Disclaimer:This is all for fun, I do not claim ownership of the characters or anything recognized from the work of JK Rowling. I am only borrowing them.
Warning:Mature themes, subject to change: mild violence, strong language, scenes of a sexual nature as well as general innuendo smattered throughout, adult themes including but not limited to death and disease both mental and physical.
[A/N] Thank you for all of you comments, questions, and reviews. I am letting this story tell me where it wants to go in order to arrive at the plot points I have lain out so if you need clarity on anything please let me know!
Playlist: Bo Burnham – Nerds | Massive Attack – Teardrop | Yeah Yeah Yeahs – 10x10 | Tegan & Sara – Time Running
Sunday July 31st, 2005| 6:25 am | St Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries
"Did you bring the Prophet for me?"
Draco scoffed. Barely twenty four hours since she had collapsed and almost brought the whole of Hogwarts along with her and she was ordering him around.
"I'm glad to see you too, you ungrateful bint," he bit back, but tossed the morning Prophet to her.
Bringing it had been against the better judgment of Potter, which had only spurred him more surely to bring her a copy. Even without the added benefit of vexing Potter on his twenty-fifth birthday he would have brought it to her. He was of the mind that no matter when it was delivered, time would not completely soften the blow of an exposed secret.
Unstable Warding Ceremony Proceedings, War Heroine Hermione Granger Collapses!
Headmistress's Judgment Called into Question
Pursing her lips, Hermione refolded the paper and delicately set it on the table next to her. "After coffee then."
"They let you have coffee?" Draco asked skeptically as he primly sat down into the visitor's chair next to her bed, reaching to grab her chart. She raised her hand and silently summoned it out of his grip.
"Knocked on my ass and I can still Summon things from your grip." Her little grin had a shadow of wickedness, reminiscent of their days tormenting each other in medical school.
What had started as an echo of their bitter feelings towards each other at Hogwarts had devolved into something with less animosity. Between the exhaustion of Healing courses and the lack of a Dark Lord or Draco's father's constant influence, hesitant friendship was forged as they constantly attempted to best the other in their studies. They had also been the only two accepted from Britain, since very few students from Hogwarts had been able to complete their N.E.W.T.S with all the Outstandings necessary to begin the courses, and even fewer qualified to study in the revered L'Institut de Guérison Magique.
Draco couldn't help but smile to see her mischievous smirk. Before leaving for home the previous night he had stopped by her room to check on her. She had been sleeping soundly and the glamours and charms on her hair and skin had been completely cancelled, displaying a collection of bruises over the exposed skin of her arms and part of her shoulders. Her cheekbones had looked sharper than he remembered. This morning she had a bit more color in her cheeks.
"About that," he began, ignoring her triumph of keeping her records from him, "Severus and I have had the dubious honor of watching Potter's memory of the warding ceremony but we need to talk to you before we even begin to decide what cocktail of potions to put you on."
She folded her arms around her chest, her cheeks getting ruddier but he couldn't tell if it was from embarrassment or anger. "You're…"
"…not your Healer, I know! Merlin, you stubborn witch, would you just let me help you? I'll even throw in a reward for you and vote in favor of your next Muggle loving venture with Orphus & Gamble."
Her face softened a bit but her arms were still folded. "You were going to vote for it anyways, you manipulative tosser. But I'll bite."
"We were hoping to see your side of what happened at Hogwarts," Draco said. He brought his wand out from its concealed sheath on his left forearm, holding it casually in his right. Hermione understood immediately; he could tell by her expression. Instead of the expected anger her face held hesitation and concentration.
"You know I don't like this," she said slowly after a couple of minutes simply staring at his wand hand, "but it's the best way. Did you bring the Pensieve, too?"
Draco shook his head. "No, Severus will be reviewing that downstairs in the lab. I'm not positive that he left the ward last night, to be honest. I'll be sending him your memory through the cabinetry system, a reverse of how we send potions up to these levels."
Her curls were lighter around her face this morning than when he had seen them the night before, hanging lankly around her cheekbones and shoulders. When he had visited her after her round of treatment, it had been secured back with a braid or in the towel after her shower, so he wasn't able to appreciate how long it had gotten. As she thought about what he was asking of her she hid behind the curtain of her hair that hung down well past her shoulders. Draco mused over the image she made, an image that looked distinctly like Severus whenever Draco caught him brooding over a tumbler of Firewhiskey in his study.
"Which would you rather do first?" he asked her soothingly, standing from the chair and leaving his outer robe draping over the back of it.
