Chapter 10
June 2001
“Here you go, a Weasley Bracelet” Ron announced to the TV room
“Thank you Ron”
The five of them plus Dean were having a break. After the meeting on Thursday night and the errands Harry and Hermione ran at Gringotts yesterday, there was nothing to do but lay low, be prepared and wait for the signal that they were expecting to be in two weeks tops.
She sent the pamphlets yesterday morning before her appointment with Mr. Pucey.
Ron said the pamphlets worked out and that the tension was growing, they decided to close the shop because of that and that resulted in the first Saturday in months that everybody was free, so they took their little group out on the courtyard to bask in the early June sun.
After a couple of Margaritas Hermione started to feel uneasy. Why do you continue with the tequila? It makes you paranoid!
“Am I being stupid taking precautions for the Veil? I feel like it went from a hundred to zero on a couple of weeks”
“Are you doubting yourself or Malfoy?” asked Ginny from her seat.
“Both? I don’t understand why I got so fixated on it, as if I was actually crossing it the day after that meeting, as if it was my plan to do it and not an idea someone passed through me. Also,what if he was taking the mickey out of me ? Making fun of the mudblood as a control tactic and as a bucket list item? His wife planned a coup for three years and took power of the government of WIZARDING BRITAIN to get back at her husband as her bucket list”.
“Don't forget punishing her son’s childhood friend for saving his own life instead of sacrificing for Malfoy” said Ron with his index finger standing as if saying some wise words.
“Mister Pucey told daddy that they were after Pruet not only for Flint, but because Narcissa blames him for not training Draco enough to save his own life”
“Shite” said Dean.
“If that's true, can you think of someone else who she could blame for the death of her son, Hermione? Maybe the girl he pushed out of the way?” Ginny deadpanned.
“Double shite, I didn’t know that Hermione”.
“What I’m saying is that if Mr Malfoy felt that he was going to pay with his life for what happened to his son, you wouldn’t be far behind so, maybe it was a real challenge or a heads up”.
“Hermione, I know what you are feeling, I know what it is to feel this pull guiding you to a destiny that you didn’t ask for, like no matter the road you choose, it will take you there even if it’s not what you’re aiming for”.
“Hermione doesn’t need a compass ” said Luna cryptically in a very I see your future voice.
Ok… note to self. I guess.
You know that Ron is smitten because even after that … statement…He grinned at her and kissed her temple.
awwww… where is Crookshanks? I need a hug.
They moved to the kitchen all buzzed and sticky, Dean proposed to make chips and frozen margaritas. Kreacher was only too happy to disapparate to Morgana knew where, leaving them alone.
“Harry, how was it to die?” Luna asked
It was only because of the forth Margarita and the three years of therapy they had that they were able to broach the subject.
“It was weird, one moment I was tired, dirty and cold on the forest floor, the next I was clean, my body was lighter, nothing ached, I didn’t have my glasses but my eyesight was twenty twenty, King’s Cross….
“WHAT!?” Hermione sat up from her position unsticking her forehead from the table top, the room was spinning.
“What do you mean you didn’t have your glasses?”
“Well I didn’t”.
“But, you died with your glasses on, and you revived with your glasses on. Were you naked?”
“No”, he looked around the room trying to understand what the problem was, nobody had a clue apparently. “I had my jeans, my shoes and my t-shirt, I didn’t have my jacket though, but I wasn’t cold so I didn’t need it and I didn’t have my glasses because…”
“...You didn’t need them, Harry!! What if the Veil decided I don’t need the bracelets?”
“Triple shite”.
Hermione ran heaving to the loo, she needed to change to vodka from now on.
“Hey” called Ginny from the bathroom door after a long moment “I brought you sober-up, pepper-up and hang-over potions”
“After that piece of news I don’t need sober-up” she said from her napping pose sprawled on the floor with her head on the toilet seat.
“Ron and Luna decided to skip chips and are making Lasagna for dinner, Dean and Harry left for a minute, Dean said he had an idea” she told Hermione, helping her stand up and watching her rinse her mouth.
“BLOODY HELL! WHAT IS SHE DOING HERE?”
“Evening Weasley, as always, a pleasure for you to see me”.
“Ron, we told you Pansy was with Dean, remember?”
“Yes, but I don’t remember Dean counting her for dinner”.
“Stop with the dramatics, you have been meeting with Theo and Blaze in that little war council you have”.
“They are snakes but not slea….”
“Please be polite to my girlfriend, she came with me to help Hermione with the glasses situation” interrupted Dean.
“The glasses situation?” Asked Hermione from her spot in the hall watching the other five banter in front of the floo.
“Granger, They told me you want to tattoo four bracelets”
—--------
“They say you have a cursed scar”.
They were at the library, moving the furniture so Pansy and Hermione could get comfortable and have good lighting. They ate while Pansy explained how she was going to melt the metal and use it to “magically ink the bonding bracelets on her skin”. Stop calling it that! She was welding it on her skin. Welding it. Hermione didn’t eat a bite.
She looked around the room and finited the concealment charm she had on her left arm.
“Salazar!, that cow!!” Pansy looked actually unnerved. “I have a theory Granger : this was made with a cursed dagger that belonged to the Black Family, correct?” She nodded “The token bracelets are sometimes used in old families to create a bond, kind of like adoption, marriage or a soulbond, so if I imbue your skin and your magic with the Black bracelet, the bond with the family might heal you. I don’t want to get your hopes up because there is no Black alive to close the bond”.
