(A/N)
Hello,
Sorry for leaving you all with such a cliffhanger. I had not been keeping well lately, but here is the chapter and the much awaited 'morning after'.
REVIEW and VOTE. Keeps me going! This one's nearly 4,000 words long! The more the reviews, the quicker I post people!
XOXO
Mili
P.S. All you people following and favouriting the story, THANK YOU!
Hermione's wand buzzed beside her to wake her up. She tried to pry her eyes open, but the lull of sleep of rather tempting even after the hours of sleep that she had had in Draco's arms. Draco's arms?! With that thought, her eyes shot open and she became still as she realised he was still sound asleep, snoring lightly, next to her. His naked torso was against her back. She could feel his breath on her neck. An arm casually draped over her middle in a firm grip and legs entwined with hers. He felt like a furnace next to her and it was rather toasty in bed with him under the covers. Toasty and a little too comfortable.
Images from the night before flooded her mind. She felt her cheeks go beet red as she tried to twist her head to get a glimpse of his face. She contorted herself so as to not disturb him and managed to turn her neck enough to be able to see his serene sleeping visage. His pointy face looked rather handsome, but that was something that she had admitted to herself a long time back. The lack of a serious or broody attitude on his face made the features softer somehow. He was as beautiful as a Veela, she thought. She had slept next to him enough times now in the Estate that she knew that he had a perpetual frown marring his face, even while he slept. His demons never left him alone. And it had always broken her heart. But today, he looked truly at peace. No smile graced his lips, but a peaceful veil fell upon his face.
Those very lips that had worshipped her all night and into the morning. Hermione knew that kissing Draco could be addictive. Even the ghost kisses he gave to tease her were charged enough. The kisses were a different matter altogether. But just thinking about the sex, about how passionately yet in such an animalistic manner he had taken her over and over again, just the thought alone could give her an orgasm.
She had woken up in the middle of their slumber and given in to an urge to kiss him, which he had returned fervently with another round of carnal pleasure. It was all on instinct. Neither had thought about the consequences of their actions and for a change, neither had thought about what they felt at that moment. At all.
Hermione felt Draco stir as his eyes fluttered open in the sunlight wafting through the window. He gradually opened his lids to see Hermione staring at him open mouthed.
"I could kiss you some more if that's what you want." He said smiling at her through half-open lids. His post-sex morning voice alone was invitation enough for her to jump his bones, but she knew this was not the time or place for all this. She tried to get up, looking a little flustered, when he pulled her back in bed, in his arms. "Let's not think too hard about this? Okay? It was wonderful. Don't ruin it with your genius brains, Granger." Hermione turned to face him and after a minute or two of wondering how he knew her exact thoughts, she simply nodded. He smiled in return. The sudden cold that the lack of covers on her caused her nipples to harden which made them graze against his naked chest. She could hear his suppressed groan and tried to move away, which in turn made her brush against him in a more intimate manner. The action made his favourite appendage hard enough for Hermione to feel against her bare thigh.
Both blushing a brilliant shade of crimson, moved away from each other in a flash. Both enjoyed a quite breakfast of fruits that they had found in the woods around the cottage. The food in the Cottage could be centuries old for all they knew. Neither said a word but both made sure they didn't touch or were within close-range of the other. It was almost as if they found each other's touch to be explosive, but last night they did make each other explode with pleasure again and again, so it was a valid point.
At around noon, Hermione's curious brain couldn't take it anymore.
"What are we planning to do Draco?" Apart from the fact that those were the first words spoken by either of them since morning, her tone caught his attention. She had often called her Draco over the past few weeks, sometimes in tender moments when they were trying to be each other's support or in passing. But the way she had called him today, there was something more real, more deliberate about it. As if she had thought about it and called him Draco instead of Malfoy.
"At 1:25 as planned, we should try it again. That's what we had thought, right?"
"There was something else that had crossed my mind?"
Draco put down the book that he had been trying to read to lay off thoughts about the brunette in front of him. Now that she had his complete attention, she continued. There was no longer the embarrassment of last night that lingered on her face, but the fierce determination that overcame her when she had discovered or uncovered something brilliant.
"The earrings, last time we held them in the box as we recited the spell. We were sure they have some enchantment on them or some curse, so we put them aside yesterday. What if they are the key to the spell? We checked them for magic, which they possess, but we do not know now the nature of it, do we?"
