FIC: Where Your Strength Is, for inell, C/Hr
Title: Where Your Strength Is
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Charlie/Hermione
Summary: Hermione has been shut away doing Order research for too long when Charlie is brought to Grimmauld Place, injured after an attack on the dragon preserve.
A/N: inell, lovely thing that she is, bought paid LJ time for a couple of my journals, so this is my way of saying thank you. So NOT my usual writing style, but hey, I’m daring to be different ;)
Word Count: 4127
They put you where they think your strength is. Never mind what you want to do. Never mind that you feel infuriatingly helpless shut up in a musty, half-haunted old house with no one around but a few surviving doxies and a fugitive hippogriff. You are the bookworm, the researcher, the one who goes straight to the library at the first sign of trouble. Therefore you’re the one who will do the research now, think things through, and let the real witches and wizards do the actual work.
Today is no different than any other. Time doesn’t seem to pass at all in the ancient and dusty House of Black, and sometimes as you watch the figures in the portraits that line these walls, you feel as though you’re caught in a portrait yourself. As though you’ve been locked in this time and this place for all eternity, nothing more than a few brushstrokes of oil paint on moldering canvas. You feel like you don’t exist unless someone comes by to view you, to interact with you for a few moments before rushing off once more to do Important Things, leaving you within the walls of this house, confining you as though they are the frame of your own portrait.
You hunch over your latest tome, a treatise from 1345 on the magical properties of goblin entrails, hoping desperately to find something, anything, to help turn the tide of the war. This is what you’ve been instructed to do, and so you’re working away at it, pretending that you’re studying for your NEWTs instead of searching hopelessly for some vague, undefined bit of information that you aren’t even sure exists. Apart from the occasional Order meeting where you listen politely to what everyone else is actually out doing, you never see anyone, never do anything. It’s just you and your notes and your books. Amazing how something that once seemed like an idle fantasy of the ideal way to live has quickly became a lifestyle you despise.
So absorbed are you in your reading that you don’t hear the babble of voices at first, and it is only the harsh cry of pain coming from the parlour that alerts you to the presence of other people in the house. Wand in hand, you creep out of the library and down the hall until you’re hovering just outside the door, listening to the commotion. You hear snatches of conversation- “You-Know-Who... Dragons... deaths... Charlie.”
Your eyes widen and the hand gripping your wand tightens, knuckles whitening. You walk into the room and clear your throat. Albus Dumbledore and Severus Snape are huddled in the corner, heads close together as they have a furious, whispered conference. Molly Weasley is kneeling by the sofa, mumbling incoherently as she sobs, Remus Lupin at her side, a hand on her shoulder. And laid out on the sofa is Charlie Weasley. Unconscious, his myriad freckles standing out in startling contrast against his deathly pale skin. You move closer until you’re standing next to Molly. You feel like a ghost; no one acknowledges your arrival, no one notices your existence. You take a moment to look at the man before you, at the blood staining his robes, at his bruised cheek and the jagged, torn flesh of his neck, at the cruel, blistering burns on his hands.
“Isn’t anyone going to heal him?” you blurt, and the noise dies down immediately. All eyes in the room are upon you. All eyes but Charlie’s, who remains comatose before you. No one says a word, and you mutter, “Honestly!”
You aren’t a mediwitch but you’re well versed in healing charms and basic first aid, and it only takes a few moments to heal what you can see. “curatio tergum” for the burns, “minuo constum” to stem the blood flow.
“Molly, help me take these robes off,” you say, surprised by how businesslike your voice is. But this has to be done and your three former professors have now gathered around the fireplace, talking to someone over the Floo Network, leaving you alone with Charlie’s distraught mum. Molly startles a little but helps you strip off Charlie’s clothing until he is in nothing but his navy boxers and an undershirt that must once have been white but is now stained in a chaotic rust-coloured pattern. You run your wand through the air above his body, murmuring every healing spell you can think of. Spells to clean cuts, to heal internal injuries, to stop hemorrhages. You aren’t sure what you’re supposed to do now, so you whisper, “What happened?”
“Romania,” Molly says before dissolving into tears. “Oh my baby! My baby boy!”
“Someone, please! Tell me what happened!” you shout, your patience wearing thin. You don’t bloody have the time for this, not when Charlie Weasley is draped before you, looking drained and broken and lifeless. You’ve only ever seen Charlie strong and vital, whether crashing tables in the air with Bill and laughing like a maniac, or preparing to root out a nest of Death Eaters, jaw set in unyielding determination.
Remus returns to your side and speaks quietly. “They attacked the dragon preserve in Romania. Three people were killed, seven injured.”
“Why did they-“
“They’ve taken the dragons, Hermione,” Remus says, his words punctuated by Mrs. Weasley’s sobs. “The dragon-keepers who witnessed the attack say that had some kind of magical artifact. Green orbs that glowed and made some sort of sputtering noise. We’re not sure exactly what they are or how they work, but the dragons followed them, as if they were put under a thrall.”
