There was an anticipation in the air and in her chest, that tugged Hermione along and strung her through the days. She was restless, tense, and twitchy as Christmas drew near.
Her skin tingled and itched. Her mouth was eternally dry and parched. She longed for a comfort, for some kind of relief. For a remedy for an illness she couldn't quite put her finger on.
Hermione supposed that this malady was the natural result of being the proverbial mouse in a den full of snakes. She kept her head down and did her best to avoid Narcissa, counting down the days until Christmas.
Wednesday. 22.
She strode into Draco's bedroom (banging the door against the wall as she entered) and flung open the curtains. Bright, wintry light streamed into the room and lit up everything in yellow-gold rays. When his deceptively still form gave no indication of awareness that she was there, Hermione had stalked over to his bedside and slapped him upside the head.
This elicited an immediate response.
"Tsss! What the fuck do you want?" he hissed, rubbing at his smarting head. There was no groggy veil of sleep in his tone; he had been awake and alert the entire time. Bastard.
"You," Hermione shot back through gritted teeth, "need to put on your big High Reeve pants, and use your fucking words and speak to your mother."
She gave him a hard jab in the chest for emphasis, before stepping back to regard him with her arms crossed over her chest.
Draco stared back at her with narrowed eyes. There was an ugly, mutinous expression on his face.
Hermione paused for a second, taking in his body language and petulant demeanour.
"Are you- … are you sulking over having to confront your mother?" she asked incredulously. The very idea was so absurd and yet, every fibre of her being knew it to be true the second she put it into words.
Draco scowled hard and looked away, saying nothing.
He was absolutely sulking over confronting his mother.
Cretin.
Hermione gave a loud, derisive snort that would've made Ron proud, before stepping around the bed to prepare Draco's daily thrice-daily potions dose.
"Unbelievable," she muttered darkly as she worked. A round flask was unstoppered swiftly and a small amount of indigo liquid poured out. "Just absolutely ridiculous and pathetic, you know." Two drops of bright gold tincture were added to a tiny bottle, causing the solution to steam and bubble. "You go to all that trouble to save her, sacrificing your own health in the process, I might add, and you can't even stand to be around her?" she huffed.
Hermione continued her quiet, relentless tirade until a small apothecary's worth of brews were perfectly doled out and placed onto an ornate silver tray. Then, she carefully carried the tray from her workstation to place it onto the nightstand.
Draco remained silent the entire time, but the dark expression had disappeared from his face. All expression had, in fact; his face was blank, as if carved from marble.
He accepted the potions wordlessly from Hermione, and downed them without complaint. A flicker of disgust was all that escaped from behind the mask of indifference that he wore so carefully — the healing brews truly did taste absolutely vile.
"Wake up from your little coma and speak to your mother, before she comes after me," Hermione warned him darkly.
His mouth tightened in a grimace, but he eventually gave a begrudging nod before looking away.
"Anything else?" he asked in a resigned tone.
Draco's eyes were drawn to the window. He was staring forlornly into the snow draped landscape outside, of swooping, rolling white hills, barren trees and frost flecked shrubs.
Hermione regarded him slowly.
There was a stiffness in the way that he held himself, that had nothing to do with a week of bed rest and fatigue. His shoulders were tense, his back rigid.
He was stretched as taut as she was, Hermione realized with a sense of foreboding.
"No," she muttered, suddenly shy after her outburst. She hesitated for a moment, before ducking forward to press her lips chastely to the hollow of his temple. Draco stirred at the sudden movement, but Hermione avoided his gaze.
"Feel better soon," she mumbled, hurrying from the room. She chanced a glance backwards as she closed the door behind her; he was staring outside the window still, expression faraway.
The door closed with a click.
Thursday. 23.
The skin below her right thumbnail had been meticulously torn to shreds. Tiny raw welts, fresh red flesh exposed, were the telltale symptoms of her gnawing, festering anxiety.
Hermione's fingers picked rhythmically at the skin, pulling and twisting off hangnails. Small drops of blood formed and pooled until the entire expanse of skin was a crimson smeared mess.
She swiped the blood nervously onto her jeans and shook her entire hand, body trembling along with it, as if she could shake off her own neuroses.
She sat on her bed and stared outside the window at the rapidly fading light of day, wondering if he was doing the same; if they were staring at the same darkening sky.
Slowly, the room blackened and she was left with only her thoughts.
Friday. 24.
"You may leave us now."
