xxix. pure-blood

The scarlet steam engine idled by the platform and perfumed the air with the heavy smell of carbon and ash. Hermione, bundled in her coat and scarf, paused just beyond the empty barrier onto the station and sighed, puffs of white still slipping through the loose weave of her emerald scarf.

Hermione Granger loved her parents. Truly. Her childhood had been filled with love and trips to educational locales and warm Sunday afternoons spent in the den reading together or watching telly. She would read the paper over her father's shoulder. She would play checkers with her mum, knees tucked under the coffee table, a furrow of thought digging between her mum's brows as she considered the board. Dr and Dr Granger were genuine and affectionate parents.

However, Hermione knew they weren't very understanding.

The Grangers never much enjoyed Hermione's insatiable quest for knowledge. To be certain, having a bright child was a joy, but when curiosity turned into near-obsession, a need to question everything right down into the atoms of its creation, that brightness becomes a curse. Her parents would feed Hermione's inquisitive nature to a point, then say "Enough, Hermione," with exasperated sighs and brow rubbing.

They had no comprehension of magic. To them, magic was the trade of backroom peddlers and shabbily dressed charlatans on stage; it was all theatrical, pulling rabbits from hats and yanking loads of handkerchiefs from one's sleeve—smoke, mirrors, and a bit of glamour. The Grangers let their daughter go with Minerva McGonagall in hopes of Hermione learning better control over herself and her rabid curiosity, and after a few months missing her presence, they'd come to fully understand they'd sent their only child into a realm beyond their own. There'd be no Oxford for Hermione, no future as a lawyer or a doctor or a dentist like her parents. By sending her into the world of magic, they'd effectively cut off feasibility of her ever functioning in their own.

The Granger spent much of their two weeks together attempting to convince her staying home and not returning would be best. Hermione knew that wasn't an option—not that she wished to leave Hogwarts behind anyway. From the moment Hermione stepped foot across her threshold and took Professor McGonagall's hand, her parents ceded all guardianship rights over to the hands of the Ministry, and in the eyes of judicial circumstance, she was Hermione Malfoy, ward of the Most Noble House of Malfoy and subsequently held to a contract that wouldn't be completed until September nineteenth, 1996. To the Ministry, Hermione Granger no longer existed.

She loved her parents. She'd greatly looked forward to spending the holiday with them, and yet the more the Grangers persisted in disparaging magic, the more Hermione felt as if they were again telling her she was too much, that magic was just one element too much in their otherwise practical daughter they wished she could be rid of. Hermione could no more quit being magical than a cat could quit being feline. She spent the final days of break in her room, longing for Hogwarts, for Harriet and Elara and a comfortable four poster beneath a murky lake.

Hermione's stomach flipped with guilt when she glanced one last time at the barrier before walking away.

The majority of students returned home for the Christmas—Yule—holidays and yet few filled the compartments, most lingering still on the platform, procrastinating to the very last minute to wring out the last drop of vacation they could. Hermione boarded the train and thought of finding an empty compartment—until she saw a familiar face and burst into a wide grin.

"Elara!" she said as she eased the door open and dragged her trunk behind her. "Can I sit here?"

The pure-blood girl lifted her eyes from the book in her hands and smiled in turn, a hesitant look Hermione might have taken offense at before she came to learn more about the youngest Black daughter. "Of course," she said. Hermione jerked her trunk over the threshold and let the door clatter shut. Using her wand, she cast a quick Wingardium Leviosa, and the trunk settled neatly on the rack. Hermione sighed when she sat because using magic again after abstaining for two weeks was a joy.

And to think I haven't even been a witch for a full year. She paused. Well, technically, I've always been a witch, haven't I?

"Did you have a pleasant holiday?" Hermione asked. Elara closed her book on her hand, using a thumb to hold her place, and gave Hermione her attention.

"Not…entirely. My uncle passed on."

"Oh, I'm so sorry. You mentioned he was ill, but I didn't know…." Of course she hadn't known. Elara was particularly quiet and answered most personal questions with blank stares or utter passivity.

