Chapter Text
Luckily, the Order had the good sense not to concentrate all its potion reserves in one place—namely the Tube’s Headquarters, which had been raided. Instead, several safehouses were tasked with brewing and maintaining useful potions, such as healing draughts or Veritaserum for those rare occasions when a Death Eater was captured for interrogation.
Oddly, the Order didn’t consider Polyjuice as a necessity, failing to account for the possibility that someone might one day need to infiltrate Gringotts.
For Hermione, this was poor contingency planning.
She informed Kinglsey of this fact several times and he could only nod in embarrassment silence.
Harry later clarified that it wasn’t embarrassment so much as profound annoyance with her, which was fair considering the wizard had practically kicked them out of his office by the end of the discussion.
Hermione must have done something right because the next day, Kingsley announced he had tracked a batch of Polyjuice brewing in the Huddersfield’s safehouse and that it would be ready in two weeks.
This left them plenty of time to plan, because one does not break into Gringotts by winging it.
Which was exactly what Harry had proposed when they returned from Slovenia with the theory that Bellatrix had likely hidden a Horcrux inside her vault.
Harry’s poorly thought-out plan consisted primarily of the three of them squeezing under his Invisibility cloak and Confounding any goblin who would cross their path.
Even Ron told him it was a terrible idea.
Apparently, Bill had once explained that getting into Gringotts was rarely the difficult part, but getting out was.
To illustrate the point, Ron then recounted a particularly ghastly story involving a witch who had managed to infiltrate the vault passageways under an exceptionally powerful Disillusionment charm. The spell rendered her completely invisible and by the time she reached the vault she intended to rob, some enchantment woven into Gringotts’s damp air interacted with the charm and made the invisibility permanent.
For over a century, people reported faint whispers echoing through Gringotts’s underground (“Get me out”, “You don’t see me?”, “Please”) until one day, her corpse was found curled up beside Vault no. 34. The vault was eventually rebranded as the Invisible Dame Vault, and the fortune inside remains to be claimed.
Hermione personally thought the tale sounded something the goblins would invent to discourage the thieves, but it seemed unwise to test the theory. Better to plan accordingly.
First, they thought of Narcissa. Perhaps, as a Black, she had access to Bellatrix’s vault. This avenue quickly turned out to be a dead end when Narcissa informed them that her sister had transferred all her assets under her husband’s name years ago.
Despite not having access, Narcissa was able to provide lots of information about the vault, such as its location within the bank and the various security measures protecting it. Which were…extensive.
Still, preparation is the key to success, and after two weeks of planning, they now have a plan to counter every obstacle Narcissa knew of.
Everyone’s role is then carefully rehearsed.
Naturally, Hermione takes on the role of Bellatrix. Yes, any of the boys would have felt too awkward in a woman's body, but it’s mostly because Hermione proved again and again that she’s a terrific actress. It is only fitting that she should play the lead role.
Harry will go as himself, still stubbornly attached to the idea of sneaking through the bank beneath his Invisibly Cloak and casting a Confundus charm when in need. Hermione graciously allows him the secondary lead, seeing how he alone possesses the unique ability of sensing Horcruxes, which proves convenient since they still have no clue what object they are searching for.
And because both Hermione and Harry are participants, Ron (naturally) immediately feels excluded and volunteers himself as a background actor.
“That’s just one more body to smuggle into Gringotts,” Draco argues.
“Then don’t feel obligated to come!” Ron fires back.
Much to Ron’s disappointment, Draco is not only essential to the project, but he has also been cast as Hermione’s co-star.
They will enter Gringotts openly, Hermione as Bellatrix and Draco as himself, and the boys under the cloak.
According to Draco, a Monday morning visit to the bank between aunt and nephew is quite mundane. The goblins have seen the pair together often enough not to question it. Also, as a plan B, they can depend on Draco’s own key to at least get in if Hermione’s duplicated key encounters a problem.
More importantly, Draco’s vital role in this mission has the added benefit of securing his pardon.
Another topic that resulted in Kingsley eventually ejecting Hermione from his office after hours of relentless advocacy.
A battle she ultimately won, thanks in part to Lupin who had previously already pleaded the case.
Kinsley called her back the next day and slid on his desk the three pardons drafted for the Malfoys. Each contained essentially the same conditions: contributions to the war effort, cooperation with the Order, and immunity for past crimes and future ones if committed in direct service of securing victory.
Some conditions varied depending on the person.
