7 First Kisses - Chapter 2 (Draco/Hermione - Harry Potter)
Title: 7 First Kisses
Author: leopion
Character(s): Draco Malfoy/Hermione Granger
Genres: Adventure, Alternate Universe, Angst, Time Travel
Timeline: Canon compliant until the final battle in DH
Rating: MT
Warnings: Secondary Character Death, Strong Profanity
Disclaimer: I do not own nor claim the Harry Potter series, which belongs to J. K. Rowling.
Summary: People say that the first kiss is a once-in-a-lifetime experience, but perhaps it’s not always true. An alternate ending to DH. Dramione Couple Remix Round 1 - Henry/Lucy (50 First Dates)
Also archived on: Hawthorn & Vine, Granger Enchanted, The Manor, AO3, and fanfiction.net
AN: Originally written for Round 1 of dramione_remix. Revised for archiving.
My deepest gratitude to dormiensa , elizpeace and mccargi, callarose as well as the mods and my readers at dramione_remix. Full acknowledgement (plus table of contents) can be found here
7 First Kisses
by Leopion
The Second
Hermione woke up with a start. The taste of hot tears-whether hers or Malfoy’s-still lingered on her tongue, but the aching and throbbing in her body had completely vanished. The smell of freshly-cleaned linen surrounded her, and whatever was underneath her felt incredibly warm, soft, and comforting. Maybe she had fainted after the ... incident. Blood rushed to Hermione’s cheeks at the memory. Better not dwell on it. She tried to figure out where she was instead. She could hear the even breathing of someone else nearby. Friend or foe, she didn’t know. Even if she’d fainted, this seemed too good to be true. She should have been waking up on the cold stone floor of a dungeon’s cell somewhere.
Hermione peeled her eyes open. Before she could register the pattern on the ceiling, there was a soft knock on the door. She closed her eyes again, feigning sleep.
‘Hermione!’
Her heart seized. Could it be? Was she dreaming?
‘Hermione!’ another familiar voice called, and once again Hermione felt as though her heart was going to burst out of her chest. ‘We have to go now!’
‘Shhh, Ron! You may wake Luna.’
That seemed to be the last encouragement Hermione needed to open her eyes once again and turn her head to fully inspect her surroundings. On the small bed on the other side of the room, a girl was sleeping with her back to Hermione, but she knew that those blonde tresses could only belong to Luna Lovegood.
Clearly, Hermione was in her bed at Shell Cottage.
Harry and Ron continued to knock. Hermione shot up from the bed and raced to the door. Whatever reality this was, it would not do to wake Luna. Once she’d finally opened the door, Hermione had to rub her eyes before believing what she saw. Her senses seemed to be playing a lot of tricks on her in the last couple of minutes. Right in front of her was Harry Potter, very much alive and healthy. Unable to resist the urge, she jumped up and hugged him.
‘Hermione, what are you doing? What’s wrong?’
‘I don’t know.’ She sobbed into Harry’s chest. How could she tell him that he was supposed to be dead? That they were supposed to have fallen?
There was a sound of someone clearing his throat. Hermione realised that Ron was watching Harry and her from his spot next to the doorframe. He looked quite uncomfortable. She quickly released Harry.
‘I know pretending to be Bellatrix is quite a dreadful task,’ said Ron, ‘but we have-’
‘Wait!’ blurted Hermione. ‘What’s the date?’
Both Harry and Ron shot her a quizzical look. ‘The first of May, of course.’
Hermione froze, her heart doing a little dance in her chest.
‘Honestly, Hermione, are you all right?’ said Ron, walking closer and putting his hand on her forehead.
Awaking from the reverie, she nodded hesitantly.
‘I think it was just because of the nightmare I had last night,’ she added quickly. But was it just that, a nightmare? Was she confusing dreams with reality? Probably. But then, what if this was just a dream and the other was reality? The knot in her chest tightened, and another sob threatened to escape, but Hermione fought it down. Either way, at least in this time and place, her friends were alive, and she still had a chance to set things right. It was then that Hermione decided not to tell Harry and Ron anything just yet. She had to figure out what this all meant first. If their doom really was a dream, she didn’t want to dishearten her friends. Besides, things had been playing out differently since the minute she hadn’t turned up to meet them on time. The only thing Hermione could do was to try and stick to the old plan as much as possible. Otherwise, who knew what disaster the laws of causality would lead her towards? Then again, if they postponed their trip and stayed at Shell Cottage for one more day, nothing could possibly go wrong, could it? Hermione shook her head to clear her treacherous thoughts. She could feel Harry giving her shoulder a slight squeeze.
‘Can you two go outside and wait for me?’ she asked, looking up at Harry and Ron with a faint smile. ‘I’ll be there in just a minute.’
Hermione closed the door behind her two best friends and let out a small sigh. She quickly grabbed the beaded bag under her pillow and fished out the set of old robes she’d brought from Grimmauld Place. Having changed into the oversized outfit, she took out the phial of Polyjuice and dropped Bellatrix’s hair into it. The potion swiftly turned into that exact shade of black she’d once seen. Remembering its foul taste, Hermione braced herself before downing the concoction in one gulp. She almost retched as the very same pus-like liquid assaulted her taste buds. If what she recalled was just a nightmare, then how could it be so accurate? Was this merely a way to make her re-live this Hell?
The questions played in her head over and over again as Hermione walked from her room to the front door. Her hand stopped momentarily on the doorknob, but then she took a deep breath and turned it. Ron, Harry, and even Griphook-the usual grim expression on his face-were waiting for her on the lawn.
Although the look Harry gave her as she strode towards them was nearly a precise duplication of his reaction yester-in the dream, Hermione still felt a twinge in her chest, perhaps slightly more intense than before. The nasty taste of the Polyjuice potion was still clinging to her tongue like a leech, but she set about altering Ron’s appearance without complaints. She didn’t even have the heart to argue with Ron over his fastidious instructions about his desired disguise. All she could focus on was preventing herself from staring at his features, tracing her fingers along the line of his face, remembering him before it was too late.
She finished the task with as business-like a manner as she could muster. As the group made their way to the Apparition point, Harry and Ron still occasionally shared that worried look in her wake, but she decidedly ignored it. Hermione figured that her denial or explanation now would only double their concerns.
With a final glance back at Shell Cottage, Hermione stepped past the boundary wall, following her friends’ lead. Tightening her grip on the walnut wand, she turned on the spot, plunging into the constricting darkness. At that moment, Hermione knew something was meant to change, whether for better or for worse.
Their trip to Gringotts went without too much trouble. There were occasions when Hermione accidentally blurted something she shouldn’t have known, but thankfully her slips of the tongue didn’t substantially affect their mission. By the look of it, both Harry and Ron had decided to chalk her odd behaviour up to nervousness.
However, the smooth sailing didn’t last long, and soon Hermione found herself facing the possibility of either drowning in an ocean of hot metal or being captured by an army of enraged goblins. Harry had yet to release the dragon.
The duplicating treasures were burning hot at her feet. Hermione cast Stunning Spell after Stunning Spell, waiting desperately for Harry to act. But as the circle of goblins closed in and the wizard guards managed to avoid the dragon’s frantic rage, she knew that they’d run out of time.
With all the strength she could gather, Hermione aimed at the metal cuffs restraining the dragon and cried, ‘Relashio!’
‘We have to get on,’ she shouted in response to the matching horror on her friends’ faces. Hermione fought her way towards the dragon, but once she’d got there, it proved much more difficult to climb up its back without Harry’s help. Her clammy hands kept slipping off the beast’s metallic scales. In the end, it wasn’t until Harry and Ron had also reached the spot that they managed to climb up together.
Just like the last time, the combination of their spells and the force of the dragon’s struggle brought them out into open air. Hermione squeezed her eyes shut, feeling both overwhelmed and relieved. They’d just escaped Gringotts with Hufflepuff’s cup. The wind whistled in her ears as they tore through the air.
‘Brilliant, Hermione!’ She could hear Ron’s shout. Hermione gave a small nod that she doubted Ron could see, but he said nothing else. They were all dwelling on their own thoughts as the dragon flew higher and higher in the sky.
During the last few hours, Hermione barely had time to think straight. It had been almost suffocating having to keep up two appearances at once: the normal, unknowing Hermione to her best friends, and Bellatrix Lestrange to everyone else. Hermione had come to the conclusion that just like Harry and Ron, no one had any idea that this whole ordeal had happened before. The more she wanted to believe that she’d just had some sort of prophetic dream that would help her along the way, the more the evidence pointed otherwise.
Despite the somersaults of her stomach at the dragon’s sudden movements every now and then, this time around, Hermione found that closing her eyes helped. Or maybe her mind was too much of a jumble for her fear to fully surface.
How had this all come about? Was it the moment when their lips touched? Had Malfoy inconspicuously activated a Time-Turner then? No, if it’d been a Time-Turner, her past, ‘duplicate’ self would have gone with Harry and Ron. She would’ve had to hide as they made their way to the Apparition point, just like she and Harry had had to hide in Hagrid’s hut and the Forbidden Forest to prevent their past selves from seeing them. Whatever this was, Hermione was taking the place of herself on the previous day, and no one had noticed.
