June 2002

The next night, Hermione slipped out of Grimmauld Place after dinner, claiming the need for more milk from the market up the street.

When she arrived in the shack, she stood awkwardly, wondering if Draco would appear. She suspected that he wasn't expecting her to make it.

He arrived suddenly with a sharp crack, wincing.

She stared. In the past, he'd always been fully dressed; shirt, robes, and a cloak for good measure. While she'd stripped him to his waist twice, both occasions had been mostly professional and he'd redressed immediately afterward.

He was just wearing trousers and a button down shirt. All in black. The absence of layers emphasised how tall and lithe he was. He seemed like a panther; black, cool, and predatory.

Practically speaking, it was logical and efficient. Fewer layers to remove. Less weight pressing against his injured back. Yet it felt weirdly intimate.

He wandlessly summoned a chair, and straddled it backward while he began unbuttoning his shirt.

He hissed and gasped under his breath as he twisted his shoulders to pull it down.

"Is it hurting any less?" she said, hesitating slightly as she laid a hand on his arm. His skin was still unnaturally cold. Touching him sent a shiver of fear down her spine as he flinched faintly and his muscles rippled beneath her fingers.

"Slightly," he said, after a beat.

With a wave of her wand, she carefully drew out and banished the murtlap and dittany, and then administered a very gentle cleansing charm over all the cuts.

Draco jerked and dropped his head down against the back of the chair.

"Fuck, Granger!" he snarled, his knuckles white where he was gripping the chair.

"It's done now," she said after another moment. "I'm sorry. I had to. Wizarding folk may be immune to most infections but there's no knowing what else that knife had been used for. Or exactly what properties Nagini's venom has; it may neutralise your natural immunity."

"A bit of warning next time, please," he said, his voice shaking slightly.

"Sorry. Most people prefer not to know. Bracing for it can make it worse."

"I'd prefer to know."

She stared at the runes. A cold sinking sensation came over her. The tendrils of dark Magic were already beginning to creep out from the runes again. She had been too late. The runes would continue to poison him.

She lay a hesitant hand on Draco's arm. "This—is going to hurt again. Do you—want me to stun you?"

He glanced back at her, and studied her face. Something in his eyes flashed for a moment, and his expression hardened.

"Is there really any point?" he said.

Hermione flinched and she dropped her eyes. "Let me try," she said quietly.

Draco stared at her for another minute before he snorted faintly and shook his head in disbelief as he looked away.

"Fine. One more try," he said in a resigned voice before resting his head on the back of the chair.

Hermione stunned him again.

It only took her a few minutes to remove all the traces of dark magic. Then she cast several diagnostic charms, trying to break down the layers of the ritual and find something she could deconstruct and nullify.

The ritual was set.

She was too late.

She traced her fingers over his back as she wondered what to do.

He had to know. She was almost certain he knew the runes were going to kill him eventually.

A gradual death sentence for his aid to the Order. Whatever he wanted by aiding them couldn't be a long term ambition. With the price he'd paid, she doubted he was planning to usurp Voldemort. If he did, it would be a short reign.

The Order needed him. The first Wizarding war had lasted eleven years. When she told Moody what had been done to Draco and said she had offered to heal him he told her to do what she could.

If Hermione couldn't find a way to stall the erosion, they would be extremely lucky to have Draco last that long. If he did, he'd barely be reliable at that point.

Hermione reached up and ran a fingertip along the chain around her neck for several minutes before pulling the amulet out from under her shirt.

She stared at the sun-disk. Then she unclasped the chain and slid the amulet off. She pressed the tip of her wand against it and reversed the series of protective wards and charms it carried before placing it on the floor. She stomped sharply on the amulet and felt it break under her heel. When she removed her foot, a small white stone lay amid the crushed red glass and twisted metal.

She didn't touch it. With a flick of her wand she levitated the stone so that it hovered in the air. She could feel the magic emanating from it. It made the air hum. She reached over and pulled Draco back into her arms, trying not to put any pressure on the runes.

Then she floated the stone over and lowered it to the left side of his chest, against his bare skin.

It started glowing, brighter and brighter, until she had to squint. Then she watched as the light slowly sank into his skin and faded away.

Hermione stared, wondering if anything else would happen; if there would be any immediately noticeable effects. There wasn't an abundance of information about how to process worked.

She performed a diagnostic and inspected it, Draco was sleep deprived and living on a high dose of top quality pain relief; he had muscle damage from the cruciatus, and the runes were still an unintelligible, mangled concentration of wounds and poison and ritual curse. The diagnostic charm did not indicate anything else. Which was normal—she thought—that was how it was supposed to work.

After a minute, when nothing else occurred, she carefully leaned Draco forward in the chair again.

She reapplied the salve she'd made, pressing it in as lightly as she could before replacing the containment enchantment and all the protective spells.