As owner of the Manor, Lucius must willingly grant Aurors access to the property upon the Order’s victory, so they can spend several weeks enthusiastically poking every cursed object they find.
As Voldemort’s strategic advisor, Narcissa must provide a full account of any war strategies, operations, or intelligence immediately upon signing the pardon.
All reasonable conditions.
Draco’s pardon, however, contains the harshest condition of them all, being contingent upon securing a Horcrux in Bellatrix’s vault.
Hermione is furious when she returns to the Manor later that day. Something Draco easily points out by offering the sort of comfort every woman yearns to hear.
“Someone’s in a mood.”
She fixes him with a stare so disapproving that he elects to withdraw to the library for the next several hours, no doubt reflecting on his communication skills and how he can do better next time. Or so she chooses to imagine.
She still hasn’t told him—or his parents, for that matter—about the pardons. Her long-standing sense of self-sufficiency and independence has left her with the habit of handling everything on her own and only sharing once it’s fully done.
She knows it. Everyone knows it. They’re called control issues.
But how is she supposed to tell Draco that she finally got him the pardon she promised she would, only for it to come attached with the tiny little minor condition that they absolutely must find a Horcrux tomorrow.
She can’t.
Not that she hasn’t tried. Kingsley experienced the absolute pleasure of Hermione barging into his office once again and getting lectured about unreasonable expectations and if he could please remove this insane condition.
But Hermione did not win this time.
By the time Draco finds her in their bedroom, her voice is hoarse and she tucks away her wand as she watches the last of the sunlight sink below the horizon. His footsteps are cautious and weary, perhaps wisely anticipating the consequences of saying the wrong thing.
But he gets it right this time as he presses a lingering kiss beneath her ear.
“Feeling better?”
She melts into his embrace and lies that she’s just nervous about tomorrow.
“We have a solid plan, Granger.”
And they do. He simply doesn’t know the stakes are now staggeringly higher. Even if they somehow manage to infiltrate Gringotts and escape, it will all be for nothing if there’s no Horcrux inside the damn vault.
Yes, mainly to ascertain that Voldemort is mortal once again, and then kill him, and win the war, and live happily ever after and blah blah—
But—
Her stomach knots painfully. She decides none of it matters if Draco ends up imprisoned anyway.
She turns and crashes her lips against his with enough force to send them both off balance. The bed—and Draco’s maddening muscular back—soften the fall and Hermione doesn’t feel the least bit apologetic.
She needs this. Need him. She always does, but tonight, she fears some sort of urgency, sharpened by the fear of tomorrows that may never come.
Draco lets her take the lead for all of two minutes, long enough for her to undress them and start exploring his sculpted chest with her tongue. Before she can proceed further, his knees press against her hipbones and he flips her against the mattress, holding her wrists with a smug smile.
The rest unfolds into a battle for dominance, neither willing to surrender the control, each stubbornly intent on giving more than they receive.
Every time he thinks he’s won, she steals control back. Every time she gains the advantage, he finds a way to undo it.
When he dives into her from behind, one hand on the headboard, the other steering her by the hip, she lets him feel just how great he can make her feel, allowing her rapture to flutter deliciously around him.
Yet, she won’t give him the satisfaction of staying in charge. She scrambles on top of his lap and he’s back inside in a matter of seconds. But she’s the one in charge this time, thighs flexing with strength, hands on his shoulders for balance.
She almost yells at him when his palms slide sneakily toward her waist. The next thing she knows, gravity fails her entirely when he’s back at maneuvering her, lifting her and slamming her back on his length.
But she lets him. For every hard thrust, she writhes and arches, screaming his name to drown his own groans moaned against her hair.
When he rocks into her so deliriously slow and deep, she tells him everything he wants to hear.
That she loves him.
That she’s so proud of the man he’s become.
That he can’t go.
Because she won’t let him.
His breathing turns uneven, and whatever reply he tries to give dissolves into broken grunts against her neck. A long and deep curse rings into the room when he comes, breaking her into her own version of a blubbering mess.
She can still feel him rocking into her lazily, holding her shivering body flush against him, when panic resurfaces.
She can no longer hold back the tears from spilling at the thought of tomorrow. Draco keeps her gathered against him, pulling her closer, mistaking her stress for the aftermath of a great (incredible) shag.
She buries her face against his shoulder, grateful he cannot see the expression she's wearing.
Only then, when the pink sky fades into dusk, do the series of doubts begin to creep in.