"So, are you saying that Silvius never got any time turner? Instead, he got these earrings that are enchanted with a time spell?"
"Yes. See, the time-turner ideally takes you back in time. So, if I were to go back in time, say from our fifth year at Hogwarts to our first; my 15-year old self would meet my 11-year old self. That does not mean that we exchange places with our versions of that time period. We simply step into that time."
"So if we stepped into this time, we should have exchanged places with ourselves, but since we don't exist here, we probably exchanged places with Silvius and Adelia?"
"Yes. Precisely. Or this isn't a time turner at all!"
"What do you mean?"
"Draco what do you know about Wormholes?"
"What holes?"
"Uhh...Wormholes?"
Draco looked extremely puzzled at this point. He was wondering what was Hermione on about, but her latest question sounded rather absurd to him.
"What in Merlin's name is that supposed to be?"
"You know how we can apparate to travel between two places? And time turners help us travel between two specific established times?" Hermione continued with her eyes shining with a gleam of knowledge. Draco nodded and urged her to go ahead.
"A wormhole is somewhat similar. It is much like a tunnel with two ends, each at separate points in space and time. So when you travel through one, you travel through time much like how you apparate." Draco's puzzled expression meant that he understood what she had said but was itching to sate his own curiosity.
"So isn't that the same as what a time turner does? And why did I not come across what a wormhole is in any of our books or notes?"
"Oh, we did!" Hermione jumped from the chair that she was sitting one and moved to sit next to Draco. Pulling a parchment and a quill and some ink that she had found in a drawer, earlier. She scribbled something on the parchment and turned it towards Draco.
Tempus Locus
"What do you think it means?" Hermione asked. Draco remembered coming across the word several times in a particularly dark book that they had found in the Manor when they had started their research. "Time and location?"
Hermione looked at him for a minute then scribbled something again.
Tempus Location
"Now, what does this mean to you?" Hermione asked with excitement dancing in her eyes. Draco looked at her very hard but with a defeated sigh exclaimed, "I know you are onto something, but they both mean practically the same to me, time and location, Hermione."
"What you are saying are the general meaning of the words. What would be the specific translation, Draco?" Hermione egged him on.
Draco thought about it. "Locus and location are more or less the same. Locus is more in a 'space' context, and location means, umm well, location. But both mean the same more or less?" He was starting to doubt his own words at this point.
"That's where we both misjudged what we read! Space is where everything exists. When you say location, you are talking about the specific point where a person or objct is, be it on a map or in time. But, when you say space, it could mean the vacuum, nothingness, just a place or simply the area that an object occupies. And a spell that determines your location, would specify where you are to where you land up. While a spell that warps spacetime, it will open up a vacuum if there are things that one wants to send across, or create things where there is a vacuum, with the help of time, to balance things!"
"Okay, so you are saying this is an entirely different kind of spell from what the time-turner does?"
"Bingo! When we had both read about the spell, we assumed it was some kind of advance time-turner charm, whereas, it was an advanced time turning spell to let one travel in time without actually specifying where one needed to go in the spell itself."
"So wouldn't we just land up anywhere? That would be rather absurd and dangerous."
"The object that was enchanted would be the determinant! I had read something like that! That what you chose helps determine where you land up. And the time turners need to be wound up as far as one needs to go, but with this spell, you just need the object, no need for complicated spells for when you want to travel a huge amount in time. It's a stroke of genius!"
"So basically, Silvius decided to take Adelia and escape in time? This was no coincidence or a botched up spell, it was planned!"
They had not realised in all their excitement they had shifted closer and were sitting with their knees touching. This was just another moment where the two had thoroughly enjoyed brainstorming. Their wits could be at loggerheads and yet work to indefinite levels of genius. Their love for books and knowledge was something that they had always shared, but the reasons they sought them were what had divided them. Hermione wanted to know all that she could to be able to be ready to help everyone, while Draco wanted to know everything to be able to impress the pureblood circle he had grown up in. However, both secretly simply wanted to be accepted and having knowledge seemed like an easy way for that. Also, books were their solace, their escape from the dreary realities they both faced.
