Hermione dressed for the trial with care she hadn't used since the Yule Ball ages ago when she had been a child and all that had mattered had been being pretty for a night. That had ended badly. She hoped this went better. She hoped she didn't end up in tears after this one.
She thought she probably would, however.
The pencil skirt was Muggle, fitted, grey, and expensive. Every seam screamed that this had been made by people who cared about how fabric lay more than about mass production. The fabric itself whispered of age old wealth and conservatism and people who said things like the poor buy everything twice, oblivious to the reality that most people would never be able to afford this kind of quality.
She'd be able to pass this skirt down to a grandchild, assuming she lived long enough to have one.
The blouse tied at the neck, a bow that should have been dowdy and dated and instead seemed just daring enough to make respectability fun. Hermione pulled it on thinking she had to ask Narcissa where she shopped or, perhaps, how she spotted good finds. She would never have pulled this off a rack, never have even considered it would be anything other than boring. The diamond bracelet glittered at her wrist. The heels she slipped on were, perhaps, higher than she would have picked but she had to admit, as she examined the whole ensemble, they worked. They hurt, but they said power. They said confidence.
Draco wore black. Expensive black. Elegant black. But black. He walked her to the front stoop where Narcissa waited. Lucius, it seemed, would not be attending. Narcissa picking a single loose curl Hermione had been unable to wrestle into submission, tucked it into her chignon, and murmured a charm. Whether the magic held, or the curl was simply afraid to defy the matriarch, Hermione wasn't sure. Either way, it stayed out of her eyes and where it belonged.
"Dolohov will be minding his manners," Narcissa said. Hermione wasn't so sure this would be the case but she smiled as though she believed it. Narcissa wasn't fooled. "It behooves him to have you seem cooperative," she said. "Bullying you will not accomplish that."
That Hermione could believe.
When they apparated to the Ministry building, it seemed Narcissa was right. A group of reporters clustered on the steps, enough notice-me-not charms in place that the Muggle citizens of London passed by without a sideways glance. What was the collective noun for reporters? A gaggle as if they were geese? An argument as if wizards? There had to be a perfect word to describe them. "A miller," she said.
"What?" Draco asked.
"The collective noun," Hermione said. "Everyone knows a murder of crows. It's a miller of whores."
He glanced at the reporters and one side of his mouth tweaked up. "Nice," he said.
Rita Skeeter was there, of course, but perhaps time had taught her to be wary of people named Hermione. The pink feather she had shoved in her pointed hat wiggled and danced as she backed away, allowing Hermione to trace her movements through the pack. Through the miller. Other reporters were not so clever. "Miss Granger," one said, shoving a quill under her face, "how does it feel to betray the brother of a man you were reportedly planning to marry?"
She could feel her hand tightening on Draco's arm.
"Miss Granger," asked another, "does this mean you regret having helped bring down You-Know-Who?"
"Miss Granger! Are you doing this because you're fucking Draco Malfoy?"
Antonin Dolohov appeared out of nowhere, an unexpected savior, and the waves that had been threatening to drown her parted for him. "Miss Granger," he said, and bowed over her hand. "Would you like anything to drink before the trial begins? A glass of tea?"
"No, thank you," she said.
She, Draco and Narcissa followed him through the crowd until he turned at the door of the Ministry and said, "Give them something for their articles, won't you my dear?" The reporters started to shout again, hurling questions at her like hatred, until Dolohov held up his hand. "Let her speak," he said.
She could hear the cameras going off, immortalizing her. The papers would feature Hermione Granger, flanked by Malfoys and a Dolohov. Did she look like a political prisoner? Did she look willing? Would Ron see this and know she had to do it?
"I abhor the use of violence against a free press," she said. "Terrorism was the way of Voldemort. It isn't mine."
She could see the look of utter, smug satisfaction on Dolohov's face as he turned her again, one hand on her back, and drove her into the building. She ignored it.
She was seated toward the front, on a long hard bench. Draco settled on one side of her, Narcissa on the other, and Draco took her hand and squeezed it. Percy already sat in a heavy wooden chair, his wrists and ankles chained down. That pale, pale Weasley skin had blanched even further, leaving his freckles spots of dark rage scattered on his face. She could see bruises, some an aged yellow, some a fresher purple. He wasn't having a good time of it in custody.
He wouldn't look at her.
That made him the only one. The court room was filled with people who whispered and jostled one another as she sat down and as she waited with what she hoped looked like boring, impermeable, patience. She could feel their eyes on her.
She leaned her shoulder into Draco's and he tightened his grip on her hand. A lightbulb flashed. "Should I tell them my better angle is from the other side," Draco whispered in her ear. She smiled, half-hysterically, and let herself be grateful for the support.
"You look equally good from both sides," she whispered back. "Don't be vain."
"Shall we go out when this is over?" Narcissa said. She surveyed the room as if she had found herself, quite unexpectedly, surrounded by badly trained house pets and she wanted to be careful not to step in anything foul as she picked her way free. "Something quiet."