Then she slipped the remnants of the amulet into her pocket and rennervated Draco.

He lifted his head sharply and stood. Hermione gently pulled his shirt back up over his shoulders. He stared down at her as she buttoned his shirt and then straightened the fabric before staring up at him. He had a tired expression on his face as he stared down at her.

She impulsively reached up and touched him on the cheek. She felt his jaw twitch faintly under her hand as she studied his expression. She thought his skin felt a little less cold.

His eyes glittered, and the corner of his mouth twitched, but he didn't pull her hand away.

"I have to go," she said, "I'll see you tomorrow night."

Draco didn't say anything as she left the shack and apparated away.

The next night, there was no poison or dark magic bleeding out from the runes. Hermione said nothing as she quietly removed the salve, cleansed the incisions, replaced the salve, and then carefully recast all the spells.

Draco was more silent each night. He'd tense and gasp slightly in pain as Hermione cleaned the wounds, but he rarely said anything unless Hermione asked him a question.

"Is it going to be suspicious—that someone is healing you?" she abruptly asked after several days.

Draco froze for a moment and then laughed faintly. "Did that just occur to you now?"

Hermione flushed. "It's not usually a concern."

He shook his head. "There are no orders restricting me from getting them treated. If you somehow manage it, it will hardly be the first time I've succeeded at something against improbable odds." His lip curled faintly. "So by all means, continue poking at them with your wand."

Hermione continued without another word.

She discovered, to her faint offense, how rarely anyone paid attention to her comings and goings. She didn't even need to offer any excuses for leaving Grimmauld Place every night.

Harry, Ron and Ginny had gone to investigate a lead on horcruxes. Hermione had realised that several artifacts of the Hogwarts founders had gone missing during Voldemort's lifetime and so the Order had assigned Harry to try hunting them. Hermione suspected that Kingsley and Moody had very little hope that Harry would find anything; she thought it was likely just a way to keep Harry from insisting upon fighting in every single skirmish.

With the intelligence Draco provided, Moody and Kingsley had begun approving more risky and ambitious attacks. The decisions were partly because of the opportunities that Draco had afforded the Order, but primarily because the situation was dire enough that Order had to either begin taking risks with long odds or conceding that they couldn't win the war.

Despite the success of the Order's attack, it had also set them back severely.

They had hundred of new fighters to feed and house, and at the same time their resources in Europe were steadily drying up as Voldemort's hold grew stronger. The French Resistance had all but vanished. They had received word that Hagrid and Olympe Maxime had been captured and executed shortly after the prison attack. All of Eastern Europe was firmly under Death Eater control, while the Northern European countries were so occupied with keeping Voldemort's encroaching forces at bay that they had little support they could offer.

The Order was running out of money. Running out of resources. Trying to feed an army with personal vaults and secret donations. It was difficult for Resistance fighters to hold jobs in the muggle world.

Hermione had nearly drained her own bank account personally paying for potion supplies as the Order was forced to repeatedly slash her budget even while the need for the healing potions increased sharply.

They weren't starving yet. But Hermione was beginning to grow suspicious about how Kingsley was accomplishing such a thing.

Sometimes she doubted that defeating Voldemort would even be enough. If he died, with the control the Death Eaters currently had, there was a good chance someone would just step in to replace him.

Her mind always went immediately to Malfoy when that thought occurred.

She had yet to really see a demonstration of his abilities, but based on everything the Order knew of him, he was considered one of the likely candidates to take over in the event of Voldemort's demise.

Moody and Kingsley were almost certain that it was Draco's true motive in spying for the Order.

According to Severus, the Dark Mark had several elements to it. It allowed Voldemort to summon his followers to him, wherever they might be. It also enabled him to locate his followers; they couldn't run. And finally, the Dark Mark prevented bearers from attacking their master. Even if Malfoy thought he had the ability to kill Voldemort, he couldn't wield magic against him, not lethally. Draco would need someone else cast the death blow.

Hermione sometimes thought that becoming the next Dark Lord was indeed Draco's motive, but—after the runes, she questioned that conclusion. There was something angrier and more embittered in him than ambition. The deadliness and cold rage felt more like desperation than pride.

When she had told Moody that Draco had not demanded an Unbreakable Vow from her, the glint in Moody's eye made her begin to suspect that he intended to use her to kill Draco at some point.

She tried not to think about it.

She couldn't think about killing him.

She couldn't stand behind him night after night, trying to heal the runes carved into him and think about murdering him when he stopped being useful. Such coldness exceeded even her capacity for strategy.

Her fingers trembled slightly as she recast the protective charms over the cuts. She'd tried using bandages but the venom reacted.

"Alright. You're done," she said quietly as she pulled his shirt up over his shoulders lightly.

When she left, she didn't apparate immediately back to Grimmauld Place. Instead she walked down the lane and into Whitecroft.

