Hermione was back to how she had been the first day they arrived at Grimmauld Place: flustered. She couldn't meet Draco's eyes, not with Harry and Ron around, nor could she stop thinking about having him beneath her on the bed, or what might have happened if Ron hadn't interrupted, or what could happen the next time they were alone again, as long as Harry and Ron stayed away —
She was a mess. After a year of stealing desperate kisses in the lab on the few days the Wolfsbane allowed it, to suddenly be thrown together like this and still not have him to herself felt unnecessarily cruel.
Unfortunately, her only distraction was Harry's increasingly erratic and alarming behaviour. He looked exhausted all the time, but there was a disturbing alertness in his eyes. He didn't eat much, and spent far too much time with the Horcrux, but Hermione couldn't persuade him otherwise.
Hermione had given up on personally attacking the Horcrux and had resolved herself to research a solution, instead of ferociously casting every possible spell at it. Even Ron had grown tired of it, which was a blessing, in Hermione's opinion, since it seemed to make him bitter and suspicious.
But it didn't matter. None of them had made any progress, and they were no closer to destroying the locket than the day Kreacher had presented it to them. The days took on a frustrating, morbid sort of pattern, wherein Harry would lock himself away with the Horcrux, Ron would wander the house, and Hermione and Draco would peruse the library for possible answers. Hermione would point to the books she wanted, and Draco would pull them for her, and, in some extreme cases, read them to her, too, when the book's magic would not tolerate Hermione's looking at it.
That was where Hermione found herself now, curled up on the sofa, listening as Draco read to her about sinister potions. She watched him as he read, the way his eyebrows rose when he encountered something intriguing; the way his long, elegant fingers held open the book…
"Are you really not going to ask?" she said suddenly.
He stopped reading, eyes moving from the page to her. "What?"
"What this is all about. You haven't asked what the locket is, or why we need to destroy it, or — "
He shook his head. "If I needed to know, you would tell me."
"But aren't you curious?"
"Curiosity is dangerous," he told her gravely. "Sure, I'm curious, but I'm a lot more interested in staying alive, which means not having any more information in my head than is absolutely necessary."
Hermione thought this over, suddenly aware of how much responsibility he'd placed on her shoulders. "And you trust me? To decide what you need to know?"
"Of course I do," he said, surprised. "If not you, then who?"
It seemed like such a significant thing to say. Draco watched her mull it over, the book open in his lap, forgotten, and Hermione was still thinking it through when they heard a scream echo down the stairs.
They leapt up from the couch — Draco ahead of her whilst she untangled her legs — and charged from the library.
"Ron?" Hermione called, her voice shrill and panicked. "Harry?"
They stumbled up two flights of stairs, footsteps thundering, until Draco suddenly halted halfway down the second-floor hallway. Hermione nearly crashed into his back.
"Really, Weasley?" Draco sneered. Hermione, who was in a defensive stance with her wand up, shifted to peer around Draco and spotted Ron, pale, staring at the wall. "A spider?" Draco raised his wand, cried, "Incendio!" and the fat insect dangling from the ceiling vanished in a burst of ash.
"You'd be the same way if you'd met Aragog," insisted Ron faintly.
"That was Hagrid's pet Acromantula," explained Hermione before Draco could say anything rude. Harry appeared, then, in the stairwell. "Hi, Harry. Don't worry — just a spider."
"Oh. Good."
"Pet Acromantula?" repeated Draco incredulously. "You're telling me he kept one on school grounds?!"
"Well, in the Forbidden Forest —"
"Is he insane? Imagine if a student had stumbled in there. They would have died. Acromantula venom is almost as powerful as Basilisk venom —"
"We know. Believe us, we know. But Hagird — wait." Hermione's heart accelerated and her eyes went to Harry, who seemed to be quaking with excitement. "Oh my God," she breathed. "How could I have never thought of it?"
And she turned and ran down the stairs.
The boys followed after her, their heavy footsteps thumping as they called after her.
"Hermione?"
"What are you doing!"
But she couldn't waste time explaining it to them, not if this might work. "Kreacher!"
Pop!
"Kreacher, could you please bring me all the potions and — and bottles of things? I think they're in my bag — "
Kreacher bowed and disapparated. Hermione ran through the house and felt that sinister something tugging her nearer. The door to the Horcrux Room opened with a foreboding creak; she didn't stop until she was standing before the weathered old table, where the locket lay innocuously on top.
"Hermione?" panted Ron. "What are we doing?"
Pop!
Kreacher appeared with an armful of vials and bottles. Hermione picked out the one she needed — small, with a viscous, silvery grey-green substance inside — and thanked him. He growled and disappeared.
She took a step toward the table, but stopped halfway, because the locket flinched.
"What the fuck," breathed Draco.
"It's never done that," said Harry eagerly. "Do it again."
Vial clutched in her right hand, Hermione took another half-step closer. The locket twitched. She did it again, and this time, a voice stopped her.
"Did you hear that?" she asked.
The three boys looked at each other dubiously. "Hear what?"
"N-nothing," she breathed, still approaching the locket, this time out of curiosity. The whispering voice was getting stronger. She wanted to hear more.