Then again, how could something as simple as a kiss trigger such extraordinary magic? It had to be much more than that, if she was being completely honest, but even admitting this didn’t bring her any closer to an explanation. More importantly, did Malfoy know? Was she alone reliving the past?
‘... are we losing height?’ Ron’s voice drew Hermione back to reality.
‘I say we jump when it gets low enough!’ responded Harry.
‘Straight into the water, then?’
‘Yeah. What do you think, Hermione?’
‘Okay,’ was all she could manage before Harry shouted, ‘NOW!’
They all let go and slipped off the steely scales into the river below. For a moment, Hermione felt at ease. After the flight on dragon’s back, the water made her feel safe somehow: it was soothing on her skin, and at least she knew what she was doing here.
When they started fighting their way through the weeds, however, her exhaustion began to set in. Once they got to the shore, Hermione collapsed onto the grass. Harry tried to hoist himself up, but Ron was quicker. He signalled for Harry to sit back down and then went about casting the protective spell around them. Things were getting more and more different than what she remembered. Granted, the details seemed to be relatively inconsequential, but she was beginning to suspect they mattered.
Not allowing her mind to wander further from the task at hand, Hermione clambered up. She pulled their new clothes and three bottles of pumpkin juice out of her bag almost mechanically. Should she expedite their journey by suggesting that they head straight for Hogwarts? If they got to the diadem quicker this time, maybe not as many would die. Maybe Harry would never go to Voldemort. But then, the crux of the issue occurred to her. It didn’t matter if Harry went. Voldemort couldn’t kill Harry with the first curse. If Narcissa Malfoy’s lie hadn’t been discovered, the second curse would never have come, at least not until Harry faced the monster again in one final showdown. Why had the Killing Curse only worked upon a second try even though the sacrifice and protection of Harry’s mother was no longer valid? Had Harry already known this when he decided to hand himself over?
And what about the others? They shouldn’t have to die in vain. But what reason could she give her friends to convince them to go back to Hogwarts? After all, she had been the one who’d opposed this idea most adamantly yesterday. Yes, yesterday. Besides, she had made it this far without actively ‘interfering’, hadn’t she? It wouldn’t do to back out now.
Hermione searched her memory for the right course of action. She remembered asking about the fate of the dragon and Ron’s joke making them laugh. Her laughter this time was forced and short-lived. She found herself holding her breath in anticipation of Harry’s trip into Voldemort’s mind. Merlin, please let it be the same.
‘He knows,’ said Harry. Hermione let out a sigh of relief. Luckily, Ron’s full attention was on Harry, and Harry was still too absorbed in what he’d just seen that neither of them noticed.
Harry went on describing Voldemort’s fury at the loss of the cup and his thoughts about another Horcrux at Hogwarts. They decided to go back. There was no plan but no opposition either. The three of them silently Apparated into Hogsmeade.
***
It was still Ron’s idea this time, getting down to the Chamber of Secrets. Again, he gave her the pleasure of destroying the Horcrux. As soon as Hermione picked up the Basilisk’s fang and held it over the cup, the green jewel encrusted on it flashed scarlet, and a voice boomed out.
‘I have seen your heart, and it is mine.’
Hermione hesitated. No wait, she had experienced this moment before. She knew what it would say next, ‘You are just a worthless Mudblood. Some may have considered you intelligent, but you know it is not true. You cannot do anything without books. You need to spend hours pleading the books to tell you what the plan is. You know you cannot think on your own. But you don’t have-’
And she knew she had stabbed it then, so powerful was her determination not to lose sight of their ultimate goal. She knew that she could do it now.
But then, Tom Riddle’s voice spoke again. ‘You couldn’t save them, Hermione Granger.’
Hermione felt her heart seize. She almost dropped the Basilisk’s fang in her hand.
‘You failed them all, and you will fail again tonight.’
‘Come on, Hermione. Stab it!’ Ron encouraged. She looked up at him and tightened her grip on the fang. Before she could act, however, two monstrous bubbles burst out from the cup. Hermione let out a scream of horror and backed away from it. The bubbles grew rapidly into two male figures. They were leaden in colour, solid but still ghost-like.
One of the figures lifted his hand up and pointed at her. It was Harry.
‘You could have stopped me from handing myself over, but you let me walk to my death.’
Hermione shook her head. ‘I didn’t know you were going,’ she whispered. ‘I didn’t ... It wasn’t me. Whatever it was in Snape’s memory caused you to go.’
They locked eyes: hers were pleading, but his were cold, unforgiving. Hermione turned to the other figure. Ron looked back at her with even more hatred although he remained silent. Could ... could it be their ghosts coming back from yesterday?
‘Now that you know everything, will you stop me tonight?’ continued Harry.
‘Does it even matter?’ Ron laughed, a high, cold laugh that she’d never heard from him before. ‘Nothing can be changed.’
Then, he turned to her, opening the flaps of his robes to reveal a terrible gash on his bare torso, where a thick, silvery liquid was pouring out.
‘I died for you, Hermione. I will die again for you tonight, but it doesn’t mean anything to you.’
‘No, it’s not true,’ croaked Hermione, her throat clogging up and her eyes brimming with tears. ‘I’ve missed you so much. I wished I could have died.’
‘But you didn’t die,’ shouted Ron. ‘You didn’t even care. You went ahead and kissed him. You fraternised with the enemy.’
‘Enemy!’ echoed Harry. ‘How could you?’
‘He-’
She broke off. Someone else was calling her name. The voice said something about Voldemort’s enchantment, but her ears were buzzing. She couldn’t seem to tear her eyes away from the ghost-like Harry and Ron.
‘You were the reason we died,’ they chorused. ‘You won’t be able to change anything. We will die again tonight. All because of you.’
‘Hermione, I’m here. Stab the cup now!’
She recognised that it was Ron-the real Ron. The two figures from the Horcrux kept jeering, but she closed her eyes and tried to block them out. Biting her lip, Hermione curled her hand into a fist around the fang and stabbed.
There was a terrible scream. She opened her eyes to see a stream of blood gushing from the cup in front of her. Ron had come to her side.
‘It was the dream, wasn’t it?’
Hermione nodded and wiped her tears with the back of her hand. When she looked up at Ron, he was going to say something, but then he stopped himself. After a moment, he patted her shoulder and said, ‘Don’t worry, Hermione. It was just a dream.’
It sounded more like he was trying to convince himself to not be bothered by it, but she could see the question written all over his face: Who was he? She couldn’t tell Ron, though. Especially when he was Draco Malfoy. Especially when it wasn’t just a dream.
‘We have to get back to the Room of Requirement,’ she said, changing the topic. ‘Harry may have gone back already.’
Ron agreed. They gathered the Basilisk’s fangs and made their way back to the Room of Requirement in awkward silence. Hermione’s mind was still reeling from Riddle’s taunts. She knew she shouldn’t let them trouble her, but she just couldn’t help it. What would happen if she stopped Harry from going to Voldemort? Now she felt sure that his decision had something to do with Snape’s memory. Although Hermione had no doubt that Harry wouldn’t hesitate sacrificing himself for them all, surely the memory must have played its part. Nevertheless, what was the use of worrying about this when she didn’t even know if they would ever get to the point of retrieving the memory?
That was why Hermione spent the rest of the journey thinking about how she could hint at the diadem and its hiding place to Harry, in case his search wasn’t as fruitful as yesterday. Finally, they spotted Harry on the seventh floor corridor and grounded to a halt.
‘Did you see the diadem? Do you think it’s the Horcrux?’ asked Hermione, unable to contain herself.
‘I did, and I do. But first things first, where the hell have you been?’
‘Chamber of Secrets,’ replied Ron.
‘Chamber-what?’
‘It was all Ron’s idea,’ said Hermione. Maybe this would be just the thing to lift the tension. ‘After you left, we were talking about not being able to destroy the Horcruxes, and he thought of it. Basilisk’s fangs.’ She held out her armful of the items in front of Harry. ‘The sword can destroy Horcruxes only because it’s absorbed the venom. I didn’t remember that, but Ron did. He was amazing!’
Hermione stopped to catch her breath and cast a surreptitious glance in Ron’s direction. She was relieved to find him beaming.
‘That’s great,’ said Harry. ‘But I thought you had to speak-’
‘Ron can speak Parseltongue. Show him, Ron!’
Ron let out a hiss and a snarl to Harry’s utmost amazement. ‘Just imitating you, mate,’ he added. ‘Had to try a few times before I got it right. So, we went in, and ... ’
Ron paused; his excitement vanished. ‘Hermione stabbed the cup,’ he finished sombrely.
Harry seemed flabbergasted at this change of sentiment. ‘What’s happened?’ he asked, looking from Ron to Hermione.
‘It was my nightmare. Riddle taunted me with it.’
‘Is there any-’
‘It’s nothing really,’ Ron cut in. Hermione was thoroughly grateful that he did.
‘So, the diadem?’ asked Ron.
‘Right! I know where it is. He hid it ...’
Hermione tuned Harry out. After all, she’d heard his explanation before. Now that they were preparing to enter the Room of Requirement, her nervousness about Malfoy returned full-force. What if he never turned up? Or worse, what if he didn’t know anything about yesterday and she messed everything up by telling him? How could she speak to him without Harry and Ron knowing? Even if she could, would he agree to help?
