Draco and Hermione reached the old Purge & Dowse department store laden with a bag of enough chocolate frogs for three boys and enough Quidditch magazines for four. The window dummy in her outdated fashion stared at them, unblinking, until Draco said, "Hullo. Popping by for a quick visit."

"Then come in," she said.

A few steps later and they'd passed through the glass. It took Hermione a few moments to reorient herself. The lobby held patients, visitors, and a gaggle of Medi-witches on break smoking pipes and ignoring everyone. A boy who'd puffed up like a balloon bobbed near the ceiling. His mother had clipped a leash to the belt loop of his pants and was waiting patiently for their turn. Another couple had somehow glued themselves together using a peculiar plant that wiggled and gave off belches of foul-smelling steam but showed no signs of releasing them.

"You might as well head up to the third floor," the receptionist said after an especially large steam burst. She had to wave her copy of Witch Weekly at them to get their attention, but once she did she added, "There's a small waiting area up there as well."

The couple mumbled their thanks and headed towards the lift looking like unathletic children forced to do a three-legged race. Hermione hoped they made it up without hurting themselves even more.

"We're here to visit Archibald Lestrange," Draco said.

The receptionist glowered at them both, her hands reopening her magazine, but Draco smiled his perfectly straight smile at her and shifted a little so the hint of his greying Dark Mark peeked out from the edge of his shirt cuff. Her glower became a strained welcome. "What's he here for?" she asked.

"He was cursed," Hermione said blandly.

"Spell damage?" she asked. Before Hermione could answer, she said, "That's fourth floor."

"Thank you for your time," Draco said with impeccable, cool courtesy as he set one hand on Hermione's arm and steered her toward the lift. By the time he pressed the button to go up, the receptionist had her head down over whatever scintillating article Witch Weekly had to offer.

Probably a glowing puff piece on Pansy Parkinson, Hermione thought bitterly to herself as the doors closed and the lift began moving upwards. Let's find out how the chirpy little fascist does her hair and where she buys her robes while she tells us, in oh-so-serious and hushed tones, that Auror lives matter and those Phoenix people are nothing but terrorists and we all know what to do with that sort. They're the new bad ones.

She'd heard it all before, so many times. She'd sat down with people who seemed reasonable and pleasant, people who bragged about their kids marks at Hogwarts and skill at Quidditch until you asked what they thought of Muggle-borns. She'd heard it at the party at Draco's house. They should be grateful for what they have turned pretty quickly into It's their own fault when they get hurt. They should be respectful with Aurors. I teach my children to be polite, why don't they? The Aurors need that power. You need law and order. Look at what happened with… and then they would pause, afraid to say the name of the man she'd helped bring down.

Draco poked her as the lift passed through the first floor and began to climb to the second. "What's the matter?" he asked.

"I just hate this," she said.

He looked down at his feet and seemed to try to collect his thoughts. Before he said anything, the bell dinged and the doors slid open to the ward where victims of spell damage were treated. A little exploration down the sterile corridor revealed every patient room had a clipboard hanging on the door with names and what Hermione thought was much too much personal information. They picked up one clipboard after another and the fifth one read, "Archibald Lestrange."

Draco knocked on the door and, without waiting for a response, pushed it open. A lanky-haired, sullen boy sat in the lone bed, his arms crossed. When he saw who it was, he stiffened. "Come to finish me off?" he asked.

"I beg your pardon," Draco said. It was far more of a slap back into place than a question and Hermione watched the boy blanche and slouch under the reprimand.

"Sorry," he muttered.

Hermione pulled up one of the chairs and sat down next to his bed. "I didn't want to," she said.

"I know," he said. The horrible thing was that she knew he did. She could see in his eyes the knowledge that people had to do terrible things and that it had just been his turn to be on the receiving end of abuse. "You didn't hit anywhere too bad at least."

She could see a bandage on his shoulder where the hospital gown had fallen down and she nodded. She'd missed any major arteries, hadn't severed his throat, hadn't hit him in the gut. It could have been a lot worse. It had been luck, but sometimes she'd settle for fortune's favor.

"If you hadn't done it, that one would have made you," he said. "You might have hit my face."

"We brought you some things," she said, and handed over the bag of goodies.

Archibald Lestrange opened the present and a look of delight turned him from an angry, miserable adolescent back into a boy. She could see the child he'd been and perhaps a hint of the man he'd become. "You like chocolate, then?" she asked.

He was already tearing into the chocolate frog when he answered, "There are people who don't?"

She smiled at him the same way people had smiled at her when she'd been in the infirmary with horrible curse wounds and felt old and matronly and hideously mature. He pulled out the card and looked at it.

It was Harry.

Hermione hadn't realized they hadn't pulled Harry from the packs. She was sure it didn't read, 'Member of currently active Order of the Phoenix, wanted by Aurors for questioning, please report all sightings.' They probably stuck to, 'Harry Potter struck down Dark Wizard Tom Riddle (aka the Dark Lord, aka He Who Must Not Be Named, aka Lord Voldemort) in a duel at the Battle of Hogwarts.'

Hermione might have expected a child raised by Rodolphus Lestrange to sneer at the very old photograph of Harry Potter, looking impossibly young as his scar peeked out from behind his hair. He didn't. He waved the card around with glee then said, "Is it true you knew him?"

Hermione shared a look with Draco. "Yes," she said after a moment. "I knew Harry pretty well before I… before Draco and I -."

Archibald cut her off. "My dad says he is one of the greatest wizards to ever live."

