Chapter 30: Draco
In Focus
"The fact was that where Will is concerned, she was developing a new kind of sense, as if he were simply more in focus than anyone she'd known before. Everything about him was clear and close and immediate." ― Philip Pullman, The Subtle Knife
Later that night—
Friday, July 27, 2007
St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries
Draco apparated into the main lobby of St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries with a sharp crack. He looked around and immediately was jostled by a wizard sprinting past him from the main entrance.
"Oi!" Draco cried, though no one heard him. The wizard was already gone.
The lobby was teeming with panicked witches and wizards, some of them shouting for loved ones, others clutching injuries that ranged from a bloody nose to a severed hand. The atmosphere was thrumming with fear and urgency.
Draco barely registered the familiar, sickly smell of antiseptic potions and the sharp tang of burnt spellwork as he pushed through the crowd. He ignored the glares and muttered curses directed at him, focusing only on his destination. The queue at the check-in desk was long, a line of anxious faces hoping for reassurance or information.
Draco didn't have time for niceties.
The young witch at the desk looked about to cry, her hands trembling as she answered questions and directed people to various departments. Draco stepped in front of an elderly wizard who had been explaining in great detail the nature of his ailment. The witch looked up at Draco, startled, and he saw the recognition flicker in her eyes.
"Excuse me, sir, you'll have to wait your turn—"
"I need to get to the Poisonings Department immediately," Draco interrupted, his tone brooking no argument.
"I'm sorry, but there's an emergency—"
Draco cursed and gave up on trying to reason with her. He shoved his way past the other visitors and headed straight for the lifts. The harried witch called after him, but the din of the lobby drowned out her voice. He could see a security guard nearby, attempting to calm a frantic witch asking for her son, and seized his chance.
Instead of waiting for the lift, Draco slipped through the door to the stairwell and began to climb, taking the steps two at a time.
The narrow stairwell echoed with his footfalls and the exertion and tension knotted in his chest. On the second floor, he passed a trainee healer, her face pale and eyes red-rimmed. She clutched a clipboard so tightly that her knuckles were white. She barely looked at him as he sped past, her thoughts likely consumed by whatever horrors she left behind upstairs.
When he reached the third floor and opened the door to the landing, Draco was greeted by a scene of utter chaos. The corridor was crammed with people, some in chairs, others on stretchers, all suffering—loudly. The smell of burnt hair, roasted flesh, and foul fumes filled the air, making breathing difficult. Draco paused, momentarily overwhelmed, unsure where to go or what to do.
He steeled himself and moved forward, weaving his way through the throng. Some rooms he passed had their doors flung open, and inside, he could see healers in lime-green robes frantically working on patients. One healer, a young wizard with sweat-soaked hair, rushed out of a room and nearly collided with Draco.
"Where's Healer Wells?" Draco demanded, but the healer didn't stop, too absorbed in his task to even acknowledge him. Draco followed the healer down the hall, his heart pounding louder with every step.
At the end of the corridor, Draco heard raised voices. As he rounded the corner, the sight before him made his blood run cold.
Harry Potter was there, in scorched and bloodied Auror's robes, looking more furious than Draco had ever seen him. His face was twisted in anger, more intense than when they'd fought on the Quidditch Pitch in fifth year, or during that fateful encounter in the bathroom sixth year.
Potter was shouting at a healer, a woman Draco recognized as one of the Patil twins—Padma, he realized after a moment, seeing her lime-green robes. She tried to keep her composure, but Harry's fury was palpable.
"You need to get in there and help her!" Harry shouted, his voice raw.
Padma's expression was strained. "We're doing everything we can, but yelling isn't helping!"
"She was at the center of the explosion!" Harry's voice cracked, the desperation evident.
Padma sighed heavily, her patience thinning. "Harry, you need to sit down. She's—we—you need to sit down."
Draco, suddenly feeling out of place, forced himself to speak up. "Patil—where is Healer Wells? I have neutralizer and antivenin."
Both Harry and Padma turned to stare at him, their argument forgotten. Draco noticed for the first time how terrible Potter looked—his face pale beneath the grime and soot, his eyes red and weary, his hands shaking slightly.
"Potter, you look awful," Draco said before he could stop himself.
Potter's anger seemed to drain away, leaving behind only exhaustion. He slumped against the wall, his shoulders sagging as if the weight of the world had finally caught up with him. "Hermione's hurt," he muttered, the words strained, as if saying them made them too real to bear.
Draco's stomach twisted in dread. Was Granger in one of those rooms, surrounded by frantic healers?
"Wells is down the hall, second door on the right," Padma said, her voice softer now as if the tension had also affected her.
Draco nodded and turned to go, not stopping for goodbyes as he rushed past them. Behind him, he heard Patil mutter his name in a questioning tone, but Draco didn't slow down to make out the words.