Draco's injury was eating into her detachment. It was causing her to go off mission.

Death Eater. Murderer. Spy. Target. Tool.

She repeated the list to herself again and again. But her conviction and resolve sounded hollow.

She found a creek, and watched the moving water glitter in the moonlight as she tried to force herself to detach. She shoved her hands into her pockets, and then hissed and jerked her right hand out. She found her index finger bleeding slightly. A piece of her amulet had broken the skin. She'd forgotten about it.

She pulled the rest of the shards from her pocket and tossed them into the creek, before healing the scratch.

He killed Dumbledore, she reminded herself. He was probably just trying to become the next Dark Lord.

Death Eater. Murderer. Spy. Target. Tool.

But then she'd think of his accusation: that she knew what would happen to him. That she was only pretending to care that he was hurt. That she was probably hoping he'd die once he wasn't useful anymore. The bitterness and resignation in his tone haunted her.

Perhaps he expected her to betray him someday.

The thought made something inside of Hermione shred somewhat, as though it were mangling her internal organs.

Why hadn't he made her take a Vow?

What did he want? The mystery around him dragged her mind toward him. Obsessing over every detail. Trying to comprehend what drove all the inconsistencies of his behavior.

The push and pull he exerted over their relationship felt like a tide. His arrogance and loneliness. He disliked her, despite whatever "fascination" which had prompted him to demand her. He often seemed to wish he could have nothing to do with her.

But he was so isolated. He couldn't bring himself to push her fully away when she gave him opportunities to give in.

It was as Severus had said. She had been a miscalculation on his part. Even though he appeared to suspect her manipulation, her draw was inevitable and apparently irresistible.

Draco wasn't the only one falling into an obvious trap.

She knew he was using her. Using the Order. She knew that he was manipulative, cruel, dangerous, and responsible for the deaths of countless people. But as she tried to unravel him, he grew increasingly tragic and terrifyingly human.

She pressed her hands over her eyes and took a deep breath as she tried to clear her sympathy away.

She felt that if she could just know what his motive truly was, she'd be able to sever the sympathy; root it out from wherever it had started growing inside of her.

She didn't feel guilty for manipulating him but she wasn't sure that she had the resolve to be able to eventually kill him.

Sometimes she wondered bitterly if Moody and Kingsley regarded her as having any limits. Make her a whore, then make her a murderer. Did they just assume she'd want to?

It felt sometimes as though they were walking her down to Hell and watching as she passed through the gates. She wondered how pleased they were to have a tool who would suffer in whatever way they needed her to.

Moody was her handler. He handled her. Whatever trace of hesitation he'd had when he first asked her to give herself to Malfoy, he'd moved beyond. She was useful. An excellent pawn for the Order. The key to the piece they really wanted.

Malfoy.

Compared to Draco's value, Hermione was an acceptable loss.

If Harry and Voldemort were the Kings on each side of the board, then Malfoy was Voldemort's Queen. Gaining him was worth sacrificing almost every other piece on board. He was unrestricted and deadly. Crucial.

It made sense. Strategically, she saw the logic. She understood the necessity.

But on a personal level, it hurt so deeply she could barely breathe.

She hated herself.

She hated Moody. She hated Kingsley.

They'd take, and they'd take, and she'd be left with nothing but ashes when the war ended.

But they weren't really taking. She was offering. It wasn't as though they were requiring anything of her that she wasn't willing to do.

For Harry and Ron, she reminded herself. It will be worth it.

But something inside of her felt as though the war was corrupting her. She was twisting. Reshaping herself into a creature that felt like everything she hated.

Darkness gets into your soul, that was what Harry always said.

Never mind how irredeemable she thought Draco was for killing Dumbledore. If she sold Draco out at some future point, she imagined she'd belong in a far lower level of hell than even he did.

But she'd still do it.

Minerva had been right. Hermione was fully willing to damn herself if it meant winning the war.

She slipped down the bank of the creek, gathered up several stones, and began building them into a stack.

Her mother had travelled a great deal before marriage, and had told Hermione how in Korea the people would pile rocks up, each one representing wishes and prayers.

Mothers would build large towers of prayers for their children.

Hermione had built stacks in her backyard as a child, praying many prayers for friends. Heartfelt prayers that had lain unanswered for years until she reached Hogwarts.

Hermione laid down large foundation stones for Harry and Ron.

Let them live, she prayed. Let them survive this war. Please don't let me lose them.

Then she placed a stone for Ginny. Fred. George. Charlie. Bill. Molly and Arthur.

Percy had died during the Ministry takeover.

Let them live, she murmured.

She added stones for Remus and Tonks, Neville, Poppy and Severus and Minerva and the Caithness orphans. She was afraid she'd be too selfish if she included everyone in the Order and the Resistance. The stack was somewhat unstable.