None of Hermione’s questions were answered when they went into the Room and asked Ginny, Tonks, and Neville’s grandmother to leave for a while. Once they’d come out again, Hermione couldn’t help glancing around the corridor. Malfoy should be here by now, shouldn’t he? If only she could figure out where he was hiding.
At least she knew where he’d revealed himself yesterday in the Room of Hidden Things. For once, Hermione wished that things were different. She wanted to go towards that section of the room or at least follow Harry there. But it only took them a few steps before he suggested that they split up. Since it would probably look suspicious to argue, Hermione begrudgingly turned to another direction.
She walked away only far enough to be out of Harry and Ron’s sight. Stopping behind a pile of dusty, tattered books, Hermione strained her ears for any sign of movement. Her heart was pounding so loudly that she was afraid she would miss something.
‘Hold it, Potter.’ Hermione’s heart skipped a beat. Should she go out there and face him now? Was he with Crabbe and Goyle?
Hermione listened intently to their conversation. Malfoy seemed to act too normally for someone who already knew what was to happen, although Hermione couldn’t really tell. She had been too far away from them yesterday that she had nothing to compare with now.
‘What’s a die-dum?’ She could hear Goyle say. The battle broke out as soon as Ron called for Harry. Hermione had to duck into a corner to avoid the junk crashing down from Crabbe’s Descendo. Everything was playing out in the same way as yesterday, it seemed.
When the Cruciatus Curse was cast, Malfoy’s scream ‘Stop!’ rang throughout the Room again. Hermione sprang out from behind the tower of hidden objects and shot a Stunning Spell at Crabbe. The spell hit him squarely in the face, knocking him unconscious. Malfoy didn’t pull Crabbe out of the way this time. Hermione turned to look at him. For a moment, she saw something there-understanding, recognition in his eyes-but he narrowed them instantly.
‘Now, now isn’t it the Mudblood? Stupefy!’
The curse came so close to hitting Hermione that she couldn’t tell if it was meant to miss or just poorly-aimed. She didn’t have time to dwell on it as Goyle had raised his wand as well.
‘Expelliarmus!’ yelled Harry and Hermione in unison. Both Malfoy’s and Goyle’s wands shot out from their hands into the heap of junk. Ron fired a Petrifying Curse right then, but Malfoy managed to grab Goyle and use him as a shield against the attack. Leaving the Petrified Goyle behind, he turned tail and fled into the mountain of objects.
‘Coward,’ bellowed Ron. ‘Should we chase after him?’
‘What for?’ asked Harry, his hand now holding the diadem dug up from the pile of junk.
Hermione needed to find an excuse to follow Malfoy alone, but how? Besides, was he expecting her to follow him? Or did he just want to cut short the confrontation with the expectation that Hermione would leave the room with her friends and then sneak away to meet with him elsewhere? In that case, where, exactly?
‘Should we destroy the Horcrux now?’ she asked, hoping to buy some more time.
‘In here? But what about Malfoy? Should we let him see?’
‘He’s already aware that you’ve been after the diadem, Harry. And he knows that you’ve got it. If Malfoy goes out to Voldemort with that knowledge, Voldemort will know that we’ve destroyed it.’
‘True. But does it matter?’
‘Once he knows that the diadem is gone, he will reinforce the protection around the snake. We can’t afford that. Let me go after Malfoy and Stun him. You guys get on with the Horcrux.’
‘Are you sure, Hermione? We’re all in this together.’
‘We don’t have time, Ron. Don’t lose sight of what we’re meant to do. I’ll take the Marauder’s Map and use it to catch up with you.’
‘All right,’ said Harry. ‘But if we don’t see you in twenty minutes, we’ll come back.’
Hermione nodded. There was no use arguing with them any further. Harry and Ron walked towards the door, but then Ron looked back hesitantly.
‘Go,’ she hushed. ‘I’ll be all right. He’s just a cowering ferret anyway.’
‘Who did you just call a cowering ferret, Granger?’ came a drawl as soon as the door sealed itself after Harry and Ron. Hermione turned back to face its owner, relief washing over her. He knew.
‘There’s no time to be bitter about that, Malfoy.’
As she said this, Hermione raised her wand and conjured a clock in mid-air. The clock instantly started to count back from twenty minutes. Malfoy raised his wand and set it back to fifteen.
‘You’ll need the extra five minutes to follow them,’ he said dryly.
He was right. Hermione mentally scolded herself for the lack of provision.
‘But the wand, how did you-’
‘This is called the Room of Requirement for a reason, Granger. Now get down to business.’
‘So you really do know, then?’ asked Hermione.
‘I do not speak in code, Granger. Be explicit.’
Hermione huffed. ‘You know that this whole day has already happened before, that Crabbe was supposed to cast Fiendfyre and die in it, that your mother lied to Voldemort and was punished for it, that Harry lost in the end, that you came to heal me and somehow we’ve ended up in this entire ordeal all over again. Is that explicit enough for you?’
He stared at her for a moment. Hermione was sure that her cheeks were flushed from the speech.
‘There’s no need to recount everything like that,’ he scolded, the wand in his hand trembling. It was his mother’s wand, she realised. ‘But yes, I know everything.’
‘What should we do now?’
‘Knowing why we’re here would’ve made it much easier to figure out what we have to do,’ he observed.
Hermione nodded. ‘I agree, but I don’t have a clue. I’ve just been trying to stick to whatever happened all day.’
‘Same here.’
‘So, should we-could we try to change things?’
‘It’s complicated, Granger. Just one wrong step and we’ll ruin everything.’
‘Do we have anything to lose?’ she asked, feeling her eyes prickling.
‘This chance,’ replied Malfoy, though it sounded like a question rather than an answer. ‘We don’t know if the day will repeat again, now, do we?’
‘No,’ said Hermione quietly. ‘We can only do our best, though.’
‘What if it’s still not enough?’
Hermione could see that despair was taking over Malfoy. She couldn’t let it get to her, too.
‘Have a little faith, Malfoy,’ she snapped. ‘If you’re not going to do anything, then I’ll take care of it myself.’
She didn’t know if antagonising him was a good idea, but at least it seemed to switch him back to business mode.
‘Fine,’ said Malfoy. ‘What do you think we should change?’
‘As you said, we may mess things up completely. The only way I see it, we should only change what is necessary.’
‘Though it must still be something that affects the outcome of the war.’ Malfoy crossed his arms over his chest. ‘In that case, you should expect a complete change of events afterwards.’
‘I agree,’ said Hermione, lifting her eyes to meet his. ‘But isn’t that what we want?’
Malfoy took a deep breath and nodded. ‘It should be something relatively close to the end, then?’
‘The forest, Malfoy. If your mother’s lie hadn’t been found out, Harry would have been alive when they got back to the castle.’
‘No, that’s too risky. Why shouldn’t we stop him from going to the Dark Lord altogether?’
‘I don’t know, but ...’
Hermione didn’t have any solid proof, but she instinctively felt that they shouldn’t change this, that it was something instrumental to the defeat of Voldemort.
‘I don’t have time for your mind games, Granger,’ said Malfoy. ‘You can’t expect me to follow blindly when my mother’s life depends on it.’
‘So that’s all you care about, isn’t it?’ asked Hermione. She wished she could say that she understood his concerns, but the situation required her to be cool-headed. ‘How do I know that you won’t betray us just to keep her safe?’
‘Don’t you think that I want Potter to win as well?’ snapped Malfoy, his eyes flashing. ‘Don’t you think that after all this, I’ve realised that we are all just worthless scum, easily disposed of at any moment by the Dark Lord?’
Hermione narrowed her eyes at him but then relented. ‘Harry handing himself over to Voldemort is vital for us to defeat that monster.’
‘And?’ Malfoy prompted.
‘I haven’t figured out the exact reason yet.’
‘Try me.’
Should she? Hermione glanced at the clock over her head. It was ticking away far too fast; they only had six and a half minutes left. Malfoy seemed to have noticed the dilemma as well.
‘At least tell me the things you know. What’s that diadem for?’
Malfoy’s look told Hermione that he wouldn’t agree to anything without having this question answered. She let out a sigh, reached for her bag, then dropped it onto the floor with a heavy thud. Kneeling down next to the bag, Hermione began rummaging through it for the book she needed. She could practically feel Malfoy’s gaze burning a hole in the back of her head.
Was she doing the right thing? Dumbledore had trusted Harry, Ron, and her not to tell anyone, even the Order of the Phoenix, and here she was, preparing to tell Draco Malfoy the secret to Voldemort’s downfall.
‘Here, read this.’ She thrust the ancient tome into his hands.
‘Are you freaking kidding me? Wait-Secret of the Darkest Art?’
Hermione held up a hand to stall Malfoy’s next remark. ‘I don’t have much time to explain more. Just know that Voldemort’s made a number of Horcruxes. The diadem and his snake, Nagini, are two of them. Once you’ve read the Horcrux section, you’ll understand.’
She didn’t miss the suspicion on Malfoy’s face as he examined the table of contents, although he tucked the book in the crook of his arm and turned back to her in the end. ‘So, what’s the plan?’
‘Plan for what?’
‘To prevent the Dark Lord from finding out about my mother’s lie.’