And the doubts continue to drag Hermione in like quicksand, refusing to leave.
Not when a goblin with a shiny bald head let them in, satisfied with Bellatrix’s key legitimacy.
Not when she squeezes beside Draco in the cart and Harry’s breath fans against the back of her neck as he and Ron climb aboard beneath the cloak.
Not when the Thief’s Downfall cancel their enchantments, revealing Hermione’s true identity.
Not when Draco manages to cast a timely stunner at the goblin before he can alert any of his colleagues.
And definitely not when a gigantic dragon appears in front of the vault entrance to everyone’s collective shock, considering this information wasn’t part of Narcissa’s intelligence briefing package.
However, when she spots a small golden cup, recognizing it from their list—one Draco identifies as Hufflepuff’s cup—her doubts start to fade. And when Harry hovers his hand over it and confirms it is indeed a Horcrux, the doubts are officially dead.
R.I.(fucking).P.
Now, those doubts might have resurfaced in the average person the moment a dragon comes barging in, threatening to turn the vault into an incinerator. Judging by the pallor of its scales, it’s safe to assume that guarding Bellatrix’s vault in the depths of Gringotts has been its sole occupation for years.
But Hermione is not the average person. Not when she happens to know a bigger, fiercer and significantly more attractive dragon.
Draco appears to reach the same conclusion as he starts unbuttoning his dark grey robes.
“Do you think Tweedledum and Tweedledee—” He jabs his thumb at Harry and Ron before handing her his robe to stuff into her beaded bag. “can manage to stay on my back without plummeting to their deaths?”
“Hey!” Harry shouts, overhearing him. The dragon answers by breathing fire in his direction, but he narrowly avoids the blast and emerges from a mountain of duplicated cups. “I was always a better flyer than you Malfoy!”
The sheer arrogance of the statement is so out of character that Hermione briefly wonders if the Horcrux has already messed with Harry’s brain. Nevertheless, he manages to reach their ledge, the cup glinting in his hand. Her heart soars.
“I’m not riding him,” Ron announces as he joins them.
“Kindly leave me out of your fantasies, Weasley.” Draco grimaces and steps away from the group.
Just as the dragon opens its jaws and a sphere of fire begins to gather deep in its throat, Draco jumps and a swirl of black and silver ripples through the air.
Massive wings unfurl before them, and his paws slam onto the ground with enough force to rattle the vault and draw a muffled croak from Ron. Moments later, he swings between them and the approaching flames, shielding them with his fireproof scales.
Hermione was right. Her husband is bigger, fiercer and more attractive.
Unfortunately, the other dragon seems to reach the same conclusion.
The fire stops.
The beast blinks.
Then—lets out what Hermione can only describe as a deeply interested rumble.
“Oh, for Merlin’s sake,” she mutters, trying to smother the ridiculous spark of jealousy curdling in her chest over a dragon.
Scratch that.
A dragonette it would seem.
Dragon-Draco tilts his head when she approaches, her enormous tail wagging so enthusiastically that several priceless artifacts are launched into the ravine behind her. Given the chaotic state of the vault, it is merely another damage to add to the extensive insurance claim awaiting the Lestranges.
If they’re alive to file it.
This oversight is far from being a concern for the dragonette, seeing how she has decided to set aside her duties as guardian of the vault in favor of a much more annoying task, consisting of seducing Hermione’s husband.
With light steps, she struts toward him, accompanied by the entirely fictitious rose petals Hermione is now convinced are swirling around her. Then, then, the beast stretches her forelimbs along the ground while keeping her bum high in the air in a manner deliberately sultry.
Oh. No. She did not just pull a pin-up move…Not on Hermione’s watch.
Wait—was that a flutter of lashes? Did a dragon just bat her eyes at her husband?
“You’ve got to be kidding me!” Hermione shrieks, jumping from the ledge and marching threateningly toward the dragonette. “He’s mine!”
Pointing a finger inches away from the teeth of a dangerous predator possibly ranks rather low among recommended survival strategies, but Hermione can’t be blamed for a perfectly valid knee-jerk reaction to witnessing a dragon shamelessly flirting with her husband.
Something Draco apparently chose to judge when he slams down his paw directly in front of her, preventing what would likely have been an embarrassing and painful death.
He fixes her with a withering stare that seems to say are you fucking serious right now?
Before she can protest, he plucks her up by the collar of her shirt like an asinine dandelion and deposits her on his back.
