June 2005

Severus is coming. Severus is coming.

Hermione felt as though she were turning to lead. There was constant aching pain in her chest, and a stone seemed to be lodged in her throat; she felt it each time she swallowed.

A palpable sense of horror and despair spreading around and through her. It was as if she was drowning with the rising tide; the water had reached her face, sliding slowly across her skin, lapping a little higher each minute. She was locked in place and could do nothing but sit, feeling it draw over her.

She wanted her occlumency back.

Now that she remembered having it, she felt its loss. Death and mutilation, everyone she'd seen die, right in the forefront of her mind. It hadn't always been that way. There used to be space from the emotional agony, but now there wasn't.

Soon Draco would be another person who'd died because she couldn't save him.

She didn't think any amount of occlumency would ever make the pain of it fade.

If she could just occlude a bit, she thought she'd be able to say everything she felt she needed to say, to ask him what she wanted to know. Instead, each time she tried to broach the subject, her voice would break, her shoulders would begin shaking, and she'd start crying and then hyperventilating.

Draco would stoically let her cry and then wrap his arms around her and calm her when she started overbreathing.

She'd jerk away angrily.

She wanted to scream at him. Stop accepting this. Stop being resigned. You're breaking my heart. Stop acting like it's alright. It's not alright. It's never going to be alright. Stop being resigned.

It was easy to be angry at him—at least she was still trying. He was just going along with it.

She finally broke down and raged at him until she had a panic attack. His plans were stupid and selfish. It wasn't fair that he got to die, and she was left to live with everything. If he'd just let her help him rescue Ginny, none of this might have happened. He should have let them work together. If he hadn't been so controlling and not tried to do everything by himself—everything might have been different.

He just stood there without a word while she vented it all. Until she started hyperventilating and collapsed on the floor with her arms protectively wrapped around her stomach. He shushed her and rubbed circles on her back while she cried and tried to shake him off.

"Don't do this to me, Draco. Don't do this. Don't—don't—don't—don't—"

Afterwards, he was called away, and she was left to seethe and obsess and realise he was doing it intentionally.

He could read her thoughts. He knew the ways her mind tilted. Prior to Montague's attack, he'd gone out of his way to needle her and make her hate him. He'd given her a target, something to focus on; a way to channel her stress. If she was angry at him, she was less self-destructive. Her rage dampened her guilt.

Then leaving would be easier for her.

She didn't want to be managed.

She swallowed her anger after that. She didn't want to waste the time she had by being angry.

But when she was alone, she wanted to scream and break everything within reach. The manacles physically prevented her from doing anything but cry. She was burning with rage, and devastation, and guilt without any capacity to channel it. She felt as though it was poisoning her from the inside, as though the emotions were corroding the blood in her veins.

She obsessively kept going through all the stacks of books that covered the floor of more than half of her room. If she read them enough times, maybe she'd have a breakthrough, maybe she might see something she'd overlooked before.

When Draco visited, she tried to ignore the fact she was leaving.

He had an unusual amount of availability leading up to the anniversary of the Battle of Hogwarts. Lucius was responsible for "hunting", and executions had been placed on hold until the anniversary celebration.

Draco was able to spend most of his time with her.

She poured herself into him. She wanted every detail of him.

They made love several more times. After the first time, it was easier. She was confident that she could handle it, that she could stop if she needed to. She could communicate things to him physically that she struggled to verbalise without crying.

She could hold onto him and wish to never let go.

He held her in his arms and kissed down her body. He touched and tangled his fingers in her hair. He traced along her neck and shoulders as though he were measuring and memorising the way she fit in his hands. He pushed into her, and she stared into his eyes, watching the way they flickered and changed colour when the pupils dilated.

Mine. Mine. Mine. She felt it like a heartbeat.

Mine.

To have and to hold...

She pulled his lips desperately against hers, wrapping her arms around his shoulders, tangling her fingers in his hair, absorbing the sensation of being with him, the rhythm of his heartbeat with her.

For better, for worse...

In sickness and in health...

She ran her fingers along his runes, feeling the implacable magic that resided there. She kissed each of his scars, and he kissed hers. They entwined their hands, brushing their noses together, and whispering to each other.

They took every moment slowly. They had barely any time left; they didn't want to waste it by rushing.