"I had hoped for more time. I was quite busy with the arrangements afterward."

What does she mean by that? Why would she be busy with such things when she's only eleven?

"How was your vacation, Hermione?"

She pushed such thoughts away and smiled. "It was—nice." Hermione left out the strange anxiety that had prevailed in her warm but nonetheless mundane home. "Mum and dad wanted to get out of country for a bit, but opted to stay home in the end."

"Read anything interesting?"

Now that was a question Hermione could answer at length, and she did so with pleasure, rambling off about the very book Elara had sent her for Christmas from the House of Black library, an tome about old and more dubious Charms. Hermione knew if a prig like Draco or, God forbid, Mr or Mrs Malfoy knew Elara was distributing books out of the family library to a Mudblood like her, they'd go ballistic. She expressed interest in seeing the Black library in its entirety, then winced at how heavy-handed she sounded. Elara simply smiled again.

"I would invite you and Harriet over during the summer, but the house is…not in the best repair."

"Oh, that's okay, I didn't mean to invite myself over." Hermione nibbled on her lower lip and wondered why she suddenly felt so anxious. Then, she realized this was the first time she'd been alone with Elara and her presence was…singular. Normally Harriet would be there, ignorant to any awkward tension—well, not ignorant so much as uncaring. The bespectacled girl could be quite persistent and read Elara's silences and minute shifts in expression better than Hermione did. "I hope Harriet had fun staying at Hogwarts."

Elara grimaced. "She sent Cygnus home with a letter. Apparently Snape's been giving her detention."

"No! Why would he do that?"

"Because he's a miserable bat." Elara scowled at the air before her. Professor Snape always snarled over Elara's terribly botched Potions, so Hermione assumed the dislike was mutual. "He's the sort. After all, aren't you of the opinion he cursed Longbottom in November?"

She had been, but a trip to the library after the match had proved Elara correct in her guess that Professor Snape could have just as easily been reciting the counter-curse. "I'm not sure." It wasn't very Slytherin to curse people out in the open; oh, they'd do it in a dark alley without witnesses, but in the middle of a stadium? No, that showed no finesse, no skill. Sloppy.

"He acts oddly around her," Elara said, her eyes hard.

"How so?"

"He…hesitates."

Hermione didn't understand what she meant by that and, frustrated, went to ask the other girl to clarify—when the door clattered open again.

"Granger," drawled Draco Malfoy in a chilling, if childish, mimicry of Mr Malfoy. "Back from the Muggles, are you?"

"Hello, Draco, pleasant holiday?" Hermione asked through her teeth, wanting more than anything to set the pointy little toady on fire. She checked that urge, however, before her wishes became reality.

Draco sniffed and lifted his sharp nose into the air as Goyle and Crabbe stood silent and bored behind him, blocking part of the corridor. The train had set out some minutes ago, though parts of outer London still flashed by the windows. "You didn't come to our Yule ball."

Hermione's mind flashed back to the gilded invitation she'd received via owl post, the one she'd thrown into the fire after penning a succinct reply. "I was with my parents," she said by way of explanation. Really, she thought it should be obvious.

Malfoy sneered. "You're a witch, Granger, and it's tradition! You don't celebrate Christmas anymore."

"There's a difference between being proud of heritage and being a bigot, Malfoy," Elara interrupted. She opened her book again and prepared herself to settle in with such carefree indifference, Hermione was beginning to believe the pure-bloods might really have that cold, haughty look encoded in their DNA. "Learn it."

"Watch your mouth, Black," Malfoy spat. "Or people will start thinking you're a Mudblood loving fool, too."

"I have no love for Muggles," Elara responded with a shrug, causing Hermione to flinch with surprise and considerable hurt. "Nor whatever diatribe you mean to spew."

"Father's quite upset with you, you know. He's been to the Ministry and they're going to overturn the emancipation. You should watch yourself, blood-traitor."