‘Meeting up in the forest during the one-hour armistice, I guess,’ said Hermione. She didn’t know what they should do afterwards, but formulating a plan didn’t seem possible now. Only two minutes left. ‘We’ll figure it out then.’
‘Fair enough,’ said Malfoy. ‘And I believe you should be able to find me with that ... map thing of yours?’ He indicated the Marauder’s Map lying at Hermione’s feet, which she’d abandoned in the rush to search for the book on Horcruxes.
‘Yes, of course,’ she replied before bending down to pick up the map along with her bag. ‘Harry and Ron are already in the Great Hall. I have to go.’
‘Granger, wait!’
‘What is it now?’
‘I don’t know if it will be of any help or if your giant friend’s told you already, but about Potter going to the Dark Lord ... The first time the curse struck, the Dark Lord himself passed out. It seemed-my father said-as though there was a connection between them.’
But the second time, Voldemort hadn’t fainted, her brain automatically supplied. The connection had been severed after the first curse. If this connection was something important to-Her eyes widened in realisation. She turned around to fully face Malfoy. There was no deception in his eyes.
She would have asked for more details to verify her theory, but the timer went off right then with a shrill clang. Hermione didn’t know what prompted her into doing it, but as she rushed to the door, she called back at Malfoy.
‘I think Voldemort’s accidentally made Harry into a Horcrux.’
***
‘Don’t listen to him,’ Ron said to Harry once Voldemort’s message was over.
It took every ounce of Hermione’s will to repeat her line from yesterday. ‘It’ll be all right.’
They made their way back to the castle, to be engulfed by the suffocating silence. Hermione stopped at the doorway, her heart laden with grief and guilt. Now, more than ever, she felt that she could understand how Harry must be feeling: to know that he had the chance to prevent deaths and sufferings, but didn’t take it. Fred, Lupin, Tonks-all she could have saved this time. But she was afraid that if she did, she’d lose the chance to alter the final outcome of the war.
Hermione walked up and hugged Ginny. They then joined the rest of the Weasley family. Hermione couldn’t look at Fred, Lupin, or Tonks’ body. She couldn’t even meet the eyes of the survivors, knowing that if she failed tonight, some of them would die as well. She watched Harry leave and felt a strong impulse to follow him, to run away and to learn more about Snape’s memory, but she resisted. She needed to wait for someone else. Malfoy’s name still hadn’t appeared on the Marauder’s Map.
She stayed and tried to provide comfort to Ginny, Ron, and the others, but when it proved too much to bear, Hermione silently retreated from the group. She checked the map again, this time to find a tiny dot labelled Draco Malfoy swiftly approaching. Upon arriving at the entrance to the Great Hall, the dot stopped. Hermione looked up but saw no one. Realising that Malfoy must be Disillusioned, she gave a slight nod before turning back to the map. The dot was moving again towards the front door. Hermione slipped into a sheltered corner of the Hall and also cast a Disillusionment Charm on herself.
Thus, the journey to the forest began. She stopped at the front door, unsure as to which direction she should go. The sight of the battle made her insides lurch. Perhaps it was best to avoid the direct path, in case she bumped into one of the few survivors who were trying to bring bodies into the castle. Hermione took out the map again. Apparently Malfoy was taking the longer route, keeping closer to the lake. Hermione decided to do the same.
The more she walked, the more she could feel the chill creeping up on her. The swarm of Dementors-previously lurking among the trees-was now gliding towards the lake. A quick glance at the map confirmed her suspicion: Malfoy’s dot was being driven further and further from the edge of the forest. The Dementors must have sensed his presence. She could also see Harry making his way across the grounds. She didn’t have much time. Hermione briefly wondered if she should attempt to stop Bellatrix without Malfoy, but she instantly scolded herself for the idea. She could not leave him to deal with the Dementors alone.
Sending a Patronus from her spot was as good as signifying her presence to the occupants of the forest. Hermione had no choice but to walk deeper and deeper into the freezing fog. She tried to quicken her steps, but her legs felt like jelly. At this rate, she would never get to the forest soon enough. Hermione turned her head and tried to look at the other side of the forest, but she could hardly see through the fog. What was happening there? She shakily took out the map, her heart pounding. The parchment was so close it touched her nose, and even then, she couldn’t find Harry among the dense trees of the forest. However, something else caught her eye, and her heart sank. The name Draco Malfoy had stopped, hanging precariously at the edge of the lake. It was time to act.
‘Ex ... expecto Patronum,’ she stammered. A tiny jet of silver shot out from the tip of her wand, clearing up the fog for a fleeting second. Hermione could make out the black robes circling around Malfoy, who had reappeared, kneeling on a glassy-grey surface. Frozen water, Hermione realised. Then, she was blind again, fog covering her eyes, her entire body bitten by the cold. The despair gripped at her heart and twisted it like a pair of pliers. It was too late now.
Think of something happy, Hermione, something, she willed herself. Harry will win. But for that to happen, she and Malfoy still had a mission to accomplish. It was their only chance.
‘Expecto Patronum,’ she shouted with all her might, her chest aching. A silver otter leapt out from her wand, heading towards the lake. Hermione ran, racing to keep up with the silver creature, which swept the Dementors aside in its wake. A comforting warmth filled the air. She reached Malfoy at last. Her eyes widened at the cracks that were beginning to spread on the ice. It was melting, becoming too thin to hold the weight. Before Hermione could react, there was a deafening splash as Malfoy’s limp form disappeared underneath the water.
In pure instinct, she tossed her wand onto the grass and-for the second time that day-plunged herself into the water. The warmth that her Patronus had created moments ago was instantly replaced with a paralysing cold.
Hermione blinked rapidly as water stung her eyes. After a few seconds, she managed to keep her eyes wide open. The water was clean, but the lack of light made it almost impossible to see. She caught a glimpse of black amid the dull grey surroundings. It must be his robes. Hermione swam closer. Thank Merlin, it really was him. Quickly discarding the sodden robes and slipping one arm around Malfoy’s waist, she began to swim towards the surface, straining to offset the burden of his weight dragging them down. She was starting to feel short on air.
Finally, they both emerged above the water. Hermione gasped. The fresh air flooding her lungs sent a new wave of energy through her body. It was enough for her to get Malfoy and herself to the shore, which luckily wasn’t too far away.
‘Malfoy!’ she called, shaking his shoulders gently but receiving no response. She lifted Malfoy’s chin up with one hand and tilted his head back with the other hand on his forehead. Hermione tried to feel for his breathing and then checked for his pulse. Nothing.
No, she could not lose him now. Hermione took a deep breath and brought her mouth to his, her hand pinching his nose closed. She breathed into him. One, two. And then chest compressions. One ... two ... three ... four ... Nothing seemed to matter but the numbers reeling in her head. ...twenty-eight ... twenty-nine ... thirty ... Hermione repeated the procedure again and again, each time praying for it to work.
Her heart soared as his chest started to rise and fall again, without her rescue breaths. His eyelids fluttered open while she was trying to place him in a recovery position.
‘C...c...cold,’ he stuttered with difficulty. It was not until then that Hermione realised she was also soaking wet. She shuddered as the chill registered. All the same, Malfoy’s safety came first. If only she had a-Damn it! How could she have forgotten her wand!
‘It’s all right. I’ll be back in a second,’ she said to him and stood up to look for her wand. It was not hard to find, given that the sky was starting to light up. She swiftly came back to Malfoy’s side and used a drying spell on his clothes. Although he didn’t attempt to say anything else, she was glad to see the colour gradually return to his face. Once the drying was done, Hermione conjured a small jar along with a Bluebell flame and placed it next to him.
As Hermione set about drying her own clothes, Malfoy spoke up. ‘What’s happened?’
‘You were driven to the lake by Dementors and nearly drowned.’
‘So, you dragged me up here?’
‘Yeah, and gave you CPR.’
‘CPR?’
‘It’s a Muggle first-aid procedure,’ she replied. ‘Short for Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation, which involves mouth-to-mouth res-’
‘Mouth-to-mouth? You took advantage of me when-’
‘What?’ exclaimed Hermione, incredulous. She looked back at Malfoy, who apparently had shot up to a sitting position at his discovery. ‘You weren’t breathing. I had no other choice.’
‘Are you a witch or what?’
Well, he had a point. ‘I used to volunteer as a lifeguard during summer. It just seemed the natural thing to do,’ said Hermione defensively.
Returning to her current task, she mumbled, ‘It wasn’t like I enjoyed it, anyway. You tasted like the Giant Squid and smelled like fish.’
‘I didn’t know you had a pastime of snogging water crea-’
Malfoy’s taunt was cut short by a loud bang.
‘Oh, no!’ Hermione clapped her hand over her mouth. ‘Harry! The forest!’
She leapt to her feet and ran, the sound of Malfoy’s footsteps thundering close behind her. The trees came closer and closer into her vision. There was a flash of green light. Hermione prayed to the heavens that it was the first curse. But then, Voldemort’s voice made her heart drop.
‘A traitor like Narcissa Malfoy cannot be tolerated. Let this be a lesson for you all.’
Hermione could hear an anguished cry behind, and she suddenly realised that neither she nor Malfoy had any disguise. But it didn’t matter anymore. They had failed. Hermione fell to her knees, barely noticing the mellow light of the rising sun shining on her. She let out a large sob and felt herself fall again, into the darkness.
