Author's Note: There's a trigger warning associated with this chapter. See the end notes for details if you need them.
Hermione stepped into the shower, hoping the hot water would help calm her nerves. Everyone was on high alert. Even though they were prepared, and just about ready to leave, it was still unsettling knowing that the raid could be any time.
After chewing Hermione out, Tonks suggested she tell Draco to stand-by for information right before the raid, and Hermione did her best to make it sound like instructions before sex. She hoped he understood the double meaning because he didn't reply, didn't acknowledge receipt of the message, and refused to answer any of her pleas to talk.
Several times she held her Galleon in hand, tempted to tell Draco outright about the bombs. And then she'd change her mind. It was only the knowledge that she'd put everyone – including Draco – in even more danger than they were already that kept her from saying anything.
Feeling empty, she held her body as the water pounded down, and her lip trembled in worry. Covering her face with her hands, she began to cry. Hot, angry tears of frustration.
Hermione understood Tonks' rationale. For all the trio's work on the Horcruxes, killing Voldemort wouldn't be enough. They also needed to gut the support system of Death Eaters that ran the Ministry and other institutions from behind the scenes. She couldn't deny that blowing up the safe houses would strike a devastating blow to Voldemort's Army, a victory that the Order desperately needed. Although they stymied Voldemort's progress in controlling wizarding society, they hadn't been able to overthrow him. Up until now, the Order had been treading water, barely keeping above sea level.
The bomb strike could mark a significant turning point in their favor.
But Hermione was still furious. She had never felt so helpless, or regretted an idea so much in her life. She wiped her nose, smearing snot and tears in the water running down her face.
What if Draco didn't get her warning in time? What if he ignored it? What if he threw away the Galleon? All sorts of irrational thoughts ran through her head. He'd only have a few minutes. And then what? What could she do?
Maybe she could stay during the raid. With Harry's invisibility cloak, no one would see her. But how would Draco know where she was? How would she even know which safe house he was at? How would Hermione be able to identify him? When in their masks and robes, all Death Eaters looked more or less the same.
Fingers twitching nervously, she pulled the wet, matted hair from her face and tilted her head back into the water stream.
Tonks told her long ago that the spy/handler relationship wasn't an egalitarian one. But good relationships were.
Militaries weren't democracies. Without knowing why, soldiers did what they were told, trusting their commanders to make the right decisions for the whole, not the individual. But you couldn't hide critical information from someone you loved.
Hermione understood all this. And yet, knowing didn't help.
She wanted to strangle Tonks. And she was certain Draco felt similarly towards her. She betrayed him. Thinking back, there were a thousand ways she could have handled that conversation with him better. She wished he would have stayed so she could explain her moral dilemma, but what was left unsaid? She was sure he understood why she held back, but it didn't matter then, or now.
Her heart ached, and she wiped away more tears. Hermione was sure that telling him had been the right thing to do. He didn't deserve to be lied to. But the longer Draco's silence lasted, the more she second guessed herself. Would he really abandon them? Had she endangered the Order? She didn't think she had at the time, otherwise she never would have said anything at all. But after her conversation with Tonks, she wasn't sure.
What if she had left that conversation until the end of the war? Taking up his case up with Kingsley – when she may even have had something to compel him with?
Less dangerous for the Order, but it felt wrong.
Everything felt wrong.
Despite her marathon of Portkey repurposing, she felt like a failure.
The shame she felt after her conversation with Tonks hurt. It was a foreign feeling, hollowing out her body.
Sitting down on the shower floor, Hermione wrapped her arms around her legs as her cries turned into gut wrenching sobs. The helpless ache in her chest was amplified by how scared she was that Draco would get injured, or die.
Weeping with heaving shoulders, she watched the remainder of the soap suds spiral down the drain before exiting the shower.
Hermione wrapped herself in a towel and noticed the D.A. Galleon glowing.
He was contacting her!
She nearly rammed her knuckles into the sink in her haste to grab the coin, and flipped it over immediately.
Polyjuice. Get out now.
