
"Don't worry," he said, raising his glass to her. "I haven't told anyone about them." He took an enormous gulp, eyes drooping slightly as he regarded her. "Or you."
She took a seat across from him, gripping her purse tightly in her lap, "Why not?" She pressed, narrowing her eyes at him. There was evidence of starvation in the hollow of his cheeks, and of isolation in the dilated pupils of his eyes. "I mean, I'm thrilled that you haven't, it quite literally saved my life but… Why didn't you? Say anything, that is."
"I was going to," he admitted. "I supposed I could have won myself some form of witness protection for giving up Malfoy and his Death Eater clan. But after I said your name, your real name," – Hermione blanched – "and the coppers relayed that to whomever they radioed, I was taken… elsewhere. Then everything changed."
"Elsewhere?" She questioned, frowning.
Longbottom nodded, "Hm." He refilled their glasses, then went on. "It all happened a bit quickly to be honest."
The paranoia bubbled in Hermione to the point of boiling over and she reached out, gripping his wrist between her filed nails, digging them in until his pale skin broke. "Tell me everything," she begged. "Everything. No detail is too small."
"Why should I?"
She blinked, "Are you telling me that you didn't tell anyone about my double identity, and you demanded that I follow you all the way out here for what… nothing? You seriously expect me to believe I don't think you need to confess something? That you don't – I don't know – trust me or need me for something?"
He shifted uncomfortably in his seat, sipping at the dark liquor.
"That's it, isn't it?" Hermione breathed. "You need something from me. Otherwise why bother with," she paused, gesturing to the stale air between them and the dim light barely illuminating the space around them. "… all of this."
Longbottom grumbled something incoherent under his breath, but Hermione wasn't about to get taken advantage of, and she definitely wasn't about to leave here without any answers. "What was that?" She snapped loudly, glaring at him. "What the fuck did you just mumble?"
"I said," he hissed back at her. "You are too fucking clever for your own good."
She sighed, leaning back against the aged wooden chair that was currently fucking up her posture more and more every minute. "I know," she lamented finally, taking a generous sip. "It's going to get me killed one day. Of that, I have no doubt."
Longbottom shook his head, raising his glass to her once more. "My stupidity will be the death of me, so," he lifted his shoulders minutely. "Cheers to that."
Hermione snorted, meeting his glass and clanking hers against it, then bringing hers to her lips. The whiskey burned her throat, numbed her tongue, and slicked her lips. "So," she said lifted her feet to a crate and crossing her ankles, making herself comfortable. "Are you going to tell me how you came to know my name? While you're at it," she said, aiming her forefinger toward him. "If you could explain what the bloody hell you mean by 'elsewhere' that would be enormously helpful."
"Well," he said, inhaling deeply. "If we're going to get into the nitty gritty, you may as well call me Neville." When he met her eye and she arched a judgmental brow, he continued, "You and your Death Eater lot always call me Longbottom." – "Because that's your name," she cut in, but he ignored it, talking over her – "It reminds me of my father, Professor Longbottom as everyone called him, and on me the name just feels… empty. I don't feel like I measure up to it."
Hermione, recognizing the flash of genuine pain behind his blue eyes, bit back a derogatory comment.
"He's how I know who you are, by the way." Longbottom – Neville, she corrected herself internally – stated, taking a cigarette from her with an amicable nod. "My father. He did teach you chemistry. Hermione Granger," he said, tasting her name on his whiskey-soaked lips. "He talked about you a lot. It was ridiculously modest of you to claim not to be one of his brighter students, you know."
She shrugged.
Neville shook his head, chuckling, then abruptly angled towards her and proclaimed, "And you know what else?" His chest heaved up and down dramatically and his eyes were wild and bloodshot, but she could tell from the lack of tension in his limbs that he was growing comfortable around her. As if she was the one withholding a secret worth his life. "As soon as I mentioned your name and the coppers relayed that, they completely abandoned protocol."
Her eyes narrowed, "How do you know what police protocol is?"
He let a mirthless laugh escape his lips as he settled back into his chair and took a long drag, exhaling a cloud of smoke. "I was not the poster-perfect aristocratic boy my parents, and my Gran, so desperately wanted. I was constantly in trouble for – Fuck – for everything, really."