Previous Chapter
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Author: leopion
Character(s): Draco Malfoy/Hermione Granger
Genres: Adventure, Alternate Universe, Angst, Time Travel
Timeline: Canon compliant until the final battle in DH
Rating: MT
Warnings: Secondary Character Death, Strong Profanity
Disclaimer: I do not own nor claim the Harry Potter series, which belongs to J. K. Rowling.
Summary: People say that the first kiss is a once-in-a-lifetime experience, but perhaps it’s not always true. An alternate ending to DH. Dramione Couple Remix Round 1 - Henry/Lucy (50 First Dates)
Also archived on: Hawthorn & Vine, Granger Enchanted, The Manor, AO3, and fanfiction.net
AN: Originally written for Round 1 of dramione_remix. Revised for archiving.
My deepest gratitude to dormiensa , elizpeace and mccargi, callarose as well as the mods and my readers at dramione_remix. Full acknowledgement (plus table of contents) can be found here
7 First Kisses
by Leopion
The Second
Hermione woke up with a start. The taste of hot tears-whether hers or Malfoy’s-still lingered on her tongue, but the aching and throbbing in her body had completely vanished. The smell of freshly-cleaned linen surrounded her, and whatever was underneath her felt incredibly warm, soft, and comforting. Maybe she had fainted after the ... incident. Blood rushed to Hermione’s cheeks at the memory. Better not dwell on it. She tried to figure out where she was instead. She could hear the even breathing of someone else nearby. Friend or foe, she didn’t know. Even if she’d fainted, this seemed too good to be true. She should have been waking up on the cold stone floor of a dungeon’s cell somewhere.
Hermione peeled her eyes open. Before she could register the pattern on the ceiling, there was a soft knock on the door. She closed her eyes again, feigning sleep.
‘Hermione!’
Her heart seized. Could it be? Was she dreaming?
‘Hermione!’ another familiar voice called, and once again Hermione felt as though her heart was going to burst out of her chest. ‘We have to go now!’
‘Shhh, Ron! You may wake Luna.’
That seemed to be the last encouragement Hermione needed to open her eyes once again and turn her head to fully inspect her surroundings. On the small bed on the other side of the room, a girl was sleeping with her back to Hermione, but she knew that those blonde tresses could only belong to Luna Lovegood.
Clearly, Hermione was in her bed at Shell Cottage.
Harry and Ron continued to knock. Hermione shot up from the bed and raced to the door. Whatever reality this was, it would not do to wake Luna. Once she’d finally opened the door, Hermione had to rub her eyes before believing what she saw. Her senses seemed to be playing a lot of tricks on her in the last couple of minutes. Right in front of her was Harry Potter, very much alive and healthy. Unable to resist the urge, she jumped up and hugged him.
‘Hermione, what are you doing? What’s wrong?’
‘I don’t know.’ She sobbed into Harry’s chest. How could she tell him that he was supposed to be dead? That they were supposed to have fallen?
There was a sound of someone clearing his throat. Hermione realised that Ron was watching Harry and her from his spot next to the doorframe. He looked quite uncomfortable. She quickly released Harry.
‘I know pretending to be Bellatrix is quite a dreadful task,’ said Ron, ‘but we have-’
‘Wait!’ blurted Hermione. ‘What’s the date?’
Both Harry and Ron shot her a quizzical look. ‘The first of May, of course.’
Hermione froze, her heart doing a little dance in her chest.
‘Honestly, Hermione, are you all right?’ said Ron, walking closer and putting his hand on her forehead.
Awaking from the reverie, she nodded hesitantly.
‘I think it was just because of the nightmare I had last night,’ she added quickly. But was it just that, a nightmare? Was she confusing dreams with reality? Probably. But then, what if this was just a dream and the other was reality? The knot in her chest tightened, and another sob threatened to escape, but Hermione fought it down. Either way, at least in this time and place, her friends were alive, and she still had a chance to set things right. It was then that Hermione decided not to tell Harry and Ron anything just yet. She had to figure out what this all meant first. If their doom really was a dream, she didn’t want to dishearten her friends. Besides, things had been playing out differently since the minute she hadn’t turned up to meet them on time. The only thing Hermione could do was to try and stick to the old plan as much as possible. Otherwise, who knew what disaster the laws of causality would lead her towards? Then again, if they postponed their trip and stayed at Shell Cottage for one more day, nothing could possibly go wrong, could it? Hermione shook her head to clear her treacherous thoughts. She could feel Harry giving her shoulder a slight squeeze.
‘Can you two go outside and wait for me?’ she asked, looking up at Harry and Ron with a faint smile. ‘I’ll be there in just a minute.’
Hermione closed the door behind her two best friends and let out a small sigh. She quickly grabbed the beaded bag under her pillow and fished out the set of old robes she’d brought from Grimmauld Place. Having changed into the oversized outfit, she took out the phial of Polyjuice and dropped Bellatrix’s hair into it. The potion swiftly turned into that exact shade of black she’d once seen. Remembering its foul taste, Hermione braced herself before downing the concoction in one gulp. She almost retched as the very same pus-like liquid assaulted her taste buds. If what she recalled was just a nightmare, then how could it be so accurate? Was this merely a way to make her re-live this Hell?
The questions played in her head over and over again as Hermione walked from her room to the front door. Her hand stopped momentarily on the doorknob, but then she took a deep breath and turned it. Ron, Harry, and even Griphook-the usual grim expression on his face-were waiting for her on the lawn.
Although the look Harry gave her as she strode towards them was nearly a precise duplication of his reaction yester-in the dream, Hermione still felt a twinge in her chest, perhaps slightly more intense than before. The nasty taste of the Polyjuice potion was still clinging to her tongue like a leech, but she set about altering Ron’s appearance without complaints. She didn’t even have the heart to argue with Ron over his fastidious instructions about his desired disguise. All she could focus on was preventing herself from staring at his features, tracing her fingers along the line of his face, remembering him before it was too late.
She finished the task with as business-like a manner as she could muster. As the group made their way to the Apparition point, Harry and Ron still occasionally shared that worried look in her wake, but she decidedly ignored it. Hermione figured that her denial or explanation now would only double their concerns.
With a final glance back at Shell Cottage, Hermione stepped past the boundary wall, following her friends’ lead. Tightening her grip on the walnut wand, she turned on the spot, plunging into the constricting darkness. At that moment, Hermione knew something was meant to change, whether for better or for worse.
Their trip to Gringotts went without too much trouble. There were occasions when Hermione accidentally blurted something she shouldn’t have known, but thankfully her slips of the tongue didn’t substantially affect their mission. By the look of it, both Harry and Ron had decided to chalk her odd behaviour up to nervousness.
However, the smooth sailing didn’t last long, and soon Hermione found herself facing the possibility of either drowning in an ocean of hot metal or being captured by an army of enraged goblins. Harry had yet to release the dragon.
The duplicating treasures were burning hot at her feet. Hermione cast Stunning Spell after Stunning Spell, waiting desperately for Harry to act. But as the circle of goblins closed in and the wizard guards managed to avoid the dragon’s frantic rage, she knew that they’d run out of time.
With all the strength she could gather, Hermione aimed at the metal cuffs restraining the dragon and cried, ‘Relashio!’
‘We have to get on,’ she shouted in response to the matching horror on her friends’ faces. Hermione fought her way towards the dragon, but once she’d got there, it proved much more difficult to climb up its back without Harry’s help. Her clammy hands kept slipping off the beast’s metallic scales. In the end, it wasn’t until Harry and Ron had also reached the spot that they managed to climb up together.
Just like the last time, the combination of their spells and the force of the dragon’s struggle brought them out into open air. Hermione squeezed her eyes shut, feeling both overwhelmed and relieved. They’d just escaped Gringotts with Hufflepuff’s cup. The wind whistled in her ears as they tore through the air.
‘Brilliant, Hermione!’ She could hear Ron’s shout. Hermione gave a small nod that she doubted Ron could see, but he said nothing else. They were all dwelling on their own thoughts as the dragon flew higher and higher in the sky.
During the last few hours, Hermione barely had time to think straight. It had been almost suffocating having to keep up two appearances at once: the normal, unknowing Hermione to her best friends, and Bellatrix Lestrange to everyone else. Hermione had come to the conclusion that just like Harry and Ron, no one had any idea that this whole ordeal had happened before. The more she wanted to believe that she’d just had some sort of prophetic dream that would help her along the way, the more the evidence pointed otherwise.
Despite the somersaults of her stomach at the dragon’s sudden movements every now and then, this time around, Hermione found that closing her eyes helped. Or maybe her mind was too much of a jumble for her fear to fully surface.
How had this all come about? Was it the moment when their lips touched? Had Malfoy inconspicuously activated a Time-Turner then? No, if it’d been a Time-Turner, her past, ‘duplicate’ self would have gone with Harry and Ron. She would’ve had to hide as they made their way to the Apparition point, just like she and Harry had had to hide in Hagrid’s hut and the Forbidden Forest to prevent their past selves from seeing them. Whatever this was, Hermione was taking the place of herself on the previous day, and no one had noticed.