“Only the Dark Lord and Walden MacNair seem to know anything about them,” Professor Snape puts in, scowling. “But I do know that they’ll use the dragons to lay siege to us as well as to attack Muggles.”
“And what happened to Charlie?”
“He tried to fight them off and he got caught in the spellfire,” Remus says, hand once more landing on Molly’s shoulder. “We don’t know which curses he took, but he seems intact. It looks like you’ve done all you can for him physically, Hermione. We hope he’ll awaken on his own soon.”
The rest of the day passes in a whirl of Order members and frenzied arguments and strategies thought and rethought, but you stay by Charlie’s side, watching the shallow, barely-there movement of his chest, a visual promise to you that he’s still alive, still hanging on. You flip through several books on healing, but without know what curses hit him, you can’t do much more. You feel powerless and angry at your books, as though they’ve betrayed you by withholding the information you so desperately need.
As midnight approaches, you conjure a stretcher and ease Charlie onto it. No one notices you as you float him up the stairs to one of the vast, disused spare bedrooms. You fold back the covers and transfer him to the bed, and then you tuck him in. He doesn’t stir. You ponder what to do next, but you have no answers. You hate that you can’t do anything, and with a heavy sigh you pull a chair to his bedside and sit down. You examine his messy red hair and the scar you never noticed before scything through his left eyebrow. You imagine the way his blue eyes usually sparkle, mischievous without inspiring the sense of alarm you usually feel when you see that expression adorning the twins’ faces. Your eyes follow the contours of his muscular arms where they lay atop the blankets, the skin so weather-beaten that his freckles almost blend in, to the burned hands you’ve bandaged yourself.
You’ve known Charlie for years without knowing him at all. In your mind you’ve always identified him as Ron’s older brother, the handsome one who works with dragons, the amiable one who has always been closer to Bill than any of his other siblings. But now as you sit here, you feel an inexplicable sense of panic rising from some deep place within you, as though you’ve almost lost something precious, though that’s absurd. Charlie, after all, was never yours to lose.
You’re not sure how long you sit there, just watching him, but sometime the next morning Professor Lupin gently shakes you awake and your muscles scream in an agony of protest. You realize that you’ve spent the night bent at a ninety degree angle, sitting in the chair with your head resting on the mattress, your hand holding Charlie’s.
~*~
There are days when you want to kill him. On a rational level, you can understand his frustration. He is boarded up in this mausoleum just like you are, his curse injuries chaining him down, the lack of news driving him mad. You’ve been at his bedside every day, feeding him at first and then watching him eat as his strength returned to him. You’ve listened to him talking about the dragons- his dragons. His life, his friends, the dragon-keepers who died in the last raid. You’ve told him about the adventures you’ve had with Harry and Ron, about the research you’ve been doing for the Order since you finished school over a year ago. You talk about the plans you had that have been put on hold, auror training or university to further your interest in arithmancy. You both talk about your parents, your families, the differences between growing up as a wizard and as a Muggle. For two weeks it’s been you and him and mostly it’s been all right. Mostly he’s been friendly and funny, and you find yourself happy just to hear his voice, his inflection, happy just to sit next to him and continue your research while he sleeps. You try to ignore the way your breath catches every time he says your name, the way you can’t help but return his confident smiles that make you feel like you’re the center of his world.
But then there are days when his frustration boils over and he becomes petulant and full of complaints, and you just want to throttle him.
“Porridge today,” you say as you walk into the shadowed room, a breakfast tray in your hands. You set it down on the night table and with a flick of your wand, the curtains draw themselves open. The figure in the bed curses, flinching at the sudden influx of light.
“Hermione, for fuck’s sake I’m not awake yet!”
“It’s half past nine and it’s time for your walk,” you counter. You’re sleepy and irritable from the all-nighter you pulled in the library last night, searching for some trace of an ancient Chinese spell Professor Snape thinks he might once have heard about. Once. Years ago. That might pertain to dragons. Maybe. You hate that man sometimes.
“My back’s too sore,” Charlie says, and you realise that it’s going to be one of those days.
“Charlie...”
“You’re not my mother, Hermione. What the fuck is it to you whether I get up at nine thirty or four p.m. or not at all?”
“Oh, I’m so sorry!” you retort, and you know your voice has taken on that shrill quality you've never quite grown out of. “Far be it from me to actually care what happens to you! God knows I don’t have the right to claim any place in your life. I’ve only been beside you every bloody day these past weeks! I’m only the one who’s been trying to nurse you back to-“
“I don’t need nursing, I don’t need a walk, I don’t need you hovering!”
“Fine! Stay there and rot for all I care!”
You slam out of the room, tears threatening to spill over your cheeks, and you go straight to the library and back to your hated pile of books.
He comes to find you within ten minutes, dressed in one of his mother’s knitted jumpers, a horrid olive colour that does nothing for his features, and an old pair of Muggle-style jeans. His expression is contrite as he holds onto the doorframe to keep himself upright. You can see the effort of getting dressed and moving down the stairs etched in pain across his face, and your heart melts.
“Hermione,” he begins, his voice shaky.