She picked up one last stone and hesitated.

If the pile fell the wishes wouldn't come true.

She stared down at the final stone in her hands, brushing her fingers across it slightly. It was cold but the bite slowly faded as she kept hesitating, turning it over and over in her hands. Holding it out, then drawing it back and holding it longer.

Maybe she shouldn't place it.

Maybe it was selfish.

She almost put it back into the creek.

Then she bit her lip and placed it.

If there's any way, don't make me responsible for Draco's death, she prayed.

The stack wobbled but didn't fall. She let out a sharp sigh of relief and nearly cried.

She washed her hands off in the creek and then stared at the tower she had built.

It was a silly, superstitious ritual. It didn't mean anything.

But she'd given nearly everything for the war, and it had yet to be enough. Superstition felt like all she had left.

She cast a spell to repel muggles around the stones and apparated away.

She kept healing Draco, night after night. The venom combined with the runic magic made the injury one of the cruelest she had ever encountered. No matter what she did, it stayed fresh. He should have been in a hospital or on bed rest, not apparating and spying and whatever it was Voldemort had him doing.

She scoured old healing textbooks, and stayed up late into the night brewing potions she hoped would help heal or at least ease the pain further, but nothing she tried worked. Nagini's venom was essentially a neutralising agent against any type of healing, Magical or nonmagical.

It should have eventually worn off. When Arthur had been bitten by Nagini in the ministry, the venom had faded after a few days of blood replenishing potion. But runic magic interacted with the venom, and kept the venom isolated in the incisions. Hermione couldn't simply flush it from Draco's system.

Packing the cuts with Essence of Dittany and Murtlap and keeping infection at bay was all Hermione could do until the venom wore off on its own.

Draco finally spoke to her first after several weeks.

"Be careful foraging," he said abruptly as she was pulling his shirt up over his shoulders.

She paused.

"I have been. I send detection spells out every time I apparate somewhere to make sure there are no anti-apparition wards nearby. And all my clothing is shielded."

"The Dark Lord wants the Order crushed within the year. He is growing confident about his hold in the rest of Europe. He's concentrating his troops and bringing in new resources."

Hermione felt herself grow cold.

"In related news," he added, "I've just been given a manticore. I haven't the faintest idea what I'm expected to do with it."

The casual way in which he announced it made it seem like he had been given an unwanted spaniel and not one of the most deadly, semi-sentient dark creatures in the wizarding world.

"You were given a manticore?" she repeated. She had to force the words out, her chest felt as though it were being constricted.

"It's only half-grown, I'm told. McNair informed me that it has been dropped at my manor," he said with an aggravated expression as he pulled his shirt closed.

"Are you allowed to kill it?" she said, watching his pale skin vanish beneath the black fabric.

"Well—I doubt that is what was intended, but it didn't come with instructions."

"Manticore blood is impervious to most magic. You could probably craft some very useful weapons with it."

He turned to look down at her. "Such as?"

Hermione hesitated, and then reached forward to finish buttoning his shirt and straightening the collar. They were standing so close their bodies were almost touching. She could smell the cedar in his clothes, and she cautiously rested a hand on his chest over his heart, feeling his heartbeat under her fingers. She bit her lip for a moment before looking up at him. His mouth was quirked in faint amusement as he stared down at her, his eyes darkened as she stared up at him.

"I've read that goblin wrought knives or arrowheads infused with manticore venom could cut through shield charms," she said slowly. "Clothing soaked in the blood would be impervious to almost all magic. Like shielded clothing, but the magic wouldn't ever wear off."

Draco's eyes narrowed "So what?" he asked, watching her carefully. "You think I should kill my gift from the Dark Lord and then use it to make enchanted objects for the Order?"

"No," she said, sliding her hand away and looking down. "Even if you wanted to, I wouldn't be able to provide any explanation for obtaining them. And most members wouldn't use them anyway. Manticores are dark creatures after all." Her tone was bitter at the last words. She drew a sharp breath. "Most of the fighters in the Resistance would get killed if they ran into a manticore on a battlefield. There's probably only a hundred who would even know how to, and are capable of, killing one. So—if you could invent an excuse for disposing of it before your master decides to unleash it, it would be preferable."

She edged even closer and touched the back of his hand nervously.

She would beg, she would do anything to convince him.

He drew his hand sharply away from her touch, and for a moment she braced herself for his irritation. But then he caught her chin and tilted her head back until her eyes met his. He studied her expression for a moment as she stared back at him.

He leaned toward her until she thought he was going to kiss her. "You are always so pragmatic." She felt the words brush against her lips.

Then he released her chin abruptly and stepped away. His eyes were glinting as he noted her confusion.

"Don't die, Granger. I might miss you," Draco said, smirking, before he vanished with a crack.