Hermione's stomach lurched violently. It was starting. But... Polyjuice? With growing horror, she realized that if the Death Eaters were using Polyjuice, they could walk in right through the front door.
She thumbed the Galleon in response. No time for sexual innuendo.
Safe houses rigged to blow. Stay outside.
Panicked, she glanced around the bathroom. She had Draco's Portkey; she could get out now. But she didn't know how long it would take for her Patronus to arrive from France to warn the others.
Too long.
Polyjuice.
The Order was fucked.
She made sure the bathroom door was locked and stepped back into the shower with her wand, Galleon and Portkey, closing the curtain around her to buy herself more time.
Quickly, she shot off two Patronuses to Harry, Neville, Penelope and the other safe house leaders warning that the raid was now, the Death Eaters were Polyjuiced, to trust no one and leave. She watched a series of her otters shimmer, circle around the bathroom and fly through the door. She signaled Draco again, hoping he could check the Galleon.
No reply. She didn't hear the Caterwauling Alarms either. Second by second ticked by in silence.
She signaled Neville again, and more to the other safe house leaders, then Lavender and Dean. She messaged Draco again. Soon after, shouts and the sounds of hexes firing punctuated the silence, and the Caterwauling Alarms finally started blaring.
The bathroom shook as a hex hit the floor from below, making her slip and fall over in the shower. She cried out as she banged her knee.
Sitting on the wet tiled floor, clutching her knee in pain, she signaled to the other safe house leaders again as shouts and rising pandemonium sounded from below. Not knowing which houses would be targeted, she sent more Patronuses to Tonks, Remus, Minerva. Heart thundering in her chest, she messaged Draco again. She sent more Patronuses to Mary, Cho and Terri. Then to the other safe house leaders, hoping against hope they had activated their alarms, she didn't know.
Hermione gripped her wand, hands trembling in terror; her Patronus was more of a desperate prayer than a charm at this point. Fear clawed at her chest. She hoped she had reached them in time, and couldn't think with all the noise around her. Panicked, she realized her Patronuses might be too slow to reach the other safe houses. She summoned her Galleon for communicating on raids and tapped her bare foot anxiously as she heard it slip under the door and around the shower curtain.
Her hands were shaking so badly she almost dropped it before messaging everyone.
She messaged Draco again. No reply.
Suddenly, the bathroom door blasted open with a bang and she jumped again, dropping her Portkey. The Patronus Charms must have given up her location. She pointed her wand towards the door and, cursing, bent to pick up her Portkey. She fumbled with the pouch one handed, trying to undo the drawstring while holding the towel around herself.
"Hermione! Why are you still here?"
Hermione's shoulders sagged in relief. It was Harry. She stood up and shoved the shower curtain aside to see his panicked form in the doorway. Heart beating rapidly, she stepped out from behind the shower curtain, holding her towel closed and clinging to the Portkey. Of course, the stupid sod would come get her instead of leaving by himself.
"Come on!" he yelled. "Summon your Portkey! We have to get out now!"
She looked up sharply at his fear-contorted face. Harry knew they had anti-Summoning charms on their Portkeys. Precisely so Death Eaters couldn't pick them up like Harry and Ron did during raids.
It was his fucking idea.
Cold terror gripped her spine as she realized it wasn't Harry standing two feet away from her.
She angled her wand at him from below so he wouldn't notice and shot a non-verbal Stunner.
The Polyjuiced Death Eater fell to the ground just as her wand flew out of her hand, caught by a sneering mirror image of herself.
"Mudblood," her doppelganger said with a disgusted curl of the lip.
Hermione shrieked for help and there was a flash of red light. She flung the Galleons and Portkey back into the shower before everything went black, hoping the Death Eater didn't notice.
~
Hermione woke to a pounding headache and blinked open her eyes. Wherever she was, it was dark and damp. The stones she lay on jutted into her back and legs, cold and uncomfortable. She only had her bathroom towel loosely covering her body. But it wasn't just the stones, the lack of clothing, or the air that chilled her. She had only experienced the frigid despair seeping into her bones at one other time in her life – when she and Harry faced Dementors in third year.