“Never mind,” you say, walking toward him. “It’s all right.”
“I shouldn’t have said that. You’ve done so much for me.”
“Charlie-“
“I shouldn’t have said I don’t need you.”
You stand before him, heart rate accelerating. You love the pattern of freckles dusted across his cheeks. You’ve memorized their position on the bridge of his nose. You know what those coppery lashes look like when his eyes are closed and they’re flush against his skin, which has lost much of its tanned health. Without thinking, you reach out and brush some of his untidy fringe from his forehead, feeling perspiration on his skin from the effort of standing up.
“You’re overtaxing yourself,” you say quietly, wondering if you’re imagining that he’s leaning into your touch just a little. “Let me get you to the sofa.”
He lets you slip an arm around his waist, his own arm settling across your shoulders as you guide him to the couch. He is a head taller than you are, and it feels like you were made to fit against him like this. You ache with this knowledge, that you can be so close to him but no closer, his nursemaid but nothing more. You want him to undress you, lay you out on the rug by the fireplace, show you just how much he cares as he presses kisses into your flesh. But you know he doesn’t want you, not like that. And why should he? You’ve always been the smart one, the proper one. You know you have nothing to offer him, that you aren’t beautiful or interesting or courageous. You focus on helping him across the room and try to steer him into a seated position, ignoring your tumultuous thoughts.
The git refuses to sit.
“Charlie, you’ve got to rest,” you say, avoiding his eyes. You’re afraid that if you look into those clear blue depths just now, you’ll give yourself away and he won’t want you to come near him again. You’re just his little brother’s bookish friend, after all. You’re just the one who’s been looking after him because you’re the only one around.
But he doesn’t let go. “Hermione, look at me.”
You can resist responding to the challenge in his tone and you look up at him, chin tilted defiantly. “And now you’ll sit down?”
He just stares at you. “I shouldn’t have said I don’t need you,” he repeats. “Because I do. You have no idea, Hermione.”
His voice cracks and your breath catches, and you aren’t sure which of you moves first but his lips brush against yours, his arms tightening around you, turning you a bit so that you’re facing him completely and you’re holding his waist as though you’re afraid that you’ll die if you let go, and maybe you will. His lips are dry and malleable and perfect, and his hands are in your hair, arching you backward a bit.
“Charlie,” you gasp, pulling back, staring at him incredulously. But his face has always been so transparent, so readable, and you can see only warmth and fervour and yearning there and it opens something inside you and you’re back in the circle of his strong arms, lips parting to allow him to taste you, tasting him back.
You lose track of time, only becoming aware of your surroundings when someone clears his throat behind you. You should probably spring away from Charlie guiltily, but you don’t want to let go. Instead you lean back a little to see Remus Lupin smiling gently at the two of you.
“Sorry to interrupt,” he says, “but we have news.”
Charlie’s grip tenses around you. “What’s happened?”
“Severus has learned where the dragons are. But we don’t know how to free them from Voldemort’s thrall.”
“He hasn’t attacked with them yet, then,” you say.
“No. But it could be any time.”
“How did he find them? Did he track those orbs?” Charlie asks.
Remus shakes his head. “No. He found out through Narcissa Malfoy. She wants to take a dragon to Azkaban to rescue Lucius. According to her, they’re being controlled by MacNair. She wants to go with Severus tonight because Voldemort is planning on using them tomorrow.”
“Snape.” Charlie’s jaw is clenched tightly. “He must have known about the original attack. Mustn’t he have?”
Remus shakes his head. “Voldemort doesn’t inform his followers of any of his plans until it’s time to implement them.”
“But he must have some clue how those orbs work!”
“He knows that MacNair is in charge of the dragons. Beyond that, he has no idea.”
Charlie nods, his chin brushing against the top of your head. “Thanks for telling us, Remus.”
Professor Lupin nods and leaves you, and the two of you stand wrapped up together for a long time.
~*~
You’re supposed to wait like a good little Head Girl until they’ve decided what to do. Charlie’s supposed to lie there like an invalid. But he has an odd, determined expression on his face, and you can’t help the way your curiosity is rising.
“What is it?” you ask him.
“MacNair. The executioner.”
You nod.
“You know what we saw. Death Eaters in dragonhide cloaks, wielding green orbs that seemed to spit and hiss.”
“Yes, but we’ve looked into what those orbs are. We still don’t know.”
“And Snape doesn’t think there’s any evidence of the orbs at their encampment?”
“Apparently not.” Your brow furrows, wondering what he’s thinking.
“They had masks on, Hermione. And no one knows what those orbs were. What if they weren’t anything at all?”
“You mean a decoy?”
“Exactly. What if those hissing noises were coming from MacNair himself?”
You pause, taking in what he is suggesting. It makes a terrible kind of sense. “You think he can speak to the dragons? Like a parselmouth?”
“Dragon-keepers have tried speaking in parseltongue before and it doesn’t work. But if MacNair knows a derivative, if he can speak the language of dragons and convince them to come with him-”
“And we spend all of our time trying to figure out what those orbs are instead-”
“Then we’d never understand how they were doing it.”
