Author's Note: A gentle reminder that depiction is not authorial endorsement. Third person limited point of view necessarily involves some distortions of vision and missed/misconstrued events.
Hermione remained seated on the exam table in a state of horror. The grating, scratching sound of Healer Stroud's quill in Hermione's file continued along with the endless, monotonous ticking of the clock.
Hermione's mouth felt parched and she struggled to swallow; there was a sour taste in her mouth. She tried to breathe evenly but found that her throat had closed, and she could do nothing but sit rigidly and try not to pass out at the thought of getting handed over to Lucius Malfoy.
Lucius Malfoy who was insane; far more insane than Bellatrix Lestrange had been. Who always broke the rules and crossed lines and somehow managed to use his silver tongue to save his skin. Who could have killed Arthur Weasley, but instead chose to curse him in such a way as to steal the Weasley patriarch's mind and leave his body intact for his family to care and mourn over; a helpless, childish shadow of a wonderful, generous father. Who cursed George with a horrific variation of the necrosis curse that it had forced Hermione to cut off his leg at the hip while he was still conscious in order to save him. Who killed Ron before Hermione's eyes, laughing the entire time.
Hermione thought she might faint or just snap and start screaming. Her head was pounding and the room was swimming slightly.
She started shaking.
"What's wrong?" Healer Stroud asked.
Hermione flinched.
"You—just threatened to hand me over to Lucius Malfoy."
"I'm hopeful it won't come to that," Healer Stroud said in a bland voice.
"And if it does?"
"Well, we can have it supervised, if there is too much concern that Lucius will overstep himself. It's unfortunate I can't redose you with the fertility potion this month. I'll have some potions sent that should at least ease things and possibly improve your odds of success."
Hermione fell silent and didn't speak again. She felt so ill with stress she wondered if she might be poisoning herself.
Malfoy arrived late in the evening and she stared at him listlessly. His expression was hard; set jaw and cold, flinty eyes, but also tired. He was probably back to hunting down the last member of the Order. Or perhaps he was worried that his father was going to kill her prematurely.
She studied him, trying to divine from his expression why on earth he would have done anything to intentionally not get her pregnant. Hermione couldn't think of an explanation for it. She kept turning it over in her mind but couldn't come up with anything that seemed plausible.
She reviewed the possibilities.
It could be because he found the idea of her being the biological mother of his heir so objectionable, but Hermione doubted that was the issue. For one thing, aside from using Mudblood as though it were her given name, he didn't seem to care much about blood purity. He didn't treat Voldemort's victory like it was a testament to pureblood superiority nor did he treat Hermione's imprisonment as being due to her dirty blood. Whenever he spoke of the war, he referred to the sides as being set apart primarily by idealism vs realism.
In Hermione's experience, bigots were obsessive with their bigotry. Draco Malfoy at Hogwarts had been a little parrot of his father's bigotry. The Draco Malfoy of the present—Hermione wasn't sure what he was obsessed with.
Hermione, if Astoria were to be believed.
Hermione didn't know what to believe.
He always had such a smooth answer and a compelling excuse for all his behaviour.
Why wouldn't he want her pregnant? She couldn't imagine where that fit strategically.
She hadn't wanted to be pregnant, but now knowing what lengths Healer Stroud and Voldemort might go to in order to ensure it...
She still felt utterly nauseated at the thought of having Malfoy 'take' her on a bed 'with less detachment;' of getting pregnant; of not getting pregnant and then getting handed over to Lucius...
No good options; just worse and worse until she thought she was going to finally just have a mental breakdown.
She couldn't stop thinking about it, and every time she reviewed the options again she felt as though she were going to be violently ill.
Malfoy cast a diagnostic charm on her eyes and studied it.
"How much can you see now?" he asked.
Hermione laughed abruptly.
She had no idea when she'd last laughed. Years before, most likely. But the question was funny. Hilarious even.
Everything in her life was a complete and utter horror, and somehow Malfoy's first concern was her eyesight. He kept her prisoner in his house, raped her on command, and he was concerned about her vision.
She couldn't stop laughing. It kept going on and on and growing increasingly hysterical sounding and then she wasn't laughing she was actually crying. She was crying and crying and crying, while she rocked on the edge of her bed, and Malfoy just stood there the whole time; staring at her, expressionless.