Was she in Azkaban?
Frantically, she pawed the wet stone floor though she knew her wand wouldn't be there.
"Hello?" she called out, in a raspy voice, wondering if she was the only one captured. She coughed. Her throat was dry.
The answering cackle echoing off the walls scared her more than any Dementor ever could.
Nononononono –
"I had to purify my wand of your filth."
It was dark in her cell, but she could make out the faint outline of Bellatrix's curly hair, illuminated by her wand as she entered. Hermione struggled to get up but Bellatrix waved her wand with a swish, spreading her limbs out from her body, pinned down with invisible restraints.
Hermione's eyes widened in horror as the older witch sauntered closer. She pulled on her arms but there was no slack. She tried to move her legs but to no avail and she heaved shallow pants of terror.
"The little Mudblood that knows far too much," Bellatrix crooned. "You didn't get to taste my knife last time." She pulled a long sharp blade out of her belt and licked the flat side, smiling down at Hermione. "There's no one to save you now," she taunted with a flash of her gleaming teeth.
Hermione struggled violently, trying to get up. "Please don't!"
Bellatrix knelt down over her, black eyes reflecting the poor light of her wand.
Oh god!
"Are you ready to tell me what you did with my sword?"
Hermione yanked with her arms, straining to get away, but only succeed in moving her torso a few inches. Bellatrix observed her ineffectual struggling with delight. She lowered the knife to Hermione's breast and she curled her toes and dug her fingers into her palm, trying to brace herself.
"No?" Bellatrix tsked. "More fun for me."
Hermione squeezed her eyes shut, but that did nothing to prevent the sting of the knife piercing her skin. She cried out in surprise from the sudden slice into her flesh, and then wrenched her jaw wide, screaming in earnest.
~
Hermione drifted in and out of consciousness, briefly thinking she heard someone enter her cell. She wasn't entirely sure what Bellatrix had done to her. All she knew was that now, she couldn't move, couldn't open her eyes, and could barely breathe. Her exposed muscle was burning, and the slices in her skin seared her nerves every time an air current passed over.
Draco had said before he felt like pieces of him were being taken away and replaced with something else.
She just had pieces taken away. Pieces laying on the ground next to her.
The person approached her and stopped. They couldn't do anything else to her, it had already been done. There was nothing left to take, there was nothing left to hurt, and she had peace from that knowledge.
"Mother of – NO!" was the strangled whisper of a male voice she didn't recognize.
What did he want? There was nothing here. There was nothing left of her. Her head was throbbing from Legilimency, and it dulled the physical pain in her body somewhat. So did the fact that she was near death. The pain would end eventually, she'd be dead. Her life was rapidly slipping away – but she hadn't told Harry that he was the last Horcrux.
The stranger knelt down next to her and pressed two fingers to her throat, and released a muffled sob of relief.
Maybe he'd figure it out. Harry was so much smarter than he gave himself credit for.
She should have told Harry.
The man cast a charm, and almost immediately the burning from her exposed flesh ceased. That was nice. She could go back to sleep now. And not wake up.
A vial was pressed to her lips, but she couldn't move her mouth. She didn't want to. She was done.
At least her parents were safe.
And she protected Draco, if he survived the raid. She should have told him sooner. About everything.
"You have to drink," whispered a shuddering voice.
She didn't have to do anything. Not anymore. She was dead, she did everything she could.
He tilted her head upward, and the Legilimency induced throbbing morphed into dizziness. She almost drifted off into blackness again but the bitter taste of Blood Replenishing Potion roused her.
"Stay with me," the unfamiliar voice rasped. "Please."
The warm liquid spilled out the side of her mouth.
"Hermione, drink. We have to leave. You won't make it if you don't drink."
Leave? She could leave? Someone had come for her. She was too tired to feel happy.
"Swallow. Swallow and you'll live. Please don't leave me."
She could live? She struggled to swallow and coughed, but some of the potion made its way down, and warmth diffused within, enabling her to drink more.
"Again," he commanded her.