Then again, how could something as simple as a kiss trigger such extraordinary magic? It had to be much more than that, if she was being completely honest, but even admitting this didn’t bring her any closer to an explanation. More importantly, did Malfoy know? Was she alone reliving the past?
‘... are we losing height?’ Ron’s voice drew Hermione back to reality.
‘I say we jump when it gets low enough!’ responded Harry.
‘Straight into the water, then?’
‘Yeah. What do you think, Hermione?’
‘Okay,’ was all she could manage before Harry shouted, ‘NOW!’
They all let go and slipped off the steely scales into the river below. For a moment, Hermione felt at ease. After the flight on dragon’s back, the water made her feel safe somehow: it was soothing on her skin, and at least she knew what she was doing here.
When they started fighting their way through the weeds, however, her exhaustion began to set in. Once they got to the shore, Hermione collapsed onto the grass. Harry tried to hoist himself up, but Ron was quicker. He signalled for Harry to sit back down and then went about casting the protective spell around them. Things were getting more and more different than what she remembered. Granted, the details seemed to be relatively inconsequential, but she was beginning to suspect they mattered.
Not allowing her mind to wander further from the task at hand, Hermione clambered up. She pulled their new clothes and three bottles of pumpkin juice out of her bag almost mechanically. Should she expedite their journey by suggesting that they head straight for Hogwarts? If they got to the diadem quicker this time, maybe not as many would die. Maybe Harry would never go to Voldemort. But then, the crux of the issue occurred to her. It didn’t matter if Harry went. Voldemort couldn’t kill Harry with the first curse. If Narcissa Malfoy’s lie hadn’t been discovered, the second curse would never have come, at least not until Harry faced the monster again in one final showdown. Why had the Killing Curse only worked upon a second try even though the sacrifice and protection of Harry’s mother was no longer valid? Had Harry already known this when he decided to hand himself over?
And what about the others? They shouldn’t have to die in vain. But what reason could she give her friends to convince them to go back to Hogwarts? After all, she had been the one who’d opposed this idea most adamantly yesterday. Yes, yesterday. Besides, she had made it this far without actively ‘interfering’, hadn’t she? It wouldn’t do to back out now.
Hermione searched her memory for the right course of action. She remembered asking about the fate of the dragon and Ron’s joke making them laugh. Her laughter this time was forced and short-lived. She found herself holding her breath in anticipation of Harry’s trip into Voldemort’s mind. Merlin, please let it be the same.
‘He knows,’ said Harry. Hermione let out a sigh of relief. Luckily, Ron’s full attention was on Harry, and Harry was still too absorbed in what he’d just seen that neither of them noticed.
Harry went on describing Voldemort’s fury at the loss of the cup and his thoughts about another Horcrux at Hogwarts. They decided to go back. There was no plan but no opposition either. The three of them silently Apparated into Hogsmeade.
***
It was still Ron’s idea this time, getting down to the Chamber of Secrets. Again, he gave her the pleasure of destroying the Horcrux. As soon as Hermione picked up the Basilisk’s fang and held it over the cup, the green jewel encrusted on it flashed scarlet, and a voice boomed out.
‘I have seen your heart, and it is mine.’
Hermione hesitated. No wait, she had experienced this moment before. She knew what it would say next, ‘You are just a worthless Mudblood. Some may have considered you intelligent, but you know it is not true. You cannot do anything without books. You need to spend hours pleading the books to tell you what the plan is. You know you cannot think on your own. But you don’t have-’
And she knew she had stabbed it then, so powerful was her determination not to lose sight of their ultimate goal. She knew that she could do it now.
But then, Tom Riddle’s voice spoke again. ‘You couldn’t save them, Hermione Granger.’
Hermione felt her heart seize. She almost dropped the Basilisk’s fang in her hand.
‘You failed them all, and you will fail again tonight.’
‘Come on, Hermione. Stab it!’ Ron encouraged. She looked up at him and tightened her grip on the fang. Before she could act, however, two monstrous bubbles burst out from the cup. Hermione let out a scream of horror and backed away from it. The bubbles grew rapidly into two male figures. They were leaden in colour, solid but still ghost-like.
One of the figures lifted his hand up and pointed at her. It was Harry.
‘You could have stopped me from handing myself over, but you let me walk to my death.’
Hermione shook her head. ‘I didn’t know you were going,’ she whispered. ‘I didn’t ... It wasn’t me. Whatever it was in Snape’s memory caused you to go.’
They locked eyes: hers were pleading, but his were cold, unforgiving. Hermione turned to the other figure. Ron looked back at her with even more hatred although he remained silent. Could ... could it be their ghosts coming back from yesterday?
‘Now that you know everything, will you stop me tonight?’ continued Harry.
‘Does it even matter?’ Ron laughed, a high, cold laugh that she’d never heard from him before. ‘Nothing can be changed.’
Then, he turned to her, opening the flaps of his robes to reveal a terrible gash on his bare torso, where a thick, silvery liquid was pouring out.
‘I died for you, Hermione. I will die again for you tonight, but it doesn’t mean anything to you.’
‘No, it’s not true,’ croaked Hermione, her throat clogging up and her eyes brimming with tears. ‘I’ve missed you so much. I wished I could have died.’
‘But you didn’t die,’ shouted Ron. ‘You didn’t even care. You went ahead and kissed him. You fraternised with the enemy.’
‘Enemy!’ echoed Harry. ‘How could you?’
‘He-’
She broke off. Someone else was calling her name. The voice said something about Voldemort’s enchantment, but her ears were buzzing. She couldn’t seem to tear her eyes away from the ghost-like Harry and Ron.
‘You were the reason we died,’ they chorused. ‘You won’t be able to change anything. We will die again tonight. All because of you.’
‘Hermione, I’m here. Stab the cup now!’
She recognised that it was Ron-the real Ron. The two figures from the Horcrux kept jeering, but she closed her eyes and tried to block them out. Biting her lip, Hermione curled her hand into a fist around the fang and stabbed.
There was a terrible scream. She opened her eyes to see a stream of blood gushing from the cup in front of her. Ron had come to her side.
‘It was the dream, wasn’t it?’
Hermione nodded and wiped her tears with the back of her hand. When she looked up at Ron, he was going to say something, but then he stopped himself. After a moment, he patted her shoulder and said, ‘Don’t worry, Hermione. It was just a dream.’
It sounded more like he was trying to convince himself to not be bothered by it, but she could see the question written all over his face: Who was he? She couldn’t tell Ron, though. Especially when he was Draco Malfoy. Especially when it wasn’t just a dream.
‘We have to get back to the Room of Requirement,’ she said, changing the topic. ‘Harry may have gone back already.’
Ron agreed. They gathered the Basilisk’s fangs and made their way back to the Room of Requirement in awkward silence. Hermione’s mind was still reeling from Riddle’s taunts. She knew she shouldn’t let them trouble her, but she just couldn’t help it. What would happen if she stopped Harry from going to Voldemort? Now she felt sure that his decision had something to do with Snape’s memory. Although Hermione had no doubt that Harry wouldn’t hesitate sacrificing himself for them all, surely the memory must have played its part. Nevertheless, what was the use of worrying about this when she didn’t even know if they would ever get to the point of retrieving the memory?
That was why Hermione spent the rest of the journey thinking about how she could hint at the diadem and its hiding place to Harry, in case his search wasn’t as fruitful as yesterday. Finally, they spotted Harry on the seventh floor corridor and grounded to a halt.
‘Did you see the diadem? Do you think it’s the Horcrux?’ asked Hermione, unable to contain herself.
‘I did, and I do. But first things first, where the hell have you been?’
‘Chamber of Secrets,’ replied Ron.
‘Chamber-what?’
‘It was all Ron’s idea,’ said Hermione. Maybe this would be just the thing to lift the tension. ‘After you left, we were talking about not being able to destroy the Horcruxes, and he thought of it. Basilisk’s fangs.’ She held out her armful of the items in front of Harry. ‘The sword can destroy Horcruxes only because it’s absorbed the venom. I didn’t remember that, but Ron did. He was amazing!’
Hermione stopped to catch her breath and cast a surreptitious glance in Ron’s direction. She was relieved to find him beaming.
‘That’s great,’ said Harry. ‘But I thought you had to speak-’
‘Ron can speak Parseltongue. Show him, Ron!’
Ron let out a hiss and a snarl to Harry’s utmost amazement. ‘Just imitating you, mate,’ he added. ‘Had to try a few times before I got it right. So, we went in, and ... ’
Ron paused; his excitement vanished. ‘Hermione stabbed the cup,’ he finished sombrely.
Harry seemed flabbergasted at this change of sentiment. ‘What’s happened?’ he asked, looking from Ron to Hermione.
‘It was my nightmare. Riddle taunted me with it.’
‘Is there any-’
‘It’s nothing really,’ Ron cut in. Hermione was thoroughly grateful that he did.
‘So, the diadem?’ asked Ron.
‘Right! I know where it is. He hid it ...’
Hermione tuned Harry out. After all, she’d heard his explanation before. Now that they were preparing to enter the Room of Requirement, her nervousness about Malfoy returned full-force. What if he never turned up? Or worse, what if he didn’t know anything about yesterday and she messed everything up by telling him? How could she speak to him without Harry and Ron knowing? Even if she could, would he agree to help?