Narcissa's impassive face stared back at Hermione. A single eyebrow was arched expectantly as she waited. She stood next to Draco's bedside, a hand resting gently upon his shoulder.
There was no hint of warmth or tenderness in her. Not in her expression, nor her stance.
Narcissa could've been an executioner piloting Draco to his death, and suddenly there wasn't enough air in the room.
Hermione swallowed hard. Her chest seemed to have constricted, tightened, become a fraction smaller.
Everything about her felt so much smaller now, in the presence of the two silent, still Malfoys.
"Of course," she muttered, ducking her eyes away from Narcissa's face. Her gaze landed upon Draco's instead.
He was an imprint of his mother, his features carved by the same sculptor. The same straight nose and high cheekbones as the woman next to him. The same impassive, hard expression on his face.
Draco's eyes flit to meet hers, and their gazes locked for a moment. Hermione felt an uncomfortable jolt through her, like a spark of static electricity prickling her skin. Shocking her. She watched as something seemed to flicker in his eyes before they darkened and became resigned.
"You can go, Hermione. Thank you," he said stonily.
She backed quickly and quietly out of the silent room, intensely aware of two sets of eyes tracking her movement as she went.
Saturday. 25.
Hermione awoke on Christmas morning, bobbing on the cusp of consciousness.
Crisp linen sheets pressed against her face and for a few blissful moments, she was able to pretend.
She was tucked into bed in the girls' dormitory of Gryffindor tower. The winter break had started just the week before, and she had a wonderful two weeks to peruse the library to her heart's content. A pile of presents would be waiting for her at the foot of her bed. All she had to do was open her eyes.
She willed the scene in her mind's eye to change, and it did.
She was laying in her childhood bedroom, home from school for the winter break. The whitewashed, hand carved bed frame that she had had since she was a little girl. The clean scent of washing powder tickled her nose; it was the same one that her mum had bought at the shops for years, and had complained that it got more expensive each time. Christmas morning, when she would pad downstairs barefoot, too eager for a pancake breakfast to manage to put socks on or brush her hair. Her mother at the stove flipping pancakes and scolding her good-naturedly. Her father, slicing fruit and laughing.
Her heart began to beat fast at the thought. Her chest, so tight with anxiety in recent days, seemed to grow smaller and smaller until she could take it no longer.
She wrenched her eyes open.
The over-height ceiling of the Malfoy home was all that met her eyes, and Hermione felt her heart shatter just a little.
She closed her eyes again and pulled the covers up over her head, willing herself to drift off into memory once more.
Merry Christmas, Hermione.
"Mudblood! Muuuudblood, wake up!"
Hermione's eyes snapped open as a piercing shriek jolted her awake, the door to her bedroom crashing open with a bang. She kicked wildly, trying to untangle herself from the bedding that had twisted around her in her sleep. It was a pointless endeavour, as the entire pile and Hermione were levitated into the air a moment later.
Hermione gave a scream of pure terror as she found herself suspended several feet above the bed.
"Bella! Bella, put her down at this instant!" a woman yelled.
"Oh you're no fun, Cissa. The Mudblood and I were just playing around — she loves it, watch," Bellatrix trilled back in sing-song. Hermione thrashed wildly and hovered for another moment, before Bellatrix released the spell and the entire pile came crashing back down.
In an instant, Bellatrix was upon her.
"My dear, disgusting Mudblood," Bellatrix crooned. She had dashed forward and leapt onto the bed in a single bound, pinning Hermione in place with her own body. Her hands immediately wrapped around Hermione's beck and began to squeeze.
"How terrible, how sad, how dreadful it is that you're being locked up in this bedroom, on Yuletide of all days!" Bellatrix gasped coquettishly. Hermione scrabbled desperately, raising both hands up to try to pry Bellatrix's fingers off her neck, but it had no effect — Bellatrix simply squeezed tighter.
There was a roaring of blood in Hermione's ears as she gasped, choking and sputtering. Her lungs burned from the effort of taking in nothing, trapped underneath Bellatrix and kicking up feebly. Her heart pounded fast as a rabbit's, a quick, terrified, light-footed stamping in her chest.
Her vision was beginning to darken.
The roaring in her ears grew louder, while everything else grew distant.
She could hear Bellatrix, inches above her, cackling and jeering at Narcissa. Despite the distance however, Hermione couldn't make out any distinct words; it was as if she was underwater.
Her vision was black. She couldn't see anything, anymore. Her limbs were too heavy to move.