"Your dad?" Hermione asked, sure she had to be missing something.

"Yeah," Archibald said. He'd turned the card over and was greedily reading the tiny blurb. "He says he was marked by greatness as an equal but he had more."

"Love," Hermione said softly. Love had been the thing Harry had that Voldemort had not.

Well, love and sanity.

Archibald didn't respond to that, which was probably just as well. "How long do you think you'll be here?" Hermione asked, sure she ought to make some sort of conversation. You couldn't just show up, apologize for cursing someone, drop a bag of treats on them, and then go, right?

"Just until tomorrow," he said. "They make me drink that blood replenishing stuff, which is so nasty, but the cut got a weird infection they had to spell away so they wanted to make sure it didn't come back." He shrugged a little, then flinched when that moved the injured, cursed, infected shoulder. He clearly didn't care how long he stayed here, and was pretty unfazed by the injury.

"Harry Potter hit me with that one once," Draco said.

Archibald looked excited at that. "Really?" he asked.

"Mmm hmm," Draco said. "I'd tried to crucio him in the toilet."

"You couldn't hit him though, right?" Archibald asked.

Draco shook his head, confirming Harry Potter, boyhood rival, had been untouchable. Hermione could see Archibald's hero worship grow. "Other than with my fists, no," Draco said rather dryly. "He dodged trouble."

"We should go," Hermione said. She wasn't sure how much of their boyhood rivalry remained. Harry had sent her off easily enough so he couldn't hate Draco the way he had when they were as young as this boy. Either that or he'd trusted her to hold her own. Or, as Draco had said that first night, she'd been the most disposable. Harry certainly wouldn't have sent Ginny out.

She shoved those thoughts aside and stood up. "I'm glad you're feeling better."

"Thanks for the chocolate," Archibald said. He looked down at the card he still held. "I wish this were signed."

She could tell that was a hint but it wasn't the sort of thing she could deliver on. "Harry and I aren't in touch anymore," she said. "Not since," she gestured at Draco.

Archibald shrugged with adolescent nonchalance and she thought to herself she had to find a way to get him a signed card when this was all over. How she'd convince Harry to send something off to a Lestrange she didn't know, but he, of all people, would appreciate her wish to separate a child from the sins of his parents.

With the door closed behind them she sighed and smiled at Draco. One task, done. The guilt for one crime assuaged. She hoped they would all be this easy to rectify. He took her hand, laced his fingers through hers, and squeezed.

As much as she hated what had led him to knowing what she felt, it was good to be understood.

"Hermione Granger."

The drawling voice interrupted their walk away, and Hermione turned to see a dark man bearing down on them. His hair hung down over his ears in a way that suggested he needed a haircut more than that he preferred longer hair, and he was licking his lips.

"I have not seen you in many years," he went on.

"Rodolphus Lestrange," Hermione said. She was sure Draco had to be cringing internally from the way she had tightened her grip on his hand but he managed to keep his face as bored as her voice. "Yaxley freed you from Azkaban, I see."

Lestrange smiled at her. It was a fearsome sight and it was all she could do not to step backwards. "He felt leniency was in order for many people who had been caught up in the war," he said. "Reconstruction of society and all."

"Quite," she said.

"It's why your dear love's parents drink tea in their lovely house instead of dining with the devil."

There didn't seem to be a way to answer that so Hermione put a bland expression on, her own Death Eater's mask, and waited for him to continue. She'd learned that silence could be more a more effective weapon than denunciation or, as Moody put it, give the bastards enough rope and they always hung themselves.

"Things aren't like they were," he said. He leaned in closer and she could smell his breath. His eyes looked wild enough she expected whiskey, or the sickly aftersmoke of some peculiar narcotic, but he exhaled nothing but a stale coffee reek. That was bad enough. "We were like gods, once," he said. "Or acolytes. I was loyal. The most loyal."

"I recall," Draco said dryly. "Very well, thank you."

"You." Rodolphus pointed a finger at him. He chewed on his nails and a gnawed cuticle waggled at Draco. "You are nothing."

"So I am frequently told," Draco said.

"But she," Rodolphus went on, "she helped bring down… Potter will come back. I know it."

Hermione considered the line she'd added to the miserable prophecy. "Like Arthur?" she asked. She tried to keep her voice polite and encouraging. It must have worked because Rodolphus brightened at once.

"Yes," he said with more of his mad enthusiasm. Spittle tried to escape his mouth and Hermione decided that was an acceptable reason to take a step backward. Not showing fear was one thing but she didn't think she needed to allow herself to be spit upon. "Exactly. You understand. We were elevated beyond reports and bribery and the endless petty dealings of human corruption and now… now we are like nothing. Like the rotting Malfoys."

"Well," she said, "things are tough all over."

"Potter will return," Rodolphus assured her. "You don't need to be afraid. You don't need to shelter with them. You know."

He turned on his heel and disappeared into his son's hospital room and just as Hermione was about to let out an exhale of relief he stuck his head back outside the door frame and said, in a totally sane and normal tone, "And thank you for only hitting Archibald in the shoulder. I do appreciate that and shan't forget it." Then he pulled his head back in, the door shut, and Hermione was left staring at Draco.

Draco, who was looking at the door to Archibald's room with his mouth partially open. "Well," he said after a moment.

"Azkaban is hard on people," Hermione ventured.

"I suppose," Draco said. He sounded like he suspected Rodolphus had been utterly round the bend long before his stints in prison. "Let's go home."

Hermione thought that was the best idea she'd heard in a while.