Hermione grunted, something between a cough and a snort that dissolved into her next sip. "I'm starting to think none of you aristocratic fuckers are as clean and noble and precious as you all make yourselves out to be."
"You may be right about that," he agreed, leaning his head back against the back of his chair. She waited patiently for him to continue. There was an undeniable gut feeling that this was a vital part of the reason he appeared to be willing to trust her; to rely on her for something. "Anyway," He went on and she let out a shaky breath. "The two officers or whatever took me to a weird, dirty location that was definitely not their Headquarters. It was in a rough part of the city, practically some hole in the wall, and there were tons of other men there. Not law enforcement. Or, at least, I don't think they were."
Hermione desperately wanted to interrupt and press him for more details, but his eyes had glazed over as he relived the memory so she kept quiet, mentally recording all of the details as best as she could.
"They put me in a windowless room, kicked me around a bit. Made me bleed. That was typical. What was odd was that when a new officer came in, one of their supervisors I would guess, the air in the room – It changed. It got cold… so, so cold. Then he – "
Neville stopped abruptly.
He snapped his eyes open and Hermione could see the paralyzing fear echoing behind the deep, brilliant blue of his irises. A shiver shot up her spine.
"He killed them." Neville told her, barely above a whisper. "The other man, the new one, he just – he shot them. Execution style. Didn't even blink." He swallowed heavily, the lump in his throat bobbing helplessly. As trapped in the recollection as he was. "I knew that was the moment I was probably as good as dead. That's when I – Well – Let's just say that I don't think the other man expected me to put up a fight."
Neville shuddered.
"I'm – I'm sorry," Hermione muttered, eyes dropping to his hands clamped in his lap, furiously digging into skin and tearing at what was left of his cigarette.
"At first, I blamed you for what happened. I thought – There had to be a reason they brought me there and tried to… you know. After I said your name." He slid a sidelong glance at her. "The real one, that is."
She coughed once, clearing the dryness in the back of her throat. "What changed?"
He shrugged, "Nothing, I guess. I just – I realized that I kept quiet for a reason. Deep down I knew I could trust you somehow, that you wouldn't have been – couldn't have been – the reason they brought me there." He filled their glasses liberally, nearly spilling the spiced liquor over the rim. "My father trusted you. Liked you. I figured that if you were good enough for him, then I didn't have a reason to doubt you."
Neville sighed. "Besides, it's not like I have a clean track record. This could have been a result of some ghost of my past that had nothing to do with you. Guess I can chop it all up to one horrible coincidence."
Being herself not a very firm believer in coincidences, Hermione tilted her head and blinked at him through hazy eyes. "That's it? Just like that?"
Neville met her eye, "Are you telling me that I shouldn't have thought better of you? That you did have something to do with that whole ordeal?"
She shook her head, "No, I - "
There was a pause. A long, palpable silence.
"Who was the man? What happened to him if you… you know." She gestured to him and her drinking and smoking and conversing like old friends. "You're here." Hermione bit back the words, You're fine, because truth be told he didn't look it. He looked as rattled and rugged as an Order member.
"He's alive," Neville supplied, squinting at the new light she'd handed to him. "I knocked him out, but I didn't kill him, that's for sure. Maybe I should've…" He trailed off, took a long drag, then exhaled his next statement. "There was nothing remarkable about him, I hate to tell you. He was plain, short brown hair and pale skin, with no discernable marks to identify him." He choked on a forced laugh. "Well," Neville added. "Now he might have one."
Her brows furrowed, "What?"
Neville shot her a winning smirk, "I may have left a bit of a scar on his left hand. With my teeth."
At that, Hermione could not hold back a fit of laughter. It tore through her ribs, expanding her lungs and constricting them until they ached and burned. Her throat was dry that if it weren't for the copious amounts of whiskey, she was certain it would be bloody sore as hell.
"You - " She clutched her stomach. "You bit him?" Hermione wiped a tear hastily away as she met Neville's amusing gaze. "Didn't you just say he shot two cops? He had a bloody gun and you – Oh, bloody hell. That is bloody brilliant."
