Disclaimer: All Characters and things associated with Harry Potter belong to J.K. Rowling and Warner Brothers. This writing is purely for entertainment only.
Summary: Harry died in the Forbidden Forest and Ron and Hermione must find a way to finish his mission in a world where Hermione and her blood status leaves them both in incredible danger.
Chapter 7
Hermione and Ron had not slept much the night before, nor had they spoken much. Both were too wrapped up in their own thoughts about what would happen next, now that they had decided to help right again and track down the snake. Although they didn't sleep or talk much, they did find comfort in each other's arms, Ron wrapping his arms tightly around Hermione and pulling her onto his chest for the evening.
This was how Hermione felt the most safe, with Ron surrounding her. She felt as though nothing could touch her as long as he was holding her.
As the morning sun crept through the window Hermione did stir from her position and glanced up at Ron.
"We need to get going soon," Hermione whispered although her voice sounded so loud against the silence of the room.
Ron nodded, his chin getting lost in her curls.
"We're going to be alright..." Hermione tried to assure him though her words came out more like a question.
"We will be together. That's all that matters," Ron told her, kissing her forehead softly.
Hermione nodded, knowing they had to get up but not wanting to. She knew once they stood, the small life they had created for themselves over the last few months would be over and she wasn't sure she was truly ready for it. Now that she would face death down again the memories of her life alone with Ron in the tent flooded back and she realized, even in all of the sadness and chaos there had been moments when she and Ron had truly been happy. She wondered if they ever would be again.
The noise of footsteps downstairs caused Ron to sigh. "Suppose we should get up."
Hermione nodded against his chest again and then reluctantly got out of the bed and Ron followed her.
The two got dressed and packed their belongings into Hermione's small bag in near silence, other than a few words to make sure they had everything they needed. When they were finally ready they made their way downstairs to find the other four waiting for them already.
"Weren't sure you were going to make it," Ginny's voice leaked with sarcasm.
"We're here," Ron responded.
Before Ginny could say anything else, Bill stepped toward.
"Everyone understands what they will be doing?" Bill asked
Everyone nodded.
"Shell Cottage will remain a safe house...if you are caught do not give this place away. We will try to meet back here next month. If you need to come back sooner do that but if you don't make it back within the month then we will continue to operate without you. Try your best to stay in touch with the radios." Bill said.
Again, everyone nodded.
"Alright then...best of luck to everyone," Bill said.
It was strange. Neither Bill, Fleur, Ginny, or George said goodbye to one another. It seemed as if it was an unspoken rule. Hermione wondered if they assumed if they didn't say it, then it would make it seem like they would all survive until they saw each other again. She found it oddly comforting if that was the case.
Bill and Fleur disapparated and George looked impatiently for Ginny to join him so they could do the same but instead she tossed herself at Ron, hugging her brother fiercely without another word.
Ron stood statuesque for a moment before wrapping his arms around Ginny. He could tell his sister was a broken shadow of herself but somewhere deep inside the Ginny who he knew and loved was in there. He could feel it in her embrace, almost a silent way of telling him she still loved him very much.
After a long moment, Ginny let go of Ron and moved toward Hermione, hesitating before hugging Hermione as well.
"Keep an eye on Ron, yeah?" Ginny whispered in Hermione's ear.
Hermione bit her lip but nodded in response, realizing what Ron had as well. The Ginny she had called her best friend was still there, just hardened by the loss of Harry.
Ginny let go of Hermione and then moved to take George's hand.
"See you two lovebirds in a month," George teased lovingly.
Before Ron could offer his brother a cheeky comment back, George and Ginny were gone and Ron and Hermione stood in the kitchen of Shell Cottage alone.
"Well...I guess that's it then," Ron broke the silence, staring at the place his siblings had just stood. He realized there was good chance he would never seem them again and yet he took comfort in the few days he had with them, even if they were stressful days. He had not really realized how much he had missed them until that moment.
"Ron, are you okay?" Hermione asked, able to read the sadness in his expression as he was lost in his own thoughts.
Ron laughed a bit to himself and shrugged. "Honestly, I don't know."
Hermione nodded, not sure what to say to comfort Ron. She merely reached out and took his hand, giving it a squeeze.
Ron looked down and smiled at their entwined fingers and then glanced back up at Hermione, his eyes intensely blue.
"We should probably go, right?" Ron asked.
Hermione nodded, knowing if they didn't leave now they may not ever. After a long moment, she took the lead, realizing Ron seemed paralyzed at the idea of leaving. Holding him tightly, they disapparated.