A low croon rises from the dragonette, and then a series of sounds follows, mostly chuffs, trills and low growls exchanged by the two dragons, and Hermione wishes for a translator to stop her from feeling like a third wheel.
“Does she fancy him, you reckon?” Ron asks as he scrambles behind her, rapidly followed by Harry. She hates that both of them handle the whole mounting-a-dragon business with much more ease than she did on her first time.
Their unintelligible conversation now over, Draco moves to the vault’s exit, and the dragonette yields to him as if he’s God himself. Hermione had no idea that dragons could openly gape in admiration, but here’s one proving that it is entirely within the realm of possibility.
Nor was she aware that they could express sorrow in such a heartbreaking fashion.
Hot on Draco’s heels, the dragonette chokes against her spiked collar when she reaches the end of the chain holding her to the vault’s arch. Realizing they’re about to leave, she lets out a yelp of despair—a sound painfully similar to that of a dog abandoned on the side of the road, watching helplessly its owner driving away and disappearing forever.
She lunges after them anyway, which only causes the chain to snap taut. Her neck jerks back. Another whine escapes her throat, higher this time, definitely pleading. Begging.
Her claws scrape frantically against the wet stone when she tries to follow. Her legs paddle in place and she twists against the leash, straining toward them.
She whimpers, completely distraught at the thought of being left behind.
When Draco soars into the air, she sinks back onto her haunches, defeated and miserable. Her ears droop and her head lowers until her gaze settles on the stone beneath her claws. A ground she has undoubtedly had years to study, counting every crack and crevice in the rock.
Something Hermione also indulged in during her own captivity in Azkaban.
“For Morgana’s sake…” Hermione mutters under her breath, cursing her unfortunate sensitivity to the misery of magical creatures.
Here goes nothing.
With a careful aim, Hermione throws a slicing hex at the chain.
How magnanimous of her. She only hopes the dragonette remembers who freed her and refrains from any future quests to seduce her husband.
She almost feels guilty for devoting so much attention to this, especially since Draco hasn't shown any interest in the supposed competition. He appears completely indifferent to the dragonette as they ascend closer to the surface, even if she practically has her bulbous snout shoved up his rear.
Hermione shouldn’t care. She doesn’t. Yet something loosens in her stomach when he lets out a low grumble of jealousy, reassuring her that she still has his entire attention. Funny how she once cringed at his possessiveness and now finds comfort in it.
She has no idea how he knows, but when Ron grabs her by the waist to stop himself from tumbling backward—still a novice at the dragon riding art, despite his ‘remarkable’ mounting ability—Draco notices immediately. As if he had an internal radar capable of detecting any male’s touch within a mile radius.
An intentional and calculated ripple runs through his spine, and the boys are promptly jostled farther away from her.
“Are you mental!” Ron shouts, clutching a dorsal scale for dear life.
Draco retorts with another ripple which makes them slide even farther away.
“Oh, come on!” Harry contributes.
A satisfied rumble vibrates through Draco’s chest.
Their new positions, however, give them a more secure grip, which proves fortunate considering that seconds later, they burst through the bank’s vaulted ceiling.
The impact is brutal.
Millions of shards of glass rain down around them, rapidly transformed into sand thanks to Harry’s quick thinking.
They soar over Diagon Alley beneath the astonished and terrified gazes of the Saturday crowd.
Right.
They’re probably not accustomed to seeing two enormous dragons during their morning errands.
Hermione manages to extend a Disillusionment Charm over the lot of them just before the magical district gives way to Muggle London’s border.
She has no clue where Draco intends to take them. Civilization gradually turns into broad stretches of wilderness and, after nearly an hour of flying (probably less if she wasn’t dramatic), her thigh muscles begin to ache for relief.
“Draco, I think here is far enough.” Hermione screams into the cold wind.
Minutes later, they begin a slow descent into a small glen nestled between three pointy hills.
Once her feet touch solid ground, she’s pleased to witness Harry and Ron’s dismounting technique, which is as graceful as a mountain troll attempting a waterslide. Evidently, their promising mounting skills had been simply beginner’s luck.
Ron staggers toward the nearest bush and proceeds to part ways with the baked beans he had for breakfast. Or she assumes, not wishing to examine the content of what he’s expelling into the juniper shrub.
Harry proves more resilient and opts to collapse into a starfish position on the grass, still clutching desperately the cup in one hand.
Thank Merlin. She almost forgot he was in charge of it.