Neville rolled his eyes, "I'm glad you find my circumstance amusing." Though, a moment later, the vehemence slid from his tone and he openly joined in the mocking. "Honestly? Fucking bastard deserved worse than that. I can't stand men who didn't fight in France."
Hermione blinked back tears, sobering up.
She grimaced into her glass, not meeting his eye, "My father didn't fight in France."
His glare pierced through her, sending chills up her arms and lifting the thin hairs there effortlessly. Hermione had never felt so frightened of Neville Longbottom before that moment, and what he said next did little to ease her mind.
"Are you fucking joking, Granger?" His bloodshot eyes narrowed, and his lip curled in evident anger. "I shouldn't be bloody sitting here – having a drink with you, no less – and I definitely shouldn't have kept my mouth shut if that's how you repay me. Fucking disgusting."
Hermione groaned. "Neville," she warned, coaxing him back into his seat with a cutting glare of her own. "He didn't fight in France, but he did serve his country. He - " She grimaced, toying with the glass between her fingertips as she grasped for the words. "My grandparents," she explained. "They're French – the Grangers – and my father was chosen to stay in the city and interpret messages from or to the enemy. He didn't fight, that's true," Hermione admitted. "But he did serve."
"Hm," Neville grunted, sitting back and letting the whiskey wash over him, bringing him back to a state of relaxation. Or close enough to one. "He's no coward, then. I can't bloody stand the men who didn't serve." He said, amending his phrasing for her benefit.
She nodded her appreciation.
"How did you know he didn't serve?" Hermione chimed after a shared moment of solace.
"Call it – Fuck, I don't know – soldier's gut feeling or something like that. Any man who served is automatically brethren. We can see – from one look at another – the ghosts of the war lingering behind our eyes. The seconds fighting for our life, crawling on our bloodied elbows in the trenches, in the mud. That one minute. The soldier's minute. In battle, that's all you get. One minute of everything at once, and anything before is nothing, and everything after is nothing. Nothing in comparison, to that one minute. Nothing that matters."
He shuddered, and she did too, imagining it.
"Didn't you get enough of it?" Hermione remarked, inhaling familiar smoke. "Over there?"
Neville snorted, disregarding her query, "For you, I imagine, with your clever and logical brain that sort of emotional reading might not be comprehensible. Let me put it this way," he went on. "The men who went off to fight, or stayed and relayed messages or whatever, they spent years giving their lives for their country. For freedom and democracy. Then, they woke up one day and it was over."
He took a deep breath.
"They were expected to go back to work, or school, or find something to bloody do to make the voices stop and the violence cease. Most of us, excluding your precious Death Eaters, struggled to make a living and re-enter society. So, to answer your question, you can mostly tell by where a man ranks in his field." Neville supplied.
Hermione considered this, then nodded along.
"Right," Neville stated, clearing his scorched throat. "The two coppers? They're arguably old enough to have put years of experience into their field and stand way higher than a bloody PC, but there they were. The man? He was older, but not by much, and yet he was high enough or secure enough to feel that he could kill them in cold blood and not suffer any conceivable consequences." He shook his head. "Like I said, disgusting."
She pursed her lips. "Makes sense," she sighed. "You're sure you don't recognize him? He didn't have any military insignia or anything?"
Neville shook his head.
"So," he said, choking on a dejected laugh. "I'm pretty fucked. On the one hand, I have this man with connections to the police, and absolutely no remorse for them at the same time, hunting me down. Then, on the other cursed hand, I have Malfoy plotting where to mount my head on his wall when he finally finds me."
Hermione opened her mouth to give him a snotty retort, but he was already shaking his head at her, aiming an accusatory finger at her over his glass. "Don't," he cautioned. "Don't look at me like that, Granger. I know damn well even if I swore not to talk that he would still kill me."
She sighed, finding it impossible to disagree with him. He had a point. In fact, he had too good of a point. "Why don't you try and join him, then? Surely he would be more interested in saving your life if he recruited you."