There was a controlled urgency as he fed her the potion and within seconds, feeling returned to her body. But the dull pain she had experienced prior burst through her muscles and skin, wreaking havoc on her nerve endings.
The shriek on the tip of her tongue was silenced by his wand. Then he cast a quick charm which dulled the overwhelming pain.
"That's it, Hermione," he whispered, covering her naked body with a warm blanket. Despite the charm it scratched against her exposed flesh and she released another silent shriek. "Pain means you're alive. We're leaving now."
Gently, he lifted her into his arms, wrapping the blanket around her. She felt sharp, stabbing pains in her back and stomach when he moved her and she jerked, writhing in his hold.
"Shhhh," the man hushed her.
"Wha..." Her throat hurt from screaming and he couldn't hear her anyway.
"Don't try to talk," he whispered, holding her close. He must have seen her attempt to communicate. Hermione felt herself rising upwards as he stood.
Despite regaining her ability to feel more pain, relief washed over her. Hermione was being rescued, she could still live, and her rescuer made her feel safe. His hand dug into her back as he hoisted her up close to his chest, arms cradling her tight. She whimpered a moan after he hit something broken.
"Sorry," he murmured, sensing her pain.
The strange man's lips pressed briefly to her forehead. Harry? Ron? She was jostled slightly as he walked out of her cell and down a hallway. Even though he had silenced her, she did her best to keep quiet and bite back her cries of pain.
His boots clomped loudly; he wasn't even trying to be quiet. Was that on purpose? Or maybe her head hurt so much that any sound was jarring. He strode down the stone corridor and the rocking back and forth nearly lulled her to sleep when suddenly, the cold air dropped in temperature. He tightened his grip on her, curling her into his chest as a feeling of despair settled in.
It was a Dementor.
They wouldn't make it out, she'd die here. He'd die here. There was no point to any of this. She just wanted to go back to sleep. Death was easier.
Her rescuer's body tensed as the Dementor passed by. After a few moments, Hermione's despair gave way to nervous anxiety, and then dizzy exhaustion. Her mind started to drift away as the walking motion rocked her to sleep, despite how loud her rescuer was being.
Hermione felt his body flex nervously again as they heard another person walking down the corridor, rousing her.
"What are you doing, Travers?" the voice called out, clearly annoyed.
The voice of the man carrying her was a low growl, more confident than it had been in her cell. "Transfer to the cell with the other Mudbloods. Lestrange finished interrogating her."
"Why bother covering her up?" Came the suspicious reply.
"I don't want to see her bloody cunt. You do it if you're so hard up for filth."
Draco.
Tears of relief pricked her eyes.
He was alive, and he had come for her.
The other man grunted in answer. "Fuck off," he replied, his voice trailing down the hallway.
Draco's body relaxed and they continued on down the corridor. He turned and walked down another hallway, heavy boots stomping on the stones. It was almost as if he wanted to be caught. Hermione was scared, but started to drift off again. She couldn't stay awake.
Suddenly his thigh hit her back and her body jerked up and down as he ascended a staircase two at a time. Hermione screamed as something sharp moved inside her. He reached the top and waited, breathing heavily from the exertion of running up the stairs with her. His wand touched the top of her head and the cool feeling of a Disillusionment spell spread down and over her body.
"This is going to hurt," Draco whispered in Travers' voice.
Hermione squeezed her eyes in preparation and shrieked as he hoisted her over his shoulder, keeping one arm across her rear to lock her in place. His shoulder pressed into a torso injury and she cried out again. Hanging upside down made it even harder to breathe. She couldn't keep quiet in that position and started coughing. Draco felt her erratic movements and rubbed her lower back.
"Little bit more," he whispered. "You're going to make it."
"Travers, can you tell–" Draco jerked and turned them around to face another approaching Death Eater. She heard footsteps close in and then pause. "Is that a Disillus–"
"Avada Kedavra."
It wasn't a yell. Hermione always imagined that someone using the Killing Curse would be so filled with hate they'd scream the incantation. Like when Bellatrix killed Sirius in the Department of Mysteries.
Not in this case.