It took her twenty minutes before she finally stopped sobbing. Then she just sat there, hiccoughing and holding her hands over her eyes as she tried breathe. She felt as though she were hollow inside; as though she had sobbed out everything inside of her and all that was left was a shell.
Finally she was quiet but for an occasional hitching of her breath as she stared at the floor and wished she'd just die.
"Feel better?"
The corner of her mouth twitched and she shrugged tiredly.
"As close to better as I ever will," she said. She stared at his hands and noticed his fingers twitch subtly. She glanced up at him.
"What were you tortured for this time?" she asked.
He smirked as he slid his wand up into his right sleeve. "Clearly you haven't been following the news lately. The public, through their vast collective intelligence, has somehow concluded that I am the High Reeve, even without the confirmation of the Daily Prophet."
The news piqued her curiosity. "Because of Montague?"
He shrugged. "It may have been related, but I suspect it had more to do with my appearance in Romania coinciding with the High Reeve's visit. The press in some of the other European countries is considerably less controlled than Britain's. Once one paper starts saying it, it doesn't take long to spread. I am now publicly acknowledged as the Dark Lord's protege. The previous anonymity was for my protection, of course."
"Of course," Hermione said. "But you were punished for it."
"Other people are dead," he said, eyes cold, "I was merely chastised."
"So just two minutes of the cruciatus then?" Hermione said in a biting tone.
"Five."
Hermione felt herself pale with horror as she stared up at him. He gave a thin smile.
"Don't worry yourself on my account, my conscientious little healer. It was days ago. I live on."
There was a pause.
"Why did you kill Montague?" she asked. She had been lying in bed for days, and wondering about it. If he was going to kill Montague, why not have done it immediately? Why publicly?
Malfoy smirked. "I was wondering when you'd finally ask that question. I would have thought it was obvious. He blatantly and intentionally interfered and endangered my assignment, despite being repeatedly warned that you were not to be tampered with in any way. I would have done it more formally, but with my trip I was unfortunately short on time."
"So you killed him in the middle of St Mungos?" she said, eying him doubtfully.
"Well, I was going to kill him in his hospital room, but he tried to run. I improvised." Malfoy's expression was indifferent. "Now, if you're quite done barraging me with questions I believe we have a legilimency session scheduled."
He didn't go through her eyes. Hermione wasn't sure if there was any healing literature about using legilimency following an eye injury, but Malfoy apparently had decided not to risk it and just drove through her skull.
It hurt a bit more than it usually did, but once he had forced his way through, the pain eased somewhat. Hermione wished there were some way of dissociating while he sifted through her mind, but legilimency dragged the victim through the mind alongside the legilimens. Wherever Malfoy went inside her mind, so did Hermione.
She had no newly unlocked memories, only fresher repetitions of the old ones; especially Ginny crying. It felt like she dreamt of it every night. Always the same memory. It always stopped at the same point.
He seemed to almost hesitate before delving with her recent memories. Of Montague. Of Astoria. Of Stroud's questions before and after his arrival.
By the time he jerked his consciousness out of Hermione's mind, she felt as though she had collapsed inward upon herself. Reliving it all was traumatic enough to make her jaw clench until she felt as though her teeth might crack with trying to keep from shattering internally.
She rolled over onto her side and curled into a tight ball.
Malfoy sighed, the sound barely audible, but didn't say a word. He lingered for a few moments longer before she heard him leave.
She lay in bed trying not to think; wishing she could just turn her mind off.
Dread swallowed her like a shroud; like the chill of a ghost, it hung inescapably around her.
She couldn't shake it. She barely bothered to try.
The day after Stroud's visit she left her room for the first time since the equinox. She kept to the North Wing, wandering aimlessly. Silent. Drifting from room to room. Window to window.
As her eye continued to recover, she could see clearly enough to discover that spring had finally begun to creep over the estate. The cold, grey English countryside was beginning to show the faintest glimmers of fresh green, peeking from the tips of tree branches and sliding cautiously out from the dark soil.
Watching spring unfold itself slowly almost felt like hope.
