A/N: So I apologize sincerely for the tardiness of this chapter. With the move to France and settling in and getting used to everything, I've had a bit on my mind in the past month. However, that doesn't excuse me leaving everyone hanging! Anyways, here it is!

Chapter 22: Questions and Answers

Hermione and Lucius were sitting in the downstairs study, both in black velvet dressing gowns. They were speaking quietly in heated tones, wary of the two sleeping figures in the chairs across from their position on the couch.

"What are we going to do?!" Hermione was slightly panicked at the sight of two restrained men across from her.

"I don't know love; we could leave them here for the night…" Lucius looked like he was at a rather boring tea party.

"Luc! I know you don't like them, but I can't leave me friends like that!"

"Really? They're friends?" he drawled.

"Not again, Luc," she said exasperatedly.

"Fine."

Hermione stiffened as the redhead let out a soft moan and began to move about, gaining his bearings slowly.

"Ughhhh," Ron's eyes opened slowly, "Hermione? Where am I? …Why? FUCK!" Ron growled and Hermione cringed a little. "Traitor! Murderer!"

"Stop it! Stop it!" cried Hermione, glad that they had restrained both Ron and Harry in their chairs.

"Why should he?" asked the man in the other chair, causing Hermione to shoot a glance reminiscent of a scared doe at the now awake Harry.

Hermione stiffened, but her tongue stuck in her throat.

Lucius sighed and realizing that his wife was freezing, stated calmly in a steel tone, "You do realize that she doesn't actually have to explain anything to you? She is a grown woman."

Harry and Ron both shot him venomous glances, while at the same time replying, "Stay the fuck out of it."

Lucius sniffed and sat back smirking, waving his hand at Hermione to continue.

She took a deep breath and attempted to summon the anger that had possessed her earlier. "Lucius is right; I don't have to explain myself."

"Lucius is it now?" spat Harry. Hermione didn't think she'd seen Harry evince this much disgust since Snape was alive.

Hermione huffed, "Yes, Lucius; just as I've been calling him for the past seventeen years and when we first started working together."

Harry snarled, "I knew working with him would change you. Look where it finally landed you, acting the whore to the rich Pureblood." Hermione drew back in pain as if Harry had physically slapped her. "Is that why you're never around anymore, Hermione? Too busy playing the slut?"

Hermione's eyes flamed in fury, even as tears threatened to fall. Lucius stood, his aura bursting with restrained magic. "How dare you speak to my wife that way? Your friend?" he snarled in a tone that would have caused most wizards to lose their faculties.

Ron chuckled darkly, "A woman that her so-called 'friends' didn't even know was a wife. What say you to that Lucius? Is she ashamed of you?" He turned to Hermione with his mocking blue eyes, shining with hurt, "Or perhaps Blondie over there wouldn't let you tell the world that he lowered himself to marry a Mudblood."

Hermione sat on the couch in shock. She had never imagined her friends could be so cruel, even in the war it had only ever been fatigued anger.

Lucius sat for a few moments as silence reigned, waiting to see if Hermione would reply. Then he stood resignedly, "Yes, we're married. And perhaps you hit the nail on the head Mister Weasley." He gave Hermione a mocking bow and then turned to the men in the chair, "Gentlemen, I leave you to your petty squabbles and should you so desire, to search our home. I guarantee you, the most dangerous Dark object you'll find, however, is me." He swept out of the room, leaving Hermione haunted by the look in his eyes.

She swelled in indignation, "Never did I imagine that you two could hurt me as much as this. Time and again you've disrespected me when it suited you and I'm sick of it! I married Lucius Malfoy on Christmas Eve of 2002. I've been sleeping with him since that long ago trip to Moscow. I've been waiting for you two to notice the ring on my finger for fifteen years; for you to notice the articles in the paper; for you to notice my change in address; for you to actively take a look into my life."

She looked at Ron with hurt eyes, "Members of your family died to keep people from calling me and other Muggleborns, 'Mudbloods.' What would Fred say, Ron?"

She glanced out the window, tearing her eyes from Ron's anguished visage, and looking instead at her husband, head-bowed walking through the softly falling snow with nothing but slippers and a dressing robe to keep him from the cold. Her deadened eyes looked back at the two boys she had risked life and death with. "I couldn't bear to hurt you two more after everything during the war, but it just happened! And for once I felt like it was something just for me!" She hugged herself wildly, "God, for once it wasn't anything to do with 'the trio' or the 'war heroes.' For once someone saw me for my brains and even my looks."

She glanced mournfully at the two, "I waited for years for you to come over when Lucius was with me, or for Teddy to slip up and mention 'Unca Luc.' For years I waited for you to notice like so many of our friends and family did." She glared at Harry, "But no. You were both so wrapped up in your own lives of 'becoming normal' with careers and wives and children that no one ever noticed Hermione."

She blinked the tears that were clouding her vision and looked once more out the window, but Lucius had gone and she bowed her head. "And so, here we are." She laughed hoarsely, a sound that grated Harry and Ron's ears because the bitterness was so foreign to the Hermione they'd known.

"My 'friends' know nothing of my life because I haven't had the courage to stand up to them, and I stand to lose the one person that means the most to me in this world."

