Mirror Image

“We need to get your books,” Molly said, scanning the list in her hand. She clicked her tongue. “I think we should do robes first, books last.”

Hermione had been keeping her distance from the Weasley’s since her disastrous visit to Grimmauld Place earlier in the summer, but she needed to go with them to Diagon Alley. They’d always gone back to school shopping together, ever since Hermione’s second year at Hogwarts. It would have been too suspicious if Hermione suddenly decided to ignore the annual Weasley trip to Diagon Alley, especially with her parents supposedly still out of the country.

Everything in Hermione wished she could be out with Draco and Theo - even Toma would have been more welcome company than the Weasleys and Harry at this point - but they’d agreed once again to keep their relationship quiet, both platonic and romantic.

Toma had been clear - he wanted Hermione to begin a public, social conversation about the current Statute of Secrecy this year. Hermione’s papers would be better received if she was the same Muggle-born best friend to the savior of the wizarding world than if she was the soon-to-be-Mrs. Malfoy-Nott, trotting about with the unknown Mr. Grozdanov.

It wasn’t a small group of Weasley’s that moved down the street - it was Molly and Arthur both, Ginny, George, Fred, Harry and Ron, and Hermione at the rear, making their way through the crowds of people packed onto the street. Not a small group at all, but the smallest crowd of Weasleys Hermione had ever been a part of. They were finally at an age where the Weasley children were aging out of Hogwarts, and the size of their cohort in Diagon Alley was shrinking with every year. In just two years the twins would take their NEWTs, it would only be Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Ginny returning to school.

Madam Malkin’s Robes for All Occasions came into view, and Hermione realized that maybe, for the first time in her life, she might just be able to get the fancier, softer-made uniform. Now that she knew what she was missing, it made sense to her to pay the extra price to get something nice when she had never quite understood it before. There was no way she could tolerate the scratchy, synthetic sweaters and trousers now that she’d had a summer of fine silk, linen, and natural wool. And she had the funds for nicer things now - the little money left from her parents, and the allowance of money from the Malfoys tucked into her little purse.

The store wasn’t as packed as Hermione expected it to be. There were students milling around the racks of Hogwarts sweaters, and one particularly distressed boy being fitted for something custom, but the entire Wealsey family fit inside the shop with hardly any fuss. The majority of students must have already come, or they were putting off their shopping until the very last days before the train back to Hogwarts.

Harry and the twins bee-lined for the newest quidditch kits, each one of them feeling the lightweight fabric, admiring the new designs, and checking for their sizes. Molly and Arthur were pulled to the fancy dress rack by Ginny, who was admirably pleading her case for a new dress ‘just in case there’s another ball’, leaving Ron and Hermione to their own devices.

“Wanna look at sweaters with me?” Ron asked, just slightly awkwardly. The lingering feeling that Ron was going to say something, do something to make a move on Hermione hadn’t faded in the weeks Hermione had been away. 

Ron hadn’t grown tall enough to warrant new trousers yet, but each year he seemed to put a hole in his sweater elbows and there was only so many times Molly could fix them with darning before the whole thing really just needed to be replaced. Hermione eyes the sweater he was wearing now - sure enough, there were a couple of holes worn into the elbows.

“Sure,” Hermione agreed easily, despite the awkwardness. There was a sign above the sweaters on the rack declaring the year-old ones to be on a 30% off sale, and the expensive, magicked ones above the rack on the shelf on the wall. 

Ron immediately grabbed for one of the old stock sweaters from the last year, pushing the hangers around the rack to look for his size and disregarding the metallic squeal of the hangers on the bar. Hermione winced at the noise and stretched up to the top of the shelf to grab for the higher-end sweaters. They were softer to the touch than her old Hogwarts uniform, and she could feel the tingling sensation of magic woven into the pieces as soon as her fingers brushed the material. She immediately began to check each of the sweaters folded on the top rack, looking for one of the lighter vests with cooling charms woven into the fabric for the spring and summer months, and a merino wool winter sweater for the winter.

She picked out her things quickly, and left Ron debating between two different sweaters that ultimately looked identical. She still needed to get an over-robe and a new skirt, having grown enough that her old one was too short. Though, when Hermione had tried it on before coming shopping, Theo had remarked he liked it better when it was short and-

No. She couldn’t think about that with a room full of Weasley’s around her. She shook her head and grabbed a robe with a weather-repellant charm on it, and two new skirts.