At exactly, 1:23 p.m., both stood in the exact same position as they had when Hermione had first said the spell back in the present. Draco held the box in hand and had the other hand firmly held Hermione's much smaller hand in his. Hermione held the box with the earrings in it with her free hand with Draco. As the grandfather clock's hand moved to strike 1:25, Hermione quickly looked at Draco for encouragement as they both recited,
"Nos tempus est huius"
Nothing.
They repeated the enchantment again.
Nothing happened.
"We are stuck here! This is permanent! We will have to go back and live our lives as the bloody Zabinis from Italy while our friends and family will never know what befell us! Dear Merlin! I wish I had never taken up Shacklebolt's offer! Godammit!" Hermione screamed in frustration nearly throwing the jewellery box.
Draco could feel her frustration seeping into him. He put down the box on the table with a bang, not caring that he could be breaking an heirloom. He turned to face her and held her by the shoulders in a death grip. "Calm yourself down, Hermione!"
"Why are you screaming if you want me to be calm! It's already 1:27 and we are still here, my watch is still stuck in the same bloody moment!"
"I am screaming because I don't know what else to do, okay? I don't." He said calming down visibly as his grip on her loosened and gradually he put away his hands.
"We are doing something wrong. We are missing something." Draco observed in a completely stoic voice. "Hermione, can you remember what all we had with us when the spell worked the last time? The spell literally means 'The time is ours.' so I doubt there is a reverse spell to that, except that we are missing some technicality."
"I don't know Draco. I can't think anymore. We are just stuck here."
"You can't be accepting that as our fate. We can't spend the rest of my life here while my Mother drives herself insane and you can't stay here without knowing if your parents actually ever got healed. What about our friends? Think about Harry? Ginny? I know Blaise would be miserable without me even if we are not stuck at the hip like you lot."
Hermione looked up at him with tear-filled eyes. "Don't make me think about it all. I can't do it again. I just can't."
"What happened to the Gryffindor courage of yours?"
"I am no Gryffindor! I am a healer who is basically a quack! None of this is real! Our identities, our professions, our abilities, our marriage, whatever is between us, it's all a sham!"
Her last words were like a blow to the stomach. He didn't want to think about what she had just said, but he couldn't stop feeling the despair spread through his chest. He steeled himself and took on the impassive shell that he was so used to being within.
"Think Granger. We must be skipping something." He said in a deadpan voice. Hermione's emotions were too charged for her to notice the sudden switch in his. If she had paid even the slightest bit of attention she would have realised that his voice had no tone. It wasn't cold like it used to be back in the day, it wasn't proud, neither was it hurt. It was simply dead, as dead as he wished for all emotions that he had felt for her to be.
"The necklace!" He suddenly exclaimed.
"I held it in one hand when you had said the spell!" He explained. It might not be enchanted but it could be what binds the magic!" He explained. He went to the bedroom where their clothes from last night lay in a pile in a corner. The sheets, now straightened, still reminded him of the tryst last night. But a bitter distaste followed almost immediately as he reprimanded himself mentally. He looked for the necklace and found it carefully placed on the dresser. He grabbed it and dashed outside.
"Here. Put it on." He practically thrust it into Hermione's hands without so much as glancing at her. He avoided touching her and waited impatiently as she struggled with locking it.
He asked her to hurry irately. "Draco, help?" she asked. Hermione was confused as to what had vexed Draco suddenly. He seemed possessed by anger all of a sudden and Hermione could not pinpoint what had caused him to act so. All she could do was try to act normal and hope it calmed him down.
"You can't even manage that much?" he retorted in a tone which was colder than when he had first called her mudblood. This hurt more than anything he had ever said to her before, more than anything anybody had ever said to her in fact. She looked at him with shock brimmed eyes.
He moved from where he stood at the window and pulled out his wand. With a silent flick of his wand, he snapped the necklace shut. The sensual gentleness that he had when he had first given it to her was all gone, it was replaced by a version of Draco Malfoy that Hermione had never seen before. His eyes had been cold and proud when they were young, but in this moment, Hermione couldn't recognise them. They weren't even haunted like he used to often look like after the War. He seemed stone-cold; dead inside.
He came and stood next to her. "Let's do this again. I know it's long past 1:25, but there's no harm in trying." He declared as he picked up the jewellery box again. He put a hand on her back, between her shoulder blades over her sweater that she was wearing once again, making sure that he did not touch her skin anyway. The effect she had on his mind and body was unravelling, but he knew better than to act on his feelings. The hand on her felt as if someone had asked him to put it there on gunpoint. Forced and distant.