Afterwards, Hermione lay curled up in his arms, her back against his chest.

Home. This is what home feels like.

She took his left hand and pressed it against the swell in her lower pelvis.

"That's her," she said. "I'll—" her throat tightened, "—I'll probably be able to feel her move within the next month. The book says it feels like fluttering at the beginning."

Draco's fingers twitched in her hand, and he pressed a kiss on her bare shoulder.

She stared down, studying his hand beneath hers as it splayed across her stomach. "It's called quickening—when you first feel a baby move."

After lunch, Draco led her past the hedges running along the South Wing of the manor. As they walked around the hothouse, Hermione stopped with surprise. There was a stable of winged horses on the Malfoy estate.

She stood speechless at the doors and stared in at all of them; enormous Abraxans, Granians, and Aethonens. All of which stared down at her and Draco through barred stalls. They stomped their hooves and tossed their heads, nickering as Hermione ventured forward.

She reached up, and a dainty Granian fluttered its smokey wings and shoved its nose through the bars, nuzzling against Hermione's palm.

"I didn't know you had horses," she said as she stroked its muzzle and scratched at its ears. "I thought I'd explored most of the estate near the manor. I don't know how I didn't notice the stables."

Draco was oddly quiet. She turned to look at him. He had an unreadable expression on his face as he studied her.

He tilted his head and seemed to be hesitating for several seconds. "You did know about them." His eyes dropped. "You used to come here daily during the winter. You stopped at the end of February."

Hermione stared at Draco, her fingers rubbing against the Granian's neck. The horse nearly knocked her over as it nosed at her robes.

She turned back and scratched at the swirl on its forehead while trying to wrap her mind around the revelation.

Her mouth opened, but no words came out. She swallowed and cleared her throat several times.

"Oh," she finally managed to say in a light voice after standing and smoothing the Granian's mane so it would lie flat. Her nose and eyes were burning from the dust and the sickly sweet scent of hay.

After a minute she nodded. "That makes sense."

She nodded again and cleared her throat. "I think I lost a few memories—I think during my first seizure." She kept fussing over the horse without looking back towards Draco. "It's—it's so interesting how memory works. There are probably a lot of things I don't even know I can't remember... It—" she had trouble thinking of what to say. "It must be very odd to watch."

"I don't think it was your seizure," Draco said from behind her. "It's something the Dark Lord does. A legilimency technique, I suppose you could say. He tears apart memories. He's talked about the method in the past. Little pieces of things; he takes them and shreds them apart. He—enjoys feeling the mental anguish the victims experience when they lose the memories."

There was a pause.

"Coming here used to make you happy, so he took it from you."

Draco summoned several apples from a bin nearby and sliced off a piece, handing it to Hermione. Hermione laid it on the flat of her palm and held it up. The Granian's muzzle brushed and tickled against her skin as it huffed and ate.

"Were there other things?" she asked. "Other things that I don't remember forgetting?"

"You had a memory of your father. He told you to fold a thousand paper cranes to get a wish. That was all I knew of."

Hermione stood, feeling cold as she absorbed it. "I wondered—why I did that."

Several more horses pushed their heads through the bars of their stalls and tossed them up and down until Hermione moved from horse to horse, petting their noses while she bribed them into quietude with apple slices.

She could feel Draco watching her, and it made her stomach knot as she tried to calculate why he'd brought her there.

"So—why do I need to know about the horses?" she asked as she scratched the ears of an Abraxan whose head was the size of an elephant's.

Draco handed her another apple slice before he answered.

"With sufficient resources, portkeys and apparition leave traceable signatures. Apparition and brooms don't go far enough, fast enough. Granians fly faster than any other magical creature. You'll be flying horseback from the manor to Denmark. There's a safehouse there with an international portkey; it will take you to Ginny."

Hermione nodded again, withdrawing from the horses and walking past Draco without a word. Of course, it was just another step towards her departure. It seemed like everything he did was just an additional phase in his goodbye process.

They were heading back to the manor when Draco stiffened and froze, his expression becoming a mixture of disbelief and rage. Hermione stared up at him nervously.

Lucius—

"Astoria has just apparated into the foyer," he said.

A feeling of cold washed over Hermione. Compared to Lucius, Astoria was a minor inconvenience, but the combination of both of them was horribly ill-timed.