Except—the place inside Hermione where hope had once lived now felt like a hole. As though someone had reached in and cut away something from the core of her being. Where hope had once bloomed there was now nothing but something painful and rotting.
But still—spring was beautiful to see.
It felt surprising to find that there were still beautiful, untainted things in the world. Contrary.
Not rationally. Rationally, Hermione knew that Voldemort's rule didn't blot out the stars in the night sky, nor destroy the Fibonacci sequence, nor defile the first crocuses of spring. But somehow, it surprised her that she could still see that beauty.
Somehow she had thought that the ugly coldness of her life indicated that ugly coldness and cruel beauty were the only things left within her reach or sight.
As she looked outside at the estate as it began to adorn itself with new life, it made something inside Hermione shrivel.
If she had a child.... it would be beautiful. Untainted. Pale, and smooth, and pink. With trusting eyes that would only know to expect goodness. With hands that would reach for anyone who reached out toward it. A baby would be beautiful. Pure as spring. Sweet as summer.
And then it would be taken away. Hermione would die, and her baby would be left behind; trained and hurt and twisted up inside until it was a cold, cruel, monster like Malfoy, and Astoria, and all the Death Eaters.
Hermione tore herself from the window she was standing in front of, and hurried toward the inner rooms of the North Wing. Rooms without windows. She didn't want to think about spring, or life, or children, or beauty, or goodness.
She didn't want to think about beautiful things that had been, but were now destroyed. Or the beauty that still remained. It cast the horror into harsher relief until it made it physically painful to think—to breathe—to live.
If only a person could die just by wishing it fervently enough.
She couldn't eat. She could barely choke any water down. When a set of five potions arrived with a note from Healer Stroud she shoved them into a cabinet in the bathroom.
The dread twisted itself tighter around her heart, day after day; knowing her next fertile period was drawing closer and closer.
Malfoy walked unexpectedly into her room, and she nearly burst into tears.
He looked tense enough to shatter as he stared at her.
She shot to her feet as though electrocuted and then froze.
There was a pause, and Malfoy looked more uncomfortable than she had ever seen him.
"I thought sending word ahead of time might just make it worse," Malfoy said, watching her carefully.
"I—haven't prepared," she muttered, looking away from him.
"You shower every morning. I don't require you to be excessively washed." His voice was as sharp as the edge of a knife.
The portrait apparently still kept him appraised of everything she did.
Hermione kept standing and staring at him. It felt like the first night when she'd been in his room; trying not to tremble, wondering if she was supposed to just go over and lie down on her bed.
Would he want her near the foot or in the centre of it?
"Take this," he said, pulling a vial of something from his robes and holding it towards her.
She accepted it, and looked at the consistency and colour before removing the cork. A calming draught.
He watched her swallow it.
She felt the potion take effect as her jaw and shoulders loosened, and the twisting tension at the base of her skull relaxed somewhat. The knot in her stomach that had twisted itself tighter and tighter for the last twelve days finally eased slightly.
While Hermione was taking the Calming Draught, Malfoy reached into his robe again and pulled out a second potion. She was surprised to see him take it himself.
It did not appear to be a second vial of Draught of Peace. If anything Malfoy seemed more tense and angry after taking it.
A libido potion? It hadn't even occurred to Hermione that he was taking anything. Had he always been? Aside from the very first night, she never looked at him on those nights. Even then, he could have taken something when her back was to him.
Why would he need one? Stroud had described him as perfectly virile. Exceptional.
Rape really wasn't his thing.
"Do—? Do I—? Should I be in the centre or on the edge of the bed?" Hermione forced herself to ask.
He stared at her.
"Centre," he finally said in a clipped voice. "Given that I'm ordered to be less detached."
Hermione turned toward her bed.
Her bed.
Where she slept every night.
The only place with any sense of solace or safety that she had left.
Her bed.
Where she was about to—to be? Was it rape if she'd rather it be him than his father?
She bit her lip and swallowed hard as she walked over to it and tried not to start crying.
She sat on the edge and then slid herself toward the approximate centre of it before forcing herself to lay back. Malfoy approached a moment later.
He'd removed the outer parts of his robes, just wearing a shirt and trousers.