"The list of things I don't care about is quite long; even so, the concerns of Lucius Malfoy and his feeble-mouthed son might just top it."

Hermione thought it unfair that, even when flushing with rage, Malfoy was still pretty in that prim, affluent mien of his. She had always been an ugly crier. Goyle and Crabbe shuffled in the background and looked eager to be off, seeing as they didn't have the skills to counter Elara's savage repertoire.

"Good day, cousin," the pure-blood girl said with finality, disappearing behind her book. Malfoy stood and gawked for a moment longer, then allowed himself to be encouraged into the corridor and out of sight by his bored friends. Once the door rolled shut, Elara lowered the book again, looking cross, and yanked the shades down on the windows.

"What's this about an emancipation?" Hermione asked for lack of knowing what else to say. Oh, she had plenty she wanted to say, but the words vied for dominance and created a traffic jam in her head.

"My uncle," Elara began as she closed the book again and, with a sigh, dropped it on the seat at her side. "He assured my emancipation before he passed on so I—and, by extension, the House of Black—wouldn't be slipped into Malfoy's pocket. Malfoy's been to the Ministry to throw a tantrum, of course, but there's nothing he can do about it."

"Do you really not like Muggles?" Hermione asked, unable to keep the hurt out of her voice. Yes, she was a witch—but Hermione had been raised a Muggle, was a Muggle-born, and to hear that someone she considered one of her best friends might hold that heritage against her was almost more than Hermione could take.

Elara must have seen the pain in Hermione's eyes because her irritated expression eased to something softer. "I think it's more appropriate to say I don't like people in general," she replied with a crooked smile. Pausing, she then began to unbutton her cuffs, rolling them back to reveal pale, skinny wrists. Given that Hermione had never seen the other girl dressed less than perfectly and completely covered, even when she woke up late and surly in the mornings, she couldn't help but glance at the skin bared to the afternoon sunlight.

Scars marred Elara's arms, puckered and pink, not quite new but definitely not old either. Horrified, Hermione initially thought they were evidence of Elara hurting herself. The thought turned Hermione's stomach with worry, until she noted how thick the scars were, the flesh torn rather than sliced, amassed mostly about the mound of her palms and the lower portions of her thumb joints. If she had to be objective, Hermione would say it looked as if…as if her wrists had been bound by something restrictive, unyielding, something like handcuffs, and she'd tried very hard to rip them off.

"The place I lived before, the people there, were much like the Malfoys. The kind of people who justify what the Dark Lord did, just as the Dark Lord justifies what they do. They prescribed to a particular dogma and felt themselves justified in harming those who were different from themselves."

"That is foul," Hermione said, shaken, staring. "Foul. Why haven't you gone to Madam Pomfrey? Or Dumbledore? Or—or—!" She didn't want to say Professor Slytherin. Their Head of House was terrifying.

"Because it's done. I'm not going back there. I don't want to talk about it."

"But—."

"No, Hermione." With that, Elara quickly pushed her sleeves back into place and redid the buttons. She kept her eyes averted.

Hermione didn't know what to say. Elara had only spoke of her prior home once or twice and had referred to it as 'that place' or 'those people.' Still, Hermione couldn't have guessed this kind of trauma lay beneath Elara's steely exterior, her inflexible need to remain unnoticed and in control of herself. The part of Hermione that was 'too much' wanted to urge the other girl to tell someone who could do something, someone who could fix that horrendous scarring or take away the flinty, hateful gleam in Elara's pale eyes. Someone had to be able to help.

Hermione closed her mouth. She stood from her seat, then sat next to Elara. The other girl stiffened, but as the minutes passed and the train continued to rattle around them, laughter echoing in the corridor, she finally relaxed. "Don't tell Harriet," Elara whispered.

"Why ever not?"

"She has her own problems to deal with."

That brought an end to the conversation. The two witches sat in silence as the world continued to change beyond the gentle rocking of the train's carriage. Hermione watched the countryside and considered just how little she truly knew about her best friends' lives.