Draco scoffed and looked heavenward. "Why is it that nothing ever goes wrong by halves?"

He stood for several seconds with his eyes unfocused. When they cleared, he snorted angrily. "Yet another person I'll have to deal with."

His left hand strayed towards his wand holster as he stalked towards the manor, the gravel crunching loudly under his shoes.

Hermione followed him, and a sinking sensation came over her as it occurred to her that Draco had likely been expecting to have to kill Lucius ever since his father's return, and now Astoria was on that list as well.

In the case of Astoria, it was not surprising. But Draco had protected his father over the years, Hermione was certain of it. It would have been far easier for Draco to have orchestrated Lucius' death at some point than to account for his father's constant unpredictability.

Draco paused in the rose gardens and scowled. "She's headed to the veranda to meet us."

He rolled his neck so that it cracked, straightening as his expression schooled itself into one of indolent viciousness. He sauntered around the corner of the manor, Hermione following a few subservient steps behind him. Astoria was waiting for them, her hands on her hips.

The corner of Astoria's mouth twisted upwards as she stared down the steps at Draco and Hermione. She lifted a thin shoulder. "How did I guess I'd find you two together out here?"

"I imagine you asked a house-elf," Draco said as he ascended the steps and looked her over coolly. "I thought you were spending the summer in France, Astoria. Did they cast you out?"

Astoria's lips curled so that her teeth were briefly bared as she raised her chin. "I'm here for the celebration. You're going to be the guest of honor. Do you realize how much people will talk if your wife doesn't attend with you?"

Draco raised his eyebrows skeptically, and Astoria glanced over at Hermione.

"What? Were you going to take her? Sit her on your lap and fondle her publicly the way Amycus does with his?" She rolled her eyes. "No. That's hardly your style. You can't keep her under a mountain of wards if she's let out in public."

Astoria tossed her head. "I'm not required to get permission to return to my own home. I'm here to appear beside my beloved husband. People are beginning to talk."

Astoria's expression was growing pinched, and her lips pursed briefly as she stared resentfully up at Draco. "Not that you ever pay attention, but they do talk about you so very much." Her voice was saccharine. "I find myself unable to do anything but answer the endless questions about you when I go out. They all want to know when you'll visit me." She gave a laugh like shattering glass. "Adrian joked at a party that you've been staying here in England because your paternal side is starting to come out, and then the whole room laughed because everyone knows the only thing you do is kill things."

Draco's mouth quirked at the corner. "Well—I'll be rather busy for most of it. You'll spend most of the event with my father. I don't believe you two are acquainted."

Astoria's brittle expression rippled as a flash of uncertainty appeared on her face. "Really? Lucius? He's back in Britain?"

Then her expression sharpened, and she glared at Hermione. "Because of her?"

Draco followed his wife's gaze and stared at Hermione with hardened eyes. "Hardly. The Dark Lord has recalled him to assume some of my duties now that my new status has so many demands upon my time."

Draco's mouth twisted into a mocking smirk. "He's a touch eccentric now, my father, but you both share certain interests; perhaps he'll like you." He shrugged and looked Astoria over once again before summoning Hermione up the steps with a quick movement of his hand. "Do keep out of the way, Astoria, if you possibly can."

He started towards the doors, and Hermione followed him, trying not to make eye contact with Astoria.

As Hermione passed, Astoria spoke up in a low voice "He's going to kill you."

Hermione froze briefly, and Astoria continued. "Didn't you know? You're dead—as soon as that baby's out of your belly. The Dark Lord wants your corpse. I hope he does something foul with it."

"Astoria, didn't I say something a few months ago about talking to the Mudblood?" Draco drawled dangerously from the doorway.

Astoria paled and stepped back

"Mudblood," Draco's voice was sharp as a blade. "Come before I drag you."

Hermione continued towards Draco, feeling Astoria's eyes on her back.

When they got inside her room, Hermione drew a deep breath and turned, folding her arms tightly around herself. "Tell me the whole plan. I need to know—I need you to tell me the whole plan."

Draco closed the door firmly and stood in front of it. His eyes were calculating as he stared at her. After a moment he looked down and straightened his cuffs.

