Secrets and Masks

08. Missing In Action

23rd December

Hermione sat in her usual spot on the cushioned window ledge in her room, knees pulled to her chest and her arms wrapped around her calves; her very own perch in her birdcage.

A snowstorm had befallen the manor overnight. The once green grass and perfectly pruned rose bushes were transformed during the moonlight. The gardens were untouched, not a single footprint distorting the crisp white snow. If possible, it looked even more alluring now, almost enchanting.

Hermione had become quite fond of snow since the start of the war. She used to hate it. Thought the wretched stuff was nothing but an inconvenience that left everything around it cold and miserable.

She adored snow now, because it hid the evidence of the war. It covered the destroyed buildings and concealed the burnt meadows where battles had been fought. It covered the blood on the streets and made everything ... new again. Fresh.

Hermione could never be in a bad mood when there was snow outside, the children living in the Order's bases wouldn't allow it. The little ones turned positively feral with joy at the sight of the stuff. Their laughter and screams of delight as they piled on their waterproof coats and enchanted thermal scarves, all so they could venture outside to build snowmen, were infectious, always had been.

It was a wonderful thing to see the children of war actually being children for a change. It was just a small reprieve from the murders and bombings going on outside; awful things that their innocent minds were completely unaware of, but it was a reprieve nonetheless, and they deserved it more than anyone.

As Hermione looked out onto the grounds, she wondered if the children were already up and playing outside. She wondered if Harry and Ginny's children; Rose, Fred and Severus, had already dragged their parents outside by their sleeves and demanded that they make snow angels with them. Her thoughts took a dark turn when Harry's gleeful face flashed behind her eyes. Her thoughts - filled with children's laughter and crooked snowmen a moment ago - were suddenly bleeding back into the war. She couldn't help it. Her mind always did veer back in that direction quicker than the snow would melt.

She started to wonder if the others would still be searching for her, even after all these weeks? Were they searching for her right now? Were they trudging through the streets in the knee-high snow to find her, instead of spending time with their families? Their real families?

Probably not. Probably assumed that shed died on the field that day with Tonks. She would just be another name on the long, never-ending list of the dead now.

'Hermione Jean Granger,' Harry would say in her eulogy. 'Fallen soldier, missing in action. Presumed dead'.

She realised, with a stabbing pain in her chest, that's all she was now; a soldier.

She wasn't someone's lover. Wasn't even someone daughter anymore. She gave commands, formulated battle plans and rescued slaves from the Dark Lord's clutches, but she was just a soldier. A lethal assassin. A killer. A person who'd murdered hundreds more Death Eaters than anyone else in The Order.

Was she really any better than Malfoy?

"What makes Miss happy?" Romy asked when he appeared in her room that afternoon, setting down a silver tray at the foot of her bed, the same place the elves always left her meals.

Hermione tore her gaze away from the gardens to look at the elf. His eyes were burning questions, concern clear in the downturn of his tiny mouth. "I'm sorry. I don't know what you mean?"

"Well, Romy and Quinzel have noticed that Miss is very sad all the time. And Romy and Quinzel do not like sadness, it makes our hearts feel poorly."

Oh, what a sweet, sweet little thing. How could something so pure of heart and completely devoid of darkness serve a master as cruel as Malfoy? How had his malevolence and brutality not squished their bright little souls?