“Just these then?” the saleswitch asked as Hermione approached the counter with her things. The rest of the Weasleys and Harry were still shopping, though Hermione couldn’t for the life of her imagine what was taking them so long. Ginny hadn’t won her fight about a new dress and was instead trying on shoes in the corner. Ron was still at the sweaters rack, and the others were just now stepping away from the Quidditch kits to look at their actual uniforms. 

Hermione nodded to the saleswitch and watched her total it up. She was about to ask for Hermione’s money when the total she had written on the official books disappeared before her very eyes, and a small notation appeared below it.

Paid in full by account.

“Oh. You’re free to go,” the saleswitch said, her eyebrows high on her head and curiosity piqued. She flipped through the book and then smiled. “Ah.”

“I’m sorry,” Hermione said, dropping her voice low lest one of her shopping partners overheard. “But don’t I owe you for the robes?”

The saleswitch shook her head. “Says here you’re paid in full by one of the account holders. Or rather, two account holders.” She spun the book around to show Hermione her ticket, the total of items she had picked out, the notation, and then flipped to the back of the book, where two account names were glowing on the page.

Malfoy account.

Nott account.

Hermione huffed through her nose, momentarily upset that somehow, the boys had done this and no one had warned her and she didn’t like to be surprised while she was out with people who couldn’t know about her relationship. Not to mention, she’d told them she could pay for her own things. She didn’t want to be a monetary burden on them, and the agreement was barely a month old. She didn’t want to be some kind of magical gold-digger, a greedy thing that sucked money from two of the oldest magical families in Europe.

She didn't want to be the pathetic Mudblood who leaned on Pureblood money.

Magic recognizes magic.

Was it actually something they’d done? Or a side-effect of the agreement she’d signed? Theo and Draco had said that one day, her magical signature - the very essence of her being - would be recognized by the Malfoy and Nott family magics, and vice versa. It was early, almost too early, in an agreement for that to make sense, but it was the only thing she could think of to explain this. A month in, and the bond between them was somehow strong enough that Hermione’s shopping was recognized as an expense on the Malfoy and Nott accounts. They hadn’t consummated the relationship, the thought making Hermione’s cheeks heat even as she tried to pull her blood away from her skin, but somehow, Hermione was a part of their family already.

Was it because she’d orphaned herself?

Was it because she lived with them?

Or was it simply because they were well-suited to one another, their bond already stronger than most even in its infancy?

“Oh,” Hermione said dumbly. “Ah- yes. Thank you.”

The saleswitch just winked. “New arrangements are hard to get used to. I was pretty surprised the first time my husband’s family magic recognized me. You’re young, so it must be a pretty strong bond to be recognized so quickly.”

“It is,” Hermione said. “I mean, I am.”

The saleswitch smiled and shooed Hermione away, and so she waited outside for the others, her robes tucked into her bag neatly. It gave her a few minutes to think about what the saleswitch had said. For the bond to be recognized so quickly, it had to be strong. Was that really because Hermione, Draco, and Theo were uniquely and magically well-suited to one another? Or was it the united sense of danger they lived in with Toma over their shoulders? Was it forced proximity of their living arrangements? Or a sort of left-over strength from spending all summer together?

Was this a sign Hermione had made the right choice, or the wrong one?

She was pulled away from her thoughts by the Weasley’s, pouring out from the shop with their own purchases. They had noticed she’d left the shop and it was as good a reason to hurry up with their own shopping as any. 

For as easy as getting robes had been, her books were a different story. She needed a good number of volumes for her classes - she was taking OWL level prep as well as her regular courses, and she had a good number of books for her personal collection, all suggested to her by Toma, Theo, or Draco.

And one particular volume from Narcissa, who urged her to glamour it when she bought it.

Flourish and Blott’s was packed with students and families. It was a smaller store, with thin, narrow aisles that didn’t allow for much movement at all, and from where she was standing, she could see several classmates inside she had no interest in catching up with. She had even less desire to send in her list of books with one of the Weasley’s.

“Alright, then,” Molly said. “Fred and George, you go with your father, and Ginny, come with me. Hermione, boys, wait out here until there’s more breathing room in there.”

The five Weasley’s headed into the store first, leaving Hermione with the boys and waiting patiently for more people to leave the store. Ron immediately slumped against the wall, utterly disinterested in books or making conversation. Hermione turned to talk to Harry, but he looked pretty disinterested in doing much more than staring himself, and Hermione huffed.