“So you suggest to, what? Tattoo the melted gold right into the scar?” Hermione shrieked, It was getting harder and harder to keep calm.
“I told you it is not going to be hot, and it would move like ink!!” Pansy tried to regain some patience “I’m thinking of tattooing next to the scar, a parallel line. I’m a professional Granger, and a witch with experience in things like this and healing and numbing spells. It’s your choice if you trust me”.
“Alright” grumbled Hermione
“Wait! You’re not going to tattoo just lines, Hermione. Right ? Shouldn’t this be symbolic? Or funny ? Please, can it be funny?” Ginny begged.
“Maybe the stars for the black family? Constellations?” Ron suggested
Sirius, Draco.
“But the Potters and Weasleys don’t work with constellations” Harry said
She saw the runes stuck to The wall under a concealment charm and she knew it.
—----------------------------------
She didn’t even dignify him with coming herself, instead she sent the bint of Peony Parkinson.
He regretted dying like this. He would rather have died in a place surrounded by beauty, not by the worst specimens of the wizarding world. What is Dolores Umbridge doing here anyway? In the depths of the Ministry, in the coldest and emptiest room that existed.
Lucius Malfoy walked the short way to the arc in the middle of the room.
It took her long enough, for a moment he thought she had changed her mind, found a new and better obsession, maybe worried about other insignificant details.
Ah! but the devil is in the details ! Don’t the Muggles say?
She was waiting for that insignificant detail of the perfect date when she was disposing of him.
He hoped the mudblood chit followed through with The Ritual, he would rejoice in the afterlife seeing her coming back and slapping Narcissa across the face. Who knew? She may come back to this side with my son.
Lucius was at the end of the road.
Breathe in. Breathe out
“Happy Birthday Draco”
On Sunday the 5th of June of 2001 at 07:01 pm, Lucius Abraxas Malfoy ceased to exist.
—-----------------------------------------------------
Monday Morning bright and early Hermione was getting ready to go to the Ministry. She spent the rest of her Saturday and Sunday trying to recover from the upheaval of the Magical Tattoo.
No, she didn’t overreact.
She didn’t scream like a banshee, no, she wasn't regaling them with her best to date rendition of the triwizar’s tournament dragon egg. Her magic didn’t go haywire exploiting the sconces of the house and the street, canceling the silencing spells on Walburga creating a cacophony of shrieks and curses for two long minutes until Pansy stunted her.
Rude.
Anyway it is not that it hurt after they rennervated her, it actually helped a bit to her scar, it looked the same but it burnt less, it's just that now it pulsated with magic, it was all that magic infused in her veins that knocked her out all of Sunday.
She covered her tattoos and scar with a strong concealment charm, courtesy of House of Black and a long sleeved, forest green, silk blouse. The tattoo was beautiful, the runes representing the four families' mottos in elegant vertical lines, two on each side of her scar, ink infused with gold and ancient magic. So much magic that if she sneezed she would spontaneously levitate.
I better take a dampening potion to avoid accidents today.
She put on her jeans and boots and she was ready, practical shoes in case of needing to run for it. She was going this early to be there at seven o’ clock. It would be empty, so no risk of being spotted, she’d have the chance to leave some of her documents. If Sofia was there this early, as she sometimes was, better, she’ll tell her that she was going into hiding and might send her work by proxy.
Get in, don’t be seen, get out Harry insisted.
Why can she go polyjuiced? Ron asked.
Because the only time they listened to my advice on security was by adding water from the thief's downfall to the reception hall.
That one bit me in the arse.
At seven o’ one she was on the lift on her way to the floor of the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, Circe! When she becomes head of the department she’s changing that name.
“Hermione?!” Sofia called from the end of the hall when she spotted her leaving the lift.
“Good Morning Sofia, how….”
“What in Helga’s name are you doing here? I told you to work from home, I told you not to come here”.
She knew she wasn't her boss’s favourite but this was a bit extreme.
“You need to leave, NOW” She took Hermione by the arm and dragged her back to the lifts. “The Prophet just came in, they started the executions yesterday night without witnesses, Lucius Malfoy was the first, and that's only the footnote of the front page”
She started pushing the lift button like rapping in morse code “Helga’s fat cunt”.
woah
“You are in the front page Hermione, Golden Girl tarnished or some shite like that, capture order for abducting, blackmailing and harassing a member of the press” “disfiguration of a classmate, help to escape and concealment of a fugitive, use of an illegal time turner, responsible for the abduction of a Ministry employee, breaking and entering the Ministry, twice, should I keep counting?”
“Well out of context it does look rather bad, but I was a minor for half of it, and the time turner was sanctioned by the Ministry”.
Sofia was making little effort to hide her need to strangle Hermione.“I’m going to open this grid and I want you to run to the floos Hermione” She hissed “I’m going down to the DMLE to run interference, hide and lay low”.
She opened the grid and Hermione walked the fastest she could without being too obvious, but when she turned to see Sofia disappearing from view she saw them, the snatcher guard, the fifteen of them came running at her like nifflers in a Malfoy piñata.
Hermione Granger didn’t make it home.