However, Hermione is considerably less pleased to discover that the dragonette is still imposing on them, and had no intention of ditching them once freed.
This is becoming a problem.
“Give it back,” Harry protests weakly when Draco snatches the cup away with his teeth, still resolute on lying flat on the ground to make any meaningful effort to stop him. He looks a bit green, and Hermione wonders whether Ron will soon have to share his bush.
Draco stomps farther into the clearing and whacks the Hufflepuff’s cup onto a patch of sand.
She knows what he’s about to do, but her skin prickles with a clammy sweat as nervous goosebumps rise along her legs. Hermione has always considered Fiendfyre a thoroughly insane method of destroying Horcruxes. It’s uncontrollable, dangerous and requires magical skills far beyond what most people possess without accidentally setting a town in fire.
Yet, Draco once told her that he had been practicing and that Fiendfyre comes almost naturally to dragon Animagi.
So she chooses to believe in him.
The dragonette approaches, seemingly drawn by any display of male competency.
Just like Hermione. How convenient (not).
Taking several steps back, Draco raises his long neck high, and draws in a deep breath. A powerful, controlled burst of flames erupts, magnificent in its execution. Hermione briefly regrets ever doubting him, because this might be the most impressive display of magic she has ever seen from him.
Scorching heat licks the blurred outline of the cup and within seconds, the vivid flames swallow it whole.
As unnecessary assistance goes, the dragonette decides to contribute her own expertise by spitting fire at the object as well, even though she’s completely obvious why they’re immolating decorative dishes.
How performative. Truly pathetic. Ughhh—
At once, the fire stops and onto the burnt patch of soil, only dark ashes remain where the cup had been.
A burst of elation surges through Hermione.
He did it. He did it. He did it!
Not only have they found the Horcrux per Kingsley’s supplementary condition for securing Draco’s pardon, but he went above and beyond, and destroyed the wretched thing entirely. The last Horcrux.
Already, Hermione can see with unwavering certainty the war’s end.
Hermione’s steps quicken, the sound of them against the ground matching the beat of her racing heart as she propels herself toward Draco. Just as she’s about to launch herself at him—or any part of his dragon form she can reasonably reach, most likely his calf—he shifts back to his human form in a swirl of dark smoke.
“You’re brilliant!” Hermione beams, flinging her arms around his neck as their bodies collide.
Draco lifts her clean off the ground, spinning them in a tight circle, his own pride obvious. He tugs her closer, his laugh vibrating against her neck
“No need to act so surprised. I told you I’ve been practicing.”
“No need to act so smug,” she retorts with no bite. “Modesty is an art, Malfoy.” She adds against his chest, still smiling. Only—
Her lips meet skin.
Her hands slide lower along his back, down to his ass cheeks, still meeting skin.
Oh.
She takes a step back to look at him properly—his lack of clothing—and immediately catches Ron’s gaze. His panicked gaze.
He has just returned from his bush, wiping the corner of his mouth, still slightly green but now functional. Which is short-lived.
He takes one look at Draco’s naked ass, makes a strangled sound, and retreats straight back into the shrub where he resumes vomiting while firing off a stream of increasingly prudish insults between retches. Something about “indecency,” and “outrageous”, and “my retinas are burnt for the rest of my life.”
Before Harry can suffer the same fate at the apparent horror of seeing another man naked, Hermione quickly retrieves Draco’s robe from her beaded bag, along with trousers and a shirt. Always handy to keep a spare set of clothes when your husband is an Animagi.
Ever so cocky—literally—Draco winks at her when he catches her appreciating the view as he slides into his trousers. The rough fabric now covers his muscular thighs and Hermione sighs at the tragedy. Harry and Ron would probably beg to differ.
Alas, one who apparently enjoys the show just as much as Hermione is the dragonette, still sitting nearby.
“Hurry up!” she hisses, holding his robe at arm’s length to block the view of his bare chest. This acts as a poor imitation of an intimacy curtain, but Hermione is not about to allow a free show.
“You’re adorable when you’re jealous.”
“Why is she still here?”
The fact that she hasn’t denied being jealous of a non-human creature isn’t lost on her. Unfortunately, a blinding possessiveness has thoroughly smothered the last remnants of her dignity.
“You have nothing to worry about, you know.”
He finishes buttoning his shirt and accepts the offered robe, entirely too amused by the situation for Hermione’s liking.