"What?" Neville blinked. "Work as one of his little Death Eater members?" She nodded, and he snorted, turning his head away from her and running a shaky hand through his ebony waves. "No fucking thank you. I spent way too much of my life doing the immoral thing, the corrupt thing, the wrong thing. I don't need any more of it. Personally, I'm actually really glad to be rid of that lab."
He shuddered violently and Hermione grimaced.
"Wait," she began, scrutinizing him. "That's it." Hermione gasped, glaring at the man before her. "That's exactly it, isn't it? That's why you came looking for me in the first place, because you knew you wouldn't make it out alive – wouldn't survive on the streets for very long or possibly even make it out of the city at all – before one of them found you and killed you. You dragged me here, in the middle of bloody nowhere, because you want me to do it."
Neville stared at her. He said nothing, and it said everything she needed to know.
Hermione shot to her feet, aghast. "You want me to kill you! You think I'll – What? – do it more humanely than either of them?" She spat at his feet. "Fuck you,"
"I hardly find that thought to be offensive," he quipped. "Then again…" He tilted his head back and forth, lamenting her allegiances. Neville tipped his glass back, regarding her with darkened eyes, swimming with pain and fury. Then, he set the empty glass down and stood, towering over her easily. "What other choice do I have? I have no one else left. My Gran left me. She left. I shouldn't have been surprised, really, since she only ever stuck around for my father, and he died. He's dead. Gone."
Her lips twisted unkindly, "So?" She scoffed, "I sent my bloody parents off to Australia when I took this assignment with Malfoy, and you know what? They didn't even hesitate to leave. I don't even get Christmas cards off them, and yet here I fucking am. I'm still living. Still breathing. Still fighting for both of those cruel luxuries."
Neville scowled.
Her chest heaved, threatening to burst as the anger boiled in her blood. "You should know as well as anyone what that feels like. You fought once, Neville. You fought." Hermione threw up her hands, exasperated. "That's all I'm asking you to do! Bloody fight."
He rolled his eyes, "That's all good and well, but that doesn't present me with a real solution to my problem – and it's a rather fucking massive problem."
"Yes," she snapped back. "It does give you a solution." Hermione reached for her purse, rifling through its contents for the bills she carried around at Draco's insistence and threw a couple hundred pounds down onto the crate, slamming the heavy glass on top of it. "That should be enough to get you to anywhere you want to go. I don't advise America. They're going through a bit of a rough patch right now." She shrugged, "Might I suggest Australia?"
"What?" Neville blinked.
Hermione didn't have time for this. She turned to descend the death trap of a ladder and called out over her shoulder, willing herself not to sway too much as the room spun.
"Just – Send a postcard, will you?"
He sputtered, "What? Just like that? You're letting me go?"
She shrugged, "A life for a life, Neville Longbottom. Looks like we're both still trying to live up to your father's exceedingly high expectations."
Without another glance back at the gangly man, Hermione left.
Hermione held her breath.
One. Two. Three.
She offered a polite smile, carefully curated not to display her anxiousness, and muttered an excuse to the toilettes. Narcissa's pale eyes bore into her as she stood from the sofa and adjusted her fitted skirt, but Hermione made sure to keep her shoulders relaxed and gaze genuine.
Outside of the sitting room, Hermione hurried toward the six-car garage under the Manor and pinched one of the sets of keys hanging by the door. Inhale. Exhale. "You can do this," she told herself. "It's not that difficult it's just a bloody car." But no matter how hard she turned over the keys, the engine did not make a sound. Frustrated, Hermione banged her head against the steering wheel and let out a muffled groan.
"Going somewhere?"
Hermione's head snapped up; her facial expression incapable of suppressing its reflex of surprise. Astoria leaned against the hood of the car, arms crossed, lips pursed, and brows arched. There was a moment of absolute silence before Hermione remembered to at least try to come up with a formidable excuse for her sneaking around places she should not be and sitting in vehicles she definitely should not be sitting in.
"I - "
An accusatory, polished finger.
"Don't."
Astoria shook her head, then opened the driver's door and shoved Hermione over into the next seat. "Give me the keys, Penny." She said, holding out her gloved hand expectantly. Astoria registered the hesitation across Hermione's face and lurched over with lightning speed to take them from her. "Unbelievable," she muttered under her breath.