"Assuming Severus doesn't arrive late, you'll leave before the anniversary celebration. It will destabilise things more rapidly if I fail to appear during the event. It's intended to be a show of strength; the Dark Lord will be hard-pressed to excuse my absence." He waved his hand dismissively. "But—that's all beside the point. Once your manacles are off, you and Severus will immediately fly to Denmark. He knows the location of the safehouse. When you've taken the portkey, he'll return. If things go according to plan, his disappearance will have been unnoticed, and he'll remain in place as long as he can."

Hermione shook. "What about you?" She felt as though she were being crushed to death. "After I leave—what exactly happens to you?"

His mouth curved into a thin smile. "I'll be making sure no one notices that Severus has gone missing for half a day. I'll make an appearance of having tried to run with you, and leave another Death Eater to be found, who will be assumed to be the secondary party involved." He sighed. "It was supposed to be Montague, given his known fascination with you. But there are other options I have in mind now." He shrugged. "It's a minor detail either way."

"What happens to you?" Hermione said again.

He met her gaze seriously. "I won't be captured, if that's what you're worrying about. I have too much information to risk interrogation."

He glanced down and appeared to be inspecting the polish on the toes of his shoes. "Don't worry. It'll be quick." He looked up at her with a faint smile. "I'm rather good at making it quick."

Hermione's mouth twisted, and she turned away and went over to the window.

She'd thought she'd run out of tears during her imprisonment beneath Hogwarts, but now she found herself constantly fighting them back.

She could feel him walking up behind her until his robes brushed against hers. She pressed her hand against the window and stared despairingly out across the estate.

It was a cage. The open sky and rolling hills were an illusion of freedom. In all the time she'd known him and been his prisoner, he'd been more chained in place than she was.

"I don't want you to die, Draco."

His left hand slipped around her waist and rested against her lower abdomen. She pressed her lips together, but her jaw still trembled.

"Draco—" her mouth twisted, and her cheekbones felt hollow and ached. There was a shriveling sense of despair in her chest. She dropped her forehead against the cold glass, "Don't—don't—I don't want you to die..."

"I know."

He slipped his other arm around her shoulders, and she pressed her cheek against the back of his hand.

She gripped the hand over her abdomen, and they stood in silence until he sighed and straightened. "I have to go. With Astoria here too—it's not worth the additional risk."

Hermione looked down at the floor and nodded. Her throat catching with guilt. They'd had less than a month, and she'd spent it researching. Now—the little bit of time left was cut short.

He withdrew his hands, and she felt him vanish.

He still came that night. After the lights in the manor were out, he appeared in her room.

"Well, my father and Astoria have met." He rolled his jaw as he pulled off his outer formal robes. "He likes her even less than I'd expected. I suppose it would be more unfortunate if they seemed to like each other, but the antagonism over dinner was tedious in a matter of minutes."

The corner of his mouth quirked upwards for a moment before his expression closed again.

"You can be here now?" she asked after a moment.

He nodded. "I'll know if they come to my door. It's more likely to be my father wanting a drinking partner than Astoria expecting to share my bed." He seated himself on the edge of the mattress.

Hermione's chest tightened and she looked down at her hands. Astoria's return to the manor placed a certain emphasis on Draco's presence beside Hermione in bed.

He was married. He had a wife.

Yet here he was in Hermione's bed because she was—his mistress.

Or sex slave. That was her intended function, as a surrogate and sex slave.

Disregarding her imprisonment, she was still categorically his mistress.

She looked up to find Draco studying her and forced a smile. "No, I don't suppose she will."

They slept face to face. He held her almost crushed against his chest, and she could feel his heartbeat against her cheek.

He sat up in the middle of the night.

"My father's wandering the manor," was all he said before he apparated away without a sound.

He didn't reappear until after lunch to "walk" Hermione. He was visibly tense and didn't make any effort to converse as they strolled through the gardens. There was an additional sense of dread seated low in her stomach as they walked among the blooming roses. He kept scanning their surroundings and eyeing the manor, as though he expected an explosion to emanate from it at any moment.

"Draco!" Astoria's sharp voice cut through the air.

The corner of Draco's mouth lifted briefly as he turned to meet his approaching wife.

Astoria was pale-faced, but the hollows of her cheeks were stained red. She stormed through the garden beds. She was impeccably attired in pale green robes splashed with scarlet detailing. As she got closer, Hermione noticed that the hem and her shoes were scarlet red as well.

