February 17th
She had to keep moving. Remaining still wasn't an option. Regardless of how tired she was, Hermione didn't stop moving until she was many, many miles away from the campsite she shared with Draco. With Malfoy. It wouldn't do for her to get too friendly with a man she couldn't trust. And she couldn't afford to trust anyone.
Malfoy was the kind of man who could sweet-talk the knickers off a nun. He might not have ever tried to turn his charm on her personally, but she knew the type all too well. She'd known several of them. Even lost her own knickers to a few. He must have inherited his charm from his father. Lucius was, more often than not, in the bottom of a bottle, but there had been a time when he was very persuasive. From time to time when he was sober and in desperate circumstances, the elder Malfoy still could be. He'd attempted to turn the charm on her a few times to garner a bit of influence from either her as Antonin's wife or from her as the Dark Lord's favorite pet. A couple of times she'd even been benevolent enough to help him. When it wasn't too burdensome or inconvenient, of course.
She loathed Lucius. Thought he was pathetic and less than a man. Something in him had broken long ago. Probably even before Harry was killed and the Dark Lord was still in residence in his opulent manor. Hermione would never forgive the coward for the part he played in her torture that night so many years earlier. An inactive participant merely existing on the sidelines was still participating by not stopping the atrocities from happening. An innocent bystander was very rarely innocent.
No, Draco definitely got his charm from his father. Very little about Narcissa was charming or pleasant. Maybe there had been a time long ago when she'd been a much more carefree and likable woman, but Hermione surely had never seen it. Anyone who could boast of batty Bellatrix Lestrange as a sibling had to possess their own special sorts of issues. Draco's mother rarely ventured outside their manor or its grounds. She wasn't welcome in polite society. Not since she openly deceived the Dark Lord. She was fortunate enough that she hadn't been publicly and painfully executed for her crimes.
Hermione wasn't sure why her mind kept going back to thoughts of the disgraced Malfoy family. Their son was one thing, but the parents another completely. Long after she had grown weary enough that she had to climb in the backseat of a seemingly abandoned car on the edge of a small village for a few hours of rest, her mind was focused on the man she'd run from the night before. She wondered why he didn't even attempt to use any of that prodigious charm he possessed to try to get her to stay longer when it was clear that's what he wanted. Was she not worth it to him to even try?
Disgusted with herself for feeling the least bit sad or offended, she pulled the scrap of parchment out of her pocket to examine it for the countless time. Just as he'd told her when he first handed it over, it was an address. To what, she didn't have the first clue. It could be anything. All she knew was, for some reason, Draco wanted her to go to Devon.
All she really knew about Devon was that a large portion of it was a Resistance stronghold. The Weasleys were from the area. It was no secret that because of their family, many of those who wanted to tear down the current government set up stakes near their family home. Arthur refused to join in with the traitorous activities. His reluctance to aid his three children active in open rebellion against the Dark Lord was well-known. He didn't even speak to Charlie or Percy or his only daughter. It saddened Hermione that he couldn't even have the comfort of his surviving children all being together because several of them were so dead-set on watching the world burn around them. If Molly had survived, she would've been horrified how they abandoned their father. Or, she would've been the spark Arthur needed to keep up the fight.
Hermione didn't want to go anywhere near the Resistance. Without being able to use her magic, she would be completely at their mercy. That wasn't a place she wanted to be. It didn't matter that Draco had practically begged her to go. She didn't feel any measure of peace about listening to him. Even if he had plenty of opportunities to hurt her and he hadn't, did not mean he was on her side. How could he expect her to trust him when he wouldn't even answer her questions?
"If it seems like a trap, it probably is."
She muttered the words she'd learned in a valuable lesson many years earlier. During a mission to flush out more Resistance members long before she was married and Antonin orchestrated it with the Dark Lord that she wasn't put in harm's way, she had been paired up with Rodolphus Lestrange to investigate an empty building in Edinburgh that was rumored to be a known hiding place. She had been thankful to be with Roddy instead of some of the more reckless Death Eaters. After so many years married to a legitimately insane woman who enjoyed making him miserable and years stuck in Azkaban, the soft spoken wizard finally had reason to live. All unnecessary risks were avoided.
It was her first experience with the city she hated. Before she and Rodolphus landed in front of their target, she had never had reason to feel one way or another about the place. She knew the rumors about the dangerous place the city had become, but very little scared her in those days. Her training had been thorough. Each time she was sent out as a representative of the Dark Lord she itched to prove her unwavering loyalty.
There was clearly something special about the building they were ordered to investigate. Something stuck out about it. A buzzing of activity intrigued her and made her want to run inside. Just as she was about to take her first step inside the interior of the building, Roddy stopped her with a grip of her arm. Tempted at first to shrug him off, she stopped. He hadn't gotten as far as he had by being foolish. If there was something he could teach her, she wanted to learn.
Nothing about the building brought him a sense of ease. He told her later when they were able to get away from the dangerous, crazed members of the Resistance that attacked them that she had to trust her gut. If she didn't feel peace, she needed to listen. A person's natural sense of self-preservation liked to do whatever it could to keep them out of danger. One just had to know when to pay attention.
She missed Roddy. He'd been an unexpected friend and comfort, especially in those difficult first years. As proud of him as she was for making his own escape, she selfishly wished that she still had him in her life. There was still a great deal she could learn from him if given the opportunity. She hoped that wherever he was, he was happy and safe. If ever there was someone who deserved it, she felt like he did.
Her decision on whether or not to go to Devon was far from being made. Though she felt nauseous each time she considered heading towards the Resistance, she wasn't ready to give up on the idea yet. In the meantime, as she figured out what she was going to do next, Hermione knew she had to keep moving. She'd been reckless enough already.