None of Hermione’s questions were answered when they went into the Room and asked Ginny, Tonks, and Neville’s grandmother to leave for a while. Once they’d come out again, Hermione couldn’t help glancing around the corridor. Malfoy should be here by now, shouldn’t he? If only she could figure out where he was hiding.
At least she knew where he’d revealed himself yesterday in the Room of Hidden Things. For once, Hermione wished that things were different. She wanted to go towards that section of the room or at least follow Harry there. But it only took them a few steps before he suggested that they split up. Since it would probably look suspicious to argue, Hermione begrudgingly turned to another direction.
She walked away only far enough to be out of Harry and Ron’s sight. Stopping behind a pile of dusty, tattered books, Hermione strained her ears for any sign of movement. Her heart was pounding so loudly that she was afraid she would miss something.
‘Hold it, Potter.’ Hermione’s heart skipped a beat. Should she go out there and face him now? Was he with Crabbe and Goyle?
Hermione listened intently to their conversation. Malfoy seemed to act too normally for someone who already knew what was to happen, although Hermione couldn’t really tell. She had been too far away from them yesterday that she had nothing to compare with now.
‘What’s a die-dum?’ She could hear Goyle say. The battle broke out as soon as Ron called for Harry. Hermione had to duck into a corner to avoid the junk crashing down from Crabbe’s Descendo. Everything was playing out in the same way as yesterday, it seemed.
When the Cruciatus Curse was cast, Malfoy’s scream ‘Stop!’ rang throughout the Room again. Hermione sprang out from behind the tower of hidden objects and shot a Stunning Spell at Crabbe. The spell hit him squarely in the face, knocking him unconscious. Malfoy didn’t pull Crabbe out of the way this time. Hermione turned to look at him. For a moment, she saw something there-understanding, recognition in his eyes-but he narrowed them instantly.
‘Now, now isn’t it the Mudblood? Stupefy!’
The curse came so close to hitting Hermione that she couldn’t tell if it was meant to miss or just poorly-aimed. She didn’t have time to dwell on it as Goyle had raised his wand as well.
‘Expelliarmus!’ yelled Harry and Hermione in unison. Both Malfoy’s and Goyle’s wands shot out from their hands into the heap of junk. Ron fired a Petrifying Curse right then, but Malfoy managed to grab Goyle and use him as a shield against the attack. Leaving the Petrified Goyle behind, he turned tail and fled into the mountain of objects.
‘Coward,’ bellowed Ron. ‘Should we chase after him?’
‘What for?’ asked Harry, his hand now holding the diadem dug up from the pile of junk.
Hermione needed to find an excuse to follow Malfoy alone, but how? Besides, was he expecting her to follow him? Or did he just want to cut short the confrontation with the expectation that Hermione would leave the room with her friends and then sneak away to meet with him elsewhere? In that case, where, exactly?
‘Should we destroy the Horcrux now?’ she asked, hoping to buy some more time.
‘In here? But what about Malfoy? Should we let him see?’
‘He’s already aware that you’ve been after the diadem, Harry. And he knows that you’ve got it. If Malfoy goes out to Voldemort with that knowledge, Voldemort will know that we’ve destroyed it.’
‘True. But does it matter?’
‘Once he knows that the diadem is gone, he will reinforce the protection around the snake. We can’t afford that. Let me go after Malfoy and Stun him. You guys get on with the Horcrux.’
‘Are you sure, Hermione? We’re all in this together.’
‘We don’t have time, Ron. Don’t lose sight of what we’re meant to do. I’ll take the Marauder’s Map and use it to catch up with you.’
‘All right,’ said Harry. ‘But if we don’t see you in twenty minutes, we’ll come back.’
Hermione nodded. There was no use arguing with them any further. Harry and Ron walked towards the door, but then Ron looked back hesitantly.
‘Go,’ she hushed. ‘I’ll be all right. He’s just a cowering ferret anyway.’
‘Who did you just call a cowering ferret, Granger?’ came a drawl as soon as the door sealed itself after Harry and Ron. Hermione turned back to face its owner, relief washing over her. He knew.
‘There’s no time to be bitter about that, Malfoy.’
As she said this, Hermione raised her wand and conjured a clock in mid-air. The clock instantly started to count back from twenty minutes. Malfoy raised his wand and set it back to fifteen.
‘You’ll need the extra five minutes to follow them,’ he said dryly.
He was right. Hermione mentally scolded herself for the lack of provision.
‘But the wand, how did you-’
‘This is called the Room of Requirement for a reason, Granger. Now get down to business.’
‘So you really do know, then?’ asked Hermione.
‘I do not speak in code, Granger. Be explicit.’
Hermione huffed. ‘You know that this whole day has already happened before, that Crabbe was supposed to cast Fiendfyre and die in it, that your mother lied to Voldemort and was punished for it, that Harry lost in the end, that you came to heal me and somehow we’ve ended up in this entire ordeal all over again. Is that explicit enough for you?’
He stared at her for a moment. Hermione was sure that her cheeks were flushed from the speech.
‘There’s no need to recount everything like that,’ he scolded, the wand in his hand trembling. It was his mother’s wand, she realised. ‘But yes, I know everything.’
‘What should we do now?’
‘Knowing why we’re here would’ve made it much easier to figure out what we have to do,’ he observed.
Hermione nodded. ‘I agree, but I don’t have a clue. I’ve just been trying to stick to whatever happened all day.’
‘Same here.’
‘So, should we-could we try to change things?’
‘It’s complicated, Granger. Just one wrong step and we’ll ruin everything.’
‘Do we have anything to lose?’ she asked, feeling her eyes prickling.
‘This chance,’ replied Malfoy, though it sounded like a question rather than an answer. ‘We don’t know if the day will repeat again, now, do we?’
‘No,’ said Hermione quietly. ‘We can only do our best, though.’
‘What if it’s still not enough?’
Hermione could see that despair was taking over Malfoy. She couldn’t let it get to her, too.
‘Have a little faith, Malfoy,’ she snapped. ‘If you’re not going to do anything, then I’ll take care of it myself.’
She didn’t know if antagonising him was a good idea, but at least it seemed to switch him back to business mode.
‘Fine,’ said Malfoy. ‘What do you think we should change?’
‘As you said, we may mess things up completely. The only way I see it, we should only change what is necessary.’
‘Though it must still be something that affects the outcome of the war.’ Malfoy crossed his arms over his chest. ‘In that case, you should expect a complete change of events afterwards.’
‘I agree,’ said Hermione, lifting her eyes to meet his. ‘But isn’t that what we want?’
Malfoy took a deep breath and nodded. ‘It should be something relatively close to the end, then?’
‘The forest, Malfoy. If your mother’s lie hadn’t been found out, Harry would have been alive when they got back to the castle.’
‘No, that’s too risky. Why shouldn’t we stop him from going to the Dark Lord altogether?’
‘I don’t know, but ...’
Hermione didn’t have any solid proof, but she instinctively felt that they shouldn’t change this, that it was something instrumental to the defeat of Voldemort.
‘I don’t have time for your mind games, Granger,’ said Malfoy. ‘You can’t expect me to follow blindly when my mother’s life depends on it.’
‘So that’s all you care about, isn’t it?’ asked Hermione. She wished she could say that she understood his concerns, but the situation required her to be cool-headed. ‘How do I know that you won’t betray us just to keep her safe?’
‘Don’t you think that I want Potter to win as well?’ snapped Malfoy, his eyes flashing. ‘Don’t you think that after all this, I’ve realised that we are all just worthless scum, easily disposed of at any moment by the Dark Lord?’
Hermione narrowed her eyes at him but then relented. ‘Harry handing himself over to Voldemort is vital for us to defeat that monster.’
‘And?’ Malfoy prompted.
‘I haven’t figured out the exact reason yet.’
‘Try me.’
Should she? Hermione glanced at the clock over her head. It was ticking away far too fast; they only had six and a half minutes left. Malfoy seemed to have noticed the dilemma as well.
‘At least tell me the things you know. What’s that diadem for?’
Malfoy’s look told Hermione that he wouldn’t agree to anything without having this question answered. She let out a sigh, reached for her bag, then dropped it onto the floor with a heavy thud. Kneeling down next to the bag, Hermione began rummaging through it for the book she needed. She could practically feel Malfoy’s gaze burning a hole in the back of her head.
Was she doing the right thing? Dumbledore had trusted Harry, Ron, and her not to tell anyone, even the Order of the Phoenix, and here she was, preparing to tell Draco Malfoy the secret to Voldemort’s downfall.
‘Here, read this.’ She thrust the ancient tome into his hands.
‘Are you freaking kidding me? Wait-Secret of the Darkest Art?’
Hermione held up a hand to stall Malfoy’s next remark. ‘I don’t have much time to explain more. Just know that Voldemort’s made a number of Horcruxes. The diadem and his snake, Nagini, are two of them. Once you’ve read the Horcrux section, you’ll understand.’
She didn’t miss the suspicion on Malfoy’s face as he examined the table of contents, although he tucked the book in the crook of his arm and turned back to her in the end. ‘So, what’s the plan?’
‘Plan for what?’
‘To prevent the Dark Lord from finding out about my mother’s lie.’
‘Meeting up in the forest during the one-hour armistice, I guess,’ said Hermione. She didn’t know what they should do afterwards, but formulating a plan didn’t seem possible now. Only two minutes left. ‘We’ll figure it out then.’
