Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters from Harry Potter, except those that clearly aren't from J.K. Rowling's stories. And since I expect anyone reading this by now to be a complete HP aficionado, I'm sure you'll know which ones they are.
Chapter 18 — Vision of Truth
The fire cracked and Hermione frowned, burying her chin in the palm of her hand.
"But how can he not remember?" Hermione protested, puzzled and a little relieved. "That's not exactly something someone would easily forget."
Ginny shrugged. "How should I know? I just asked him what happened after you told him off, and he said he went looking for you to apologize, but he couldn't find you anywhere and gave up."
"Could he be lying?"
Ginny snorted. "Hermione, if you know my brother at all, then you know he's as good a liar as he is a Quiddich player — once in a while he'll get lucky, but the rest of the time he's just pathetic."
The girls had been sitting for the last half hour on the thick red chesterfield in the Gryffindor common room, debating the riddle that was Ron and Draco.
"So what does Harry think of your dating Malf — I mean, Draco?" Ginny asked shrewdly.
"He doesn't know," Hermione said. "And if he did, I'm certain he wouldn't understand." After all, how could an obliviated cat comprehend a human relationship?
"Have you really not heard from him, or are you just saying that?"
"I really haven't heard from him."
"Oh." The lovesick girl's face fell.
"I'm sure he's fine, though," Hermione hastened to emphasize, wishing she could reassure the girl with the truth. "I mean, he's Harry after all."
"That's what worries me."
-:-+-:-+-:-+-:-
The dream gnawed at him. It began the same way each night — a pale silver mist at the edge of his unconsciousness, creeping over his vision like a faded memory. When it cleared, he could see himself sitting at a high table. The Dream Draco was looking at something in his hands. He glanced up, and Draco saw that his eyes were the same shade as the silver mist, the irises whirling turbulently as if disturbed by many winds. He held up the object in a toast.
"The Cup of Truth," his voice echoed throughout the hall, "makes all its contents bitter. A lie is a sweeter delicacy."
"A lie does not satisfy," Draco said, his voice sounding tiny by comparison.
"Yet you weave your life with them like a master confectioner."
"Not anymore," he said.
"Oh?"
The scene changed, the hall replaced by a stone corridor. Draco watched as his image rounded the corner and knocked a preoccupied Hermione off her feet. Though he couldn't hear their conversation, the vituperation passing between the two was easy to see. Besides, he knew what had been said — they had acted out that scene only yesterday. The view switched again, and now it showed a black cat watching the couple kiss with malaise.
"That's different," Draco argued.
"Really?" the Dream Draco queried. "Your life has been a lie for so long that you cannot even recognize Truth when it lies in the palm of your hand."
The Dream Draco opened his other hand as he spoke, revealing an ancient silver key. It looked vaguely familiar.
"Those who cannot learn from the past are doomed to repeat it. What lessons have you learned, Draco?"
The voice was changing, becoming older, frailer — it was no longer Draco's voice, but familiar nonetheless.
I've got a job to do.
Well, then, you must get on and do it, my dear boy.
That sage voice, so carefully nonjudgmental, speaking the words Draco dreaded, yet so desperately needed to hear.
Draco, Draco, you are not a killer.
"Dumbledore?"
The boy at the table smiled, and spoke again in the dead professor's voice.
"Those who cannot learn from the past are doomed to repeat it. What lessons have you learned, Draco?"
He thought for a moment about all the lessons he had learned from his father, including the most recent one when he had killed Draco's mother. He thought of his teachers, and of his unfinished homework. He thought of Hermione, and of the man he had known as Professor Dumbledore, the only man who had ever believed he was different from the boy everyone thought him to be.
"Friendship," he answered quietly. "Trust. Truth."
His vision seemed to crack at the corners, fracturing into his view like a broken phial, or like a spell rupturing into a thousand pieces.
"The cup of Truth is a bitter drink. A lie is so much sweeter." Again, Hermione flashed before his eyes, her image shot through this time with fissures. "Are you willing to give all that up, for Truth?"
Draco took a deep breath. "Truth cannot be changed. It is, whether I will it or not. Truth may be bitter, but sweets rot you away. I want the Truth."
"Then face the Truth within yourself."
And Draco did.
-:-+-:-+-:-+-:-
He woke, exhausted.
He knew what he had seen, what he now knew he hadn't wanted to see, because it would mean the end of this time of peace. The last few months had been so blissful, so needful after a life of repression and hate. But if he loved Hermione (and he did, he realized that now), then he could delay no longer. They must finish what they had set out to do, even if it meant that when things were over, they'd either be dead, or she would never want to see him again.
-:-+-:-+-:-+-:-
"Hermione!"
An urgent whisper propelled the girl awake. She sat up in bed, blinking blearily against the night. There was nothing there.
"Hermione."
The voice again. She knew that voice. This time the air shimmered as Draco let the invisibility cloak fall away.
"How'd you get up here?" Hermione asked softly, sleep making her momentarily stupid. "Boys can't come up the girl's staircase, and you don't know our password."
"I flew," he replied, looking at her strangely.
"Oh, yes. Of course."
"Hermione, I know where the fifth Horcrux is."
That woke her up.
"You do? Where?" Parvarti snorted and flopped over in her bed. Hermione immediately lowered her voice. "Where is it?"
"In my vault at Gringotts."
Hermione gaped at him.
"Look, I'll explain on the way, only — are you coming? We've only got a few hours left before dawn."
She nodded. "Yes, of course I'm coming — but how are we going to get in? Gringotts is closed at night. Why don't we just go tomorrow or something — it's the weekend after all."
"Believe me, you don't want my aunt Bellatrix to know we've been in the vault. As for how we're going to get in…let me worry about that."
"I need to get dressed…" Hermione murmured, getting out of bed and picking her robes off her trunk. A thought struck her, and she turned around. "No peeking."
Draco looked impishly crestfallen. "Oh, all right."
Quickly, Hermione tore off her nightgown and drew on her robes. A small charm, and her hair braided itself neatly into a plait and away from her face. She was ready.
Draco was already standing on the open casement, peering out into the night. In the moonlight, his face looked strangely alien, all planes and angles. For the first time in months, she could not tell what he was thinking.
"Let's go," she said, climbing onto the broom behind Draco and wrapping her arms around his waist. Glory, but she hated flying.
"Hang on tight," he whispered, and kicked off.
She was falling, they were falling. Then suddenly, they weren't anymore. Hermione opened her eyes to see the ground rushing by in a dark blur beneath them.
This was completely different from riding a hippogriff or a thestrel, or even the few times she had mounted the rickety old school brooms during her first year. The wind streamed by her face, tearing small wisps of hair out of her braid. Draco was solidly in front of her, and some part of her knew that if she let go, she wouldn't fall, and if she did, he would catch her. But why would she let go when she could hold onto him, burying her cheek against his shoulder and rubbing her nose in the place where his hair met the nape of his neck?
"Stop that," he told her thickly. "I can't think."
"Good," she said. "That's my department."
He laughed at that, a low, throaty sound, and turned and kissed her quickly before retargeting his broomstick. She didn't know how he compassed their destination, and she didn't care. He was obviously aiming towards something, and she was content to go along for the ride.
Chapter 18 Summary:
Hermione learns that Ron doesn't remember walking in on her and Draco. Draco has a vision of the Cup of Truth and realizes where the fifth horcrux is. Draco and Hermione leave for Draco's Gringott's vault to steal the horcrux.