"Wouldn't be losing much," Harry muttered

Hermione whipped her head around, "And what would you know, Harry Potter? All you've cared about for the past few years is making sure your life was perfect." She nodded at Ron, "Harry, you even left your best mate when you went to the Aurors." She choked, tears of rage pouring down her cheeks. "And Ginny? Don't you remember her talking about how wonderful the life of professional seeker could be? Harry, she would have been fantastic. But you," She pointed a shaky finger at Harry, "You were ready to have a family and start that perfect life. And she joined you, because she loves you! We all love you! And no one will say a thing because of everything we did and lived through in the war, we're simply glad to be alive and ignore anything that might actually cause problems."

She paused and spoke quietly, "It was always the Harry and Ron show." Years of latent anger and hurt at their neglect threatened to overflow. "I thought maybe after the Hunt it would be different because it was just us, but once Ron came back, I was relegated to Ron's girlfriend. You never even asked me if I wanted to be an Auror with you two," she whimpered brokenly, "It was always just expected that eventually it would be Ron and Harry as the Aurors. No, I was easily relegated to researcher and caretaker of Teddy, once your life didn't depend on my knowledge."

Ron shifted in his seat, unable to decide what he should contribute to the conversation and wary of the backlash that Harry would unleash.

Harry was shuddering, "So that's that then. You're blameless because I'm the one who caused all the suffering?" He snorted, "That's bullshite and you know it. I'll always hate myself for everyone who sacrificed their lives for me during the war, but I'll never be ashamed of how I've tried to live after. You, Hermione, are a hypocrite. Ron turned to Lavender because your work was more important than a relationship! You hid your life from your two closest friends! What the hell does that say about you?!"

Hermione let out another grating chuckle, "You're right, Harry. I'm complete scum, but like you, I've lived as best I could after the war. I made a decision to lie for you and Ron in my first year of Hogwarts and I made a decision seventeen years ago to not discuss my private life with you two." She turned cold eyes onto Harry, "At least the second one hasn't threatened my life."

She stood and waved off the spell restraining the two men to their chairs, surprising them with her wandless ability. "Breaking into someone's home to torment that someone because of their past and blood status is something even Lucius has grown out of." She drew herself up and hardened her voice and gaze, and both Ron and Harry knew they were no longer looking at the Hermione of old, but at the present Madam Malfoy.

"Get out."

Harry nodded stiffly and stalked out of the room. Ron, however, stayed seated and said calmly to Hermione, "Sit down for a minute."

They stared at each until Hermione finally gave in and sat down, waiting expectantly.

"Look, Hermione. I'm trying not to judge, because I no longer have that right after what I've done to you. But neither Ginny nor I need you defending us or judging what we've done with our lives either. You've hurt Harry and me by hiding this from us and if you'll recall Harry always hated people keeping secrets from him, in the past people have died because of it. So maybe if you two would get over how much you've hurt each other, you could figure out what the hell went wrong. For once I'm staying out of it. I would love to find out how all of this happened. I'm hurt and I'm not sure if I can forgive you right now, but maybe in time?" He glanced questioningly at her.

Hermione simply nodded, tears spilling down her cheeks.

He sighed, walked over and pulled her up into a big bear hug. "You silly girl. We'll go to lunch and talk this over when we're both calmer." Her pulled away and wiped her tears with a calloused thumb, "But right now I'm going to go interrogate my older brother as to why Harry might think you and George were going out for fifteen years." She chuckled hoarsely and he grinned. "And then I'm going to go track down Teddy and get him to tell me all the gory details of living with Lucius Malfoy."

He kissed Hermione lightly on the forehead and walked out of the study, leaving a trembling, and faint, speechless and very confused brunette wondering when exactly the redhead had grown more mature than his two friends.

--

Lucius heard the door slam a second time and wondered if that was his wife leaving or one of the dundertwins has simply stayed around. He supposed he ought to go find out, but he really didn't feel like leaving his tub of chocolate mint ice cream and he didn't really want to face his wife.

So much for letting go of my pride. He let the walls down and had merely been body slammed because of it. Too many times had he let people walk over him because of his emotions. If Hermione wasn't going to stand up for them to her friends, then when would she? He loved her beyond a shadow of a doubt. She'd brought life back into his life and he'd found he couldn't do without. However, they had been raised during two very different times and sometimes they both had trouble breaching that gap of years. Perhaps he needed to remember that a bit more, even if she often acted older than her 38 years.

Sighing, he set his tub of ice cream down and stood, stalking out of the kitchen to go find his wife. Anger banked, he was still frustrated at her.

"Woman!" He roared to the echoing house, knowing that his disrespectful call would get an answer out of her if she was anywhere in the vicinity. He stalked the corridors trying to find her, until he heard a soft "thud" a few passages down and then an even fainter, plaintive, "Lucius!"

His heart jumped to his throat and he began to run, "Hermione! Hermione, darling, where are you?" His head whipped trying to look from side to side, cursing his huge home. His fear nearly overpowered him when he found her a few steps away from the study, crumpled on the floor, trembling for all she was worth and fighting back the whimpers. Her breathing was shallow as she tried to speak to him and he cursed himself for not being as wary of one of her attacks as he should have been that day with everything that had happened.

He scooped her up in his arms and spoke softly, trying to calm her frantic heart beats, "Shhh, it'll be all right, I'll call the doctor and you'll be fine. Just shh, my darling."

And Lucius Malfoy prayed to every deity he knew of, as he laid his unconscious wife on their bed, that he hadn't been lying.