You stare at him, eyes wide. “But Charlie, what can we do? If MacNair can speak to them and keep them loyal to him and under his control, there isn’t anything we can do!”
“No? We can go rescue them, Hermione. Maybe in one of those books in the library-”
“No more books!” you say, and then you see the teasing twinkle in his eye. “You have a plan.”
“I need your help. We have to act quickly. We don’t have time for the Order to convene, not if Voldemort’s planning on attacking with the dragons tomorrow.”
You swallow hard, awash in a dizzying aggregation of thoughts and feelings. You’ve always done what you’re told to do, only ever broken the rules when you truly believed it had to be done. And yet... and yet Charlie is sitting next to you, a light in his eyes you haven’t seen since he came here, and he’s asking for your help. And you know that whatever it is he’s proposing, this is one of those instances when the rules should be broken for the greater good.
You lean in and graze your lips across his. A pledge, a promise, a show of support. “What are we going to do, then?”
~*~
He is exhausted and so are you, but adrenaline is coursing through you and you aren’t sure if you’ll ever be able to sleep again. The two of you tumble out of the fireplace in the kitchen of 12 Grimmauld Place around five in the morning, and the whooshing in your ears from the journey through the Floo Network is replaced by a babble of angry, anxious voices. You hear words -“scared to death - think before you act - dragons! - safety and -”
You drag yourself to your feet, your hair a matted, dirty mass, your muscles aching from your wild flight, clinging to the back of a dragon, keeping your wand trained on MacNair as Charlie held him upright on the dragon next to you.
“Where have you been?” Molly Weasley shrieks and before you can take in your surroundings, her arms are around you both, squeezing you until you can barely breathe. “Neither of you here, that obscure note, no way to contact you!”
“Mum!” Charlie gasps, struggling out of her death grasp and rescuing you as well. He promptly envelops you in his own embrace, your back against his chest, his chin atop your head. You lace your fingers with his where they lay across your stomach.
“What have you done?” Professor Snape says, stepping out of the shadows.
“We took them back,” Charlie says, a note of challenge in his tone.
“You what?”
“We went to the encampment,” you say slowly, aware that at least a dozen Order members are in the room, staring at you incredulously. “We stunned six Death Eaters and we placed MacNair under the Imperius curse.”
“You used an Unforgivable?” says Kingsley Shacklebolt, though he doesn’t sound as though he is admonishing you.
“He’s learned how to communicate with the dragons,” Charlie supplies. “We put him under the curse so that we could make him talk to them.”
“In order to lead them back to Romania,” you add.
“We had him tell them not to listen to him anymore once they were home, and then we stunned him, bound him, and sent him to the magical law enforcement department. I’m sure you’ll hear about it as soon as you go in this morning, Kings.”
“Why didn’t you wait for us?” asks Dumbledore. “You might have been terribly injured.”
“Or killed!” Molly says.
“It was time to act,” you say, clasping Charlie’s fingers close. “They were getting ready to move. If we hadn’t gone when we did, people would have died.”
His mother’s eyes narrow. “Charlie Weasley, in your condition! You can barely stand up.”
“We did what had to be done. Hermione... she performed a largior spiritus. She shared her strength and her energy with me.”
A chaos of voices arises once more, but Dumbledore holds up his hands. “We shall reconvene at seven o’clock this evening. In the meantime, I think our two heroes need to get some rest.”
It takes you a moment to realise that he is referring to you and Charlie. “Come on, love,” Charlie whispers in your ear and together you leave the kitchen.
“Heroes, are we?” you tease as you make your way up the stairs to Charlie’s room.
He shuts the door behind you and gathers you into a hug even tighter than his mother’s. “You were brilliant out there. I couldn’t have done it without you, Hermione. Not without your strength and your quick thinking.”
You kiss him then, your mouth hungry against his, your tongue questing, sliding between his lips, finding his waiting for you, stroking against yours. “Charlie, Charlie,” you gasp and he presses you against the door, his hands tangling in your already tangled hair.
“Magnificent, beautiful,” he whispers back, and his lips burn a path along your throat, his tongue flicking out, your head falling back, your fingers digging into his shoulders.
“I wasn’t afraid,” you say. “You were beside me and I felt so strong.”
He lifts you up a bit and you wrap your legs around his waist, feeling his arousal against you and you almost cry out at how perfect this is. You wonder if you should say more, should think this through. But not tonight. Only hours ago you threw aside your prescribed role and acted. Tonight is about taking action, and you let go of your fears and your insecurities, you let go of the role you’ve been performing all your life. You lose yourself in the tumble backward into his bed, in the haze of touch and taste and pure sensation. You lose yourself in the harmony of voices and rhythm, and you find yourself again in your love for Charlie Weasley and in his love for you.
You fall asleep much later in his arms, your head on his shoulder, your legs entwined with his. You know that it doesn’t matter what the day may bring or what will come with the war. You find strength now in this man whose strength you gave back to him. You find strength in the love you share.
