XVI
—
"Hermione, dear! Tea is on!"
Hermione swallowed past the lump in her throat, trying to reassure herself that it was only temporary, that once the war was over, she could reverse the charm and everything would be alright. But she knew that there was a chance this would be the last time she would ever see her mother and father.
Stealing quietly down the stairs, she paused in the hall for a moment to study her parents. Her father sipped from a steaming mug as he read from a medical journal, posing something to his wife that she agreed with as she sat down across from him. They started discussing recent cases in their practice, both of them with a passionate light to their gaze. Hermione smiled through the tears that welled in her eyes.
Taking a deep breath, she pointed her wand at her mother and father, whispering the memory charm. She felt what almost seemed to be a hum in the air, and she looked around, watching as every trace of her was wiped from the house. She lost her breath as her face disappeared from family photos, the pictures that were solely her simply vanishing into thin air.
Giving her parents one final glance, Hermione clutched her beaded bag and slipped out the door, biting her lip as she felt the tears in her eyes begin to make their way down her cheeks.
Snape snarled as he pulled out of her mind.
"Forgive me Miss Granger, but that attempt was so pathetic I have a hard time believing you even tried," he said derisively. Hermione turned away from him, her hands curling into fists at her sides as she tried to breathe past the tightness in her throat. The Potions Master glared.
"You are wasting my time. If you would prefer to spend your night whimpering in the corner, I see no reason for my continued presence."
"You will mind your tongue," she bit out, fighting to keep her voice steady. But, he did have a point; she couldn't very well master Occlumency if she broke down with every image he pulled forward. She set her jaw and whirled back to him, her expression resolute.
Snape raised his wand, murmuring "Legilimens," and Hermione felt him begin to move through her thoughts, a memory moving involuntarily to the forefront of her consciousness.
She reclined against the multitude of pillows, her attention captured by one of the books she'd pulled from Draco's shelves. She had spent far more time than she cared to admit in the Descendant Manor's master suite, usually curling up on the window seat to read one of the old volumes the boy had collected. Tonight, however, she had simply sat down on the bed and not thought twice about it.
It had gotten late, but she took no notice, enraptured in the pages and the obscure arts they described. As the night continued to wear on, she fought to stay awake, but couldn't bring herself to put the book down.
Hermione frantically tried to shut him out of her mind, but she didn't get very far.
She hadn't even realized she'd fallen asleep until she was waking up to the grey morning light, having crawled under the blankets at some point. For a moment she just snuggled into the pillows, breathing in the forest-like scent and letting her consciousness wander. Then she recalled exactly where she was, and exactly whose bed she was sleeping in.
She swore as she fished her wand from under the covers, then clambered out of the expansive bed and called for Archie.
"Wash the sheets and remake the bed," she ordered as she put the book she'd been reading back into its place. Then she turned to him with a serious expression. "You are never to speak of this, under any circumstance, do you understand?"
The elf nodded and got to work collecting the sheets as she Apparated back into her own bedroom.
The Potions Master retreated from her consciousness, his countenance both confused and snide.
"How very interesting," he mocked, but the look Hermione gave him dissolved the insulting set to his features, her voice deathly calm as she spoke.
"If you speak of my memories to a single creature on this hellscape of an earth, I will personally ensure your life is as miserable as it can possibly be for the rest of your days."
The man scoffed. "As if I would squander even a second gossiping about your pathetic life."
The two stared each other down, then he was moving through her memories again, and this time the girl fought like hell to keep him out, utilizing a less common tactic.
Flashes of her fight with Ron popped up, but she instead turned her attention to feeling the ground beneath her feet, on hearing her own breathing. The more she concentrated, the less the images manifested, until they stopped altogether. She remained in such a state for a few more moments, then came out of her self-induced trance, her triumphant gaze meeting Snape's highly suspicious one.
"A most unconventional method," he droned. "Where did you learn this?"
Hermione raised an eyebrow. "Did you really ignore me so completely at Hogwarts? I didn't grant you nearly a week to prepare for these lessons out of the goodness of my heart, I did it so that I could research anything that mentioned Occlumency or Legilimency; The technique I used was detailed by Yelena Morozova in her autobiography."
The man attacked her thoughts again, more aggressively, and she struggled to focus.
She brushed her hands over the fabric of her dress, admiring the way the periwinkle tulle shimmered. Never had she felt so lovely in her life. Smiling at her reflection, she grabbed the little clutch off of her nightstand, then made her way through the castle towards the Great Hall.