It wasn’t until she turned again, this time to look at what books were in the window, that she saw a shock of blond hair and she stopped.

Draco and Lucius were walking down the road together. Behind them, Narcissa was leaned down, explaining the shops to Toma, who was looking appropriately interested as if it were truly his first time down Diagon Alley. And at the rear, bouncing from shop window to shop window, Theo was barely keeping up with the others, looking dashing as ever. All of them were dressed well - Lucius and Narcissa in their dress robes, while Toma and Theo were in Muggle street fashion. Draco was wearing slacks that had to be charmed to stay cool in the dying summer heat, and a button-up. 

Something in Hermione’s stomach swooped. It was worse seeing them out like this, because if she’d seen Draco, dressed in his suit, or Theo, in one of her jumpers he must have stolen, back at the Manor, she wouldn’t have hesitated to kiss them. But here, in the broad daylight of Diagon Alley, she couldn’t do that. She had to watch as impassively as possible, and she had to pretend she wasn’t staring at them.

“Ugh.”

Hermione turned her head away from her boys to where Ron was making a noise of disgust. Harry, too, was staring at the Malfoys with his lip curled up a little bit. The expressions they wore were like ice water down Hermione’s back, all the heat of her attraction dying in the light of Harry and Ron’s clear disapproval.

“Slimy git,” Harry scoffed, watching as Draco’s eyes narrowed on the three of them. “He’s got Nott with him this time.”

“And whoever that is,” Ron added. He was talking about Toma, who looked far too Muggle to be on the street. His earrings were glinting in the sun, and he was wearing a pair of jeans and a polo shirt. How very half-blooded. “Do you see how he’s dressed? He’s got his ears pierced like a girl.”

“It's Muggle fashion,” Hermione said. Might as well start lending credence to their little cover story before she lost all her credibility. And, frankly, she was growing more and more short-tempered with the boys’ prejudices. “Lots of younger Muggle men have their ears pierced.”

“What’s a Muggleborn doing with the Malfoys and Nott?” Harry asked. Ron just shrugged.

“It's weird if you ask me, but you can’t help other people’s bad decisions.”

Hermione wasn't sure if Ron was talking about Toma hanging out with Purebloods, or the pierced ears.

Lucius and Narcissa both looked to Hermione as they passed, but neither said anything. They knew better than to draw too much attention to Hermione out in public, especially now that Theo had asked them all to keep the relationship quiet in fear of Thoros. Toma, too, just passed as if he didn’t know who she was. It wasn’t hurtful - nothing that Lucius or Narcissa ever did to Hermione was hurtful, and Toma had been growing on her in the last few weeks - but it felt wrong. She wanted things to be different, to be here with them, to walk with Draco’s hand in hers and Theo’s arm around her shoulders, to show Toma the wonders of this new world now that he could truly appreciate them.

She understood the manufactured distance between them, but she wished it could have been different.

Draco passed her without much more than a forced, half-hearted sneer just to keep up the ruse, and Theo was notably quieter as he passed. It was painful then - Hermione’s hands twitched at her sides and there was the smell of saltwater in the air, but it was softer and diluted by something green. And spice undercut it all, cinnamon and cardamom that burned through the last remnants of water in the air. Hermione’s eyes were wide - that was certainly the scent of Draco and Theo’s magic - and Draco nearly stumbled, but it was Theo who couldn’t help but look back over his shoulder.

“Look where you’re going, Malfoy!” Harry called. “Wouldn’t want to fall on that beak of a nose and break it, would we?”

“Don’t look at her,” Ron hissed at Theo, curling an arm around Hermione that had her shuddering. Theo’s eyes flickered to Hermione before he righted himself and kept walking, catching up with the Malfoys and Toma.