FIN
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Charlie/Hermione
Summary: Hermione has been shut away doing Order research for too long when Charlie is brought to Grimmauld Place, injured after an attack on the dragon preserve.
A/N: inell, lovely thing that she is, bought paid LJ time for a couple of my journals, so this is my way of saying thank you. So NOT my usual writing style, but hey, I’m daring to be different ;)
Word Count: 4127
They put you where they think your strength is. Never mind what you want to do. Never mind that you feel infuriatingly helpless shut up in a musty, half-haunted old house with no one around but a few surviving doxies and a fugitive hippogriff. You are the bookworm, the researcher, the one who goes straight to the library at the first sign of trouble. Therefore you’re the one who will do the research now, think things through, and let the real witches and wizards do the actual work.
Today is no different than any other. Time doesn’t seem to pass at all in the ancient and dusty House of Black, and sometimes as you watch the figures in the portraits that line these walls, you feel as though you’re caught in a portrait yourself. As though you’ve been locked in this time and this place for all eternity, nothing more than a few brushstrokes of oil paint on moldering canvas. You feel like you don’t exist unless someone comes by to view you, to interact with you for a few moments before rushing off once more to do Important Things, leaving you within the walls of this house, confining you as though they are the frame of your own portrait.
You hunch over your latest tome, a treatise from 1345 on the magical properties of goblin entrails, hoping desperately to find something, anything, to help turn the tide of the war. This is what you’ve been instructed to do, and so you’re working away at it, pretending that you’re studying for your NEWTs instead of searching hopelessly for some vague, undefined bit of information that you aren’t even sure exists. Apart from the occasional Order meeting where you listen politely to what everyone else is actually out doing, you never see anyone, never do anything. It’s just you and your notes and your books. Amazing how something that once seemed like an idle fantasy of the ideal way to live has quickly became a lifestyle you despise.
So absorbed are you in your reading that you don’t hear the babble of voices at first, and it is only the harsh cry of pain coming from the parlour that alerts you to the presence of other people in the house. Wand in hand, you creep out of the library and down the hall until you’re hovering just outside the door, listening to the commotion. You hear snatches of conversation- “You-Know-Who... Dragons... deaths... Charlie.”
Your eyes widen and the hand gripping your wand tightens, knuckles whitening. You walk into the room and clear your throat. Albus Dumbledore and Severus Snape are huddled in the corner, heads close together as they have a furious, whispered conference. Molly Weasley is kneeling by the sofa, mumbling incoherently as she sobs, Remus Lupin at her side, a hand on her shoulder. And laid out on the sofa is Charlie Weasley. Unconscious, his myriad freckles standing out in startling contrast against his deathly pale skin. You move closer until you’re standing next to Molly. You feel like a ghost; no one acknowledges your arrival, no one notices your existence. You take a moment to look at the man before you, at the blood staining his robes, at his bruised cheek and the jagged, torn flesh of his neck, at the cruel, blistering burns on his hands.
“Isn’t anyone going to heal him?” you blurt, and the noise dies down immediately. All eyes in the room are upon you. All eyes but Charlie’s, who remains comatose before you. No one says a word, and you mutter, “Honestly!”
You aren’t a mediwitch but you’re well versed in healing charms and basic first aid, and it only takes a few moments to heal what you can see. “curatio tergum” for the burns, “minuo constum” to stem the blood flow.
“Molly, help me take these robes off,” you say, surprised by how businesslike your voice is. But this has to be done and your three former professors have now gathered around the fireplace, talking to someone over the Floo Network, leaving you alone with Charlie’s distraught mum. Molly startles a little but helps you strip off Charlie’s clothing until he is in nothing but his navy boxers and an undershirt that must once have been white but is now stained in a chaotic rust-coloured pattern. You run your wand through the air above his body, murmuring every healing spell you can think of. Spells to clean cuts, to heal internal injuries, to stop hemorrhages. You aren’t sure what you’re supposed to do now, so you whisper, “What happened?”
“Romania,” Molly says before dissolving into tears. “Oh my baby! My baby boy!”
“Someone, please! Tell me what happened!” you shout, your patience wearing thin. You don’t bloody have the time for this, not when Charlie Weasley is draped before you, looking drained and broken and lifeless. You’ve only ever seen Charlie strong and vital, whether crashing tables in the air with Bill and laughing like a maniac, or preparing to root out a nest of Death Eaters, jaw set in unyielding determination.
Remus returns to your side and speaks quietly. “They attacked the dragon preserve in Romania. Three people were killed, seven injured.”
“Why did they-“
“They’ve taken the dragons, Hermione,” Remus says, his words punctuated by Mrs. Weasley’s sobs. “The dragon-keepers who witnessed the attack say that had some kind of magical artifact. Green orbs that glowed and made some sort of sputtering noise. We’re not sure exactly what they are or how they work, but the dragons followed them, as if they were put under a thrall.”