She tensed as soon as he got close, trying not to grind her teeth as she felt her jaw lock. She fought not to hyperventilate as he got close to her, and she watched him with widening, terrified eyes.
Her appearance seemed to set him off.
"Just shut your eyes," he hissed. "I'm not going to hurt you."
She forced herself to close her eyes, and tried to focus on regulating her breathing as she felt the bed shift. She could smell him; the biting scent of the forest floor suddenly struck her as she tried not to hyperventilate.
There was a pause, and then she felt him slide her robes aside and move in between her legs.
Between her legs. Like Montague.
The sharp, cold little rocks.
She sobbed through her teeth and flinched. Her body was so tense she was shaking. She could feel her nails steadily cutting into the flesh of her palms as she fisted them tighter and tighter.
"I'm not going to hurt you." Malfoy breathed the words near her left ear.
She gave a tiny nod of acknowledgment. Better than Lucius. God—she couldn't even think about it. She jerked and fought back another sob. Trying to relax marginally.
"Just—breathe," he said.
She heard him mutter a lubrication charm the moment before he slid into her.
She tried to focus on breathing. To force herself to dwell on the feeling of her rib cage expanding and contracting. Or her nails in her palms.
She could feel Malfoy's breath on her face. She smelled cedarwood oil in his clothing. The weight of his body pressed down against her. The length of him inside her.
She didn't want to feel any of it. She couldn't not feel it. He was everywhere. Surrounding her. The sensation of him in her and his weight on her was inescapably real. She couldn't detach the way she'd learned to do on the table.
She wanted to beg him to stop.
Better than Lucius. Better than Lucius.
She just wanted it to stop.
She didn't mean to, but she became aware that there were tears sliding down from the corners of her eyes as she struggled not to sob under him.
Finally he seized and came with a hiss.
The instant he did he ripped himself away from her and the bed.
Hermione opened her eyes and tried to steady her breathing. As she lay on the bed, she became aware of the sound of retching emerging from the bathroom.
As she laid there, she heard the toilet flush, and then the sound of water running from the faucet for several minutes.
She tried to compose herself, and not think about the fact she couldn't move. Not think about the physical experience of what had just happened.
He had been as considerate as he possibly could have been.
It was bizarre. He was a cold, indifferent, murderous person who could casually disembowel people, but rape crossed a line.
Did he always throw up afterward? Or was having to look at her making it worse?
Maybe something had happened to someone he knew. Someone he had cared about. Maybe it was related to his abilities with the killing curse.
He re-emerged from the bathroom. His tense expression seemed faded as though he couldn't quite maintain it. He was pale and exhausted, and more traumatised looking than she had ever seen him.
He'd never stayed after the fact before. He always left before she even saw him. Maybe he always looked that way afterwards.
He seemed—concerned about her. Not that he actually asked, but he was studying her carefully from across the room.
"I'm sorry," she found herself saying. She blinked.
Why was she apologising to Malfoy? It was as if the words had slipped out of their own volition. He stared at her with surprise. She tried to clarify.
"For crying. You were—" She had no idea how to describe him. Not the worst rapist?
"It all—just—It reminded me of Montague," she finally said, glancing away.
"Hopefully it will be easier tomorrow," he said in a hard voice. Then he summoned his robes, and stalked from the room without another word.
Hermione lay there, watching the hands on the clock slowly journey across its face. When ten minutes had elapsed she still didn't move. Maybe if she waited longer a pregnancy would take, and then she wouldn't have to lie there and endure being—
She wasn't sure what the proper term was for what Malfoy did to her.
While the general concept and situation was categorised as rape, she didn't feel like the term fully captured what had occurred. It wasn't sex, or shagging, or fucking, or screwing, or even "taking." Copulating, was possibly the proper term for before, on the table. But now—it felt too real and connected and miserable for them both to use such a clinical term.
There was no word for it.
She would gladly go without being touched by a man for as long as she lived. She didn't want to think about Malfoy arriving to repeat it all again tomorrow.
The thought of life quickening within her made her sick with horror. The thought of it not—
She could endure Malfoy. She didn't think she could endure Lucius.
She rolled onto her side and fell asleep on top of the covers.