The girl moved her consciousness downwards, imagining she was a tree with roots spreading deep into the earth. Once again, she slid into a trance-like state, coming out of it when Snape ceased his onslaught of her mind. When she came back to herself, she felt mentally exhausted, the sort of feeling she normally experienced after puzzling out a particularly difficult problem. But she was allowed no rest.
The Potions Master delved into her memories full-force, and trying to block him out felt like bracing against a flood.
She laughed as Harry attempted to dance with her, the results really quite pathetic. They were supposed to be practicing for the Yule Ball, but the poor boy was hopeless. She yelped as he stepped on her feet for what had to be the fifteenth time.
"Perhaps you ought to just stay off the dance floor, Harry," she quipped, and he chuckled, his emerald gaze meeting hers.
The scene abruptly changed.
"That's brilliant, Hermione! Really brilliant!" Harry chimed, watching her otter Patronus flick its tail and glide around the room. She grinned at him, and he grinned back, the smile crinkling his eyes as they were trained on her.
The scene changed again.
"He believed in you, Harry. He believed you could win this." She said, then glanced back at Ron. "And we'll be with you every step of the way."
The boy gave her a long, considering look, his forest-coloured stare transfixing her, then he put his other hand over hers and gave it a squeeze. "Thanks, Hermione."
Hermione gathered enough coherency to raise her wand and utter the Legilimency spell, her endeavour faring much better than her practices with Delilah over the past days, likely because Snape had already formed a bridge of sorts with their minds.
She didn't get to see much before he realized what she was doing, quickly throwing walls around his memories that she couldn't hope to break through. Nevertheless, she did manage to see a few things.
When the connection severed, Hermione felt as though her brain were suddenly speaking a different language. She panted slightly as she shut her eyes and tried to get her thoughts together.
Looking up at last, fear coiled around the girl's stomach, as the man's wand remained trained on her. His expression was something beyond anger.
"We. Are. Through," he seethed, but his voice wavered as if he was suppressing some other emotion. Still dazed, Hermione just nodded as he swept from the room. She sat down in one of the armchairs and called for an elf.
She couldn't recall exactly which of the creatures it was that came to assist her, but she supposed it didn't matter.
"I need you to fetch me…" She began, but try as she might, she couldn't recall the name that went with the face she was picturing. The girl made a frustrated noise, as the elf looked on in worry.
"Should Ditzy call for a healer?"
"No, no. My fiancé, I need… him."
The elf vanished, and a few minutes later her intended appeared, striding through the open doorway with a slightly alarmed look.
"Are you alright? Where's Snape?"
"I'm fine, I think. But my head is…" She tried to find the word, but all that came up was gibberish. It was like the harder she thought about something, the fuzzier it became. The boy narrowed his eyes.
"Do you remember my name?"
Sheepishly, the girl glanced up at him, then shook her head. Draco heaved an exasperated sigh.
"He pushed you too far. Bellatrix did the same when she was teaching me," he said, calling for a house elf to retrieve a medipotions kit. Hermione's forehead creased.
"I pushed back. Or at least, I think that's what I did."
The boy paused as he looked over the case of potions, his eyes flicking up to hers.
"What do you mean you 'pushed back?'"
"I don't know. Truthfully, I'm not even sure what I was doing in here."
Draco counted several drops of elixir into a small crystal glass, then handed it to her to drink. The Clarity Potion would help a little, but really, what she needed was sleep. He offered her his hand.
"I'll escort you to your room; after a full night's rest, you should remember everything fine."
After staring at him unsuredly for a moment, Hermione took his hand, rising to her feet.
She was silent as they made their way through the manor, her brows furrowed as her thoughts became slightly less muddled.
"So much pain," she muttered, trying to make sense of what she'd seen when she'd forced her way past the intrusion of her mind.
"What are you talking about?" The boy beside her asked as they halted outside her quarters, his voice bearing a hint of panic.
"When I was in his memories," Hermione breathed, her eyes unfocused. "There was reddish hair, and green eyes, and just… so much pain." Something else was prominent throughout the memory, too, she thought. She narrowed her eyes further. "A flower…"
His breathing hitched, and she looked up at him.
"You know what it is? What I glimpsed?"
Draco nodded once, his features pensive as he kissed her knuckles. "We can speak of it at breakfast, after you've had some rest and your mental acuity has returned."
She was about to argue, but when she found it difficult to grasp exactly why she was arguing, she let it drop. As if he'd seen her trail of logic, her intended smirked.