‘Fair enough,’ said Malfoy. ‘And I believe you should be able to find me with that ... map thing of yours?’ He indicated the Marauder’s Map lying at Hermione’s feet, which she’d abandoned in the rush to search for the book on Horcruxes.
‘Yes, of course,’ she replied before bending down to pick up the map along with her bag. ‘Harry and Ron are already in the Great Hall. I have to go.’
‘Granger, wait!’
‘What is it now?’
‘I don’t know if it will be of any help or if your giant friend’s told you already, but about Potter going to the Dark Lord ... The first time the curse struck, the Dark Lord himself passed out. It seemed-my father said-as though there was a connection between them.’
But the second time, Voldemort hadn’t fainted, her brain automatically supplied. The connection had been severed after the first curse. If this connection was something important to-Her eyes widened in realisation. She turned around to fully face Malfoy. There was no deception in his eyes.
She would have asked for more details to verify her theory, but the timer went off right then with a shrill clang. Hermione didn’t know what prompted her into doing it, but as she rushed to the door, she called back at Malfoy.
‘I think Voldemort’s accidentally made Harry into a Horcrux.’
***
‘Don’t listen to him,’ Ron said to Harry once Voldemort’s message was over.
It took every ounce of Hermione’s will to repeat her line from yesterday. ‘It’ll be all right.’
They made their way back to the castle, to be engulfed by the suffocating silence. Hermione stopped at the doorway, her heart laden with grief and guilt. Now, more than ever, she felt that she could understand how Harry must be feeling: to know that he had the chance to prevent deaths and sufferings, but didn’t take it. Fred, Lupin, Tonks-all she could have saved this time. But she was afraid that if she did, she’d lose the chance to alter the final outcome of the war.
Hermione walked up and hugged Ginny. They then joined the rest of the Weasley family. Hermione couldn’t look at Fred, Lupin, or Tonks’ body. She couldn’t even meet the eyes of the survivors, knowing that if she failed tonight, some of them would die as well. She watched Harry leave and felt a strong impulse to follow him, to run away and to learn more about Snape’s memory, but she resisted. She needed to wait for someone else. Malfoy’s name still hadn’t appeared on the Marauder’s Map.
She stayed and tried to provide comfort to Ginny, Ron, and the others, but when it proved too much to bear, Hermione silently retreated from the group. She checked the map again, this time to find a tiny dot labelled Draco Malfoy swiftly approaching. Upon arriving at the entrance to the Great Hall, the dot stopped. Hermione looked up but saw no one. Realising that Malfoy must be Disillusioned, she gave a slight nod before turning back to the map. The dot was moving again towards the front door. Hermione slipped into a sheltered corner of the Hall and also cast a Disillusionment Charm on herself.
Thus, the journey to the forest began. She stopped at the front door, unsure as to which direction she should go. The sight of the battle made her insides lurch. Perhaps it was best to avoid the direct path, in case she bumped into one of the few survivors who were trying to bring bodies into the castle. Hermione took out the map again. Apparently Malfoy was taking the longer route, keeping closer to the lake. Hermione decided to do the same.
The more she walked, the more she could feel the chill creeping up on her. The swarm of Dementors-previously lurking among the trees-was now gliding towards the lake. A quick glance at the map confirmed her suspicion: Malfoy’s dot was being driven further and further from the edge of the forest. The Dementors must have sensed his presence. She could also see Harry making his way across the grounds. She didn’t have much time. Hermione briefly wondered if she should attempt to stop Bellatrix without Malfoy, but she instantly scolded herself for the idea. She could not leave him to deal with the Dementors alone.
Sending a Patronus from her spot was as good as signifying her presence to the occupants of the forest. Hermione had no choice but to walk deeper and deeper into the freezing fog. She tried to quicken her steps, but her legs felt like jelly. At this rate, she would never get to the forest soon enough. Hermione turned her head and tried to look at the other side of the forest, but she could hardly see through the fog. What was happening there? She shakily took out the map, her heart pounding. The parchment was so close it touched her nose, and even then, she couldn’t find Harry among the dense trees of the forest. However, something else caught her eye, and her heart sank. The name Draco Malfoy had stopped, hanging precariously at the edge of the lake. It was time to act.
‘Ex ... expecto Patronum,’ she stammered. A tiny jet of silver shot out from the tip of her wand, clearing up the fog for a fleeting second. Hermione could make out the black robes circling around Malfoy, who had reappeared, kneeling on a glassy-grey surface. Frozen water, Hermione realised. Then, she was blind again, fog covering her eyes, her entire body bitten by the cold. The despair gripped at her heart and twisted it like a pair of pliers. It was too late now.
Think of something happy, Hermione, something, she willed herself. Harry will win. But for that to happen, she and Malfoy still had a mission to accomplish. It was their only chance.
‘Expecto Patronum,’ she shouted with all her might, her chest aching. A silver otter leapt out from her wand, heading towards the lake. Hermione ran, racing to keep up with the silver creature, which swept the Dementors aside in its wake. A comforting warmth filled the air. She reached Malfoy at last. Her eyes widened at the cracks that were beginning to spread on the ice. It was melting, becoming too thin to hold the weight. Before Hermione could react, there was a deafening splash as Malfoy’s limp form disappeared underneath the water.
In pure instinct, she tossed her wand onto the grass and-for the second time that day-plunged herself into the water. The warmth that her Patronus had created moments ago was instantly replaced with a paralysing cold.
Hermione blinked rapidly as water stung her eyes. After a few seconds, she managed to keep her eyes wide open. The water was clean, but the lack of light made it almost impossible to see. She caught a glimpse of black amid the dull grey surroundings. It must be his robes. Hermione swam closer. Thank Merlin, it really was him. Quickly discarding the sodden robes and slipping one arm around Malfoy’s waist, she began to swim towards the surface, straining to offset the burden of his weight dragging them down. She was starting to feel short on air.
Finally, they both emerged above the water. Hermione gasped. The fresh air flooding her lungs sent a new wave of energy through her body. It was enough for her to get Malfoy and herself to the shore, which luckily wasn’t too far away.
‘Malfoy!’ she called, shaking his shoulders gently but receiving no response. She lifted Malfoy’s chin up with one hand and tilted his head back with the other hand on his forehead. Hermione tried to feel for his breathing and then checked for his pulse. Nothing.
No, she could not lose him now. Hermione took a deep breath and brought her mouth to his, her hand pinching his nose closed. She breathed into him. One, two. And then chest compressions. One ... two ... three ... four ... Nothing seemed to matter but the numbers reeling in her head. ...twenty-eight ... twenty-nine ... thirty ... Hermione repeated the procedure again and again, each time praying for it to work.
Her heart soared as his chest started to rise and fall again, without her rescue breaths. His eyelids fluttered open while she was trying to place him in a recovery position.
‘C...c...cold,’ he stuttered with difficulty. It was not until then that Hermione realised she was also soaking wet. She shuddered as the chill registered. All the same, Malfoy’s safety came first. If only she had a-Damn it! How could she have forgotten her wand!
‘It’s all right. I’ll be back in a second,’ she said to him and stood up to look for her wand. It was not hard to find, given that the sky was starting to light up. She swiftly came back to Malfoy’s side and used a drying spell on his clothes. Although he didn’t attempt to say anything else, she was glad to see the colour gradually return to his face. Once the drying was done, Hermione conjured a small jar along with a Bluebell flame and placed it next to him.
As Hermione set about drying her own clothes, Malfoy spoke up. ‘What’s happened?’
‘You were driven to the lake by Dementors and nearly drowned.’
‘So, you dragged me up here?’
‘Yeah, and gave you CPR.’
‘CPR?’
‘It’s a Muggle first-aid procedure,’ she replied. ‘Short for Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation, which involves mouth-to-mouth res-’
‘Mouth-to-mouth? You took advantage of me when-’
‘What?’ exclaimed Hermione, incredulous. She looked back at Malfoy, who apparently had shot up to a sitting position at his discovery. ‘You weren’t breathing. I had no other choice.’
‘Are you a witch or what?’
Well, he had a point. ‘I used to volunteer as a lifeguard during summer. It just seemed the natural thing to do,’ said Hermione defensively.
Returning to her current task, she mumbled, ‘It wasn’t like I enjoyed it, anyway. You tasted like the Giant Squid and smelled like fish.’
‘I didn’t know you had a pastime of snogging water crea-’
Malfoy’s taunt was cut short by a loud bang.
‘Oh, no!’ Hermione clapped her hand over her mouth. ‘Harry! The forest!’
She leapt to her feet and ran, the sound of Malfoy’s footsteps thundering close behind her. The trees came closer and closer into her vision. There was a flash of green light. Hermione prayed to the heavens that it was the first curse. But then, Voldemort’s voice made her heart drop.
‘A traitor like Narcissa Malfoy cannot be tolerated. Let this be a lesson for you all.’
Hermione could hear an anguished cry behind, and she suddenly realised that neither she nor Malfoy had any disguise. But it didn’t matter anymore. They had failed. Hermione fell to her knees, barely noticing the mellow light of the rising sun shining on her. She let out a large sob and felt herself fall again, into the darkness.
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