“Only the Dark Lord and Walden MacNair seem to know anything about them,” Professor Snape puts in, scowling. “But I do know that they’ll use the dragons to lay siege to us as well as to attack Muggles.”
“And what happened to Charlie?”
“He tried to fight them off and he got caught in the spellfire,” Remus says, hand once more landing on Molly’s shoulder. “We don’t know which curses he took, but he seems intact. It looks like you’ve done all you can for him physically, Hermione. We hope he’ll awaken on his own soon.”
The rest of the day passes in a whirl of Order members and frenzied arguments and strategies thought and rethought, but you stay by Charlie’s side, watching the shallow, barely-there movement of his chest, a visual promise to you that he’s still alive, still hanging on. You flip through several books on healing, but without know what curses hit him, you can’t do much more. You feel powerless and angry at your books, as though they’ve betrayed you by withholding the information you so desperately need.
As midnight approaches, you conjure a stretcher and ease Charlie onto it. No one notices you as you float him up the stairs to one of the vast, disused spare bedrooms. You fold back the covers and transfer him to the bed, and then you tuck him in. He doesn’t stir. You ponder what to do next, but you have no answers. You hate that you can’t do anything, and with a heavy sigh you pull a chair to his bedside and sit down. You examine his messy red hair and the scar you never noticed before scything through his left eyebrow. You imagine the way his blue eyes usually sparkle, mischievous without inspiring the sense of alarm you usually feel when you see that expression adorning the twins’ faces. Your eyes follow the contours of his muscular arms where they lay atop the blankets, the skin so weather-beaten that his freckles almost blend in, to the burned hands you’ve bandaged yourself.
You’ve known Charlie for years without knowing him at all. In your mind you’ve always identified him as Ron’s older brother, the handsome one who works with dragons, the amiable one who has always been closer to Bill than any of his other siblings. But now as you sit here, you feel an inexplicable sense of panic rising from some deep place within you, as though you’ve almost lost something precious, though that’s absurd. Charlie, after all, was never yours to lose.
You’re not sure how long you sit there, just watching him, but sometime the next morning Professor Lupin gently shakes you awake and your muscles scream in an agony of protest. You realize that you’ve spent the night bent at a ninety degree angle, sitting in the chair with your head resting on the mattress, your hand holding Charlie’s.
~*~
There are days when you want to kill him. On a rational level, you can understand his frustration. He is boarded up in this mausoleum just like you are, his curse injuries chaining him down, the lack of news driving him mad. You’ve been at his bedside every day, feeding him at first and then watching him eat as his strength returned to him. You’ve listened to him talking about the dragons- his dragons. His life, his friends, the dragon-keepers who died in the last raid. You’ve told him about the adventures you’ve had with Harry and Ron, about the research you’ve been doing for the Order since you finished school over a year ago. You talk about the plans you had that have been put on hold, auror training or university to further your interest in arithmancy. You both talk about your parents, your families, the differences between growing up as a wizard and as a Muggle. For two weeks it’s been you and him and mostly it’s been all right. Mostly he’s been friendly and funny, and you find yourself happy just to hear his voice, his inflection, happy just to sit next to him and continue your research while he sleeps. You try to ignore the way your breath catches every time he says your name, the way you can’t help but return his confident smiles that make you feel like you’re the center of his world.
But then there are days when his frustration boils over and he becomes petulant and full of complaints, and you just want to throttle him.
“Porridge today,” you say as you walk into the shadowed room, a breakfast tray in your hands. You set it down on the night table and with a flick of your wand, the curtains draw themselves open. The figure in the bed curses, flinching at the sudden influx of light.
“Hermione, for fuck’s sake I’m not awake yet!”
“It’s half past nine and it’s time for your walk,” you counter. You’re sleepy and irritable from the all-nighter you pulled in the library last night, searching for some trace of an ancient Chinese spell Professor Snape thinks he might once have heard about. Once. Years ago. That might pertain to dragons. Maybe. You hate that man sometimes.
“My back’s too sore,” Charlie says, and you realise that it’s going to be one of those days.
“Charlie...”
“You’re not my mother, Hermione. What the fuck is it to you whether I get up at nine thirty or four p.m. or not at all?”
“Oh, I’m so sorry!” you retort, and you know your voice has taken on that shrill quality you've never quite grown out of. “Far be it from me to actually care what happens to you! God knows I don’t have the right to claim any place in your life. I’ve only been beside you every bloody day these past weeks! I’m only the one who’s been trying to nurse you back to-“
“I don’t need nursing, I don’t need a walk, I don’t need you hovering!”
“Fine! Stay there and rot for all I care!”
You slam out of the room, tears threatening to spill over your cheeks, and you go straight to the library and back to your hated pile of books.
He comes to find you within ten minutes, dressed in one of his mother’s knitted jumpers, a horrid olive colour that does nothing for his features, and an old pair of Muggle-style jeans. His expression is contrite as he holds onto the doorframe to keep himself upright. You can see the effort of getting dressed and moving down the stairs etched in pain across his face, and your heart melts.
“Hermione,” he begins, his voice shaky.