Hermione's eyes trailed him as he rolled up his shirt sleeves and sat down on the bed next to her. At this proximity, he could feel her trembling and he brought up a hand to her cheek. His action forced her to turn her face towards him, and she took her bottom lip between her teeth to stop it from quivering.
"Hermione. This is not the only way to do this."
"But it's the best way." Her voice was very small as she repeated the phrase.
"We can just do the Pensieve for now, and if we need more information then I can come back. It will give you a chance to do your own reverse Occlusion."
Hermione shook her head, moving her face slightly away from his hand and let her hair fall over her face again. Before he brought his hand back down he felt a small tear brush his thumb. "I'm pants at reverse Occlusion. I've blocked too much."
Draco sighed. That was another matter entirely, and was only able to be reversed if she consented to go back to her regular mind-healing schedule with Healer Callista Rainer or meditation. He knew this a Healer, but as a friend he knew that now was not the time to drudge up sensory memories of Bellatrix Lestrange.
Reverse Occlusion was a tricky process; it was much like waking dreams where a studious witch or wizard could view their own memories including all sensory recollection even if they weren't necessarily conscious at the time. . Occlusion itself was simple enough once the initial hurdle was passed of what imagery or technique suited the witch or wizard. Personally, Draco liked using wind. It was versatile enough that he could kick up a furious storm to block anyone wishing to push past into his mind, forcing them to get lost along the way, or it could be gentle and relaxing when he was trying to fall asleep. He knew Severus used stone for most of his protective walls of Occlusion but had never asked the details as it was exceedingly impolite, even gauche, to inquire on something so personal.
When one person who had either Occlumency or Legilimency training met the gaze of someone who was Occluding there was always a sense of what was being used. During his most recent disagreement with Potter, he realized Hermione must have taught him some of the techniques because there was an undeniable spark of fire behind his gaze that had not been there in the years prior, where Draco had felt nothing but the simple weight of Potter's ire.
"It's not that I don't trust you," Hermione choked out. She began running the palm of her right hand firmly over the wrapping on her left arm that smelled strongly of the minty burn paste the apprentices downstairs made daily.
He grabbed her hand to stop it from irritating her scar more than it already was. The last he had seen it before he and Potter had cast a simultaneous Finite at her to stop the course of magic from the warding to her body it had been fiery red and blistered almost beyond recognition. The ice cold fingers were still trembling in his hand until he brought his other one up to envelope it completely.
"It's not a question of trust," Draco began. "No. That's not right, it absolutely is, but we can try just the Pensieve first."
"The Pensieve will not show what my core was doing, Draco. I…I don't remember anything past Harry lighting the basin so my memories won't fill in many gaps, they'll just create more. Legilimency would be much more…efficient."
She was using her Healer's voice on herself.
At that moment as he sat next to her on her bed with her right hand held firmly between both of his own, the door to her room opened to admit a Healing apprentice bringing her morning potions and breakfast. Draco scowled but did not let go of her hand; she hadn't even looked up at the sound of the heels the apprentice wore as she toddled into the room.
"Oh," the girl said breathlessly, a hesitant smile on her face. "Mr. Malfoy!"
Draco plastered on an expressionless mask in favor of the sneer that was itching at his lips. "It's Master Malfoy, actually. I'm afraid I haven't had the pleasure?"
"Apprentice Pickering." The girl's voice cracked on the last syllable.
"I will give you to the count of three before I snap your Quick Quotes Quill and confiscate your wand to the Auror on duty, Miss Pickering. One…"
Draco did not even make it to the first plosive sound of two before the tray the girl had been carrying was dropped with a raucous clatter and she fled from the room. In her haste, the apprentice robes she no doubt stole from an unsuspecting fool that submitted to her charm, whether magical or physical, flapped gracelessly around her ankles. Beneath were not the standard issue uniform slacks but fashionable designer business robes that would not last a day in St. Mungo's.
"Bloody buggering press," he seethed, only then releasing her hand. He stood and swung his outer robe around his shoulders. "I need to have a word with that imbecile Potter, or whatever lackey he put in charge of your security."
As he picked invisible lint from his arm off of the robe, he turned to Hermione again. His jaw softened a bit and he forced himself to smile for her.
"You'll think about what I said? You have a choice."
Hermione nodded silently and moved to begin twisting her hair behind her head in a single French braid. Draco lingered for a moment longer before sweeping out of the room with his full Malfoy scowl firmly in place. That look had not cowed her in years, but the trademark glare was sure to wither any unsuspecting victim in the aristocrat's path.
As she finished tying off the end of her braid, she wondered if the westward stairwell was as deserted as usual.