Hermione began to protest, come up with some reason for Astoria not to tell Narcissa or Draco what she'd been doing when the other woman flicked her wrist and the engine purred, coming to life under her privileged hands. Hermione gaped.
Astoria smirked askance, "Close your mouth, Penny. It's unladylike."
"I – But – You - "
"Yes, precisely." Astoria replied, pulling the jet-black car out of the garage and skidding out of the drive and into the deserted street. "If you think that I'm letting you go alone then I regret to inform you that you are sorely mistaken." She sniffed.
Hermione, who highly doubted the woman swerving through the busy streets of London and barely missing pedestrians actually regretted saying anything, blinked. "Wait – What are you - "
An exasperated sigh.
"Penny," she said, tearing her jewel-toned gaze from the road for a spare moment. "You are hardly as unpredictable as you wish yourself to be."
Which, to that, she felt a warm sensation flood over her; it was, quite simply, too accurate though she had hoped it wasn't for this particular event. "So?" Hermione drawled, wide darting across the open road before them as they tore through the city and headed toward the very destination Hermione had been keen to drive to herself.
"So," Astoria smirked. "The party doesn't start until we walk in," and Hermione felt her lips curl upwards into their usual smize in Astoria's company.
It was impossibly too easy to park and navigate the back corridors of the racetrack as two young, unaccompanied women. A small, innocent smile to a guard here. A confident, man-eater strut there to whichever high roller was watching. Then, Astoria and Hermione emerged into the club level where the Death Eaters faced off Karkaroff and his men.
The entire floor had been emptied save for the men from both opposing parties and the signs of a brewing fight was evident in the tension in the dead air between Draco and Karkaroff.
"Get your weapons out boys," Karkaroff sniped, not letting his dark eyes leave Draco's. "Load 'em up." There was a clatter of metal as guns were produced left and right from all of what appeared to be hired men – or loyal, but fiscally so – men from Bulgaria to support Karkaroff in his turf war.
Draco, meanwhile, simply inclined his chin upward. Several weapons glinted from the Death Eaters hands, and Hermione let out a choked gasp from behind the corner where she and Astoria were hiding because in all of her time alongside them, she had never witnessed them use more than a simple blade or the razor embedded in their newsboy caps. They never needed to, and that's what terrified her.
"Take your time," Karkaroff went on, grimacing. "Hold them up in the air, momcheta, so they can see what we've got and why they should back the fuck down."
Theo scoffed, "All guns and no balls, eh, brat?"
Astoria tugged on the hem of Hermione's dress, "Oi," she whispered. "You brought a weapon, right?" as she produced a well-crafted revolver of her own, clicking the bullets into place. Hermione frowned. She had not brought a weapon. It was in the car. Under the seat where she'd stashed it the night Draco had held the family meeting to inform them all that today was the day he would be making a move on Igor Karkaroff (and that only the Death Eater men would be allowed to go).
At Hermione's grimace, Astoria closed her eyes and exhaled sharply. "Fuck," she swore under her breath. She shoved her behind her bony shoulders and narrowed her pale, green eyes at her with added vehemence. "Stay here," she quipped. Then, after letting her gaze flicker back and forth between Hermione and Draco, added, "I'm fucking serious, Penny. No sudden movements. If you die, then we're all bloody fucked."
Hermione forced a swallow down her throat.
"So," Blaise whispered to Draco – close enough to where both of the women were hiding for them to make it out – "What do we do now?" He paused, nodding once to Theo. "Just give the order, Draco."
He, however, had his frosty grey eyes trained on Karkaroff. "It doesn't have to be like this, Karkaroff," – one more sweep across the Bulgarians standing mere meters away – "But you know what? I'm bloody glad it is like this."
"You fucking Death Eater scum," the elder man bellowed, brandishing a rifle in his wrinkled hands. "You think you can just waltz in here and go against our agreement? You think you can dethrone me from these fucking tracks?" His rotted teeth flashed. "I can't wait to bury you six feet under and dance all over your grave, Malfoy."
He leveled the end of his gun at Draco's head with a sneer, and that's when Hermione leapt into action.