She looked at him only to find him staring daggers at the earrings in the box. She gulped down a million questions that crept up her mind and chanted.
"Nos tempus est huius"
The room was flooded with light in an instant. The light vanished as suddenly as it had appeared. And with equal speed, Draco pulled away from her.
Hermione took a deep breath as she looked at her watch.
"We made it. It's working again!"
In the bedroom, Draco stood looking at the corner where their clothes had once been. They had vanished. Just like the life the two had shared. They were back in time. Back in the present now.
Before Hermione could say anything, Draco was opening the door and moving out. "Don't touch anything else. We don't know what else could be charmed. Let's leave. And try to use minimal magic."
They walked out into the Marshlands. The Sun was now setting, casting long shadows. It was eery and scary. And with Draco's new behaviour, Hermione was troubled. He marched straight ahead with her trying to keep up with him. Occasionally he would stop or slow down to match her pace, but would never walk with her.
When they were almost halfway through a sudden rustling in the bushes caught her attention. Before she could say anything, something blurred by her and launched itself on Draco.
"Draco! NO!" Hermione dived in without giving it any thought. Draco pushed the creature off him with all his might and cast a quick Lumos only to see that a strange black form faced him. It had no form, nor visage. It looked like a heavy black floating cloak but unlike a dementor. The spine-chilling creature blasted towards Draco, but his Seeker instincts kicked in and he dodged just in time. Hermione stood there confused for a second before she remembered that almost all dark creatures were sensitive to light, whatever this was. But she knew that even a Lumos Maxima wouldn't help much in this thick forest. But then her brain kicked gears.
"Expecto Patronum!"
After many years, a brilliant silver otter appeared from the end of her vine wood wand. It moved towards the black figure and before it could hurt Draco, it disintegrated. It was a lucky shot, but the last resort that she had to try.
"Are you alright?" She rushed to his side. "I am fine." He was panting. He looked really shaken, but unhurt otherwise.
"What in Godric's name was that!" she exclaimed.
"A lethifold. They are like dementors, but they feed on people instead of their despair. Not much is known about them. They were said to be destroyed from this part of the Wizarding World a century back." Draco explained in a much calmer tone as he stood up and brushed the dirt off himself.
"Oh yes! Similar creatures exist in the Amazon and they suck on blood. There, they are called something else, though. They are shadow cloaks that creep on people and devour them, especially while they sleep. This could explain all the bloodless corpses!"
Draco had to give credit to the Gryffindor's mind and diligence. Even after so much turmoil and after literally passing through time, she still remembered what their investigation was originally about. Figuring out the mystery of the bloodless corpses.
Draco needed to go to the Manor to see his mother. He had to tell her that he was fine. They had been away for almost a month now! He quickened his pace and Hermione kept following him.
"Where are we going?"
"I am going to apparate to the Manor to check on my Mother." he said in the same distant tone.
"Okay. I will head over to find Harry later, probably. I have to find the things I left at the Manor, in the library."
Draco did not know what was more important to Hermione than finding Harry or any of the Weasleys. But his mind was too preoccupied to argue. Hermione on the other hand. simply wanted to be there with him a little longer. As much as she had wished to be back, she was having detachment issues with Draco Malfoy of all people! She just wanted to be sure that he was okay and looked after, after the attack.
He held out a hand without ever making eye contact as soon as they crossed the anti-apparition wards. Hermione side-alonged with him as he apparated outside the Malfoy Manor.
"Mother!" he bellowed. He rushed towards the drawing room where he hoped to find her. Instead, he was greeted by a site that had him falling to his knees right at the door.
As much as Hermione hated that wretched room, she couldn't help but run after Draco and once she reached the door, she saw Draco on the floor, sitting on his knees, with his hands trying to support him on the floor.
Ahead, on a huge display, under a pall of silk emerald, lay a coffin of dark wood. On it shined the Malfoy crest, silver and proud even in death. Flowers lay all around it. Bouquets and vases full of magical flowers, cards of every size covered the place.
As Hermione sat beside him, taking in the sight, Draco let out a loud howl as he finally broke down for the first time in his life.