“Maybe not from you,” she replies bitterly. “But she’s been performing an elaborate mating ritual ever since she laid eyes on you.”
Draco rolls his eyes.
“She has not.”
Hermione narrows her eyes at the dragonette, which immediately perks up when Draco glances in her direction.
“Really? She posed. She batted her eyelashes at you. She followed you across half the country for Merlin’s sake, she—”
“Stop,” His hand cups the side of her neck, his thumb brushing her jaw tenderly. “She knows you are my mate. Any attempt would therefore be pointless.”
“Mate?”
The qualification of what they are to each other shouldn’t come as a surprise. There’s the marriage bond, but also the bond forged during his Animagus transformation, linking him to her as the catalyst. It simply never occurred to her that all this could be categorized as a mating bond.
She hates it.
It sounds so…biological…animalistic. So…predestined. Like they never had any say in the matter.
Yet if a bond so powerful, so transcendent, is capable of getting the dragonette to back the hell off—and any other being, human or otherwise—Hermione is willing to tolerate whatever ridiculous label comes attached to it.
“It’s just a word, Granger,” Draco smirks, correctly interpreting her inner crisis. “But it’s the sort of bond creatures pick up on rather easily. Especially creatures of the same kind.”
Hermione glances at the dragonette and begins to suspect she may have escalated a situation that never actually existed. Maybe.
“She was just excited to see another dragon,” Draco says, taking her hand and leading her toward the now-significantly-reduced threat level. “She told me that—”
“Wait. She speaks?”
“When I was in my Animagus form, yes. I could understand her.”
“What did she say?”
Her curiosity is reasonably piqued.
“That she was still a child when Bellatrix captured her years ago. Likely around the same time she had to increase the security on her vault after being entrusted with the Horcrux. She hasn't seen a dragon since then.” His expression softens. “At first, she even believed I was family coming to rescue her.”
Fantastic.
Hermione’s heart sinks like a rock.
Her cold, shrivelled heart of stone.
Now she feels like the most uncaring bitch for assuming the dragonette had her sights on Draco.
A tiny dragon toddling through some distant valley springs to mind. Happy and oblivious. Completely unaware until Bellatrix wrenches her away from her home. Hermione wonders if her parents saw her being taken or whether they spent years wondering how their baby disappeared.
She offers an apologetic look to the dragonette in what she hopes is her best ‘sorry I thought you womanizer/dragon’. The message must get across somehow because the dragonette immediately stomps toward Hermione with enthusiasm.
She barely has time to register the incoming dragon before an enormous snout presses itself against her palm, nudging it insistently.
Tentatively, she scratches the pointy ridges above her nostrils. The sensation is damp, but not unpleasant. The dragonette’s eyes slide half-shut in bliss.
Hermione giggles. She then turns her attention back to Draco, her tail swishing behind her, before giving his face an enthusiastic lick. A playful gesture and not, as Hermione might have interpreted thirty seconds ago, an aggressive courtship display.
“I really thought she was flirting with you.”
Draco raises an eyebrow.
“And now?”
“Now I think she’s trying to get you as her new daddy.” Hermione winks at him. “Do you think her family is still out there? Maybe we should try to—
Harry’s scream rises from somewhere behind the hill.
Hermione bolts toward the agonized sound, though she already knows what it means. She doesn’t need to see Harry doubled over, his palm pressed against his scar, to know that his connection with Voldemort is assaulting his mind again with gruesome visions.
There’s never much she can do during these episodes beyond making sure Harry doesn’t hurt himself during this seemingly excruciating process. Much like Ron is trying to do when she kneels beside him, both friends grabbing Harry's shoulders to stop his face from smashing repeatedly into the ground.
Ron glances up when Draco approaches, only to scowl back at him. The trauma of seeing Draco’s naked arse must remain fresh.
Draco replies by flashing him a dazzling smirk.
Ron goes faintly red.
After several endless minutes, Harry finally stops thrashing and lifts his head. Sweat beads across his forehead, his gaze drifting from a confused state to an ever more confused state.
“What did you see, Harry?” She asks, summoning a cloth from her bag and dabbing his forehead.
“I don’t recognize the place,” he pants. “Voldemort…he’s inside a stone tower.” Harry’s brows scrunch into a perplexed frown. “There was shouting. People screaming from different floors…”
“Azkaban.”
Hermione, Ron and Draco say in unison, instantly recognizing the Tower from Harry’s fragmentary description.