"No, thank you," Hermione said. After this she wanted to go back to her room and cry.
Things got worse as the trial began and her face grew tighter with misery. Percy didn't bother to deny what he'd done. He sat in the chair like a knight armored in truth. You could chain him like an animal but that didn't change what he was. "Your paper spews lies," he said. "Your government is a lie. Since when does wizarding Britain have a lord? Who elected Lord Yaxley?"
"Was it your idea to bomb the building," the prosecutor asked, "Or were you following orders."
"If I followed instructions it was because I believed them to be just," Percy said. He looked at Hermione for the first time. "I am more interested in doing what is right than in saving my own skin."
"You think you're noble?" the prosecutor asked. "I say you are a terrorist." The courtroom erupted into cheers. People banged their feet on the floor and called out agreement. Percy didn't waver. He didn't even acknowledge the crowd. His eyes stayed levelly on Hermione and, recognizing the drama of the moment, the prosecutor turned to her.
"Miss Granger," he said. "Can you identify this man? He certainly appears to know you."
She nodded and stood. She pointed at Percy. "That," she said, "is Pervical Weasley, son of Arthur and Molly Weasley, active member of the Order of the Phoenix."
"Do you believe he acted alone?" the prosecutor asked her.
Hermione hesitated, and at last said, "I don't know."
"You were a member of the Order," the prosecutor said.
"I was," she said. "During the War Against Voldemort. The Second Wizarding War. I was. I knew him then."
Dolohov fixed his gaze on the prosecutor. She could see their wordless communication. Had they rehearsed this? Probably. "You have repudiated them," the prosecutor asked.
She took a deep breath. "Fighting Voldemort was one thing," she said. "Bombing businesses where innocent people work is another."
"But you know the way they operate," he pressed.
"I do," she admitted. "Or I did."
"Do you think Percy Weasley did this on his own or under the direct orders of the Order of the Phoenix."
"It would be very unusual for a member to strike out on his own," she said. "It is a small group and coordination is key. Coordination and constant vigilance," she added. She wanted to shame Percy. She wanted him to feel the weight of the mistake he had made. Moody had been on them about constant vigilance which had included the use of polyjuice.
"Thank you, Miss Granger," the prosecutor said smoothly. "Your loyalty to wizarding Britain is noted and commendable."
She smiled weakly and sat back down. Draco set a hand on her knee and squeezed it reassuringly. Narcissa patted her shoulder. Cameras flashed.
Percy looked as if he wanted to throttle her. His hands pulled against the chains for the first time and she knew if he'd been able to free himself he would have fastened them around her neck. Well, shaming hadn't worked.
At least the Dementors weren't at Azkaban any longer.
The prosecutor began a long, brilliant oratory on the ways the nation needed to come together to resist terrorism. "We have suffered for evil," he said at one point. "We will not suffer again for fools." He pointed at Percy as he said that and Hermione felt squirming, unpleasant agreement with his assessment of Percy. The outcome had been foreordained, everyone knew he would be found guilty, and Hermione sat as Aurors dragged Percy from the room, a pawn on the chessboard of war.
Narcissa wanted to wait until the reporters left, but that was not to be. "Just a wave," she said. "You've already made your statement."
Flanked by allies, Hermione smiled as gamely as she could on her way out. Narcissa apparated them all home, and brushed dry lips over Hermione's temple as they landed. "Go rest," she said. "Do you want me to send up the papers as they arrive?"
Hermione nodded, and then the world became a blur. She knew she somehow made it back to her room. She remembered Draco shutting the door and gently pulling the heels off her feet. She leaned against the wall and wondered why it was the two of them seemed to always end up on the floor when things went badly. Draco rubbed her sole with one thumb and he probably said all the right things, whatever those were. Whatever the right thing to say was when your pretend girlfriend betrayed everyone she knew to keep herself safe he surely said it. She didn't know. All she knew was he stayed. He stayed when she stripped out of the formal and proper robes and wrapped herself in ratty flannel pajamas. He stayed when she cried. He stayed when she tried to eat the cake. He stayed when she threw it up.
"I'm filthy," she said at last. She didn't know how many hours had gone by. "Just like you always said I was."
"Brave," he said. "You're brave."
"Somehow in books spies are always glamourous," she said. "They say witty things and go to fabulous parties. They don't copy out stolen documents or… or… or…"
"Life isn't like books," he said.
"No."
"You're brave," he said again. She'd ended up half in his lap in front of a fire she didn't remember him lighting. He was still in the black robes he'd worn all day, shoes cast aside but otherwise unchanged. "You're fierce."
"I'm afraid," she said.
"Me too," he said.
She woke up sometime in the middle of the night. The fire had burnt down and a chill had settled over the room. Her head was on Draco Malfoy's arm, and he had an arm tucked around her. She thought she ought to get a blanket, or tell him to go back to his room, but then she was asleep again, worn out by the strain of the day.