"Goodnight, Hermione," he said, as she scowled and shut the door perhaps a little more forcefully than necessary.
Hermione continued to try and puzzle out what she'd seen, the images dancing in her periphery, never quite clear enough for her to make out more than a vague sense of what they'd been.
She'd fallen asleep still contemplating the fragments of memory, and when she awakened the next morning, it was like seeing them all over again. This time, with her mind fully coherent and not exhausted from Occlumency, she knew exactly what she had seen. Hermione gasped.
—
Draco studied his fiancée as he stepped onto the marble tiles of the East Terrace. Her back was to him, but from the tense set of her shoulders and stiff posture, he could tell she had already figured out what it was she'd caught sight of in his godfather's memories the previous night.
He sat at what had become their breakfast table, waiting for her to join him but also taking a moment to admire her from his vantage. She'd chosen a black dress today, and one that was more impressively detailed. It was likely a deliberate decision; the parties involved in the gala planning would be arriving in a few hours for initial set up, and she would want to portray an image of control and power.
As he continued gazing on her, she took a deep breath.
"Snape was in love with Harry's mother," Hermione murmured, her tone thick with disbelief. She turned to her intended, who confirmed with a solemn nod. The girl scoffed as she took her seat opposite of him.
"It's so preposterous that I almost thought it couldn't be true. But his emotions were so… raw."
Draco nodded again. "They would be. From what I can tell, he still loves her, even though she's been gone for so many years."
She was quiet for a moment, examining him curiously. "How did you find out? Did he tell you?"
Giving an incredulous chuckle, he said, "Stars, no. It was one of my first conferences after being initiated, and Rookwood made a comment about how falling in love with a Muggle-Born was apparently not the worst thing you could do. I remember he gave Snape an odd look, then he was screaming and the Dark Lord was furious, and I had no idea what on earth was happening. My father filled me in later."
"So Rookwood knows as well?"
"Anyone who was part of his Inner Circle at the time does, but there's an unspoken rule that it isn't brought up. It's what cost the Dark Lord his corporeal form for a time; he doesn't like being reminded of that," he said with a distant look. She narrowed her eyes in confusion.
"How is that what caused him to lose his body?"
The boy took a sip of his tea and considered his words carefully.
"Snape had asked the Dark Lord to spare Lily, so he gave her a chance to back down. When she refused, he killed her, but since he'd given her the choice to live or to die for her son, her sacrifice enacted a powerful magic that protected her child. It was the reason the Killing Curse rebounded and hit the Dark Lord instead."
There was a silent moment as Hermione pieced things together in her mind, but one thing didn't make sense, though the thought of asking about it stole the air from her lungs. She gathered that bloody Gryffindor courage everyone went on about, even though she most certainly didn't have much left.
"But if… If Harry was protected by blood magic… How could he…"
She couldn't finish the question, tears springing to her eyes and her throat constricting painfully.
Draco knew what she'd meant to ask. He swallowed. He hadn't been present for it, thank every star, but he'd certainly been given the "joyous details," as his aunt had called them.
"There was no magic involved," he whispered, only just loud enough for her to hear. "The Dark Lord didn't let anyone even raise a wand to him. And he didn't waste time with taunts. The snatchers brought him in, the Dark Lord was called, and it was over."
She pushed away from the table and stood, her breath coming in shudders as she turned back to the garden. Draco stood as well.
"Let me help," he pleaded, trying to staunch the heartbreak he felt as he watched her bow her head and sob quietly. She didn't respond, but he slowly moved to stand before her.
As he'd done in the past, he took one of her hands and began tracing his sigils onto her skin. But after a moment, she grasped his fingers and pressed them to her sternum, just over her heart.
"Do them here," she commanded, her voice quiet and shaking, but clear. He shut his eyes in focus as he resumed drawing the invisible marks, and she gasped a little at how much more powerful they were when placed correctly. She recognized his symbol for peace, and the way it quieted her mind so that she was able to think more clearly. Instinctively, it seemed, she moved closer to him, her arms reaching around his neck as his free hand came to rest on her back.
It was some minutes later that he looked up at her, completing the sigil once more before gently brushing his knuckles over her tear-stained cheek. He held her gaze for a moment, then he took a chance and lightly pressed a kiss to her forehead.
Hermione breathed a soft sigh, then rested her head against him, listening to his steady, strong heartbeat. There was still an ache in her own chest, one that would never really leave, but as she stood in Draco's arms, she realized something.
He was a part of her now, and she no longer felt so alone.
—