His voice was soft and cold, but full of hatred nonetheless. She was shocked Draco was using the Killing Curse now. There was a burst of power within his body, and his muscles contracted underneath her as magic surged through him.
She heard the man crumple to the ground. Draco was already fumbling with something in his robes, and pressed a cold object to her bare foot.
"Portus."
Hermione screamed as the tug on her belly button displaced them. They reappeared and she swayed, upside down. The blood rushed to her head and she felt dizzy, drifting off again. Her surroundings confused her. They were indoors, and a cacophony of voices echoed around her. If she wasn't completely delirious, she could have sworn she heard the incessant whooshing of the Floo network marked by the Hall of Arrivals at the Ministry.
Before she had a chance to wonder anymore, his long strides cut through the crowd and she cried out, jostled painfully back into consciousness by wizards and witches going about their daily routine.
She heard him call, "Leaky Cauldron," and they disappeared into the Floo. Before she had a chance to wonder what Draco was doing, the transition ripped something open in her leg and she jerked her body with a scream.
"Good afternoon, Travers," she heard Tom call out with a quiver in his voice.
Draco grunted in reply and was already out the door, entering Diagon Alley. He rounded a corner when they suddenly Disapparated. She cried out again as they reappeared. Her limbs were wet; now actively bleeding from wounds re-opening.
He lowered her from his shoulder and gently laid her down on something soft. It smelled like her bedroom.
"Finite Incantatum!"
Her voice came out as a strangled scream from her raw throat. Draco opened the blanket and released a choked cry when he saw her body in the light.
"Eh–" Hermione tried to speak, but coughed. Her throat was dry from dehydration and hurt from yelling.
Immediately, he Scourgified the dirt and dried blood from her body and she shrieked in between his desperate utterances of 'fuck' and 'sorry.' Soon after she felt soothing, warming sensations as he got to work healing what he was able and numbing what he could. He tenderly lifted her arms and legs, moved her head from side to side, searching for areas he could attend to, careful not to touch where her skin was removed. She winced as he touched something particularly painful.
Draco cursed again in Travers' voice.
Hermione heard him fumbling in his robes again and he gently cradled the back of her head, trying to angle her upwards slightly.
"Come on, Hermione. Once more."
He pulled her lip down with his thumb and Blood Replenishing Potion filled her mouth again. She swallowed the entire vial and he followed the potion with water, soothing her parched throat. But she drank too much and coughed, sputtering the liquid out.
"Dammit."
She recognized Draco's voice now. The Polyjuice must have worn off. He gently wiped her mouth and chin with his sleeve and got back to working on her lacerations and bruises. Feeling some strength return, she tried to open her eyes, and winced from the light. His face was blurry above her, but she could see how it was lined with barely suppressed panic.
"You came." Hermione would have sobbed if she could. Her throat hurt too much. Until the warning on the Galleon, she had felt abandoned by him. "Thought you–" she coughed and the jarring movement made her dizzy, "Thought you left me."
Draco stared down at her and swallowed, his voice thick with emotion. "I love you."
Furrowing his brows, he pressed his wand tip to her forehead Hermione whimpered in relief as a cut stitched itself together. She watched him work above her in silence, occasionally meeting his intense grey gaze; determined and desperate as he continued healing her.
"We already had an all-purpose Portkey to the Ministry. Those are rare and I have to destroy it now, but... my father might notice it's missing. I came as soon as I could swipe leftover Polyjuice from the raid," His voice was low, on the verge of cracking, and his eyes were bright with unshed tears. "Who do you need, Hermione? Who can get you to a Healer?"
Delicately, he turned her over on her side and pressed the tip of his wand to the small of her back.
"Harry," she mumbled as the soothing warmth of his muscle relaxant spell diffused throughout her body. "Lost my Galleon."
She watched his silvery fox leap from his wand and fly out the window. Gingerly, he brushed her hair off her face and leant down to place a chaste kiss on her forehead where he had just healed her. Draco extended the cup of water to her in question. She nodded and he helped her drink some more, wincing as she swallowed.
Gingerly, he wiped a few errant droplets from the side of her mouth with his thumb.