“Never mind,” you say, walking toward him. “It’s all right.”
“I shouldn’t have said that. You’ve done so much for me.”
“Charlie-“
“I shouldn’t have said I don’t need you.”
You stand before him, heart rate accelerating. You love the pattern of freckles dusted across his cheeks. You’ve memorized their position on the bridge of his nose. You know what those coppery lashes look like when his eyes are closed and they’re flush against his skin, which has lost much of its tanned health. Without thinking, you reach out and brush some of his untidy fringe from his forehead, feeling perspiration on his skin from the effort of standing up.
“You’re overtaxing yourself,” you say quietly, wondering if you’re imagining that he’s leaning into your touch just a little. “Let me get you to the sofa.”
He lets you slip an arm around his waist, his own arm settling across your shoulders as you guide him to the couch. He is a head taller than you are, and it feels like you were made to fit against him like this. You ache with this knowledge, that you can be so close to him but no closer, his nursemaid but nothing more. You want him to undress you, lay you out on the rug by the fireplace, show you just how much he cares as he presses kisses into your flesh. But you know he doesn’t want you, not like that. And why should he? You’ve always been the smart one, the proper one. You know you have nothing to offer him, that you aren’t beautiful or interesting or courageous. You focus on helping him across the room and try to steer him into a seated position, ignoring your tumultuous thoughts.
The git refuses to sit.
“Charlie, you’ve got to rest,” you say, avoiding his eyes. You’re afraid that if you look into those clear blue depths just now, you’ll give yourself away and he won’t want you to come near him again. You’re just his little brother’s bookish friend, after all. You’re just the one who’s been looking after him because you’re the only one around.
But he doesn’t let go. “Hermione, look at me.”
You can resist responding to the challenge in his tone and you look up at him, chin tilted defiantly. “And now you’ll sit down?”
He just stares at you. “I shouldn’t have said I don’t need you,” he repeats. “Because I do. You have no idea, Hermione.”
His voice cracks and your breath catches, and you aren’t sure which of you moves first but his lips brush against yours, his arms tightening around you, turning you a bit so that you’re facing him completely and you’re holding his waist as though you’re afraid that you’ll die if you let go, and maybe you will. His lips are dry and malleable and perfect, and his hands are in your hair, arching you backward a bit.
“Charlie,” you gasp, pulling back, staring at him incredulously. But his face has always been so transparent, so readable, and you can see only warmth and fervour and yearning there and it opens something inside you and you’re back in the circle of his strong arms, lips parting to allow him to taste you, tasting him back.
You lose track of time, only becoming aware of your surroundings when someone clears his throat behind you. You should probably spring away from Charlie guiltily, but you don’t want to let go. Instead you lean back a little to see Remus Lupin smiling gently at the two of you.
“Sorry to interrupt,” he says, “but we have news.”
Charlie’s grip tenses around you. “What’s happened?”
“Severus has learned where the dragons are. But we don’t know how to free them from Voldemort’s thrall.”
“He hasn’t attacked with them yet, then,” you say.
“No. But it could be any time.”
“How did he find them? Did he track those orbs?” Charlie asks.
Remus shakes his head. “No. He found out through Narcissa Malfoy. She wants to take a dragon to Azkaban to rescue Lucius. According to her, they’re being controlled by MacNair. She wants to go with Severus tonight because Voldemort is planning on using them tomorrow.”
“Snape.” Charlie’s jaw is clenched tightly. “He must have known about the original attack. Mustn’t he have?”
Remus shakes his head. “Voldemort doesn’t inform his followers of any of his plans until it’s time to implement them.”
“But he must have some clue how those orbs work!”
“He knows that MacNair is in charge of the dragons. Beyond that, he has no idea.”
Charlie nods, his chin brushing against the top of your head. “Thanks for telling us, Remus.”
Professor Lupin nods and leaves you, and the two of you stand wrapped up together for a long time.
~*~
You’re supposed to wait like a good little Head Girl until they’ve decided what to do. Charlie’s supposed to lie there like an invalid. But he has an odd, determined expression on his face, and you can’t help the way your curiosity is rising.
“What is it?” you ask him.
“MacNair. The executioner.”
You nod.
“You know what we saw. Death Eaters in dragonhide cloaks, wielding green orbs that seemed to spit and hiss.”
“Yes, but we’ve looked into what those orbs are. We still don’t know.”
“And Snape doesn’t think there’s any evidence of the orbs at their encampment?”
“Apparently not.” Your brow furrows, wondering what he’s thinking.
“They had masks on, Hermione. And no one knows what those orbs were. What if they weren’t anything at all?”
“You mean a decoy?”
“Exactly. What if those hissing noises were coming from MacNair himself?”
You pause, taking in what he is suggesting. It makes a terrible kind of sense. “You think he can speak to the dragons? Like a parselmouth?”
“Dragon-keepers have tried speaking in parseltongue before and it doesn’t work. But if MacNair knows a derivative, if he can speak the language of dragons and convince them to come with him-”
“And we spend all of our time trying to figure out what those orbs are instead-”
“Then we’d never understand how they were doing it.”