At the time, she hadn't really thought it through. Which was evident enough when she stood between two dozen foreign men and a handful of her own with approximately twice as many guns aimed in her direction the moment that she placed herself in the breath of space between the two leaders.
All eyes were on her.
She definitely had not thought this through, but then again, if Hermione Granger was one thing it was a clever woman, and clever women were adept and quick on their toes. Theoretically speaking. "I believe you call this no-mans-land," she said between heavy pants.
"Penny," Theo gasped, his icy blue eyes shifting uncomfortably to Draco.
"Shut up," she remarked offhandedly – "Penny," he repeated – "I said, shut up," she snapped, eyes blazing toward her men. "Listen," she began, heaving, "Most of you were in France. So, you all know what happens next," Hermione spat, gesturing to the armful of weaponry dripping from every man. "I have my family here," she hissed, shouting at Karkaroff's men; her men; all of them.
"You have all got somebody here waiting for you," Hermione went on. "Now," she almost-sobbed, meeting Draco's eye, "I'm wearing black in preparation." (She was not – she had been wearing a shift dress that Narcissa begrudgingly threw at her under some pretense of an act of kindness, though Hermione highly believed it to be more of an act of charity for the woman.)
Astoria appeared then, from the shadows, and stood beside Hermione, taking her hand in her own.
"I want you to look at me," Hermione begged the men. "I want you all to look at me and think of who will be wearing black for you. Will it be your sister? Your wife? Your mother? Who?" She paused, catching Theo's microscopic nod, then added, "Think of them."
"Think about them, right now," Astoria chimed in, her voice booming and demanding, ten times more so than Hermione's had been pleading. "Fight if you want to," she snapped. "But Penny here isn't moving anywhere," – her eyes blazing and unforgiving – "and neither am I."
Hermione met her gaze, and they shared a brief look of triumph before a loud bang echoed through the room at the same, precise second that the gun went off for the horses below. Hermione and Astoria immediately fell to the floor, assessing each other for possible damages before letting their eyes wander to the chaos that ensued throughout the room.
To Hermione, everything felt like it happened in slow motion.
Draco crumpled to the floor.
Theo and Blaise instinctively spun out with their weapons raised, looking to take down a few Bulgarians in a matter of seconds.
Graham clutched Draco's elbow and pulled him toward the back of their small group.
The Bulgarians standing behind Karkaroff laughed in low, mocking tones.
Then, Draco stood up and aimed his revolver at Karkaroff's head and pulled the trigger.
The other man went down with a thunderous boom, dead before he hit the marble floor. Draco exhaled loudly – Hermione noted it was not shaky and definitely not remorseful – and then spun the gun on his finger, letting it dangle from his thumb precariously.
"Enough!" He shouted, hands almost raised, but not quite as if he was too proud and had held too much of an upper hand to indulge in such things. Meanwhile, every single bloody Bulgarian gun was pointed at his head or his chest.
"Enough. Karkaroff and I fought this one-on-one," he supplied readily. "It's over. It won't be in the papers," he informed them. "The coppers who run this area are mine and they've already been vacated. There aren't any witnesses," he said, sweeping briskly past Hermione and Astoria, "Go home to your families. To your sisters, your wives and your mothers."
There wasn't much else to be said so, predictably, the Blugarians fled the scene and left Draco and his Death Eaters to clean up the mess. He grimaced, nodding once to Vince and Greg and Flint to dispose of the body and the blood.
"Nott," he murmured, eyes tearing away from the corpse to his mate. "I didn't see him."
"On it," Theo replied immediately, disappearing through a service exit.
His grey, stormy eyes fell on the two women staggering to their feet with a vehement, irritated gaze. He first glared at the shorter of the two, tired and unapologetic, "Why the fuck?" He spat, staring into her jewel-toned eyes. "What the bloody hell - "
"Shut the fuck up," Astoria snapped, crossing her arms. "Don't do that. Don't go sitting on your metaphorical fucking high horse, Draco. It doesn't suit you as much as you think it does. You put all of your lives in fucking danger with this bloody stunt and Penny and I here weren't going to stand for it." She huffed. "Did you ever stop to think about the consequences? That, perhaps, the people you left behind in your precious Manor give a damn about the lives of those you dragged with you? Hm?"