“It’s where Ron and I were held before we escaped.” Hermione clarifies.
“What else, Potter?” Draco presses drily.
Harry scratches his head, trying to piece the vision back together.
“Your mother was there—on the platform.” He rubs at his temple. “Lucius too. And another man…short. White hair. He was hunched over a cauldron.”
Both Hermione and Draco go still.
“That’s Andrej,” Draco snarls. “Fuck. He did it!”
“But we sabotaged it last time, the lab exploded!”
“He must have figured it out.” Draco begins pacing, launching any unwelcomed pebbles off the path with increasingly aggressive kicks. “We haven’t been there in two weeks. He’s not dumb… Andrej questioned every adjustment we made.”
“What the bloody hell are you talking about?” Ron asks.
His confusion is valid. Hermione chose to inform only the upper management (i.e. Kinglsey—CEO, and Lupin—CFO) of the biological warfare threat brewing in Slovenia. She felt it was a need-to-know sort of information.
Harry was stressed enough as it was, already believing the fate of Britain rested on his shoulders. And he only had to juggle a three-step plan, consisting of locating and destroying Horcruxes, defeating the most dangerous Dark wizard in modern history, and saving the country from a pure-blood supremacy.
Perfectly manageable.
Hermione had therefore elected not to mention the tiny detail that Voldemort planned on stripping an entire population of its free will and turning the country—and possibly beyond—into one giant and collective mind. It appeared overly alarming at the time.
But now seems as good a time as any to reveal exactly what type of mental basket case the Dark Lord is.
Especially when he’s preparing to run his first clinical trial using Azkaban’s population. Not only were those prisoners unlucky enough to be caught during the Tube raid, now they’re about to become guinea pigs.
The reason Voldemort needed a full prison is now crystal clear. Had Cho and Hermione not emptied Azkaban the first time, they would have become his first test subjects.
So she explains the situation to Harry and Ron, accompanied by a few additional details grumbled by Draco.
“We need to go to Azkaban," Harry states with the decisive tone of someone used to improvising in life-threatening situations.
“Harry, no…” Hermione says. “We should wait until he’s back at the Manor. It’s known territory and the Malfoys control the wards and—”
“He’s about to turn Azkaban into a giant scientific experiment.” Harry pushes himself to his feet. “What, do you want to read about this in the next edition of A History of Magic? Or perhaps during the next Nuremberg trials—”
“Harry!” Hermione snaps, appalled. “I’m not saying we shouldn’t stop it from happening. I’m saying that you shouldn’t be involved in this. Let us deal with it. You know we can’t risk you because of the prophecy. Once we’ve dealt with that issue, we regroup at the Manor—an ambush, sort of—and then you end him. That’s your goal, not Azkaban.”
“Who said I can’t do both. That we can’t do both.”
She waits for him to elaborate, already cynical with the plan he cooked up in three seconds. Hermione fails to understand how his presence would be relevant in Azkaban, besides unnecessarily risking him.
“If we leave now and stop him before he uses the potion, then we’ll have all of the prisoners on our side.” His voice gains momentum as the plan takes shape. “We send a Patronus to Kingsley so he brings the Order in Azkaban. We just destroyed all the Horcruxes, and Voldemort doesn’t know it yet.” Stars practically shine in his eyes.
“It’s the perfect timing,” he says. “We end this once and for all.”
She huffs an irritated breath, annoyed that his plan doesn’t completely suck.
“Do you have an opinion, Ronald?” Hermione asks, hoping to delay the inevitable.
“Oddly, I don’t.” Ron shrugs. “His plan sounds mental, but so did most of our ideas during Hogwarts.”
Wonderful.
“And you?” She turns to Draco, hoping he takes his wife’s side. It would only be natural.
But he doesn’t see it that way.
“I don’t particularly care as long as we get rid of snake-face in the end. Sooner than later.” Draco dusts off his shoulders. “But regardless, if we want to stop him before he administers the potion, we got to leave now. With or without the Boy who’s intent to save everyone but himself.”
Harry rolls his eyes at the jab before turning back to Hermione with hope.
Traitor. The lot of them.
It’s now Hermione against Harry, while Draco and Ron have contributed absolutely nothing useful toward settling the debate.
“It’s a poorly thought-out plan…”
“Never stopped us before,” Harry replies with a wicked grin.
Hermione loathes that he’s right.
But she loathes herself even more for agreeing to it in the end.
What could possibly go wrong?
Besides everything.