And then, as suddenly as she had descended, Bellatrix gave a sharp screech of a laughter and let go.
Hermione hacked and coughed, tears streaming down her face as she gulped in blessed air. She wheezed, nearly retching, while the other two women in the room argued.
"You cannot do this, Bellatrix. What will the guests think? I- I cannot have- have her paraded around at my party, at dinner," Narcissa whispered in angry tones. Despite the rage evident in her voice, Hermione could hear the fear in it. Narcissa's voice wavered, just a little.
Narcissa gestured at Hermione, who had recovered enough to wipe the tears from her eyes and take in the bizarre sight before her.
Bellatrix and Narcissa, both dressed in fine silk dresses, standing toe to toe. While Narcissa stood tense and uncomfortable in a gown of light icy-blue silk, Bellatrix had dressed herself in a deep, blood-red concoction of lace and frills. Her dark, coarse hair had been gathered in a sloppy pile atop her head, and her eyes were gleaming with malice.
"Cissa, the Mudblood is the crowning jewel of this party, is it not? Of course! You're proud of your son, Draco this, Draco that, Draco the most eligible bachelor, blah blah blah—," Bellatrix curtsied and simpered up at her sister in a mocking fashion, "but the Mudblood … Potter's Mudblood …"
Bellatrix had trailed off and turned to watch Hermione, a vicious smile curved upon her lips. One hand stroked the front of her low-cut gown, fingers trailing across her own chest seductively. Her other hand pawed at the air, as if she could grasp and touch Hermione from several feet away.
"The Mudblood … Potter's Mudblood, the last of the trio … oh how delectable a piece of meat, she is. A tender little calf to the slaughterhouse," Bellatrix purred, stepping closer to the bed.
Hermione shrank back, her hand shooting instantly to protect and cover her already bruised neck.
"Why ever would you keep her hidden up here, Cissa? Oh, she'll be the delight at the party. The purebloods do love to gaze upon filth, to play with them before snuffing them out."
At this, Bellatrix leapt forward.
Hermione was ready this time.
She aimed a kick at Bellatrix's body and caught her in the ribs, pushing her half-off the bed, but Bellatrix recovered nearly instantly. She leapt back up with a scream of laughter and tackled Hermione bodily without a moment of hesitation, grabbing a fistful of hair and jerking Hermione's head back.
Bellatrix's hands were wrapped once again around Hermione's neck as she whimpered and struggled, her body wrapped around Hermione's, her heaving chest and breasts pressed into Hermione's own.
Hermione could feel the sticky layer of sweat on Bellatrix's skin, smell her heavy perfume of incense and sickly florals; it coated the back of her throat like bile, burned her lungs. She could taste the decay that radiated off this woman.
"Stop! Bellatrix you can't- Bella stop, stop this at once!" Narcissa shrieked. "Protego!"
A Shield Charm erupted between Hermione and Bellatrix and they were flung a few feet apart, Bellatrix crashing to the floor and Hermione thrown bodily into the wall.
Hermione gave a terrified sob and scrambled to get away from Bellatrix, but she had been forgotten in the chaos.
Bellatrix had gathered herself and stood once more, facing Narcissa confrontationally. Her curly, dark hair stood on end, the tendrils held aloft by a spark of magic in the air.
"Well? It's Yuletide, Cissa — let the Mudblood come to the party, it'll be my gift to her. Or else, I'll have to figure out some other present," Bellatrix spoke the last few words in stage whisper, trailing off darkly. She had sauntered closer and closer to her sister as she spoke, pressing forward while Narcissa edged one step, then two steps back.
"Fine! Fine! Just go, go back downstairs and I'll- I'll figure something out for her to wear!" Narcissa hissed back. Her voice had taken on a near hysterical tone, the same lilt of mania as her sister but clouded with fear instead of delight. Her hands trembled so much that Hermione was surprised she had even managed to aim the Shield Charm.
A grotesquely girlish giggle of delight erupted from Bellatrix, who threw her hands in the air in a "I told you so" way.
"How wonderful! Well, I'll leave you two ladies to get pretty for dinner then."
Bellatrix gave a final cackle of deranged laughter and swayed unsteadily to the door, humming merrily as she went, and slammed it behind her without a backwards glance.
The silence that ensued was the loudest that Hermione had ever heard.
Narcissa, as brittle and still as an ice sculpture, turned to stare hollowly at Hermione.