"Draco—Draco—this is—unacceptable!" Astoria appeared to be on the verge of tears and nearly at a loss for words. "Intolerable. Obscene. I don't even—"

When she was within a few feet, Hermione realised Astoria's robes were not detailed with red, they were spattered and stained.

As though she'd walked into a pool of blood.

"What is it, Astoria?" Draco drawled the question.

Astoria stood before Draco for several seconds, swallowing visibly. She looked down at her robes and back up to him.

"Your father has to go. He can't stay here." She choked. "He—he—he—"

She gestured down at herself. "The entire foyer is covered in blood. There were things hanging from the chandelier—intestines, I think. It's on the portraits and all the orchids I brought back from France, and my new robes! The whole room is ruined. Mrs. Thicknesse was supposed to come to tea with her daughters and several other ladies planning for the celebration—now I'm going to have to cancel because most of the house is smeared with blood, and Bobbin says there are corpses piled by the gate. Make him go."

Hermione had barely been in the other wings of the manor since Lucius' arrival; she had no idea if what Astoria said was true, or if she were exaggerating.

Hermione was certain Draco had added wards to her room after the day Lucius brought back the centaur. She could no longer hear any sounds through the doors or the windows. She'd seen bloodstained dragmarks outside occasionally when she and Draco walked, but once inside her bedroom walls, she was nearly oblivious to the world outside.

Draco sighed and straightened his robes. "Astoria, it's traditional for him to live on the estate. He has a private wing of the manor."

Astoria threw her hands into the air. "He's not using his wing! He's using the main gates and the main entrance. There's blood all over the gravel. I had the elves replace it all this morning, and it's already covered again. The manor looks like a slaughterhouse."

Draco nodded, his expression impassive. "I am aware of the condition of the manor. There are reasons I didn't ask you to return for the celebration. If you insist on attending, there are other properties in Britain you can occupy for the next several days."

Astoria stared up at Draco, her eyes wide and incredulous. "Do you know how much people will talk if I'm receiving guests somewhere besides Malfoy Manor?"

Draco quirked an eyebrow and met her gaze coldly. "I didn't ask you to come, Astoria. He's in England on the Dark Lord's orders. You're here on a whim. Do you expect me to defer to your preferences?"

Astoria started to respond, but before she could speak—

"What is this? All my family together in one place. How joyous." Lucius had seemingly materialised from nowhere.

Astoria shrank towards Draco, who shifted away from her in order to place himself between his father's line of sight and Hermione. The movement was slight, as though he were simply turning to see Lucius, but Hermione was nearly concealed after he'd altered his stance.

"Father, Astoria is dismayed by the condition of the foyer."

"Really?" Lucius cooed the word as though he were speaking to a small child. "I thought it was a considerable improvement over the barren minimalism she appears so partial to."

Astoria was visible to Draco's right, and Hermione saw her pale. Her hands moved defensively towards her stomach and then stopped as she curled them into fists at her sides.

"I want you to leave," she said in a sharp voice. Her earrings were trembling, but she lifted her chin. "I want you off the estate."

Lucius quirked an eyebrow and stared down his nose at her. "Indeed. You intend to banish me from my own estate?"

"It's not your estate, it's Draco's. It's mine. I am Lady of the Manor, and you are a guest who has abused his welcome."

"You are lady of this manor?" Lucius purred in a low voice. "My wife was lady of Malfoy Manor; I'm not sure the magic can tolerate such an inadequate replacement."

Astoria flushed, the hollows of her cheeks staining scarlet as her teeth flashed angrily. "It doesn't matter what you think. The Dark Lord chose me. Draco married me. I am the lady of Malfoy Manor. You aren't the one who gets to decide. I have done everything that has been asked of me. I lived, alone, in this horrible house, I fulfilled every role expected, I did everything asked, I never complained—even when I was taken for granted and then put aside and ignored"—Astoria sounded on the verge of tears—"I still played my part without a word of complaint because—"

"You do like to carry on, don't you?" Lucius sneered at Astoria. "Perhaps we'd pay more attention to you if you were quieter. I haven't heard a sound from the Mudblood since I arrived."

Draco's hand moved infinitesimally back towards Hermione.