He reached Healer Wells's office, clearly marked in etched glass on the door, and knocked briefly before pushing the door open. The room was small, cramped with papers and potions ingredients, and dominated by a desk piled high with notes and vials. A short, stout woman with gray hair pulled into a severe bun looked up from where she was scribbling frantically on a piece of parchment. She handed it to a house elf at her side, who vanished with a crack.
"Healer Wells? I'm—" Draco began, but the woman cut him off.
"The Charitable Potions Trust," she said briskly. "Draco Malfoy. Thank you for coming."
Draco blinked, caught off guard by her familiarity. It seemed she had known who he was all these years despite his attempts to remain anonymous.
"Five bottles of Universal Neutralizer," Draco said, holding out the vials. One of the other people in the room, a wizard Draco didn't recognize, stepped forward, took them as Wells nodded, and then hurried out without a word.
"What else?" Wells asked, already moving on.
"I have a powerful antidote brewing at home and can get more neutralizer finished in an hour or two," Draco said. He hesitated before pulling out the small vial of Nagini's antivenin. "And I have this. It's an antivenin that could work against multiple snake venoms, including enchanted ones."
Wells took the vial and examined it closely. "What's in it?"
Draco listed off the ingredients, trying to keep his voice steady. He hadn't told anyone about this potion before—hadn't even considered using it until now.
"Anything potentially toxic?" Wells asked, her gaze sharp.
"Nothing except the venom I used as a base," Draco replied. "Some powdered moonstone could react badly to raw garlic."
She nodded, a decision made. "Normally, I wouldn't risk it, but we have a patient who was at the center of an explosion in an apothecary, hit with many poisons and venoms. We haven't encountered something this complicated in years."
"If you want it, use it," Draco said, the words sounding more confident than he felt.
"Thank you," Wells replied, already heading for the door. Draco and the remaining person in the room followed her out and down the hall. His stomach twisted into knots when he realized they were heading toward the same room where he'd seen Potter and Patil.
Potter stood from his slumped posture as they approached, but Wells's assistant blocked him from entering the room.
Was Granger in there?
Draco stopped next to Potter, who had slumped back against the wall and sunk to sit on the ground, looking more defeated than Draco had ever seen him. "Is Granger in there?" Draco asked, his voice barely above a whisper.
Harry nodded, not lifting his head. "Yes."
A moan of pain echoed inside the room, sending a cold shiver down Draco's spine.
His instinct was to barge in, to demand they do everything they could to save her. How could he feel that way about Granger? … But he knew it wasn't his place. He clenched his fists, forcing himself to stay where he was.
Harry let out a choked cry, burying his face in his hands. Draco had never seen Potter cry, and it unsettled him more than any of the injuries he spotted down the hall.
"What happened?" he asked.
"It's my fault. We let her go off mail duty … but Hermione shouldn't have been there." The wizard paused to take a deep breath, and Draco was relieved that thinking through the story allowed Potter to calm down. "The Westbrook Apothecary exploded. Hermione was helping get people out, but there was a second explosion while she was inside. She got the worst of it. Drenched in … everything. I couldn't recognize her." By the last word, Potter's voice had gotten hoarse and quiet, as if saying it louder would have made the facts more true.
"Fuck," Draco hissed quietly. He eyed Potter, who didn't notice anything around him anymore. He was gazing at Room Seven across from them blankly, hopelessly. It pissed Draco off.
"I gave them all my stock, Potter, and I'm brewing some more antidotes at home," Draco said. "She's not dead."
Hermione Granger could not be dead.
"She's my family," Potter said, and Draco was horrified to note that his voice was trembling.
Draco's throat tightened, and he found himself nodding, awkwardly patting Potter on the shoulder. "I have to go."
Draco hastened down the hall the way he had come, eager to get away from that room in which Granger had cried in pain, the room in which Granger was unrecognizable to even her best friend. Draco was already thinking ahead to streamline the production of more neutralizers and how to brew Severus's antidote at its most potent.
The thought of Granger laying in that room, injured and vulnerable, twisted his stomach in a way that felt all too familiar—like the fear he had felt for his mother during the war, the fear of losing something that mattered. The realization hit him like a gust of cold wind: he cared.
It confused him. It wasn't as though they had any relationship; they were barely even enemies anymore. He was nothing—no one—to her, and she was that way to him. … But whenever they found themselves close, it was hard for Draco to deny that he felt drawn to her as if when he spoke to her, the world beyond him became clearer.
And the thought of a world without Granger felt impossible.
Draco cared about Hermione Granger's survival. And with that care came the fear that she might be gone before he truly understood why he cared at all.
Up Next: Hermione's road to recovery.