Hermione let out a breath and shrugged Ron’s arm off her shoulders. A few of the people in the book shop had left, stopping for a half-second to observe the spat between the Slytherins and the Gryffindors before they hurried down the street. “Let’s just get our books.”

~~~

“What was that in Diagon Alley?” Toma asked the moment Hermione stepped through the floo. She just raised an eyebrow. Toma was waiting for her, but not the Malfoys or Theo. Either he’d instructed the boys to keep out of their way, or they didn’t know she was there. He must have told the elves not to tell anyone, then. She couldn’t imagine any other reason why the Malfoys and Theo wouldn’t be there to greet her, especially after having spent the entire day apart for the first time since they’d signed their agreement.

“You’ll have to be more specific,” she said, snarky and sarcastic, and with an eye roll. She’d only just gotten home, still carrying her things for school and wearing her trainers, and he was interrogating her.

“The magic,” Toma bit out, teeth strangling the words. “Your magic is taking on the same scent as Draco and Theodore. I was under the impression your bond was still in its infancy.”

“It is,” Hermione said. “I don’t know why it's changing like that. But I do think it’s something I should speak to them about before I discuss the nature of my relationship with you.”

The room sparked with the scent of something smokey and salted, and Toma pushed himself into Hermione’s face. He was cold again, his face that same blank slate of nothingness and his eyes dark even behind contact lenses. “You’ll answer me,” he commanded, low and harsh and nothing like the joking teenager Hermione had come to know.

“I assure you, I won’t.” Hermione had never taken well to orders and following them, and the last few weeks had made her complacent. Had convinced her that Toma wasn’t Tom, that it really was a new man. Hermione didn’t take orders from anyone, not even her friends. She wasn’t going to stand for Toma’s issuing orders now.

Toma didn’t say anything, no uttered spells or intentional words, only a raised hand and then pain. Pain like a wave of smoke over Hermione’s body when she opened a bag of barbecue charcoals, bending her shoulders forward and pulling her skin from the inside out and boiling her blood and frying her nerves. Pain, like that night she’d brought him back but just a bit softer, a bit weaker, and before the first scream could tear from Hermione’s throat, it suddenly faded. Like a flame under a blanket, it fought against being muffled out, being extinguished. Every persistent lick of pain was there, Hermione felt them, but they weren’t strong. It wasn’t rolling tides of pain, it was pulls of a creek, soft and easily diverted. Hermione willed a smile, but it was red with blood from where she’d bit her cheek hard with the first surprise moment of the curse.

“You can’t punish me when your magic is still feeding from mine,” Hermione hissed. It wasn’t entirely true - Hermione’s magic was still feeding Toma’s, but that hadn’t stopped him from torturing her before. There was something else here, too. The curse was weak to begin with. It wasn’t in Toma’s heart, he didn’t actually want to hurt her. Hermione saw through it easily, the half-hearted and weak desire to cause her legitimate pain was enough to hinder the curse from the moment Toma conjured it.

Toma’s magic might have betrayed him, but his fists wouldn’t. He grabbed Hermione’s shirt in his hands, soft cotton wrinkling in his hold. He slammed her backwards, the brick of the fireplace cutting into her back hard and rough. She gasped, and Toma closed his grip around her throat. 

It was terrifying, this sudden and physical reminder that Toma was never going to be another teenager. He wasn’t her friend. He wasn’t kind. He wasn’t anything other than an angry, manipulative, terrible man, and he did not care for Hermione. He might have been the heir to the Slytherin line, but he was not above using Muggle fighting to settle this. He might have been laughing with her just the other day, he might have been entertaining her and acting like her friend and living the role of a movie teenager, but he was never going to be normal. He was going to hurt her, to break her whenever he saw fit.

She was his servant, no matter what he said about equals.

“You answer to me,” he hissed, low and clear. “You’re alive because I allow it, and you’re only forgiven for your little tricks because it makes my plans attainable. I don’t care that you’ve signed an agreement with Draco and Theodore. I don’t care that you are chasing this idea of love. But if your relationship with the boys ever-” he slammed her again, her head bouncing off the wall and the hand on her neck tightening until black spots danced in her vision. She couldn’t think, she couldn’t act, and she couldn’t seem to make the magic in her blood well up and fight back. It just simmered, scared and quiet, like she was. “-compromises my plans. Puts me in danger. I will kill you and anyone else who stands in my way. I will kill Draco, and I will kill Theo, and I will do it slowly. Painfully. As horribly as I can make it.”

Hermione let out a strangled gasp, something pained and stuck in her throat, and Toma let her go. She dropped to the floor of the Library, her knees bruising against the hardwood floors and head foggy from the hit, the lack of breath, the threat still ringing in her ears.

“I don’t want to see you and the boys anywhere near one another on the Hogwarts grounds unless you’re in a locked room, no chance of being seen. Fulfill your contractual arrangements in private.”

Toma leaned over her then, his face leering and dangerous even with his new hair and new eyes and new piercings. He sneered at her, his face swimming in her vision, and then he dropped something into her lap.

“Wear that at all times. In the shower, at bed. I don’t care if you’re pressed between Draco and Theo in the middle of the night, I don’t care if you’re having sex. Wear it.”

He left without another word, shoes clicking as he left her there. Hermione coughed, her throat raw, and her hands clawed at the thing he’d dropped on her lap. Cold metal brushed her fingers, cool and refreshing, and she pulled it to her face. 

It was a necklace on a leather rope, a metal pendant at the end. She blinked, trying to clear her mind and her vision, and she held the pendant up in front of her eyes. It was a skull, vacant eyes and smooth bone, and from its mouth came a rolling, smooth snake. The sign of the Death Eaters, but smaller. Cold in Hermione’s palm. If Toma’s torment of Hermione just moments ago wasn’t sign enough, his use of the Dark Mark was sign enough. He was still Tom Riddle under all the masks Hermione had put up for him, and whatever the hell he’d meant about leaning into his humanity hadn’t made him less of a violent, unpredictable man.

And yet… and yet, it had done just that. It had made him less of a violent, angry man. He had tolerated snark from Hermione all summer, which is how she got to this place to begin with. Somewhere along the months, he’d become safe, he’d become someone that Hermione could tease, snark, and joke with. He had become her friend, even with his abuse in the last few minutes. He’d been forced to hit her, to hold her down, because he couldn’t curse her.

He cared for her, even if he wouldn’t admit it.

Hermione caught her breath. It took time and concentration to keep the shaking at bay. Even weaker than expected, and only lasting a few seconds, the curse had left her shaken. Her legs nearly gave out under her, and her hands clenched on their own accord. Somewhere during the altercation, she’d dropped her things. It was good for her to focus, to clench her hands around her things and to keep his focus on the books at her feet.

Her legs hardly shook when she finally walked up to her room.