"Get off this estate!" Astoria nearly shrieked. "Get off. Get off! Get—"

A razor-fine line of scarlet suddenly bloomed across the pale skin of Astoria's neck.

Hermione watched, eyes wide with horror. A sort of gasping, burbling sound emerged from Astoria's throat as her head toppled off her shoulders, and her body sank to the ground.

Lucius stared down at the fresh corpse at his feet, and his eyebrows arched approvingly. "You're much quieter now," he said, bending over and cocking his head at Astoria's face where it lay in the white gravel. Her expression had gone limp and blank.

Lucius wagged a finger towards her. "Stay like this and, in time, perhaps my opinion of you shall improve."

Hermione peered around Draco in shock.

Lucius straightened, sighing and tilting his head back in the sunlight. "The estate feels better already. My father used to say there's nothing like fresh blood to fertilise the roses."

"You've killed my wife, Father," Draco said. She couldn't see his face, but his voice was disbelieving.

"I am aware." Lucius snorted and he looked at Draco from the corner of his eye. "Don't bother trying to convince me that you'll miss her. She was tasteless and indiscreet. Now you can marry a woman capable of producing an heir. Did I tell you about the delightful young witch I met in Bulgaria this last winter? Pureblooded. Only sixteen, but she'll be of age once your obligatory period of mourning has elapsed. Then we'll no longer be obliged to sully our line by having Mudbloods paraded through the manor like a line of whores."

Draco's fingers twitched, and his shoulders grew rigid. "You realise I'd require permission to remarry."

"Indeed. Something more easily obtained when you don't already have a wife and surrogate on hand. In six months time, when the Dark Lord has the information he desires and the Mudblood is dead, things will be different. Someone has to worry over the future, given that you refuse to."

Draco shook his head and ran a hand through his hair. "You can hardly expect this to go unpunished. The Dark Lord requires that he personally approve killing any members of the Sacred Twenty-Eight prior to their execution."

Astoria's blood was seeping across the ground towards Draco's shoes. He flicked his wand and vanished it.

Lucius twirled his wand lazily in his fingers. "I doubt the Dark Lord will mourn the loss of an infertile witch, regardless of her pedigree. Your value and mine remain considerably greater than hers. Once he hears how incessantly she talked, I expect I shall get off quite lightly."

Lucius knelt down easily and plucked Astoria's head up off the ground before snagging the arm of her corpse.

"Worry not. I shall assure the Dark Lord that you are deeply grieved by my impulsiveness. You may hope otherwise, but I would advise you to expect my return within the hour. If you are still my obedient son, perhaps you will be so good as to have a pain relief potion ready for me."

Without another word, Lucius apparated away, taking Astoria with him.

Draco stood staring at the bloodstained gravel for several seconds before he turned to look at Hermione. His expression was masked.

Hermione stared up at him for several seconds, studying his eyes. Her chest was starting to ache. She drew a deep breath before she spoke. "You planned that."

He didn't react for a moment, then the corner of his mouth curled up. "Clever."

Hermione didn't smile back.

After a moment, his eyes flashed, his expression hardening as he looked away. "What did you expect, Granger? You can't possibly be surprised." He scoffed, and his nostrils flared. "She attacked you. She tried to gouge out your eyes."

Her throat hurt, and she flinched as she remembered the sensation of Astoria's wand digging into her eyeball and her utter terror when she thought she'd be blinded. "I haven't forgotten."

Draco gave a short laugh. "I would have killed her sooner, but it diverted suspicion to have a pretty wife in the manor. Living here alone with you for so many months could have attracted attention. That was the only reason I let her live."

"I hate it when you kill people because of me," she said, turning sharply in the gravel so that it ground beneath her feet. She stared down at the bloodstained ground, her mouth twisting. "I hate it. I've always hated it. There's so much more to you, but sometimes I feel like all I do is bring out the worst in you. You would never go so far if it weren't for me. You wouldn't be like this. I did this to you."

Draco was silent for several seconds, and he sighed. "You're right. I don't imagine I would."

Hermione pressed her hand against her sternum. Her head felt light and hollow, and her chest ached as though she'd been struck, as though the bones were shattered and the shards were slowly cutting her to death.