"Others?" she murmured.
"Yes," he said, scanning her body, gently running his fingers up and down, following with a wand, healing where he could.
"Have to get them," her words came out in a tired exhale.
He snapped his gaze back to hers. "We're lucky we escaped. I can't pull the same stunt again."
Before she had a chance to reply Harry's stag appeared and asked who Hermione Polyjuiced into in second year. Draco glanced down at her for the answer.
"Bulstrode's cat," her voice was scratchy and her throat still hurt. Despite the water and the Blood Replenishing Potion, she thought she might pass out again. Her vision was blurry, and she had trouble focusing.
He raised his eyebrows but said nothing. Draco spoke her answer into his wand and added a few expletives about wasting time and injuries needing to be treated before his Patronus left the room.
"Hold me," she whispered.
With extreme care, he lifted her and cradled her to his chest, and she closed her eyes again. Everything hurt, but she felt secure with him holding her and she breathed in his scent, familiar and masculine. Draco's body was warm, and she felt protected. Aside from that, if he was holding her, Harry wouldn't hex him.
Hermione missed him so much it hurt. And now he was here, but he couldn't stay.
"Mask," she whispered again. She didn't want to have to Obliviate Harry.
His arm moved to don his mask and cover his hair with his hood. She heard his wand hit the floor.
Smart. Harry would see Draco wasn't armed.
His voice rumbled in his chest against her ear. "Why were you taken? You knew we were coming before anyone else. You should have escaped."
"Warned everyone," she mumbled.
His mask pressed onto the top of her head and he sighed. "Of course you did."
"You used the Killing Curse," she whispered, and a tear ran down her cheek.
"That was my first time. It just happened." Draco's arms tightened around her, but he didn't say anything more.
That answer worried her more than if he would have admitted to doing it on purpose. He was giving in to spontaneous fits of hatred and darkness, without even having to try. Hermione thought back to the day Draco had demanded a pardon and she offered to have him Obliviated after the Unbreakable Vow. He had reacted so strongly, adamant that he didn't want his mind messed with, that he didn't want to lose himself.
Was he losing himself? They were so close to the end of the war. Tears of despair fell from her eyes.
"I'm so sorry," she whispered. Hoping he would forgive her for lying to him about the pardon. "I didn't want to lie to you." She felt herself drifting in and out of consciousness again.
"I know. It doesn't matter anymore," he cradled her close and sighed. "I just want this war to end. I want it all to stop."
Hermione had to help him. He didn't deserve any of this. She couldn't fail him, but she was so tired and her body was broken. A few more moments went by before two cracks of Apparition broke the silence. The sounds were distant, and she knew she was falling asleep. Draco's body tensed and he tightened his grip around her.
"My wand's on the floor."
"Who are you?" she heard Harry ask menacingly. "Holy–" she heard Harry gasp. "What the fuck did you do to her?"
"I got her out and I healed her," Draco sneered at him.
She sensed Harry approach them and Draco dug his fingers into her involuntarily.
"There's so much blood!"
"You can trust him." She heard Tonks speak. It had been smart of Harry to bring someone else, and fortunate that it was Tonks. She knew everything about Draco. But Tonks sounded different, her voice was raw and... weak? Hermione had never heard her sound weak before.
And distant. Far away.
She was so tired.
"Hand her over," Harry barked at him.
She was jostled lightly as Draco stood. "You're welcome," Draco drawled.
Harry's arms snaked under her body. There was a moment where Draco pulled her in closer, but then reluctantly let Harry lift her away. His arms felt like steel clamps around her.
"New Galleon?" Tonks asked. Fabric rustled as Draco reached out to take it.
"Who is he?" Harry asked Tonks.
"Quit wasting time. She needs a fucking Healer now, Potter," Draco spoke to him with such disdain, he sounded exactly like he had back in school.
"Thank–" Harry's voice was cut off by the sound of Draco Disapparating.
Next chapter: recovery, and more confessions
TW: Hermione gets tortured but it's a 'fade to black' scenario. There is a vague description of what was done to her in the aftermath.
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