Hermione apparated them to a large field that had sat a few miles south of the Burrow. She and Ginny had hiked there a few times over the summers because a small stream led to a bridge that had been a wonderful spot for an afternoon swim in the summer heat. Hermione had always appreciated those trips because it was the one time she felt like she and Ginny could talk about girl things without the boys ease dropping.
Ron looked around at the field. He knew it well too, having spend time there as a child as well. Of course now the field did not look as loving. The sky was grey and the field was shriveled up. Even the creek didn't look as clean.
"Interesting spot," Ron said.
Hermione seemed disappointed. "I remember it being prettier."
"It used to be," Ron told her.
"I...I suppose I should have just brought us closer to Hogwarts," Hermione admitted. She has no idea why this was where she had chosen to take them. They were no where near Hogwarts.
"It's alright...gives us a chance to get a plan of some sort together. We can head out in the morning," Ron said and then moved to put the protective enchantments up.
Hermione did the same and moved to the south side of the field, where it was obvious the field was on a hill. Below the hill stood a large mansion that Hermione had truly never noticed before. She looked down and could see some young girls working in the garden, their clothes tattered and torn, their frames and skin hollow. She swore one was Katie Bell and suddenly she remembered what Bill had told her was Katie's fate.
"Ron...whose house is that?" Hermione pointed to the mansion.
Ron moved up toward Hermione, though he didn't need to see the estate to know who she was speaking of. "That's the Zabini Estate."
Hermione nodded, her eyes swelling with tears as she now knew it was Katie Bell working in the garden below. As she watched, a large man in a black jacket came out of the mansion and grabbed Katie by her hair, pulling her to her feet and ripping her shirt nearly off, causing Hermione to flinch and look away while Ron watched Katie get dragged back into the house by her hair.
"That's Katie, isn't it?" Ron asked.
Hermione nodded, her mind racing at what was happening to Katie behind the doors of that home.
Ron seemed to be doing the same and immediately shook his head. "Hermione...we can't do this. If you get caught...if that happened to you..."
Ron motioned to the mansion below and shook his head again. He didn't even want to contemplate what would become of Hermione if she was caught. He knew whatever was happening to Katie it would only be worse for Hermione. She was a muggle-born and she was well known as Harry's friend. Her fate could easily be worse than anyone else's.
"We can't think like that. We have to do this...otherwise there will just be more Katie's out there," Hermione reasoned back, though the sight of Katie was a bit of a reality check for Hermione. Hearing about her former classmates fate was one thing, but seeing it was another.
"Yeah but you won't be one of them," Ron retorted.
"I'll never let that happen to me...neither would you. I know that," Hermione said, taking his hand and giving it a small squeeze.
Ron just grunted in response and after a long moment the two went to work setting up the tent for the evening.
They didn't speak much as they got their things set up and it wasn't until Hermione was wrapping up a few pieces of bread they had saved from dinner when Ron finally spoke again.
"What do you think they are doing to Katie down there?" Ron asked. He had a feeling but he hoped he was wrong.
Hermione stopped wrapping the bread. As much as she did not want to admit it, once she had seen Katie earlier that was all that consumed her thoughts.
"I'd like to think they are just using her as a servant of sorts...like they do with the house elves..." Hermione said carefully.
"They have house elves for that," Ron threw the logic back in Hermione's face as he sat down on small cot they would share that evening.
Hermione took a deep breath and nodded, when she looked up at Ron there was a small tear in her eye. "I think we both know what they are doing to her down there, Ron."
Ron shook his head, thoughts of Blaise or any of his family touching Katie in ways she never asked. Suddenly those images in his head contorted to thoughts of Hermione being forced into unspeakable acts. He clenched his fist at the thought.
"I'd kill anyone who did that to you. If something like that happens...I'll kill them all," Ron was speaking the promise he was making out loud.
The words scared Hermione. She knew the war had changed them and she knew both she and Ron had done things they weren't proud of to survive but never had Ron been so clear in his intentions.
Hermione walked over and sat down next to Ron, taking his calloused hands in her own. "Don't say that...you're not that person."
Ron turned a sharp eye on her. "If it was you, Hermione...I would be. I don't regret saying that and I wouldn't regret doing it. If anything ever happens to you...well what's left for me? The only thing would be to make sure whoever took you paid for it...then it's over for me."
"Ron..." Hermione said softly, her eyes fixed on their intertwined hands for a long time.
"If it was reverse, Hermione...if something happened to me..." Ron prodded.
Hermione fiercely shook her head, as if to shake the thought with it. "I don't like to think about that, Ron..."