Sunday July 31st, 2005| 6:49 am | St Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries
Severus fought the unwavering urge to clutch at his throat or to scratch at the irritated skin that had not ceased throbbing since the morning prior. Cigarettes hadn't helped but he didn't know what else to do while he lay in wait. Before the boy had left for the night, at his insistence that he would be completely useless to him without a few hours' rest, Draco had forced him to wrap his neck in gauze. Although it had alleviated the surface pain and the tension, Severus couldn't seem to wash away the feeling of adhesive behind his ears where the bindings had been secured.
He had managed to catch a few hours of fitful sleep in the anteroom of the lab where they kept several comfortable armchairs that were easy to transfigure into cots. They had learned that lesson the hard way in the first few weeks of their employment with St. Mungo's after the official reports of Lautiores Maleficus. The name the hospital had given the so called disease still made his hackles rise. It only encompassed a fraction of the symptoms the sufferers reported. Emaciated wizard, indeed.
Those weeks in the beginning had made his first term as a professor of Hogwarts seem as easy as brewing the Cure for Boils. After nearly two years of crippling seizures, thousands of hours spent brewing, and no recognition of the condition, attention was finally garnered for their cause. Not that they had gone campaigning in the streets for the equal treatment of Death Eaters in medical care. It wouldn't have done them any good. The catalyst had been when war heroine, Granger, had been admitted to the Spell Damage Ward two Christmases ago.
Draco had just earned his Potions Mastery the summer prior to her attack and was working to take over his father's vacated seat in the Wizengamot. He was immediately called into St. Mungo's by Potter, who had been aware of exactly what was going on in Malfoy Manor and recognized similar symptoms to what Severus and Draco had been treating.
Severus had been with Draco when Potter's Patronus had burst in on their Christmas night caps. Two Sober-Ups and a handful of Floo powder later they both were commandeering the Potions lab at St. Mungo's and the apprentices on staff to subdue the worst of Granger's symptoms.
The story, as he had been told by Potter as he paced from one end of the room to the other as they brewed, was that Hermione had been acting distant and irritable throughout the Christmas holidays but especially on Christmas day. She had mentioned not feeling well so Harry had offered to Apparate her home instead of sending her through the Floo. Harry's firstborn had arrived just days before so he admitted to being distracted up until the moment he made to leave and Granger had had her first seizure in the kitchen of her Diagon Alley flat.
Excessive irritability, loss of consciousness, seizures, insomnia, muscle spasms, loss of appetite…she had had all the first signs of Lautiores Maleficus. All that she was missing was the Dark Mark. In its place was the scar given by Bellatrix. It had taken 1,734 days for the curse to completely manifest itself, for it certainly was connected to the same curse that had lodged itself into the scar on both his and Draco's arms.
As another cigarette rested between his lips he traced the scar of the Dark Mark on his left forearm, attempting to pull the wool from his thoughts on the entire situation. It was steadily coming up on three years since he had first seen her lying in a hospital bed completely unresponsive and thrown by the effects of the curse. He was past the point of irritation. There were dozens that had perhaps not been cured but were able to carry on with their lives with only an annual inconvenience. Severus pressed more firmly into his arm.
If only he had been able to find the blasted knife that bitch had used on her he could devise a counter-curse. He did not dare without finding it first. That was how they had lost Tracey Davis, her body reduced to ash moments after he had begun to chant.
Tracey had not taken the Mark fully but had begun the ceremonial preparations in order to spare her brother one year her junior. She had had a milder condition to the others and had volunteered for the procedure. Severus could still hear her screams and smell the burnt flesh and hair when he contemplated using charms work again.
The only runes he had been able to decipher after months of analyzing each patient's Mark as well as his own was a variation of the phrase perditus infideles. Destroy the unfaithful. The meaning there was abundantly clear. As Voldemort had been left to rot, his hand had risen from its grave to latch onto those who had bound themselves to him and punish them.
"I don't understand these fucking people!"
Draco's roar from the other end of the alley caused the knee-jerk reaction of him pulling his sleeve down back over his Mark.
"Potter is off at Hogwarts apparently assisting with damage control while he lets his most incompetent fucks stay behind here to guard her. I've already headed off three reporters, one made it all the way to her rooms in Apprentice robes."
Severus scowled fiercely, tossing his spent cigarette aside. He was starting to feel the tar coat his lungs; it was time for another dose of the antidote. Without a word as his throat was still extremely tender he spun away from Draco to follow the direction he had just come from.
As the pair of them stormed back to the front entrance to disperse the rabble and to have a stern word and possible hexing with the assigned security, neither noticed as someone slipped out the westward stairwell exit.