"I used to have so many dreams for us," she said, her voice thick. "When I'd worry about you, when I'd do things that I didn't want to do, when the war felt so heavy I thought I'd finally break under it, I'd tell myself: someday you're going to run away with him. You'll go somewhere quiet. You won't ask for very much, just you and him and that will be enough. That's what I used to tell myself. I wanted to see what you'd be like away from the war. I thought—maybe we'd find out together. Who we could be without the war."

She smiled bitterly. "I suppose in the end, I'm just like Harry and Ron. I expect the universe to eventually give in a bit. I thought we'd earned each other. I thought we'd both suffered enough that we'd get to have each other."

Draco was silent.

She looked towards the manor. "I want to go back to my room now. I barely have any time left, I don't want to spend it in this rose garden standing in your wife's blood."

She started walking towards the house and froze, her throat closing when she realised she couldn't see Draco anymore. She turned sharply back and stood, staring at him for several seconds while her chest jerked.

She felt hollow. She'd poured herself out and now all she had left was a shell.

"How am I supposed to do this without you?" Her voice was shaking. She raised her hands and then let them drop limply at her sides. "I can't even go outside by myself. What's even the point in having me escape? I might have a seizure if I have to go without you."

Draco's expression was guarded, but his eyes flickered and the line of his mouth tensed. "You'll have your occlumency back, that should help."

Hermione stared at him.

He glanced away. "I'll have Dreamless Sleep you can take, if necessary. Severus is aware of your agoraphobia, and he's planned accordingly. You'll share a horse. He's someone you trusted."

Hermione released a sharp, angry breath. "Why are you so resigned to dying? Even at the beginning, when you made your offer to the Order, you were always planning to die like it wouldn't matter to anyone. Why are you still like that? Now—" her voice broke, "—when it does?"

Draco sighed, and his mouth twisted briefly as he met her eyes. He set his jaw and glanced away, his lips twitching. "I didn't have anyone, Granger. After my mother died, I didn't have anyone. My life was blown apart when I returned home after fifth year. Everything I did after that was trying not to lose the remaining pieces that I had. Once she died—it didn't matter. Revenge was all I could do to make up for it, and it didn't matter to anyone—"

He looked down.

"Not until you came along." He sounded almost bitter. He met her eyes and walked across the bloodstained gravel towards her. "I didn't make plans past the war. Potter was never going to win, I always knew that. Falling for you didn't change that—it just—it just—" he released a sharp breath and looked down, his voice growing quieter. "It just made knowing it worse."

His throat dipped as he swallowed and stared at her, and his mouth curved into a wistful smile. "I—loved how you believed in the future, even when you didn't expect you'd get to be a part of it. How you insisted we'd somehow defy the inevitable. You Gryffindors are such idealists—I never understood the appeal of it until you." He reached out and caught a curl with his fingers. "The way you thought we'd always be together, and talked about running away almost until the end. I would have done anything to give you what you wanted, but—" he gave a short laugh and shook his head as his hand dropped away from her. "I don't know how to do it. It's not for a lack of trying, Granger. I've run out of ideas."

Hermione drew a low breath. The summer heat had mixed the coppery scent of blood with the honey-sweet scent of blooming roses. When the smell struck her, her tongue curdled and a wave of nauseous despair crawled up her throat. She pressed the back of her hand against her nose and turned away.

"I want to go back inside," she said after she'd forced away the urge to vomit.

Draco took her hand, and she dully let him lead her back to the manor.

Shortly after they arrived in her room, Draco was summoned. He conjured his Death Eater robes and vanished without a word. He didn't return for hours.

Something was wrong.

Hermione called Topsy, who appeared and informed her that Lucius had not returned either. Hermione paced in her room reviewing possibilities: Voldemort was upset over Astoria's death, Voldemort had used legilimency on Lucius and noticed something that had betrayed Draco, something else had gone wrong that Hermione was too oblivious to guess.

She hovered at the door, but there was no point in going out.

There was nothing she could do. She kept waiting.

She was standing by the window when the back of her neck prickled. She turned.

Draco was standing in the middle of the room, pulling his mask off.

He had an unreadable expression on his face, as though he were shocked and devastated.

His hair, skin, and eyes stood out starkly in the dark room making him look almost luminous. He stared at her for several seconds.

"The Dark Lord just received word—Romania has severed their alliance with the Dark Lord. They deposed the government and killed the Dark Lord's emissaries—including Severus."