~~~

“Our magic smells like all of us,” Theo said in lieu of hello when he heard Hermione push open his door. She had gotten back from her shopping trip hours ago, but she needed to pack her things for the train tomorrow and he and Draco needed to get their own trunks packed. And the elves hadn’t informed them of her arrival to begin with - something about Toma needing to speak to her, and Theo wouldn't get between the Dark Lord and Hermione.

Draco looked up from where he was sitting on Theo’s bed, a chess board between them, and he nearly froze. “Ah-”

Hermione shifted from one foot to another, then kicked one of them back behind the other, her foot hooking behind her opposite ankle. She was wearing her green nightgown again, lace grazing her thighs and her chest, and her hair pulled away to the side of her neck. She had already taken off her makeup, and her hair was frizzy where she'd pulled her fingers through it.

At Draco’s cut off sound, Theo looked up and got stuck, staring at Hermione. “You look like a goddess,” he said suddenly and all in one breath.

Hermione smiled and rolled her eyes and scoffed at the compliment. “I just… wanted to talk to you both before bed.”

“About?”

“You said it already, Tee,” Hermione said, borrowing Theo’s nickname from Draco. “Our magic today. It smelled like all of us.”

Draco gave her a lovesick look, his eyes glued to her face but his blush told her that he’d gotten enough of an eyeful of the rest of her. “Yes, it did. I guess the bond is stronger than we expected.”

“What’s expected?” Hermione asked honestly. All day, people had been talking about the strength of the bond, what was normal, how they must be unusual for their arrangement. She didn’t know what usual and unusual was supposed to be like to begin with, let alone if they were either of those things.

“Magic starts to smell like partners when it’s a particularly strong bond,” Theo said. “Usually, for most couples, it’s something that happens after the engagement rituals. For some, it can happen as late as the night of marriage rituals. But when it happens earlier than that, it’s generally because the bond is particularly strong.”

“One might call it being magical soulmates,” Draco said with an unusual wiggle of his eyebrows and a playful smile. “But I just call it having compatible magic.”

“Nothing to worry about then?” Hermione asked, and both Theo and Draco gave her a reassuring smile.

“Never anything to worry about,” Theo said, getting off the bed. He walked across the room, pulling Hermione into his chest and pressing a kiss to her lips, hard but chaste. Draco followed him after a moment, pressing his own kiss to Hermione’s lips before he pulled Theo in for a kiss as well.

“We’ll have to be careful about our magic's scent at Hogwarts,” Draco whispered. “We can’t let anyone know how far our bond has progressed already. We can't risk it getting back to Thoros or Toma.”

Theo gave a snort. “I bet Toma would have an earful for us if this was how we were found out,” he laughed, and Draco joined him. "All his plans, out the window!" Hermione forced a laugh through her own lips.

They had no idea.