"Hello," it said.
"Hello," she greeted in return.
"Hermione?" She didn't know which one of them said it, but it didn't matter.
"I've been waiting for you…"
Hermione felt a thrill jolt her heart which throbbed eagerly as that feeling — the chilled, dreadful excitement — grew stronger. She was nearly at the table now, but her pace had slowed. One of the boys — Ron? — called out to her, but she couldn't even hear his voice.
"You know, don't you? You're clever… But it's not enough, is it? You know it never will be…"
Hermione faltered, her hip bumping the table as she stared down at the quivering locket.
The voice mutated, then, into something a little higher, a little more human. It sneered at her, over and over again, "Never be good enough… Never be wanted…"
"That's not true," she insisted weakly.
Not-quite-Draco didn't hear her, only laughed derisively. "Nothing you can do about it, darling… Never be good enough… Never be wanted…"
"Hermione? Hermione, what are you doing? Put the venom on it!"
Hermione's knees had gone weak; she felt like she might faint. Everything had gone so hazy, except for the voice, which was getting louder and stronger. She raised her right hand to uncork the vial and watched black smoke seep from between the locket's fastenings.
"Fuck — is it on fire?"
"No — it's magic smoke — I think — I think it's fighting back — "
"Merlin — Granger, come back — "
"No! You can't stop her — "
"It's going to hurt her, Potter!"
"It won't! It can't. Just — just let her keep going — "
Hermione's hands were numb; she couldn't quite get the cork out.
"They're going to see," said the Horcrux. "They're going to find out… everything… and then what will you be left with?"
The smoke began to take shape, billowing into human silhouettes. Hermione couldn't help but take a step back, then another. The shape laughed, that same sneering, disdainful sound that lashed at her as harshly as any physical strike. It would become Draco, she knew, and then they would all know — Harry, Ron, even Draco himself — how she felt, and they would never speak to her again. For what could be more embarrassing than a Mudblood falling for a pure-blood? They'd be disgusted with her. She was disgusted with herself.
She should drink the venom.
"That's right," agreed the voice eagerly. "Spare them the trouble… take it, drink it…" it coaxed. "After all, who would want to be around someone like you?"
Hermione's fingers twitched, curled around the vial of venom. "It's not true," she protested weakly.
"Hermione!" Harry sounded like he was shouting. "Whatever it's saying — whatever it's doing — just kill it!"
The laughter got louder, echoing through Hermione's head, as the smoke people began to take proper shape. She saw her hair, enormous and ugly, and Draco's long limbs.
She screamed, charged forwards, and upended the vial over the locket.
A horrible sound rent the air, like when the diadem had been destroyed but so much worse; this one was enraged. Hermione fell backwards and was clumsily caught by someone saying, "I've got you — I've got you!" reassuringly into her ear.
Everything went very dark, like all light had fled the room in the wake of whatever destruction was taking place. The screaming didn't stop. Hermione felt the force of it on her skin, winding her, and the distinct sensation of something slithering through her as it departed.
Somehow, the moment elapsed in less time than it took for her to catch her breath, and she was back at Grimmauld Place, in one of the shoddier parlours, weak daylight coming through the worn curtains. She was breathing heavily, like she'd been underwater too long, and she was sitting on the floor, leaning against someone's chest. Looking down, she saw Draco's arms wrapped around her middle.
"The Granger witch has done what Master Regulus could not," Kreacher breathed, awestruck.
From somewhere behind her, Harry cheered, "You did it, Hermione!"
"I did," Hermione breathed. Draco's arms tightened a fraction. "I really did it."
And then she burst into tears.
They descended on her at once, desperate to quell the sudden sobs she couldn't control. She felt hands on her — rubbing her back, pushing hair out of her face — as she cried, one of her hands fisting Draco's shirt. She couldn't hold it back, like the Horcrux had wrung every single emotion out of her at once. It all hurt so much, and yet the pride she felt was overwhelming.
"It's not true," she blubbered to herself. "It's not true…"
"Kreacher!" Harry called. "Put the kettle on. Let's get you a cup of tea, Hermione, and maybe — do we have any of those chocolate biscuits left?"
They helped her stand, and it was then that she saw it: the Horcrux, blistered and broken, and a handful of sizzling little holes surrounding it on the wooden table. The vial lay next to it, resealed, with only a little of the venom left inside. Had she done that?
A hand she recognised as Draco's came to her back, rubbing lightly and guiding her away. When she finally looked at his face, she saw the sort of fear she hadn't seen since he'd visited Voldemort.
"I'm alright," she insisted, despite the tears and snot dribbling down her face. She wiped her cheeks with her sleeve. "See? I'm alright now."
Kreacher popped into existence to personally inform Hermione that tea was ready, an unprecedented event which left them all momentarily speechless. Ron was levitating the locket ahead of them like a beacon as they walked through the house, parading its destruction for all to see. Harry was already brainstorming if they had enough venom for the next Horcrux, and where it might be.
Behind them all, Hermione walked with Draco. When he briefly squeezed her hand, she thought of the Horcrux and its threats.
It's not true.