"But you have thought about it then. What would you do?" Ron asked.
Hermione swallowed hard. Of course she had thought about it that, especially after losing Harry. The only answer she had ever come up with was that she wouldn't care what happened to her then. If she lost Ron too there would be nothing left for her.
Hermione's silence seemed to answer Ron's question.
"See?" Ron smirked. "I'm yours just as much as you're mine."
Hermione looked up at Ron and could see the intensity in his eyes as well as the truth. She wasn't sure when it had happened but somewhere along the line she and Ron had become intrinsically connected and she knew, no matter what, that would never change now. He was right, she belonged to him in more ways than one. Whether it was physical, mental, or emotional, she was forever connected to him.
Hermione eventually nodded at Ron, her free hand tracing around the inside of his thigh as her eyes never left his, the same intensity now reflected from his blue eyes into her brown ones. "You're right..."
Ron felt his lips twitch into a small smirk as he felt Hermione's hand move further up his leg, indicating that she wanted him in the way they had spent nearly every night together the last few months. Her lips slowly moved to capture his with a precision she had perfected over time. If he sat and thought about it, the idea of Hermione Granger being a sexual creature, of coming onto him, seemed absurd, at least the Hermione he had known nearly his whole life. But the war seemed to change her, challenge her, and even break her a bit and this new version of Hermione seemed more then willing to feel a connection to him every night and it was the one thing he was truly grateful for despite of it all. At least he got Hermione.
The crackle of the radio woke Hermione and Ron up the next morning. Hermione buried her head into Ron's bear chest, her own naked body twisting closer to him under the simple sheet that lay on top of them. She did not want to leave his warm embrace or face the reality of whatever the radio had to say.
Ron also didn't want to get up as he felt Hermione stir on his chest his arms went to wrap around her even more, as if to confirm she was real.
The radio crackled louder.
"Should I just turn it off?" Ron asked, hoping Hermione would say yes and allow him to cut off communication with the outside world, even if it was just for one more day.
Hermione sighed, opening her eye and shifting her head so that her chin rested on Ron's chest and she could look directly at him.
"We can't stay here forever," Hermione reminded him that they had agreed to fight now. Their running and hiding days were behind them.
Ron sighed, knowing she was right. He reached over to turn the radio a bit louder and that was when they heard the message come through.
It was Bill's voice. Both Hermione and Ron easily recognized it.
And a warning for anyone with a tower on their property, cats have been finding nests of snakes. I repeat cats have been finding snakes high in the towers.
Ron shook his head, visibly confused. "Has Bill lost his bloody mind? What the hell is he even talking about?"
But Hermione, ever the clever witch, figured Bill's riddle out instantly.
"It's for us, Ron. It's about the snake..." Hermione sat up, not bothering to cover her breast as her mind was suddenly racing.
Ron didn't hate the view and couldn't help but stare at her small, yet supple breast. They were one of his favorite physical features that belonged to Hermione. He remembered in school, when some of the other boys his year had mentioned how small Hermione's breast were in comparison to her other classmates. At the time, Ron had been annoyed by the comment, but he had chalked it up to Hermione being his friend. Now he knew better; it was because he had always loved her breast.
"Ron? Are you even listening to me?" Hermione's voice filled his ears and snapped him from his thoughts. He realized he had not heard a word she had said.
Hermione looked down at her naked body and realized why Rob was preoccupied. She rolled her eyes and sat up next to him, pulling the sheet around her to block his view now. "Honestly, Ronald...focus!"
"Sorry, sorry! You're distracting..." He threw his hands out, motioning toward her.
"Ron...the message was for us from McGonagall. You-know-who must have the snake in the astronomy tower," Hermione explained.
Ron screwed his eyebrow up. "How do you figure that?"
"The cat? That's McGonagall...it has to be. The snake is well...the snake and the tower has to be the Astronomy Tower," Hermione concluded.
Ron blinked twice at Hermione, wondering how her brain always managed to work so quickly. It must have been overwhelming for her to always be so smart. He had to admit though, her deduction made sense.
"I mean...sure...yeah...that sounds right, I guess," Ron managed out.
"Well, it means we know he's at Hogwarts now," Hermione still didn't want to say Voldemort's name out loud, assuming it was still taboo.
Ron sighed, knowing that meant any hope of staying in the safety of the tent was now gone. They were really going to start this fight over again.
"Well, then I suppose we should pack up...back to Hogwarts it is," Ron finally said, though it was painfully obvious from the tone in his voice that was the last thing he actually wanted to do.