You stare at him, eyes wide. “But Charlie, what can we do? If MacNair can speak to them and keep them loyal to him and under his control, there isn’t anything we can do!”
“No? We can go rescue them, Hermione. Maybe in one of those books in the library-”
“No more books!” you say, and then you see the teasing twinkle in his eye. “You have a plan.”
“I need your help. We have to act quickly. We don’t have time for the Order to convene, not if Voldemort’s planning on attacking with the dragons tomorrow.”
You swallow hard, awash in a dizzying aggregation of thoughts and feelings. You’ve always done what you’re told to do, only ever broken the rules when you truly believed it had to be done. And yet... and yet Charlie is sitting next to you, a light in his eyes you haven’t seen since he came here, and he’s asking for your help. And you know that whatever it is he’s proposing, this is one of those instances when the rules should be broken for the greater good.
You lean in and graze your lips across his. A pledge, a promise, a show of support. “What are we going to do, then?”
~*~
He is exhausted and so are you, but adrenaline is coursing through you and you aren’t sure if you’ll ever be able to sleep again. The two of you tumble out of the fireplace in the kitchen of 12 Grimmauld Place around five in the morning, and the whooshing in your ears from the journey through the Floo Network is replaced by a babble of angry, anxious voices. You hear words -“scared to death - think before you act - dragons! - safety and -”
You drag yourself to your feet, your hair a matted, dirty mass, your muscles aching from your wild flight, clinging to the back of a dragon, keeping your wand trained on MacNair as Charlie held him upright on the dragon next to you.
“Where have you been?” Molly Weasley shrieks and before you can take in your surroundings, her arms are around you both, squeezing you until you can barely breathe. “Neither of you here, that obscure note, no way to contact you!”
“Mum!” Charlie gasps, struggling out of her death grasp and rescuing you as well. He promptly envelops you in his own embrace, your back against his chest, his chin atop your head. You lace your fingers with his where they lay across your stomach.
“What have you done?” Professor Snape says, stepping out of the shadows.
“We took them back,” Charlie says, a note of challenge in his tone.
“You what?”
“We went to the encampment,” you say slowly, aware that at least a dozen Order members are in the room, staring at you incredulously. “We stunned six Death Eaters and we placed MacNair under the Imperius curse.”
“You used an Unforgivable?” says Kingsley Shacklebolt, though he doesn’t sound as though he is admonishing you.
“He’s learned how to communicate with the dragons,” Charlie supplies. “We put him under the curse so that we could make him talk to them.”
“In order to lead them back to Romania,” you add.
“We had him tell them not to listen to him anymore once they were home, and then we stunned him, bound him, and sent him to the magical law enforcement department. I’m sure you’ll hear about it as soon as you go in this morning, Kings.”
“Why didn’t you wait for us?” asks Dumbledore. “You might have been terribly injured.”
“Or killed!” Molly says.
“It was time to act,” you say, clasping Charlie’s fingers close. “They were getting ready to move. If we hadn’t gone when we did, people would have died.”
His mother’s eyes narrow. “Charlie Weasley, in your condition! You can barely stand up.”
“We did what had to be done. Hermione... she performed a largior spiritus. She shared her strength and her energy with me.”
A chaos of voices arises once more, but Dumbledore holds up his hands. “We shall reconvene at seven o’clock this evening. In the meantime, I think our two heroes need to get some rest.”
It takes you a moment to realise that he is referring to you and Charlie. “Come on, love,” Charlie whispers in your ear and together you leave the kitchen.
“Heroes, are we?” you tease as you make your way up the stairs to Charlie’s room.
He shuts the door behind you and gathers you into a hug even tighter than his mother’s. “You were brilliant out there. I couldn’t have done it without you, Hermione. Not without your strength and your quick thinking.”
You kiss him then, your mouth hungry against his, your tongue questing, sliding between his lips, finding his waiting for you, stroking against yours. “Charlie, Charlie,” you gasp and he presses you against the door, his hands tangling in your already tangled hair.
“Magnificent, beautiful,” he whispers back, and his lips burn a path along your throat, his tongue flicking out, your head falling back, your fingers digging into his shoulders.
“I wasn’t afraid,” you say. “You were beside me and I felt so strong.”
He lifts you up a bit and you wrap your legs around his waist, feeling his arousal against you and you almost cry out at how perfect this is. You wonder if you should say more, should think this through. But not tonight. Only hours ago you threw aside your prescribed role and acted. Tonight is about taking action, and you let go of your fears and your insecurities, you let go of the role you’ve been performing all your life. You lose yourself in the tumble backward into his bed, in the haze of touch and taste and pure sensation. You lose yourself in the harmony of voices and rhythm, and you find yourself again in your love for Charlie Weasley and in his love for you.
You fall asleep much later in his arms, your head on his shoulder, your legs entwined with his. You know that it doesn’t matter what the day may bring or what will come with the war. You find strength now in this man whose strength you gave back to him. You find strength in the love you share.
FIN