She stormed away, pushing past Blaise's open arms with an angry bark.
Hermione, paralyzed, found Draco's eyes as mysterious and blank as the first time she'd seen him hold the end of a gun to her head all the way back when, and it terrified her. He didn't seem to register her presence without any break from reality and it unnerved her; so much so that the entire ride home she sat in silence with Astoria, ignoring him as violently as he ignored her.
When she realized that the shot Karkaroff sent toward Draco had made contact with his shoulder, she fought to sit next to him as they removed the bullet. At first, she volunteered to take it out herself but Theo had hastily shoved her aside and told her non-too-kindly that, "We've done this far too many times than we would have liked to over there."
Even Narcissa had been ushered out of Draco's study where Theo grabbed a suture kit and a bottle of vodka and got to work, but Hermione insisted. Her lips turned downward into a heavy scowl as Draco waned in and out of consciousness. "Theo," she said between gritted teeth. He didn't spare her a glance as Vince and Greg tried to escort her out.
"Theo," she growled, more vehemently this time. Hermione ripped her arms out of their grasps and plopped herself down in a seat beside Draco, helping Blaise and Graham to hold his arms and torso firmly in place.
"Fuck, fine!" He snapped, shooting her daggers. "Don't fucking lose it, though, Penny. I have enough to worry about with this one," Theo remarked angrily. The one in question would be the normally smug blond whose head lulled forward as he fought to stay awake through the blood loss.
Theo took several swigs of the vodka himself before handing it to Flint to hold and shoving his fingers and forceps into the open wound in Draco's shoulder. The minute he did, Draco roared back to life, straining against those holding him steady. His agonizing screams pricked tears at Hermione's eyes.
"Take it," Theo barked. "Come on, Malfoy, take it," More screams. Then, finally, the tiny metal monstrosity was procured and flicked into a dish on the desk. Theo sat back, taking a long shaky breath and then leaned forward with the bottle of liquor. "Have a drink," he commanded Draco.
He did so willingly, welcoming the promised numbness and licked the sheen of alcohol off his lips after several gulps. Draco held the bottle out for Theo to take back. The dark-haired man, though, turned around and muttered a quick, "Alright, deep breath," before twisting the bottle into the open wound.
The liquid dripped down Draco's bare chest as he gritted back a guttural moan, and Theo clamped a hand over the back of his sweat-soaked neck somewhat affectionately, if a little rough. "All done, mate," Theo promised with a wayward grin. "All done."
Screams echoed through the estate, but this time, Hermione did not recognize them. She dropped her half-eaten toast and gravitated toward the screams one cautious step after another. Out into the main hallway, down the main staircase, through a maze of corridors and behind a massive iron door to what appeared to be an entirely real dungeon, Hermione saw the most horrifying image.
Draco stood over a beaten and bloody man, tied to a rickety armchair, and wiped the blood off of his bruised knuckles with an old rag. He cracked his knuckles, wincing, and leaned toward the man. The other man's damp, dark hair slicked between Draco's fist as he forced his head up.
"Now," Draco drawled. "You know your precious protector is long dead, so don't expect any of your kin to be showing up to rescue your pathetic self any time soon. I doubt they are as unwise as him to underestimate me."
Hermione could not see the other man's face with his back to her, peering through a crack in the door, but she made out him spitting what was likely blood at Draco's feet. He stepped back and grimaced, then swung a calculated left hook at the captor's jaw.
"Fucking fool," he seethed. "You have no chance of making it out alive. None."
A cramp found its way up Hermione's calf, twisting the muscle. She shifted, biting down on her lower lip to hide any noise, but much to her dismay, the door swung open from her movements. "Fuck," she swore under her breath, cursing her clumsiness as Draco's head snapped up like that of a cobra.
"Pen," he choked out.
"Err," she mumbled, flickering her gaze between the grotesque scene before her and the open door. Hermione fumbled to think of something to say, but no longer needed to when the other man craned his neck over his shoulder and shot her a crooked, deeply disturbing smile.
"Penne," he croaked, teeth flashing behind cracked and bloodied lips.
Hermione paused mid-step, frozen in place. Her spine tingled and tensed; a wave of heat flushing over her and sparking a flame that had been buried so deep she nearly recoiled at its sudden presence in the forefront of her mind. "Krum," she hissed.
His smile never faltered as she strode further into the room, fists clenched, and he looked back to Draco once she reached his side with a triumphant grin despite the chains and the torture. "Ah," he remarked in his heavy accent. "Now I understand. You want kill me. Because of she."
"Shut the fuck up," Draco snapped.
Hermione didn't expect him to look at her – he was too focused on the half-dead man before him – but she didn't expect him to completely lose control, either. It was as if a wild animal had been hibernating deep within him and it had finally been unleashed. The dark, dangerous glint in his eyes told her more than any curl of his lip or cut on his knuckle would. He was furious and suddenly unbeholden to his better judgement (as a matter of relatively speaking, of course). Next to her stood a man who, for the first real time since she'd met him, gave into his fiery temper.
His hands shot out, forcing Krum's chin upward as one closed around his throat, applying pressure to the carotid arteries. His other hand swiftly unchained Krum. He inhaled sharply as the other man cackled, flexing his arms. Hermione panicked, wondering what could possibly happen next with the brutish man – arguably twice the size of Draco if not more – free to fight back.
"Draco," she breathed, almost unaware that she had done so; as if she had virtually no control over her concern for him. Which, maybe she didn't.
Any trepidation over whether or not Draco would succumb any horrible blows was swiftly put to rest as his fists connected with the other man's face repeatedly. He fell unceremoniously to the ground with a loud boom, a grunt escaping his foreign lips as his body hit the stone floor.
Draco took hold of the chair, kicking a leg loose and took the splintered wood in his grasp. He swung and swung and swung. The shape of Krum's face – the very one that had haunted Hermione since the day she saw it – started to cave in and that's when Hermione woke from her dazed state.
"Draco," she called out, rushing to his side to try and pull him back. "Draco!" she shouted.
He didn't look up. He didn't flinch. It seemed that he didn't even register she was there.
Hermione caught a glimpse of silver in his waistband and snatched it, sliding it comfortably between her fingers. It was no so unfamiliar to her now, thanks to Astoria's diligent training.
"Think of it as an extension of your hand," she had said, stepping behind Hermione to place her dainty hands overtop her own. "Like this," Astoria added, adjusting Hermione's grip. "There you go. See? It's not so different from your blade. Well – That's not true – it's completely different. But you'll get used to it."
"Do I have to?" Hermione had asked, frowning over her shoulder at the petite brunette pressed up against her spine.
"I usually find it's better to be prepared than not to, wouldn't you agree?" Astoria questioned. She had nodded her assent because, undoubtedly so, she did agree. Hermione Granger, for what it's worth, was the sort of person who was always prepared, if she could help it.
Which is how, seeing the vacant and animalistic expression stain Draco's godlike face, she blinked and leveled the stolen gun at Krum's temple. Though, temple was a bit of a stretch because at this point his skull was so caved in that it was a wonder the man was still breathing. He was, and that's why – for both men's sake as well as her own peace of mind, she told herself – Hermione pulled the trigger.
The shot echoed through the dungeons and all throughout the house. Draco spun around to face her, and Hermione watched as reality dawned across his golden features, bringing them back to their former glory in a matter of seconds as he registered what had just happened.
His grey eyes flickered between the mutilated man at his feet and the smoking gun in her hand.
"There," Hermione croaked with a tone of finality. "All done."
A/N - Aaaaaand now the real fun begins. Only four more chapters to go! I am currently contemplating including an additional chapter with an epilogue or possibly writing an entire sequel (Who knows? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯). Thank you all for the amazing reviews, I cannot tell you how ecstatic I am that this fic resonates so well with you as it does with me. Special thank you to the following for touching on some important aspects in their review: nerdalertwarning, jacpin2002, RarkMuffalo, LarryFND, tt76 and Relentless Sphinx.
This chapter title comes from Aitch's song Taste (Make it Shake) from the lines it's crazy how I'm living, I lost a couple screws / blowing clouds up in the room / now I'm off into the moon xx